As Israel’s hottest and most well-known EDM act, the Flash Brothers – Ruven, Ilan, and Shmuel Flaishler – jump between genres and have regularly revisited progressive house, progressive trance, and electro ‘80s house over the course of their career.
Currently based in Tel Aviv, the brothers are originally from Nazareth. While exposed to various forms of dance and electronic music, the three came together as Ruven studied sound engineered and production at Tel Aviv’s top music school. Rounding out all facets of creating and producing EDM, Schmuel was focused on computers, while Ilan was more into the DJing and promotion side. In 1997, the trio met DJ Choopie, who signed them to his Agnosia Records.
Since that point, the Flash Brothers have released multiple hit singles and tracks that received remix treatments from Tiesto, Paul Oakenfold, John Digweed, and other prominent producers or that have been featured on compilations. In 2004, they became the first and only Israeli producers to break the DJ Magazine top 100 list. Presently, they have taken their live and DJing shows on the road to countless countries and festivals, including, more recently, the Ultra Music Festival in Miami, Fla.
How did the three of you start producing and DJing together?
The Flash Brothers: We grew up all together listening to electronic music since the very beginning, with our father originally buying late ‘70s disco vinyls of acts like ABBA, Boney M and Rafaela Cara, for example. He was playing the records every day back at home, and this was the electronic dance music of these days. We were growing up on it basically, and afterwards in the ‘80s, it lead us into new wave, electro pop, house, acid, techno, etc. We always were interested in how this music was created and had ideas how we would change a bit. A lot of the tracks we liked if we could – so we had to discover 🙂 In the ‘90s, we started playing with our vinyls, mixing them up and started to produce the first tracks without computer yet, but in early 1997, we started to do it more professionally and built up our studio. At the end, we started to have our music being released, and in early 2000. When our first album was released, we started performing as live act and DJing together every weekend.
What are your current roles within the group? How have they changed over time?
The Flash Brothers: Shmuel usually is on the computer, creates the first ideas, records the sounds, and mixes them together. Ruven is handling the master production, making the right final mix, main sound/EQs on the vocals and everything around. Ilan is choosing the direction/style of track, adds the right loops/samples, and help creating the baselines. On the live shows, it’s a cool mixture when were all on stage, playing together on the samplers, synths, effects from live mixer, and mixing it with the CDJs players, as well.
These roles have been going for a while now, so we keep up what’s already working 🙂
You’ve had tracks remixed by prominent DJs before. Who would you like to remix one of your tracks?
The Flash Brothers: Chemical Brothers or Fatboy Slim could be awesome. Both are legendary figures in the electronic music scene and awesome producers.
Why did you decide to start the F3 project? How will sounds differ for this compared to standard Flash Brothers Material?
The Flash Brothers: F3 is our alias project that we started less than a year ago (mid 2011), deciding it will represent a different sound of ours to our more known Big Room Flash Brothers style. To highlight our appreciation for more mellow electronic club music, we wanted to create it between the genres of Deep House, Nu-Disco and deep techy House, with BPMs between 110 and123 (while Flash Bros. stuff is more between 125 and 139).The F3 project is growing rapidly at the moment, having so far had eight different singles signed on different labels, including Club Mod (Modular Records sub-label), Nurvous, Soundz Limited, Pole Position, and Undertones Gang.
‘80s synth sounds have come in vogue over the past few years. Has this trend changed your music and approach to production?
The Flash Brothers: As mentioned already, we grew up on the ‘80s so it’s been influencing our production and sets for years now. But it can be highlighted even more recently on our F3 releases and upcoming stuff as well.
It’s great to bring back the ‘80s vibe we listened to as kids for the new generation of today who missed this decade 🙂
Have listener preferences for certain electronic genres (trance a few years ago, and now house) influenced your sound or emphasis on a certain genre within your music?
The Flash Brothers: Not exactly, as we always been producing and playing out different electronic music genres (all from Ambient, Tribal House, Progressive and Techno to Electro, Trance, Nu Disco and Deep house).
It’s also having different public and crowds listening to each genre, so can’t say once people listened more to this style and now listen more to that style. We like listening to lots of kinds of music at the same time and influenced from everything we hear. That’s why our musical variety happens and we never get bored doing our stuff, always a bit different and not repeating the same vibe.
Your sound has evolved through various genres. What would you currently describe your sound as?
Electronic dance music from deeper vibe to more uplifting party rocking feel!
What equipment do you use currently, and has your setup changed over the years?
The Flash Brothers: We did change and improve a bit of our studio equipment, especially moving more from the old school hardware into working more with the software, which has been easier the last few years through the laptops, etc.
We always worked with the Cubase software since we started, and keeping it up, we just like it and got used to it. It delivers the work, and all the production software makes the same at the end (Music), so it just depends which one u like 🙂
On a technical level, have you taken different approaches with equipment for each genre?
The Flash Brothers: Not really, as although we make different genres, it’s the same equipment that creates all kinds of music. You just switch or choose different sounds, effects, etc. depending on the track and how it goes. But the same software you have at the studio should work for different genres, and it’s more what’s on your mind that leads the way.
A few new singles have come out recently. Are these leading up to an album? If so, what should we expect for a new release?
The Flash Brothers: We released last year our latest artist album (Heaven’s Gate) which was big project with three album parts, including remix albums to all 10 vocal tracks. So after this two-year project, we focused on more eclectic singles projects with different labels, plus starting last summer 2011 our F3 project.
So at the moment, there’s no album plan yet for now, but in the right time and with the right inspiration for another album it will come 🙂 But do expect lots more music – that’s a promise! 🙂
To check out the Flash Brothers’ latest single, watch the video below:
