The Disco Express on 75th release – “A celebration of original house and disco”

Celebrating their milestone 75th release Juno Daily gets the low down with head honcho Bustin’ Loose

No-one could accuse The Disco Express of slouching. Since transforming from party throwers extraordinaire into a fully fledged label in 2020, they’ve steadily and very quickly clocked up an prolific three quarters of a century’s worth of releases.

Well worth celebrating, they thought. So, for record number 75, they’ve pulled something rather special out of the bag, lining up a number of well known names to rework highlights from the label’s catalogue. We chatted to Tom Lilly (pictured, above), who helps run the label as well as recording for it under the name Bustin’ Loose, about the story so far and the ’75th Release Special: XPRESS Remix Vol 5′ EP

So this is the 75th release on the label.  Can you believe it?!  Presumably, you wanted to mark it in style…

Absolutely! We certainly did. It’s a real milestone for us to achieve 75 releases, so we wanted to do something special.  We brought out the big guns and are delighted to welcome John Morales, The Reflex, Dr Packer and Hot Toddy of Crazy P aboard The Disco Express to remix four tracks from our label.

You’ve gone for four remixes that breath “new life into original disco/house music from the catalogue”…  Talk us through why you selected each track and how you went about finding the right remixer for each.

Here at TDE we release original house and disco music for 21st century dancefloors. 

Therefore, in this compilation, we wanted to showcase the finest live talent from the label: Golden Gate, The Wild Violets and Magnolia. We carefully identified the songs that’d suit each remixer. John Morales for example we know kills it with his drums and percussion so chose ‘Deep Inside My Soul’ for him. Hot Toddy is a maestro at producing emotive and soulful nu-disco so offered him ‘Paradise’. We knew he’d smash it! Each remixer has been a permanent fixture in our DJ sets for many years and really believe they’re the best choices to club-ify the music.

Everything is sample free and recorded with real instruments in live studio environments so I’m sure they all had a lot of fun playing around with the organic stems; reimagining the originals into club heavy versions. 

You’ve become quite an international concern, with residencies around the world where you have communities to share this music – London, Berlin, Paris, NYC, Mexico City, Milan and Rome.  How does that affect the label’s sound, would you say?

The label has really picked up a lot of momentum, especially in Europe. Its exciting to see our worldwide communities grow and with people eager for a taste of The Disco Express. 

Our sound is defined by the many talented artists on the roster. We’re doing our own thing, focussing on our art and high quality output and naturally people gravitate towards us. Our sound is not defined necessarily by the cities we play in or what people want, but rather what we like and think is good, suited for the vibe we’re trying to create. Uplifting and original soulful dance music is what we’re all about and we endeavour to share this vibe every weekend, worldwide.

You always did have the parties as well as the label, working in tandem.  Again, does that bring a certain vibe to the records?

Yeah! The parties began back in 2017 at our very first venue Shoreditch Platform. Since evolving into a record label in 2020 both have gone hand in hand. At our parties when we play a record from the label, people go crazy. It’s really fulfilling to see people reacting positively to the art we’re creating.

Your productions are recorded with a lot of live instruments, set for contemporary dancefloors but inspired by the original roots of disco.  Is it important to you to be creating new sounds rather than simply sampling up old ones?

Very much so, we find in a musical ecosystem where there is so much competition its important to be unique by doing your own thing. In the short term its a lot more work but in the long run it really does pay off and gives the artists way more authenticity. Don’t get me wrong, some of my favourite music is based off samples, but sometimes it can be rehashed or a bit one trick pony. If done in a creative way, thinking outside the box however, it can be so powerful.

Our main influence in creating TDE was the night life of 70’s New York City. We really want to bring this hedonistic energy of being in a live disco environment to modern clubs around the globe, spreading our sound to a new wave of dance music lovers.

Any DJs and artists out there who’ve shown support for the tunes that you’d like to publicly thank here?

Honestly we are so grateful for the support of every artist and DJ who’s supported our music. If we’d have to name just a few of these they’d be: Folamour, Nightmares On Wax, The Blessed Madonna, Denis Sulta, TSHA, Sarah Storey, Kapote, Horse Meat Disco, Francois K, Danny Krivit, Luke Solomon, Skream, Laurent Garnier.

What’s next for Disco Express after this?

Our Best of 2024 release is soon upon us! We also have just secured a residency in Mexico City at Departamento which is hugely exciting. Not to mention we have now moved to a new London home at legendary East London venue, Metropolis. Our ambition for the future is to keep consistently releasing great music, throwing great parties and firing on all cylinders as a label and event series. 

Watch this space, this train ain’t slowin’ down anytime soon.

To buy the ’75th Release Special: XPRESS Remix Vol 5′ EDP, click here