Pig&Dan are a techno focused duo known for their label ELEVATE and releases on the likes of Drumcode.

The formation of Pig&Dan may have been an unusual one, but it was no doubt fate. The two crossed paths on a flight to Mallorca back in 1999 – when Dan was a resident DJ at Ministry of Sound and Igor was deep in the world of illegal underground raves – and the rest is history. With an incredible catalogue of releases on labels including Drumcode, Bedrock, Cocoon, Soma, Terminal M and their own ELEVATE imprint, to name a few, the pair are now preparing for the project’s twentieth anniversary later this year. We recently caught up with Dan and Igor to discuss their plans for the two-decade milestone, Dan’s CryptoDJs project and their shared love for Banksy…

Hi Guys, can I start by asking what part of the world you a both currently living, and has the local club scene started recovering after lockdown?

Dan) Currently I’m based in between Mallorca and London and I’m seeing almost no activity in Mallorca and a ton of it in the UK.

Pig) I am Mallorca born and still base myself here however I’ve decided to stay a few months in Tulum after I contracted COVID in Mexico. Unfortunately, I had to cancel my flights for the original events I had scheduled for the tour of Central and South America and ended up here (could be worse right) …Unfortunately the club scene in Mallorca is pretty slow these days and very slowly starting to open…Tulum on the other hand is as if nothing’s happened.

I’ve been told that 2022 marks the 20th anniversary of your Pig&Dan project, and I wanted to know what celebrations you have planned for the occasion?

Pig&Dan) We can’t believe 20 years have gone past so quickly, but time flies when you are having fun ;)…To commemorate our 20 years anniversary we’ve decided to release 20 tracks in 20 weeks on our own label ELEVATE…Some of the tracks are going to be updated versions of classics which we’ve worked on a little to make them feel more ‘in the now’ and the remaining tracks will be hot off the press new which scale right across the lines of genre…We’ve never believed in genres of music, we only believe in trying to create quality music…

I’m sure you get asked this a lot, but where did the name Pig&Dan come from, as it’s quite distinctive?

Pig&Dan) We were looking for a distinctive yet simple name. Igor’s nickname was Pig because he loved his extra cheese on burgers and loads of mayonnaise on everything so we thought why not Pig&Dan. It’s short, memorable and at that time there were no artists called ‘Pig’….

20 years is a long time to be working with another person, what’s changed the most over the last 20 years in terms of how you guys collaborate on music and other projects?

I think we always had chemistry from the first moment we were in the studio. I guess what changed was that we were able to park our egos outside of the studio and focus on the important thing, which is music…We’ve also learnt to be much more patient and tolerant of each other’s defects of character and worked a lot on our acceptance…Synergy is our middle name…

Talking of recent technological changes, I saw that Dan recently launched his own NFT series, and I wanted to learn more?

Dan) Well, it wasn’t just me alone who launched this innovative project, it was an incredible team of passionate music lovers that wanted to build a community through NFT collectables. These NFTs are digital assets that are based around a collectable card that represents the DJ and features a number of attributes and colours that can add to their rarity. These CryptoDJs cards can then be sold or traded on a second-hand marketplace where they could gain value. Collectors can also build certain sets/combinations that will allow access to unique enhanced experiences such as unreleased music, backstage passes, meet and greets and access to exclusive events both online and in the real world.

I also heard a rumour that Dan deals and collects Banksy art, and I’d love to know more about that?

Dan) That’s correct. I was introduced to the art of Banksy 23 years ago by one of my dearest friends, Adam. I became a collector and then started to build a large collection together with another close buddy. We were purchasing everything we could out of a passion for his art and nothing to do with financial gain. After all, he wasn’t really known back in those days. Now I’ve helped put together museum shows and helped many buyers source special under-the-radar pieces by the artist and still to this day love it being on the wall. Have to say I punch myself for not holding on to some of the pieces back then but when I hit hard times I also was forced to sell to get that food on the table.

Igor (Pig) I’m told that you are also passionate about art, what kind of artwork inspires you the most?

Pig) I think that art is like music, either you feel it or you don’t… So I don’t really have a certain type of art that I like. I like good quality things which have been created with love and passion…I was very lucky to get a few Banksy prints back in the day which is one of the treasures that I keep at home. I also love the work of Mallorcan artist Natxo Frisuelos, who creates really cool sculptures and very interesting paintings.

Igor (Pig), am I correct in thinking you are an artist yourself, as I’d love to know more about your personal creations?

Pig) Unfortunately, I’m an artist in terms of producing music, but I don’t really produce anything else but music…

Moving back to your collaborative stuff, what’s coming up in the coming months for your Pig&Dan alias. Do you have many gigs or special releases that you are looking forward to?

Pig&Dan) Well, we have a few upcoming collaborations which are very exciting but we haven’t yet pitched them out to any labels yet…One with M.E.M.O an artist and friend that has been on some great labels such as Bedrock and Mobilee and also a collaboration with a DJ from Tulum called Simone Gigante…We’ve made something more ethnic and more groovy and completely different to the techno we’ve been making for the last few years.

We are also buzzing about our upcoming projects which are 20 Years Pig&Dan on ELEVATE, Destination Unknown II (our second downtempo dub album) on Bedrock and a release on Damian Lazarus’ label Crosstown Rebels, which again has nothing to do with Techno but like all our music has the Pig&Dan imprint

We are also very excited about this new DJ series on Netflix produced by ICONIC which is gonna feature us and some great DJ producers like Dixon, Booka Shade, Monika Kruse and Patrice Baumel. Can’t wait for that to come out 😉

Thanks for taking the time to talk with me today, is there a message for fans or anything else you would like to add before we finish?

Pig&Dan) Just that we are extremely grateful to people who support us and our music. Without them, we wouldn’t be here. We also can’t wait for things to open properly so we can play all the new music we were able to produce during the pandemic…

You can learn more about Crypto DJs HERE