Looking at the official Soulwax youtube channel, it struck me that the most popular video isn’t the video for ‘NY Excuse‘, the Nite Version of ‘Krack’ or the ‘Part Of The Weekend Never Dies‘ documentary.
No, with over 2 million views it is the Soulwax remix of ‘Synrise’ by Belgian band Goose.
The band from Kortijk and Soulwax go way back. They entered the Belgian music scene in 2002 when they won Humo’s Rock Rally, the most prestigious rock contest in the country. Cleary inspired by Soulwax, Goose infuse rock songs with synths. No wonder Dave and Steph asked Goose guitarist Dave Martijn to join Soulwax for their ‘Any Minute Now‘ tour.
Dave left the band when Soulwax evolved into their ‘Nite Versions‘ live setup.
In 2010 Goose released their second album ‘Synrise’, and the instrumental title track quickly became a fan favorite. Fifteen years later, it’s considered a classic in Belgium. If you wonder who’s doing the ‘woooo ho ho hoooo’ on the track: it’s electroclash rebel Peaches.
For the album cover of the album Goose contacted the now-deceased cover designer Storm Thorgerson. The Brit was responsible for the most legendary artwork for Pink Floyd, Peter Gabriel, Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, Muse, and The Mars Volta.
Here’s some nice background info:
“I know! I know! We’ll do something with a duck!”
“He found that hilarious,” recalls frontman Mickael Karkousse. “A duck on a GOOSE record!” Thorgerson had a dry British sense of humor.
After a dinner in London, the band was able to persuade him to come up with something else, but there was another obstacle: money. “With our second album Synrise, we wanted to go all out, so we contacted Storm, who was known for his mythical covers—artworks that always raise more questions than they provide answers. We knew that came with a price tag, but it turned out he also took into account who he was sitting across from. In the restaurant where we were, several of his covers hung on the wall. He told us what they had all cost, and then we could choose which budget we would go for—à la carte!”
By the way, don’t imagine that dinner as a happy bacchanal. Storm was there to work. “It was more like a police interrogation with food. He really wanted to know everything about us: where we grew up, how we met each other, who does what in the band. At one point, one of us told him about his fascination with runways, and when we were talking about the album a little later, the fact that the songs were the result of long jam sessions came up.”
Jamming, jazz, into the groove and… a runway? “I know! I know!” And this time Thorgerson was absolutely sure. He came up with a design that featured a kind of runway, but it was meant to be the groove of a vinyl record, and a pyramid dangled above it. “In his mind, that was the needle of a record player. Okay, we had also told him during that dinner that we had a thing for pyramids, but the way he brought all those things together defied all imagination. Even ours.”
Goose was part of the line-up of the 2010 Soulwaxmas tour, so it is not really a suprise Dave and Steph remixed this track at the height of its popularity.
They also ‘remixed’ the original artwork for the 2manydjs ‘Under The Covers’ live set and you can find it in the Radio Soulwax ‘Under The Covers Volume 3’ mix.
Finally in 2016, the remix was released on a limited 12″ picture disk.
But the real reason this video is the most popular one of the Soulwax youtube channel has to do with a very popular game…
Grand Theft Auto V was released in 2013 and in this game, players can choose between different radio stations when driving around. The ‘Soulwax FM’ radio station was a mix curated by Soulwax and included the Synrise remix.
‘Soulwax FM’ introduced a lot of young kids to Soulwax and their remixes, and that’s why these gamers would check out the full versions of the tracks on youtube.
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