Q+A: 5 Minutes with MARNIK
Italian phenomena MARNIK continue to rise within the music industry, with their carefully crafted productions and collaborations with international superstars. Their collaboration with Steve Aoki on a remix of Netflix show Money Heist’s popular anthem Bella Ciao was followed up with Hollywood, a multi-platinum selling record across Europe. Their latest single, Boyz In Paris with Naeleck and VINAI, sees the duo take on a hip-hop megahit by Jay-Z and Kanye West, introducing a crossover appeal to their catalogue of successful eurodance tracks. We caught up with them to see what’s next in store for MARNIK, and check out their exclusive mix for PLAYY. here.
Set the tone for us. Where did your journey as MARNIK begin?
We began in 2014, where we met in a studio through friends and colleagues. We started collaborating and our very first track ‘Momentum’ had some kind of buzz, supported and played in many big festivals by multiple DJ’s. After that first happy attempt everything developed naturally and brought MARNIK to life. It’s almost 10 years now, our music has had different phases and it keeps evolving with us.
How would you describe the synergy between the two of you?
As we said everything happened easily and naturally, we went with the flow and things
settled for us through time. At the beginning, we both were producing and touring but after a while, we felt more effective splitting roles to give our audience our best. From 2018 Alex has been touring bringing our music all over the world while Lele has been focused on producing and making MARNIK’s music.
How would you describe your current sound, and who would you say have been
the biggest influences on this direction?
Our music changes and evolves with us through life so we like to mix our backgrounds with everything new that inspires us. We listen to as much music as possible to feed our
inspiration and to mix different sounds with our roots. It’s something that is perpetually
changing but if we have to name a few influences we’d say trance, eurodance and techno right now.
You recently remixed R3HAB and INNA &Sash!’s Rock My Body alongside VINAI. How did you approach reworking the track?
We’ve always loved Sash!’s original song, so we proposed R3HAB a remix as soon as we heard it. “Boyz in Paris”, our single featured Vinai and Naeleck, had been just released at that time so we immediately thought of teaming up with Vinai for this remix. We reworked it giving our attitudes and our sounds as MARNIK and Vinai to an original great track that never gets old.
How do you think remixes are valuable for emerging artists to make their mark?
Remix starts from that something you can find in a song you vibe with. You just leave your mark on a masterpiece, making it communicate with your taste and your sound. Remixes can be a nice way for emerging artists to make people taste their sound and their approach to something that is already loved. Take something amazing and give it a twist that has your name on it.
Boyz In Paris crosses boundaries of hip hop and electronic, is this something
you’re trying to push forward in your music?
We love vibing, bringing together the unexpected and we feel very represented by “Boyz in Paris’s” underground sound so yes, we could wanna get deeper… you never know what’s next.
Have you been touring a lot this summer? What’s been the most exciting show so
far?
Yes, we’ve been touring a lot across Asia and Europe and enjoyed every second with the dancing crowd. The energy has been amazing through every show so it’s a hard question but if we have to pick one we’d say Ministry of Sound on 8th September. It’s been super exciting to play in such an iconic club for the first time and to be welcomed with such energy by the audience.
What’s next? Any exciting projects that you’re working on?
We’re cooking new stuff! Right now we’re working on some more club-oriented tracks with techno vibes and of course lots of MARNIK proper sound. No spoilers, can’t wait to share what’s next.
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