Biography
Van Dyk grew up in East Berlin, where he kept in touch with the world beyond the Berlin Wall by secretly listening to the popular but forbidden Western radio stations RIAS and SFB and mixtapes occasionally smuggled into the country copied among school friends.
Shortly before the fall of the wall, van Dyk and his mother were given permission to leave East Germany and moved to Hamburg to live with his aunt. In 1990, van Dyk moved back to Berlin. His first appearance as a DJ was in the Tresor in March 1991. A couple more dates followed and he was soon given the chance to perform at Juergen Kramer's famous Dubmission parties in the Turbine club, together with the highly popular young resident DJ Kid Paul. The shows were called Paul vs. Paul. His mixing style drew the attention of Cosmic Baby and the two collaborated as The Visions of Shiva, on "Perfect Day" (1992) on the renowned Berlin independent label MFS (Masterminded For Success) Records, run by well known English ex-pat producer Mark Reeder and manager Torsten Jurk.
In February 1993, van Dyk and Kid Paul hosted an installment of the weekly three-hour HR3 Clubnight radio show perform for a nationwide audience on the radio. The second and final Visions of Shiva single "How Much Can You Take?" was released and van Dyk and Cosmic went their separate musical ways. By late summer, Paul released his first DJ-mix compilation "X-Mix-1 - the MFS Trip" and remixed Humate's classic trance hymn "Love Stimulation".
The growing popularity of the Dubmission parties forced a venues change, first to Cafe Moskau and then into the larger E-Werk where van Dyk began hosting regular MFS nights.
In 1994 Paul released "The Green Valley EP", "Pump This Party" and "Emergency 911". Meanwhile, MFS acquired many remixes for Paul and Reeder's close friendship with artists such as New Order gave Paul the opportunity to mix the track "Spooky" from the Republic album. After much persuasion by Reeder, he finally recorded his debut LP 45 RPM with Johnny Klimek and VOOV. Reeder also compiled the album's running order and design, and chose the album's title as a reflection of the 45 RPM speed typical for dance vinyl.
Reeder compiled Seven Ways which established van Dyk as a trance pioneer and was van Dyk's first real success in Britain. Reeder had successfully convinced his old friend Rob Deacon (formerly of Volume) to license the album for the UK and his new Deviant label.
The singles "Forbidden Fruit" and "Beautiful Place" didn't cause a great impact at first, but with the release of Seven Ways and "Words" appearing at the height of the British superclub phenomenon, van Dyk's own material began to attract attention. "By the time they realised I was a German, it was too late!" van Dyk said.
In 1998, 45RPM was re-released in the UK. To mark the event, and in homage to the defunct E-Werk, Paul released a remix of "For An Angel". Van Dyk took up a residency at Sheffield's Gatecrasher and declared himself anti-drugs, which led to home-made "No E, Pure PvD" T-shirts, also a sly note to journalists that his surname contained no "E".
Van Dyk left MFS Records and took a controlling share in the new label Vandit Records. In 2000, Paul flexed his skills with his melodic, dancefloor-friendly Out There And Back, which included the hit single "Tell Me Why (The Riddle)", a collaboration with Saint Etienne. His first mix album The Politics of Dancing (2001) was followed by a world tour and a DVD release Global (2003) and the Mexican film "Zurdo", for which van Dyk composed the soundtrack.
Reflections (2003) derived from van Dyk’s trips to India, was a more melancholy affair, and includes the single "Nothing But You", a collaboration with Hemmstock & Jennings. It was nominated for a Grammy in the category of Best Electronic Album. The mix album The Politics of Dancing 2 (2005) was preceded by a single "The Other Side," a song dedicated to the victims, and their families, of the Sumatra-Andaman earthquake and the subsequent tsunami that struck Thailand on December 26, 2004.
In 2007, his album In Between was released, accompanied by a special edition limited to two thousand (2000) copies which included a mixed version of the full album, an 8 track bonus CD and an 8 page photo anthology .[1] He embarked on his In Between Tour in June 2007[2] to promote the album.
Van Dyk hosts a show on Radio Fritz every Wednesday at 20:00 GMT. In his latest gigs, he blurs the line between DJing and live performance engineering by utilizing two PowerBook laptops sporting Serato Scratch Live and Ableton Live software, enabling a more full-featured club experience more akin to a concert than a standard night out at a dance club. On-the-fly remixes and compositions are just some of the capabilities of this new performance method.
He is married to Natascha van Dyk, who also appears on some of his releases. The two were married in Cancún, Mexico.
