We had the honour of meeting with Sunnery James and Ryan Marciano before their party Sexy by Nature in Ushuaïa Ibiza, and they was delighted to answer a few questions to Muchoticket.
- You’re just a few minutes away from your Sexy by Nature set at Ushuaïa Ibiza. What can fans expect from your 2 hour set?
SJ: A lot of house tracks. Sexy by Nature is a concept where we try to give people what we’ve got inspired by, so all things from back in the days, mashes, progressive stuff and try to mix it together and give the people an experience like ‘Wow, this was something a little bit different’. That’s what we’ll try to do and hopefully it works.
- How would you describe Ibiza to anyone who hasn’t been before? What’s your favourite thing about DJing here?
SJ: Ibiza has its own culture, and even though the whole international vibe of dance music exploded in a different way, like more mainstream, Ibiza kept it really sophisticated and that’s what I like, the people, the sites, the culture is very strong, and even though there are some mainstream parties, the majority is still sophisticated dance music and all about the vibe.
RM: He is talking about the dance scene, and it’s the entire island, it’s beautiful. Beautiful beaches, amazing food and this is actually one of the places we actually stay, we don’t only come to work, but we stay here and enjoy.
- So you’ve had the chance to enjoy the island. Which are your favourite spots?
SJ: It’s our 12th year here on the island and we have a lot of favourite spots. Es Vedrà is one of the craziest things I’ve seen in my life.
RM: We’ve always liked to go to Formentera, I don’t know If you count that as Ibiza. *Laughs*
SJ: Great fish restaurant in Sa Caleta. Ibiza is just fun to chill, we stay here 5-6 weeks with family and it’s always like coming home.
- Which artists or DJs have you enjoyed the best time working with, and why? Is there anyone you guys specially look up to?
SJ: We’ve got inspired by a lot of DJs, and we’ve worked with Steve Angello and he inspired us a lot, music wise, but also helped us with producing tips. And guys like Dennis Ferrer, Masters at Work, Kerri Chandler.
RM: Erick Morillo. We used to go to his parties all the time. When we still didn’t play here, we were like ‘Oh, maybe one day we’ll be up there’ when we used to go to his Subliminal Sessions.
SJ: We get a lot of inspiration from DJs, how they bring the vibe, and we try to do the same thing.
- What is the significance of Ibiza in your carreer?
SJ: Wow, that’s a good one. I think how Ibiza evolves during the years is quite similar to what we do. We always try to stay close to ourselves, but without ignoring what’s hot at the moment. We do our own DJ sets, but if what’s hot is more mainstream we don’t say we’re not playing that, we just make an own version and play it.
- Ushuaïa is currently considered the #1 club in Ibiza and is home of some of the best DJs in the world. What do you think makes it so special?
SJ: The time, it’s open air. You can have a great time, you can drink, get drunk, and at 12 o’clock you go home. *Laughs*
RM: When you go to a festival you think ‘This is amazing, big, huge’, but if you imagine let’s put a pool in the middle of the festival and make a party even better, and that’s what it is.
SJ: I think it’s one of the best clubs in the world right now. You look at the DJ booth everything is perfect, the sound, the people, all in the middle of Ibiza, it’s just crazy.
- Which are some examples of what inspires your music? Is there any particular artist or idea that you guys base your music on?
SJ: We get inspired by those DJs we mentioned, but never copied, always tried to bring our own vibe. We are from the Caribbean, we always have the tribal thing going on and that’s what we try to do and experience with, put all those elements together and create a new sound, and even in the progressive tracks we do, you feel the tribal drive in it, and that’s what we try to achieve.
RM: We can’t jump and ‘put your hands up’ all the time. *Laughs*. Body has to work as well. *Laughs*
- If you had the opportunity to collaborate with any artist of any genre, who would it be?
SJ: Kanye West! He is crazy as f***, but I like it! He is really creative, and I think if you can have him on a house track, which would probably never happen, something crazy would happen. He has so many creative ideas, in his music, so if you can put those two things together it would be crazy!
RM: And you really see in his albums as well, every album is an album, it’s not always the same Kanye West, it’s always different.
- Which would be your favourite festival and why?
SJ: Wow! This year we did a new festival in Romania, Untold Festival, and it was crazy, crazy atmosphere, but I must say Tomorrowland, Belgium, it’s a different vibe, it has this thing around it that’s really hot, everybody will come to see you and party from the first second they come in, so whatever you play the crowd will go totally nuts, and that’s the best thing for a DJ, to play whatever you want and get all the energy back.
- If you’re the organizers of a festival and could book any artists of all times, which 3 would you book?
SJ: Any artist? No matter genre? That’s crazy! Michael Jackson!
RM: James Brown, like back to back with a DJ.
SJ: Gipsy Kings!
RM: It’s all live music. *Laughs*
- What’s the weirdest gift/proposal you have ever received as a DJ?
SJ: In the beginning of our career, it was the craziest thing I ever had. We played in a club in Holland and all of the sudden a girl put something in my hand, I opened and it was her panties. I was like ‘Eeeh!’ don’t know if it was a gift, but it happened to me.
RM: The craziest thing someone gave us, was actually a feeling. It was a deaf person in front of the stage and he was there all the time, he had like goose bumps, he was trying to tell us ‘I love your music’, he could feel the rythms, it was very emotional.
- What are your plans after the summer season and in 2016. Do you have any big shows coming up and any new releases?
SJ: New releases coming out next week, collaborating with Sander van Doorn, called ABC for Doorn Records. We have a lot of releases planned that we can’t talk about yet, and then our radio show we do weekly, and we’re also going to travel a lot with Se