Words with Sander van Doorn

EV: Thank you so much for doing this with Electric Vibes. Our readers will be super excited! What do you like most about playing in Chicago?

Sander van Doorn: Chicago was one of the first American cities I've ever played at and right from the start the crowd was phenomenal to play for. They know the tracks that I’ve made by heart and are eager to hear new stuff. They grew with me throughout my career and supported me in the years that followed even when my music changed. It's a very giving crowd so it's always a pleasure playing here.

EV: Yeah, definitely. You just came out with your latest single, The Rhythm. What was your inspiration behind it and did you have some inspiration part of the creative for the music video?

Sander van Doorn: The Rhythm, is an old track by Blaze. I came across it a few years ago, I loved the vocal. I started working on it and wanted to give it my own special twist.  The guys from Blaze were super happy with it. They immediately wanted to clear the tracks so we could release it. The Rhythm is a mixture between a more techy sound and a certain house feel. The funny thing is, I spoke to Armin for instance today and he said he played the track. It's one of those tracks that maneuvers itself so well between different genres within electronic music.

EV: Oh definitely.

Sander van Doorn: We tried to translate that feel into the video as well. We took a lot of inspiration from the original track and the whole vibe we got from listening to it. I think the video looked amazing and sums it up perfectly.

EV: Oh beautiful. I love the video by the way. You recently have been experimenting with different genres stepping out into trance as Purple Haze. What was your motivation behind being your alias, Purple Haze?

Sander van Doorn: Purple Haze is something special. I already started about ten years ago releasing tracks like Adrenaline, Eden, Bliksem and Hymn 2.0.

Purple Haze is this kind of alter ego that helps me to express this different side of me as an artist and it lets me explore new territories. It tends to be melodic, a bit darker and less euphoric. About one and a half years ago I felt like the music I was making leaned more towards this type of sound so I thought it was the right thing to do and give Purple Haze my time and energy it needed. I decided it was the perfect moment to do something with it, like in the form of some live shows.

I went into the studio and started producing the music I felt would suit the feel of Purple Haze. I ended up with around 10 tracks and I immediately knew I wanted to put all my efforts into finishing these tracks. It compliments my SVD sound incredibly well and makes me better producer. It truly fueled me as an artist. They’re both quite different styles but that’s what I like about it.

With Purple Haze, I can do a little bit more euphoric stuff but also more techy stuff and create a whole show around it. I love touring as Purple Haze it’s such unique feeling.  It's such a great sound to play at the bigger stages. I kind of capitalized on that and produced more tracks and now I'm pretty much ready for my first artist album as Purple Haze.

EV: Oh nice, beautiful! So was this...this year at Ultra, you went at the ASOT stage as Purple Haze. Was this your first time and how was it?

Sander van Doorn: Yeah, well it wasn't my first time because I already did two shows, kind of like pilot shows over in Australia before that.

EV: Okay.

Sander van Doorn: Yeah, the shows were absolutely amazing! Ultra was really keen on having me on the ASOT stage, so I did the first show with Purple Haze there. It kind of felt like coming back home a little bit. The Trance fans and my older fans really embraced me for doing this. I felt their energy and it fueled me even more to produce more tracks like that. 

EV: Good, good.  So you experiment...obviously your house, and then you've experiment with trance. Do you see yourself stepping foot in other genres, or you just kinda want to stick to the two. What do you think as an artist?

Sander van Doorn: Personally, I've always loved being confident in the middle, for instance, like The Rhythm, it's a more techy track. It's was even picked up by Adam Beyer. Some tracks can be a little more melodic, other tracks can be more progressive or house-y. I've always positioned myself  in the middle but Purple Haze, is a lot more melodic based. SVD is more known for its house-y feel. So they’re quite different style wise.

EV: Oh absolutely. Anything you'd like to tell your fans about anything coming up in the future or anything in general?

Sander van Doorn: Two big things coming up actually. My first Purple Haze artist album is going to be released in September. I'm so excited about that, pretty much finished the whole album. Another big thing hat is coming up this has to do with my Identity radio show. We’re getting close to our 400th show. We’re planning something special down in Ibiza. So that is going to be pretty cool.

EV: Awesome, thank you so much for taking the time and doing this and our readers are going to be super excited!