Arkadyan: The Dubai-based Trio Globetrotting Through Organic House

It was in the heart of Dubai, where three expat artists, Gabriel, Marie and Benji, laid the seeds for their project ARKADYAN - a DJ/producer trio that has quickly gained recognition in the global dance music scene for their distinctive organic house productions. Their sound is versatile, a byproduct of their globetrotting expeditions into the intersection of the past and the future through a fusion of electronic sounds and original recordings of folk music from across the globe, with influences from tribal, classical, reggae and jazz.

Frustrated by rejections from big festivals in 2022, the trio launched their own party concept ARKADYAN Voyage, which serves as an epitome of their musical style and artistic endeavours, as well as a launching pad for emerging artists worldwide. Through ARKADYAN Voyage, the group is introducing a new way to party, focusing on integrating the crowds as participants in the sets rather than spectators.

ARKADYAN Voyage has quickly become one of Dubai’s biggest party series, drawing over 1,000 people a month, landing them a three-month residency in Ibiza’s Beachouse Club last June, and gaining them a slot at world-renowned festivals like Tomorrowland.

We sat down with the members of ARKADYAN to uncover the birth story of the band, the challenges they faced as newcomers, how they ended up performing at Tomorrowland, and how they aim to redefine the future of house music…

SN: How did you all find each other, and what made you decide to start the ARKADYAN project together?

We have been friends for a long time, way before we started the band. We used to make music for a lot of different artists as ghost producers, and at one point we started to be really frustrated that we didn’t have any credits on the music we made. We wanted to be recognized as artists, not just ghost producers, so we said let’s stop working for others, do our own project and start working only for ourselves.

Although each of us had skills in different areas and came from different backgrounds, we all complemented each other, and we shared the same vision for the kind of music that we wanted to create and propose to the world.

SN: What’s the main concept behind the project and what are you trying to accomplish with it?

As musicians, we love to play different instruments, and it was very important for us to incorporate that in our productions. So, we said, "Let’s start this project Arkadyan," where we will be making electronic music with no samples whatsoever - a fresh effort at dance music fused with instrumental recordings. This was like the rule of ARKADYAN.

We create the music as musicians first in the band then we produce. We don’t follow trends or make music that fits the mainstream, or what is being played out there nowadays. But, rather we record every sound that goes in our music. For example, if you hear that dramatic build-up in one of our sets, this is a recording of our vocals that we then tweaked with effects in the production process. All our songs are original from start to finish, composed by us.

SN: You have a very distinctive sound, creating original music that captures the essence of both traditional and modern influences. Can you walk us through your creative process and the groundwork you put into evolving your sound to be what it is today?

Our approach is focused on connecting the past and future through music. Given that we are inspired in so many ways by the past and history, from tribal to classical and jazz music, we always pull influences and elements from this, which add this dimension of authenticity to the music we make.

Also, because we are always travelling, we get inspired by all the different kinds of traditional and folk music in each country we go to. And, we try to dig deeper into these types of music and blend them into our productions. We even ask the local people in the countries we visit to record for us a piece of their sounds and then we treat it in our studio in our own way. For instance, we were playing a gig in the desert of Morocco one time, and there were Gnawa players around the area with a Guimbri–which is an old guitar with only two strings, and the flow was amazing and so inspiring that I asked one of them to play it again and sing a classic song he grew up with so I can record it on my iPhone. Then, we took it to the studio and incorporated it into one of our songs, ‘Tulila’ which is now being played by global artists like Black Coffee in almost every set of his.

SN: Why did you name the project ARKADYAN?

I was born in a ski resort in the Alps called Les Arcs. And, when you are from Les Arcs you are ARKADYAN. In my heart I'm an ARKADYAN, it is my identity. Ironically, when we started to research the name a little bit, we found out that it also refers to a place in Greece, which is an untouched, very organic place where its people are very connected with the earth and nature. So, besides it being a cool name, it aligned perfectly with the ethos of our project. It just felt right.

SN: All of you three came from multi-ethnic backgrounds, and live in Dubai. Does this influence the music you make?

Dubai is a very interesting place because it is like the epitome of the intersection between the past and the future. It has the melodic Middle Eastern vibe yet the city is turning to the future with all these cosmopolitan buildings emerging. So, Dubai really represents our sound. Also, it inspires us a lot in terms of mixing two completely different genres.

On the other hand, we take a lot of sonic cues and inspiration from our diverse backgrounds and past experiences in different musical fields. For example, Gabriel, our trumpet player, comes from a reggae and jazz background, and I came from rock and roll, while Marie, who is a DJ, is more experienced in dance music and knows how to read the crowd and be a really good entertainer. All of this versatile knowledge that we have helps add that unique touch to the music we make and feeds our passion as dreamers who want to go to the future.SN: Were there any kind of challenges that you faced in the initial stages of your career - in terms of finding gigs and getting your foot in the door in the music scene - and how did you tackle that and manage to establish a name for yourselves?

Being a new band, we faced a lot of challenges. It was me picking up the phone and trying to land gigs, and there were a lot of NOs. Because, when you are a new artist or performer, people usually don’t give you a chance. And, it was so difficult for us to be taken seriously. So, we begin focusing on having our name ARKADYAN exist first of all. And, to do that, we started to reach out to artists that we like and propose collaborative projects with them. We’d just contact them and be like, “Look, we like your style and we would love to do collaborations so let’s sit.” And, it picked up from then.

SN: Tell us about your latest release, ‘Leleley’. What was the main inspiration behind it, and what was the creative process for it like?

Okay, the story about it is actually interesting. We were in France with a group of friends, just jamming on old French songs many years ago. And, then at one moment one from our group of friends, Olivier, who is a very good guitarist and singer, was improvising something during a break and started to do that playful melody of ‘Leleley; and I was like, “Wait, we can do something with that, in a few years I will call you back and we could record it and do something interesting with it in the dance music scene.” I had a vision for it, so we recorded it a few years later. We mixed the melody of ‘Leleley’ with Balearic sounds, incorporating a lot of trumpets and horns. Then, we started playing it in our sets, and it was very successful and part of the peak moments.

At one point, a DJ and producer friend of ours told us that we should contact Bob Sincla’s label ‘Africanism’ and release it on it. The label had the same vibe as our song. So, I sent an email to the label and Bob Sinclar replied to our email himself and said, “I love the vibe, I love the idea of the song, can we have a call?” On our call, he said, “It is cool, but the sound design is a little bit weak and if I put my hands in it we can turn it into something stronger.” And, then we started the collaboration and the rest is history.

SN: You now have your own monthly party in Dubai, ARKADYAN Voyage. How did it get started and what is the main concept behind it? 

We struggled a lot to get a slot at big festivals and be part of cool lineups regionally and globally because our music was very different from the mainstream. This frustration inspired us to create our own mini festival and party, ARKADYAN Voyage. Because we couldn’t be in the lineups, we said, “Okay, we will have our own party and do our own lineups now.” We launched our voyage in Dubai at Surf Club, and started to invite other artists that we wanted to spotlight as well. It started very small and now it is one of the biggest parties in the city, drawing massive crowds from all over the world, and we receive requests from various international and regional artists, who want to be part of our lineups. Our Voyage also opened a lot of doors for us and brought us many opportunities to perform globally, so I think in life as soon as you start something you believe in, it goes bigger and bigger without you even realising.

The party is thematic, where each night we focus on certain vibes from a specific country; one night, for example, we would focus on South Africa, another on Brazil or Japan, etcetera. The main concept behind ARKADYAN Voyage is taking the crowd on a sojourn, and enabling them to travel to different countries each night through the music we present.

SN: What is the process behind your lineup curations?

Most of the time, it is a talent that we recruit while on the road. For example, if we are travelling to Tulum in Mexico and meet local artists who are very exceptionally talented but nobody knows about them. We try to give them an opportunity and bring these Tulum vibes for the world to see.

SN: How do you think your Voyage is contributing to the dance music scene in Dubai and the MENA region at large?

ARKADYAN Voyage for us is a platform through which we can give a chance for upcoming and small artists to perform and showcase their talent in front of a big crowd. Because we were in their place once. Especially now with a lot of Ibiza parties slowly migrating to Dubai, we are drawing bigger international crowds so we are helping expand these young artists’ exposure and opportunities. We are also introducing fresh artists and sounds into Dubai’s clubbing scene, which you won’t normally find anywhere else.

Besides that, we took our party to Ibiza last summer and had a residency at Beachouse that lasted from June to September. We are a party, born and bred in Dubai, that went to Ibiza last summer. So, it is something.

SN: Tell us more about this residency in Ibiza’s Beachouse. How did it happen?

Our ARKADYAN Voyage gave us good exposure and we got to go on a summer tour in Riyadh along with a monthly residency in Scorpios in Mykonos. One night in July, we were performing in Scorpois and at the end two people approached us who we later found out were from Ibiza’s Beachouse Club. They told us, “Your vibe and how you are always interacting with the audience and playing instruments on stage is what Ibiza needs.” Then, they offered us a summer residency and they said, “You can go wild, you are the boss of your artistic direction there and responsible for your lineup.” So, we couldn’t have said no to that.

SN: Given that you have played in different countries within the MENA region as well as Ibiza and Greece. How do you find the energy different in each and how do you cater your sets to be able to command these types of different crowds?

So, when you play in Ibiza, you are playing in front of a crowd who are proper ravers - they know their music and have deep knowledge about music and you can not disappoint them. You have to be able to catch them from start to finish because they know what they are coming for and you have to give it to them.

On the other hand, Dubai’s crowd is more of a mix of locals and foreigners or expats from across the globe, who are not proper ravers per se but rather looking to have a good time and simply enjoy. To understand how to manage these different crowds, you have to be aware of it at the very start of your set and be quick to propose something, not necessarily unlike your style, but a little adapted to catch their attention.

So, what we do for example is: we play a very special intro in all of our sets - an original edit from our productions - to test the crowd and figure out how we are going to carry on our set. And, if we managed to catch the crowd with that intro, we then continue the show in our own way, the Arkadyan way, with all of the songs from our original productions. However, in some countries, where we sense that we didn’t catch 100% of the crowd, we start adapting the sound a little bit straight away, by throwing in some acapella vocals that will touch them and get them responsive, and after we are able to command them we present what we have. But, usually, people are very responsive to our music and vibe straight away.

SN: You’ve managed to have remarkable visibility in the global dance music scene. What is the most rewarding moment for you since you started the band?

There are a lot of good moments. But, one from the top is when we played at Tomorrowland. It just happened very randomly. We were performing in Dubai and then the general manager of Tres Solis –which is part of the Tomorrowland brand, was there in the crowd with the main booker of Tomorrowland Belgium. And, after the party, we received an email from her that she liked our vibe and would like to give us a slot at the festival in Belgium.

This moment is very meaningful for us because we fought and struggled a lot to party and exist as artists in the music scene and create our own sound, and then this person was in the right place at the right time and understood our approach and what we were trying to propose and decided to give us a chance. It is a huge reward in the electronic music scene when you start as such a very small band and then a few years later voila, you are playing one of the world’s biggest festival stages.SN: You are now in a new residency at SurfClub in Dubai. What is the one thing that you are most excited about in this residency and how is it different from the previous ones you did?

We’re very excited because it marks our third year in a row at SurfClub. We are looking forward to giving more opportunities for new up-and-coming artists to share their voices. We are happy again to bring our happy vibes; from sunset till the end of the night, there will be nothing but music that makes people smile and dance. We are also introducing something new and fresh at this residency to make the crowd a participant in the show. So, it will definitely be a different way of partying.

The night will start with a slow downtempo at sunset, which will then progress into a groovy tech house, and there will be a lot of surprises and supporting acts. Each night will be thematically different than the previous depending on the artists on the lineup. We don’t want it to be repetitive in any way. Or, only repetitive in bringing happy moods to the people.

SN: Are there any projects that you are currently working on that you can share with us? 

We are currently working on a second song with Bob Sancla. It will be something new but still within the DNA of ARKADYAN. We are also working on other good collaborations, we are aiming to collaborate with the masters of instrumental music in different countries. For example, if in Japan, there is a master of the Japanese guitar, we plan to collaborate with them and blend this into our music. There are currently four or five projects like this under wraps. We are also preparing to release a full-year documentary of our world tour, and our first full-length studio album, which will be released next year by the end of the winter.SN: So, what are your long-term plans for ARKADYAN and how do you envision the future of the band?

I think we will just continue doing what we are doing and let’s say, so far, we are living in the present moment without thinking too much about the future. Of course, we want more people to recognize our art and music but we are really enjoying what we have at the moment and each time we perform live for now. I think we will stay like this, making music our own way, introducing something fresh and new each time, all within the DNA and the ethos of ARKADYAN, and let’s see what life will bring our way.