Danilo Plessow (MCDE)
Danilo Plessow is regarded as an influential DJ and producer, renowned for his excellent knowledge in music as well as his technical wizardry behind the turntables.
Danilo’s career in music started whilst he was incredibly young – he started playing drums at the tender age of 6 and discovered his love for jazz in the school big band. By the time he turned 11, he was already working on his own original productions using a computer and samples. Jazz, soul, funk, hip hop and house influences culminated in a first release, under his Broken Beat alias Inverse Cinematics, together with Joachim Tobias, in the year 2000 on Stuttgartʼs Pulver Records; multiple EPs, an album (ʻPassinʼ Throughʼ) and many remixes and compilation appearances followed.
At the same time, he already started building his record collection and playing international gigs as a DJ, at just 16 years of age. After several other projects on labels like Ubiquity and Compost, Danilo released the “Raw Cuts” Series as MCDE on his own label MCDE recordings, a highly influential series of records that is considered to be a modern classic amongst House aficionados.
The label also released tracks and remixes from Henry Wu & Earl Jeffers, Harvey Sutherland, Marcellus Pittman, Mike Huckaby and Laurent Garnier. In the following years, he reimagined tracks from great artists like Tony Allen, Billy Cobham, Caribou or DJ Sprinkles, building a reputation as an unpredictable remixer.
In his DJ sets the record-collecting nerd, the fine technician and the sensitive performer merge into one personality. With the curatorial fearlessness of a postmodern selector, true conviction, understanding and feeling Danilo Plessow is able to create something very rare and precious: spirit. In this role, he has released several compilations such as “DJ Kicks” on K7! And “Selectors” on Dekmantel, as well as playing clubs and festivals around the world, from underground favourites like Horst in Belgium to big mainstays such as the Montreux Jazz Festival and Coachella. In 2017, he held a 3 month residency at London’s XOYO club, inviting a broad range of artists like Daniele Baldelli, Kelli Hand, Kyle Hall and Dego of 4Hero.
In between his relentless touring schedule, Danilo still finds time for new adventures. On his monthly radio show “State of Rhythm“ on Gilles Peterson’s Worldwide FM station, he welcomes key figures of music such as Azymuth or Phil Ranelin, shines a light on new talents like Lauren Hansom or Marie Montexier, and features guest mixes by DJs he enjoys listening to.
For the future, he plans many new artistic projects and, above all, to concentrate on his activities as a producer and sound engineer. His new productions “Nightfall” (featuring saxophonist Francesco Geminiani and Pianist Peter Schlamb) and “Decay/Sustain/Release” (under a new alias, Basic-Variation) provide us with a little sneak-peak into the future of his by now more than 20 years active career.