Berlin-based Barcelona native Rebeca Lozano Mendez, better known as Reka, has blown up on the world stage since beginning out as a DJ more than 10 years ago. Since then, she’s become a long time resident at Tresor, embarked on a career as a producer ( her debut EP, Diving the Innermost came out on Phase Fatal’s BITE in 2018) and made the jump to Berghain. But there’s more to Mendez than being a connoisseur of all genres dark and hard-edged. In addition to being a DJ, Mendez is an entrepreneur and a science enthusiast. KEYI sat down to talk with her about her world before techno and the ways in which research and precision define her creative work and her extra musical life.
居住在柏林的巴塞罗那本地人 Rebeca Lozano Mendez，更广为人知的名字是 Reka，自从 10 多年前开始担任 DJ 以来，她就在世界舞台上崭露头角。从那以后，她成为 Tresor 的长期居民，开始了制作人的职业生涯（她的首张 EP，Diving the Innermost 于 2018 年出现在 Phase Fatal 的 BITE 上）并跳槽到 Berghain。但对于门德斯来说，不仅仅是成为所有黑暗和尖锐的流派的鉴赏家。除了是 DJ 之外，Mendez 还是一位企业家和科学爱好者。 KEYI 坐下来与她讨论了她在 techno 之前的世界，以及研究和精确定义她的创造性工作和她额外的音乐生活的方式。
You’re answering these questions en route to Spain. What are you doing there, and when was the last time you traveled to your hometown?
Yes, I am. The answer is a bit awkward. My father died months ago and I am the closest relative to take care of the paperwork following his death. I was not close to him at all, I hadn´t seen him in more than 15 years, so, it´s not a sad trip, I’m planning on enjoying the good weather, food and seeing old friends in my free time.
你在前往西班牙的途中回答了这些问题。你在那里做什么，你最后一次到你的家乡旅行是什么时候？
是的，我是。这个答案有点尴尬。我父亲几个月前去世了，我是最亲近的亲戚，负责处理他去世后的文书工作。我和他一点都不亲近，我已经超过15年没有见过他了，所以，这不是一次悲伤的旅行，我打算在空闲时间享受好天气、美食和见老朋友。
What has the last year without frequent travel been like for you? What have you been focusing your energy on?
I actually enjoyed not having to travel that often and being home often on weekends. Seeing my close friends frequently was a delight. Before Corona it was very difficult to coordinate, we were all on the road often. I´ve been doing a bit of many things. I have read, worked out, slept, and taken time to introspect more than it was possible when things were normal and I have also enjoyed that. I also took time to study new things. I´ve done some streamings or podcasts, and a rmx, but music has not been the absolute priority. It´s been a long time that I felt I needed other types of inputs different from music.
过去一年没有频繁旅行的日子对你来说是怎样的？你的精力都集中在什么地方？
我实际上很享受不用经常旅行，周末经常在家的感觉。经常见到我的亲密朋友是一件令人高兴的事。在疫情之前，协调是非常困难的，我们都经常在路上。 我一直在做很多事情。我读书、健身、睡觉，花时间自省，比正常情况下更有可能，我也很喜欢这样。我还花时间学习新的东西。我做了一些流媒体或播客，还有一个rmx，但音乐并不是绝对的重点。很长时间以来，我觉得我需要不同于音乐的其他类型的输入。
I know you’ve invested a lot of time into entrepreneurship. What is it about this field that excites you? Are you at liberty to discuss any projects you’re working on launching?
I love problem-solving and innovation. I am wired to optimize. Wherever I go I always see what could be improved. It´s a blessing and a curse, of course, because most of the time there is nothing you can do about it. My project is about optimizing the way musicians tour, both to make it more comfortable and healthier for us, and also less damaging to the environment. The way the software works will also streamline the entire booking process, so bookers and agents will also see benefits from using it, saving an enormous amount of time for them. From entrepreneurship, I’m mainly interested in coming with new ideas to solve problems, so just the creative part. I’m very bad at the business side and that´s why I’m currently stuck looking for a partner with this kind of background as well as knowledge about the music/booking business.
我知道你在创业方面投入了大量的时间。这个领域有什么让你兴奋的地方？你是否可以讨论你正在努力推出的任何项目？
我喜欢解决问题和创新。我是一个善于优化的人。无论我走到哪里，我总是看到可以改进的地方。当然，这既是一种祝福，也是一种诅咒，因为大多数时候，你对此无能为力。 我的项目是关于优化音乐家的巡演方式，既要让我们更舒适、更健康，也要减少对环境的破坏。该软件的工作方式也将简化整个预订过程，因此预订者和经纪人也将看到使用该软件的好处，为他们节省大量的时间。 在创业方面，我主要对提出新的想法来解决问题感兴趣，所以只是创意的部分。我对商业方面很不擅长，这就是为什么我目前一直在寻找一个有这种背景以及对音乐/预订业务有了解的伙伴。
Have any of these initiatives centred on alternatives to social media? You’ve been vocal about your disdain for platforms like Instagram and Facebook and the ways in which they manipulate visibility and popularity.
Yes, indeed. I have been flirting with ideas for alternative platforms to the ones existing now, but I decided to focus on the booking software first or I will never get anything done.
这些举措中是否有以社交媒体的替代品为中心的？你一直对Instagram和Facebook等平台以及它们操纵知名度和人气的方式表示不屑。
是的，确实如此。我一直在调侃现在已有的替代平台的想法，但我决定先专注于预订软件，否则我将永远无法完成任何工作。
What changes would you like to see happen in online culture and within the underground community as spaces reopen more generally? What do you think it would take for these paradigm shifts to take place?
I would like to see a bit more acknowledgment of the music itself. I see too much emphasis on the social media metrics. On one hand, we all know that anyone can get a big following, directly buying followers and likes or paying for services that help you do so, you can even pay for youtube views!. On the other hand, some artists are really good online entertainers, they enjoy being exposed and they are ingenious and funny. I think that´s great for social media but I think it´s totally unacceptable -and this is what´s happening- that your number of gigs, fee, and how many pages you get in a magazine can depend on how big is your audience on IG. It´s mind-blowing and frustrating.
I’m also tired of so much narcissism and vane superficiality online. I consider myself an aesthete, so I need to feed my soul with images, maybe even at the same level as music, but I feel overflooded with so much nonsense nowadays.
随着空间的重新开放，你希望看到网络文化和地下社区发生什么变化？你认为要发生这些范式的转变，需要什么？
我希望看到对音乐本身有更多的认可。我看到太多强调社交媒体的指标。一方面，我们都知道，任何人都可以获得大量的追随者，直接购买追随者和喜欢，或为帮助你这样做的服务付费，你甚至可以为YouTube的浏览量付费 另一方面，有些艺术家真的是很好的在线娱乐者，他们喜欢被曝光，他们很有创意，很有趣。我认为这对社交媒体来说是很好的，但我认为这是完全不可接受的–这就是正在发生的–你的演出数量、费用以及你在杂志上得到多少页取决于你在IG上的观众有多大。这是令人震惊和沮丧的。
我也厌倦了网上那么多的自恋和肤浅的风气。我认为自己是一个审美者，所以我需要用图像来喂养我的灵魂，也许甚至和音乐一样，但我觉得现在有太多的废话充斥着。
Before you got involved with music, you were involved in genetics research. Can you talk a little bit about what you were studying and how you’ve maintained and cultivated your non-musical interests?
I studied Biology and specialized in Genetics. My plans were to become a medical researcher and finding the cure for cancer via genetic engineering. But after some rough years due to overworking and family issues, I decided to take a sabbatical year to indulge in my artistic cravings which were waiting to see the light from a very early age. I then started studying graphic design, photography, acting and learned how to dj, this, just for fun. Unfortunately, the music world totally captured me and I never made it to the workplace as a geneticist. I kept connecting with science though when I started learning production, sound design, etc… I would go really deep to understand how everything works from the bottom up, the pure physics and that´s one of the reasons for being so slow to release music, I was just studying instead of doing. Now I am more into alternative/preventive medicine, brain function, advanced nutrition, and so on. Again, trying to optimize 😉
在你接触音乐之前，你参与了遗传学研究。你能谈一谈你在研究什么，以及你如何保持和培养你的非音乐兴趣吗？
我学习生物学，专攻遗传学。我的计划是成为一名医学研究员，通过基因工程找到治愈癌症的方法。但是，由于过度工作和家庭问题，在经历了一些艰难的岁月后，我决定休养一年，以沉浸在我的艺术渴望中，这些渴望在很小的时候就已经在等待着见光。然后我开始学习平面设计、摄影和表演，并学会了DJ，这只是为了好玩。不幸的是，音乐世界完全俘获了我，我从未在工作岗位上成为一名遗传学家。不过，当我开始学习制作、声音设计等时，我一直与科学联系在一起…。我会非常深入地去了解一切是如何从底层开始运作的，纯物理学，这也是我发布音乐如此缓慢的原因之一，我只是在学习而不是在做。现在我更多的是研究替代/预防医学、大脑功能、高级营养等等。再次，试图优化;)
When and why did you decide to move into a music career?
It just happened to me, It was never in my plans to work in the music field despite devouring music since I was a kid, I really thought I belonged to the academic world, I was quite good at it. The thing is that so many doors opened for me even before I knocked. Everything came extremely easy. It was like that was my destiny. In about a year of buying my turntables, I was already running a party in Madrid and Dj Hell invited me to join Gigolo Roster playing as a Dj duo with my best friend. We were getting paid to play music and traveling for free, hanging out with some of the coolest artists at the moment, getting free clothes from fashion brands… it was amazing!! How could I walk away from that!You’ve achieved a lot as a DJ, becoming a long-time resident and curator at Tresor before producing standout releases on some of the underground’s best labels and then becoming a regular at Berghain. How did you accomplish so much so quickly?
你是什么时候以及为什么决定转入音乐事业的？
这只是发生在我身上，尽管我从小就喜欢音乐，但在我的计划中从来没有在音乐领域工作过，我真的认为我属于学术界，我在这方面相当出色。问题是，在我敲门之前，就有那么多门为我打开了。一切都来得非常容易。这好像是我的命运。在购买转盘的大约一年时间里，我已经在马德里开了一个派对，DjHell邀请我加入Gigolo Roster，和我最好的朋友以Dj二人组的形式演出。我们拿着钱玩音乐，免费旅行，和一些目前最酷的艺术家一起玩，从时尚品牌那里得到免费的衣服.这太不可思议了！！！我怎么能离开呢？我怎么能放弃呢？
You’ve achieved a lot as a DJ, becoming a long-time resident and curator at Tresor before producing standout releases on some of the underground’s best labels and then becoming a regular at Berghain. How did you accomplish so much so quickly?
Omg, you make it sound much better than it actually does in my head. I feel I didn’t accomplish enough for all the years I´ve been working on music. Really, not at all. I feel I could have done much more, but I am really really bad at selling myself or networking, I have a tendency to walk away from “important” people as I have always the feeling they might think I’m talking to them out of interest. I struggle to ask for help. I want to do everything myself and I also recently realized I´ve been self-sabotaging consistently. I clearly need to work on all this, but thankful that you see it that way.
作为一个DJ，你已经取得了很多成就，在成为Tresor的长期驻场和策展人之前，你在一些地下最好的厂牌上制作了突出的版本，然后成为Berghain的常客。你是如何在这么短的时间内取得这么多成就的？
你说得很好，比我想象中的要好得多。我觉得我这么多年来在音乐方面的成就还不够大。真的，一点也不。我觉得我本可以做得更多，但我真的非常不擅长推销自己或建立关系网，我有一种倾向，就是离开 “重要 “的人，因为我总觉得他们可能认为我是出于兴趣而与他们交谈。我很难向别人寻求帮助。我想自己做所有的事情，最近我还意识到我一直在自我破坏。我显然需要在这些方面做出努力，但感谢你能这样看待它。
Are there any moments that stand out to you as times when you realized you had reached an important milestone or objective?
Yes, of course. I will just talk about my milestones as Reka, not to mix things. The first time I used Reka was to apply to the RedBullMusicAcademy, and luckily enough, I was selected as a participant in the Toronto edition 2007. It was a wonderful experience. Then becoming a resident at Tresor was a big moment in my solo career. My first E.P the next. Playing at Berghain several times and then playing at Berghain on a Sunday evening I would count as the last two milestones.
是否有任何时刻让你印象深刻，因为你意识到你已经达到了一个重要的里程碑或目标？
是的，当然了。我只谈我作为雷卡的里程碑，不要把事情搞混。 我第一次使用Reka是为了申请RedBullMusicAcademy，幸运的是，我被选为2007年多伦多版的参赛者。那是一次美妙的经历。然后，成为Tresor的常驻人员是我个人职业生涯中的一个重要时刻。接下来是我的第一张E.P。在Berghain演出几次，然后在周日晚上在Berghain演出，我认为这是最后两个里程碑。
You put your first EP out to critical acclaim on BITE in 2018. When did you first decide to start working on your own music, and how have you enjoyed the process of making music vs Djing?
In the beginning, I did not want to produce. I just loved finding new music, new labels and artists no one knew about, old school gems, and just sharing them with people. I didn´t have the need of making music, but everyone was pushing me to it, like “you need to release music or you won´t have gigs, it´s the way it is now”. So I started learning and I liked it somehow cause I love music and I was, especially at that time, a computer freak, so playing and experimenting with all those plug-ins was actually quite fun. The problem at the beginning was that most of the music I made was very undefined in style and not suitable for any label I could think of at that time. My sound is definitely more fitting to current times, and as some friends from labels gave me deadlines, I made a couple of records. I need deadlines, otherwise, I can´t finish anything, I get sidetracked with infinite other interests.
你在2018年在BITE推出了你的第一张EP，受到了好评。你是什么时候决定开始创作自己的音乐的，你是如何享受制作音乐与Djing的过程的？
一开始，我并不想做制作。我只是喜欢寻找新的音乐，新的标签和没有人知道的艺术家，老式的珍品，并与人们分享它们。我没有制作音乐的需要，但每个人都在催促我，就像 “你需要发布音乐，否则你就没有演出机会，现在就是这样”。所以我开始学习，我喜欢它，因为我喜欢音乐，特别是在那个时候，我是个电脑狂人，所以玩和实验所有这些插件实际上是很有趣的。一开始的问题是，我做的大部分音乐在风格上很不明确，不适合我当时能想到的任何标签。我的声音肯定更适合当前的时代，由于一些标签的朋友给了我最后期限，我做了几张唱片。我需要最后期限，否则，我不能完成任何事情，我被无限的其他兴趣牵着走。
What is your production process like?
I am so inconsistent that I don´t even have a process yet. It depends on what I’m working on. In my first e.p for BITE, I did a lot of sound design work, even for drums which I regret now because it was so much more time-consuming, and samples sound much more powerful. After that, I started using more samples.
你们的生产过程是怎样的？
我是如此的不稳定，以至于我甚至没有一个过程。这取决于我在做什么。在我为BITE制作的第一张e.p中，我做了大量的声音设计工作，甚至是鼓的设计，我现在很后悔，因为这太耗费时间了，而且采样听起来更有力量。在那之后，我开始使用更多的样本。
What are your plans and goals for the future, music- and otherwise?
I´d like to release an album, remix a bunch of artists I love, and work on some sort of audiovisual project. On the non-music side I wanna launch the booking software asap, exit, get some cash and maybe start working on the alternative to social media. Eventually, I´d like to go back to studying. I’m infatuated with a new discipline called biomimicry which copies the way nature has designed structures, processes, and systems to design innovative solutions to global (or local) problems.
你对未来有什么计划和目标，无论是音乐还是其他方面？
我想发行一张专辑，为一些我喜欢的艺术家混音，并从事一些视听项目。在非音乐方面，我想尽快推出预订软件，退出，获得一些现金，也许开始在社会媒体的替代工作。 最终，我想回去学习。我迷恋上了一门新的学科，叫做生物仿生学，它复制自然界设计结构、过程和系统的方式，为全球（或当地）问题设计创新的解决方案。
Are you working on anything now?
Learning how to build a software company when I have no background in this field is quite time-consuming so I´m struggling to find time and head-space to finish my album and other production projects. But I’m trying to be present delivering mixes, in the form of streaming or podcast at least once a month.
你现在在做什么工作吗？
当我没有这个领域的背景时，学习如何建立一个软件公司是相当耗时的，所以我正在努力寻找时间和头脑空间来完成我的专辑和其他制作项目。但我正努力以流媒体或播客的形式，每月至少提供一次混音作品。
Is there anything else you want to discuss that I haven’t asked you?
No, and thank you for the thoughtful questions!
你还有什么想讨论而我没有问你的吗？
不，谢谢你的深思熟虑的问题!
Interview 作者: Chloe Lula
Fashion: MISBHV , MISASSEBLED , Chronomatic , TTSWTRS
Translation 翻译: Emi
Photos照片: Keyi Studio www.keyi.eu
