Frank Ellrich has long been an icon of the hard dance scene, however it is his ability to evolve and remain at the very cutting edge of that genre that has seen him rise above many of his contemporaries. Cutting his teeth alongside Kai Tracid as part of the Tracid Traxxx mafia, Frank has since spread his wings aligning himself with the Straight On Black crew from Holland. Across his countless productions, Frank has built up a chest full of guises that include Plasmatics, Riddler & Headcrusher, Naiche & Steve K and X-frame plus of course the hugely successful Future Tribes.

First and foremost A*S*Y*S is know for his revolutionary studio productions- dark acid odysseys which have set dancefloors ablaze across the globe. Frank Ellrich is behind dozens of eternal classics including Acid Nightmare, Acid Save Your Soul, Age Of Darkness, Acid Headcracker, Theme From Pharmacy and the world conquering No More F*cking Rock & Roll which was one of the highest selling dance releases of 2005 and included an exclusive cut from world number one DJ Paul Van Dyk.

Not content with such a string of monster hits Frank’s remix credits read like a trance and techno A list. Frank has stamped his style onto remixes such as Timo Maas- Maas Mellow, CygnusX- The Orange Theme, Yoji Biomehanika – Remo Con,Tiefenrausch – The Deep Blue and the ultimate hard trance anthem Hennes & Colds – The Sound Of Rock. Since 2000 Frank has toured the world headlining major clubs and festivals the world over. His effervescent style of performance has seen A*S*Y*S stage diving in Australia, climbing the rafters in Japan, moshing alongside fans in the UK, dancing Samba in Brazil and playing live in front of tens of thousands of people in Holland. The A*S*Y*S stage show is as much about passion as it is about high-octane beats and punishing melodies. Since late 2007 Frank made his next major step by establishing new label “Fe Records”. Mainly as a new platform for A*S*Y*S productions the label claims to give the harder genres new & fresh impulse. If you haven’t already had a chance to catch A*S*Y*S, make sure you get yourself to Riot’s Summer Of Hard Dance Event at matter on 24th July.

Hello A*S*Y*S! How are you and what are you currently doing today?

Hey there, I am fine thank you. As always I’m very busy and today I have a few productions to work on. I plan to make one or two edits / bootlegs for my DJ sets at the weekend. Also I have to go to the hairdressers, its way to long at the moment, haha!

How would you describe your sound to someone who hasn’t heard you before?

It’s not that easy to describe to be honest, because A*S*Y*S has a lot of crossover potential and has encompassed the very hard to the funky and techy, the same as my DJ sets. I love all quality productions mainly from the hard genres, so my sound and music is a kind of mash up of different styles like tech trance, acid, hard trance, hardstyle and even hard electro. I also think that none of the A*S*Y*S singles that I have released since 1996 sound the same as the one before. I love to put new influences and inspirations into each track and I always change the drumming, sequencing sounds, etc. However, the overall vibe is typical A*S*Y*S, which tends to be “dark and mystic”.

You will be playing the mighty Riot! event at matter on the 24th July – are you excited? Have you played in London before? Anything cool planned for your set?

Yeah definitely! Looking forward to that one a lot. I have played a couple of times in London before for a few Antiworld parties and at Fabric. I love the vibe of the city and I am very curious regarding the location at venue at the O2 arena. Sounds very special and promising!

What are the highlights of your musical career so far? What goals do you still have a burning desire to achieve?

Hmmm, I have had a couple of highlights already. So many worldwide club hits like Acid Nightmare or No More Fuckin’ Rock N Roll or Cheers!! I think its special that Acid Nightmare is a very hard and underground tune that made it up to the top 100 of the official German charts in 2000. But honestly, all of the countries I have toured so far are something I would describe as a highlight. I love to travel and to meet new people; I’m interested in learning about new cultures, not only the party culture, haha! So to play in Japan, Australia, Canada, the US or Brazil and Russia count too.

What do I want to achieve? Well I want to be a creative part of the whole electronic dance music scene for as long as possible, because it is my passion, not only a job. When I work on my productions I never look at the clock and wish the day would be over soon so I can leave the office - I love it. Also one of my goals would be to play in China, or other Asian countries where the whole party scene is new and still something very special.

What projects are you working on that you can tell us about?

I have just finished my mix for the upcoming Sound of Kiddstock CD compilation and a remix of the official anthem too. I’m also running my own label called “Fe-Records” and I’m currently planning the new releases for this year. A new A*S*Y*S single will be part of it and that will be the next studio production I will work on.

What are your favourite bits of kit that you like to use whilst in the studio?

Oh that’s easy to answer:

Sequencer: Logic 8, Ableton Live 8 and Cubase SX 4
Hardware: Nordlead 1, Virus B
Software Synth: Sylenth 1
And all different kind of distortion plug-ins haha

Festival season is now upon us – are you playing at any or going for fun with friends? What has been the best festival you have been too?

Yeah! Next weekend Dance Valley in Amsterdam is up and I’m playing on the HQ stage - it’s going to be huge. I have heard it is nearly sold out which means about 40,000 people will attend and about 150 international DJs will be presenting their sound, so besides my gig I will be checking out all of the other acts! I also debuted in Ireland at the massive Planet Love festival in June and will be appearing at Southern Sound Festival 2009 (Bournemouth) and Parklife (Glasgow) in September.

Which tune do you never leave home without?

I couldn’t leave home without my own classics Acid Nightmare, No More Fuckn Rock N Roll and Electro Slut the successful remix I did for Kamui! People would be very disappointed if I didn’t drop one of those tunes.

In the hard dance scene, which artist or artists are your current favourites?

I am a big fan of Kamui; I love all of his productions. That has been the main reason why I signed them for my label. Also I still love most of Scot Project’s tunes and lately some releases from Kidd Kaos have been grabbing my attention!

What else have you got coming up?

As I mentioned above I do run my own label and beside my own new single I am going to release a lot of collaborations I did with several Australian artists like Dr Willis, LCK and a new Acid Headcracker version I made with The Engineer (producer for DJ Hellraiser) . Also a lot of UK gigs are up this summer. For further information you could check out my MySpace page: www.myspace.com/asys