I asked him to send me a brief autobiography, and the following is what he wrote: 

"Grew up in Connecticut; played in a punk band for a bit.  Bought my first 'real' synth when I was 16.  Went to the University of Lowell in Mass. As a piano major for a short time.  Did some industrial stuff for a few years; played in clubs in Hartford.  Found techno in 91-92. Played at the Limelight in 92 live with Taylor [Deupree].  Didn't send tapes to record labels for years.  Formed P909 in early 93 with Taylor. Wrote the first CD in one weekend; Jason [Szsotek] stopped by and we finished the album with him.  Instinct Records signed it the next day; we signed a bad deal.  The CD came out on my 21st birthday.  I had moved to NYC a little before that with only $200 in my pocket." 

"P909 became a live thing.  I started to DJ at ambient parties and 
released an ambient record.  94 was a lot of recording and gigging. 
1995 was the year of many releases: 2 P909 CDs, Facil and Escape Tank on Instinct.  More gigs, etc.  I started to DJ again; more techno this time.  Joined the Tension Records family full time.  Left Instinct where I had been working for 2 ½ years.  A few deaths in my family slowed me down for a bit." 

"96 saw Unit Park appear (the Rancho Relaxo Allstars).  DJing a lot of techno parties around the world.  Acid is dead.  P909 was still touring and fighting the contract with Instinct.  97: Marduk release on Sonic Groove.  Video for Marduk (produced by eno-one) on MTV's AMP.  The second Unit Park EP released.  Booked up DJing and playing live almost every weekend of the year.  New Prototype 909 CD (the last), new Unit Park CD, and first solo album coming out in Novemeber." 

Pezboy: How specifically did Instinct screw you over?  Any advice for producers who are in the process of signing to a label? 

Dietrich: Hmmm... Instinct.  It's hard for me to dis them too hard, 
'cause I learned a lot while working there.  But we signed a LONG deal for too little money considering the strictness of the contract - a 5 album deal with only a little in advance to start.  But we didn't know any better.  We also couldn't do anything under the name [Prototype 909] anywhere else without their permission.  So advice to someone starting out would be: if you're signing a long term contract, it can be good, because that means the label is willing to support and promote you.  But make sure the initial advance is good!  And for people who want to be on a 'bigger' label, but also want to make sure that they can release other material wherever they choose: sign an exclusive 'project name' - Not your real name. 

P: You've just announced the breakup of Prototype 909.  What led up to this decision?  Creative differences?  Boredom? 

D: Hmmm... Well, P909 has always been two sided, not three sided - so that aspect was never fair to the third member.  It boiled down to that situation getting to a point where it was hard to fix.  We've been thrown off planes for our heated discussions, usually over who got to hit on the cute stewardess.  It took us over two years to get another album done (that was also slowed down because of the Instinct contractual dilemnas).  We had the usual band miscommunication problems. It was a good time, and we reached not quite 100 live shows.  The new P909 CD is a good representation of where things came to be in the studio.  We didn't reach our potential together on every minute of the CD, which is sad, because we should have.  The live shows were much better.  Three in a studio can be tough - fighting musicians are not pretty people. 

P: P909 has sort of morphed into what is now "Unit Park."  Gimme a rundown of the differences between P909 and Unit Park, both structural and creative. 

D: I guess Unit Park morphed from P909.  Taylor and I have always worked together, since the beginning of P909; but we started to make it a bigger priority with the P909 contract problems, lack of new material, etc.  We played two shows this summer, much like P909 style with a little more structured techno-house feel, with the craziness of a P909 show. [note: I saw them at both of these shows, and at one of them they blew out the monitor.  The other was at Dietrich's own party "Let's Play Doctor" in Brooklyn - five bucks for Surgeon, Prozac, Abe Duque, John Selway, Stroboscopic, P909... it raged HARD]  We have Unit Park hockey jerseys, and are working on a stage concept of two guys behind a pile of gear.  The video is also in production.  A video that was produced for me by ENO-ONE Designs for my Marduk project on Sonic Groove Records was aired throughout the summer on MTV's AMP, so we want to follow that video success with a Unit Park video. 

One difference of Unit Park style studiowise is the overall groove... 
it's a little groovier.  P909 tended to be a little freakier, Jason 
being an electro guy.  Also now Jason won't be in the studio eating all the pizza crusts.  P909 played Mac games as a break, and UP plays SegaNHL97 too much.  Creatively, P909 definitely loved to be abstract with a lot of synth sounds, Jason was usually making the 'lead' lines. UP is more jacky.  P909 also had its own 'personality' - not even a mix of us three, but a completely separate beast.  UP is a mix of Taylor and myself all the way.  Comparing the UP CD with the new P909 CD you may notice that UP is more focused.  P909 could never recreate in the studio what we had been doing live; this shows P909's lack of communication between all three members.  We talked most before a show, and not as much in the studio.  Our last few live shows were some of our best. Unit Park is not just 2/3 of P909 - it's a completely separate entity. Hopefully after the CD comes out and we start playing more shows this will be known. 

P: Prototype 909, it strikes me, was a techno group that was all about jamming.  Unit Park, however, has a distinctly more "mature" sound.  Is this due to you and Taylor working particularly well as a team?  Are you growing as artists?  Have you changed the way you make your tracks? 

D: Prototype 909 was based more on the 'live' aspect, and that played more of a part than the song concepts.  Unit Park is the only project that Taylor and I are doing now (this is the first time we're emphasizing on only one project in five years).  Also when we write we'll use any piece of gear, not just analog or one with knobs and a lot of realtime control.  No limits in the studio now.  I'm looking forward to the next album (Trailor Park) already - it's varied for a techno album. 

P: Okay, so how do you guys go about writing tracks, anyway?  Do you start off with a concrete idea and build from there, or do you mess around until you find something you like, and then take off? 

D: Usually we start with the new synth that Taylor has bought that day... This album was based on the grooves, so we went to work there first. Lately we've been starting with melodies and structures as well as the dance floor production.  The actual starting point is always different - depends on what we've eaten, where we've been the night before... 

P: How is techno changing?  Where do you see it going?  How does Unit Park fit into your view of techno as a genre?  What do you want to accomplish with Unit Park? 

D: Ouch, been waiting for you to ask this one.  I've been listening to a batch of mixtapes I've been given recently.  All are good, but they bore me completely.  There is change needed more than ever in electronic music.  The past 5-6 years have had their peaks, but...  There is so much disposable electronic music now; I have fueled this also at times with some tracks, DJing minimal, etc.  I think that there needs to be more soul 'in the machines.'  A lot of producers have been only doing work 'for' the machines.  That's a crazy sound, but make it say something more than that's a crazy sound.  I'm still into a lot of minimal; there are still dozens of new 12"s every week, so some are bound to do a little something new.  As for Unit Park, we want to work at the live shows as much as the studio, and vice versa.  That's all I can say - we have a master plan, but it will be seen soon enough...  Our sound is 'minimal-full' if that makes sense - a little of the minimal style but with more interesting changes, new sounds, some bass lines, and a little quirkiness. 

P: What's the deal with tours?  Going to be playing out as Unit Park a lot? Would you like to play out as a DJ more than you currently do? 

D: Unit Park has started to tour with a few October/November dates - one in Mexico.  We will be playing out 1-2 times a month until the spring, when we'll work on a concentrated tour.  I DJ in spells; I was playing 2-3 times a week in the summer, but I haven't pushed to spin at all in the fall, just a few gigs here and there.  It's not easy to find time to write, perform live shows, DJ, and run a booking company without only having music on your mind.  I do need to play a few times a month to stay in 'shape.'  I'm playing a house set on Holloween in Memphis... should be interesting. 

P: What artists do you look up to?  Within electronic dance music?  Outside of electronic stuff? 

D: I'm mainly listening to classical and opera now, a great change of pace. As far as electronic: older Luke Slater 12"s, Christian Vogel, Richard James CDs, a lot of my friends' records - Taylor's, Savva's, Neil and the Scotland crew.  I also listen to a lot of darker music - ambient. This Mortal Coil, etc.  My biggest influences over the years don't seem to show up with what I'm doing now; I was into punk/hardcore, and then industrial as a teenager, F242, MBM, Cabaret Voltaire of course. 

P: This past summer I went to your Brooklyn party "Let's Play Doctor."  It kicked total ass.  What's your deal with throwing parties? 

D: Presently I'm on a mission to throw good parties in NYC; we lack parties with the spirit that I fell in love with years ago.  The parties are better in Eastbumfuck than they are here; there is no reason for that. The best DJs in NYC don't often play here.  I'm also going to bring a bunch of people to the states who haven't been seen before - mainly the crazy ones that the other countries are trying to get rid of. 

P: Gimme the lowdown on your philosophies of 'rave.' 

D: Huh.  This whole 'movement' was started by people who were into the whole thing.  At early parties, no one was trying to look like everyone else, take as many pills as they could, or bring their 12 year old neighbor with them.  The respect for the music isn't there anymore; for a 'movement' based more or less around the music, there has to be respect.  Too many promoters are out to make $$$, not a good party or event.  Look at other parts of the world - the music is respected by a more mature crowd.  Electronic music is not looked on as 'cyber music' or out of the norm.  Americans are afraid of change.  How many kids own a synth or drum machine or sampler now?  Techno has to move to the clubs over here.  It has to a point in Canada. 

As for drugs and alcohol, how can you say one poison is worse than the other?  All I know is most of my friends are more up for a drink than a pill. 

I'm working on an every other thursday club here in NYC; 'weekend' DJs on a thursday.  I want to start something away from the present scene; fuck these promoters that will only promote for you if they get 10 comps and their stupid voicemail on the flier... what's that all about?... one number for a party will do.  The only promoters I'll work with are down for the cause, not their wallet or image.  Some of the biggest DJs won't play big events in the U.S.; we've scared them to stay in Europe or fly over there to play only. 

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