Since last year, NTO has been unveiling new tracks, and making each and every one of them a step closer to his album, like diving stages. Also, his covers evolve according to each step, it’s like diving into an unknown land, that gradually and slowly reveals the theme of the album: «APNEA». Each single is an opportunity for an unexpected collaboration : Meute was invited to cover “Zig Zag”, Sofiane Pamart reappropriated with his piano “Invisible”, and Paul Kalkbrenner – the artist who gave NTO the vocation of techno – made him the honour of an already cult remix. The album APNEA was inspired by a meeting with Arthur Guérin, the Freediving Word Champion. As they spoke, they found similarities between his diving and daily training, and the way he makes music : They both need to be totally immersed, this allow them to feel close to their feelings and be completely cut off from the world.
For the first time, NTO composed a long format and invites his friends: French 79 for his hometown Marseille, Monolink, and through him the new Berlin scene, and finally a major musical influence or an abyssal duo, almost out of time: Tricky.
«This first album is a part of me. It represents everything I’ve always wanted to do in music : beautiful collaborations with artists that I deeply respect, being faithful to my music while having the opportunity to always experiment a little bit more, to tell a story that seems coherent to me. I enjoyed so much these almost 2 years of composition. I approached creation in a less «lonely» way than usual, and I feel like I have improved a lot. Finally, this album is also a bit of a family affair.
There are winks for everyone I love. » NTO
A litte bit more about NTO
The story behind NTO started with a match made in heaven: A kid from the South of France, glued to his guitar and electronic dance music. “I believe the first time it all made sense to me was when I first listened to Underworld’s live album, Everything Everything”, he says.
After going to Sziget Festival when he was 18, NTO started to hang out regularly at La Villa Rouge, and Bar Live, two legendary clubs in the South of France. At the time, German minimal techno was booming and Anthony Favier would spend his nights listening to Stephan Bodzin, James Holden, or the very beginnings of Paul Kalkbrenner, who he calls his “biggest music crush of all time”.
The evocative power of music, strong kicks and the unifying atmosphere of dance-floors this is the triple focus that will inspire him to create and produce music without going through the usually mandatory DJ phase. The story behind NTO is also about his friendship with and Joachim Pastor, with whom he created Hungry Music in 2013. At a time when melodic techno music was not the media’s first interest, the three artists were absolutely convinced that the audience couldn’t get enough of it. Performing together on Olympia’s stage to the Vieilles Charrues Festival, they learned to mater the stage, and seduced a new generation that would follow them faithfully from this moment on. Thanks to his hits ‘Trauma’ and ‘La clé des champ’, which account for several millions of streams on DSPs, NTO’s career took off internationally: from The Netherlands to Germany, to Eastern Europe to Canada…
Today, NTO is about to start a new chapter of his career. With deep basses and lysergic harmonies, he filters different layers of his melodies to make them sparkle even more, just as if they emerged from the water after hitting rock bottom.