A bonafide house hero in his native Holland and an increasingly familiar name on the world stage, Franky Rizardo’s musical journey began more than a decade ago when he flicked on the TV to be confronted by a giant dog head walking through the streets. It was Daft Punk's 'Da Funk' video, and the young Franky was blown away by the music that accompanied it. Immediately after, he bought the album Homework, listened to it constantly in my room and started to make electronic music… and he hasn’t looked back since.

Now, with a Deep Down & Defected mix album on the horizon and a music video for his latest single, ‘Troubleman’, recently revealed, we sat down with Franky to find out why he’s having the time of this life.

So Franky, were you really making music at 12?

Yeah, I was always on my computer with the simplest music programs and was already editing. I remember a program was only really suitable for making hip-hop but I used it to make trance with it, stuff like that. So yeah I was always doing that kind of stuff. I used to try and make music with anything, banging around in the kitchen. I really enjoyed it. My parents didn’t, but I did.

Were they eventually encouraging?

Yeah they were great, and they are still really encouraging me to do my thing: they really gave me the chance to do this profession, which I am really grateful for.


What was it like when you first started going out to clubs in Holland?

The first parties I remember were school parties, foam parties and stuff like that. I really enjoyed those. After that I went to the city for the first time: there was this local bar in my hometown, where all the underage kids go secretly, and drank my first Bacardi Breezer. But I remember being amazed by all the energy you get from going there and meeting all the people and all the music. The combination of all that blew me away, it was a lot of fun and I went every week until I was given a residency to play at the bar every Saturday and also every Friday afternoon. On Saturdays I would play five or six hours, music from Dutch tracks to hardcore: that’s where I learnt to DJ.

You’ve previously said that you struggle to focus on just one sound; do you see that as a blessing or a curse?

I guess it’s both. I get bored quite easily in sound, so when I’ve done something I’m like, ‘okay this is cool but I want to try something else.’ I get bored using the same samples or the same sounds over and over. I really try to keep myself entertained when I’m in the studio so I make music and just follow my feeling and go from there. It’s really hard for me to stay in the same genre, which is probably isn’t the best tactic if you want to get well-known really quickly, but for me it’s all about the pleasure I get from making that music and until this day I’m happy that I follow that path. 

So do you get to the studio and think ‘I’m going to make something that Defected would be into’?

Sometimes you do, but almost every time I start already with some idea in mind and I end up with something completely different. With the Deep Down & Defected album I wanted to make my own edits and chose tracks and remixes for this album that are as diverse as possible. I want to showcase all the genres in house music that are possible. There are some deeper tracks on there and some really deep remixes but also some stuff for the body. For me it was a lot of fun, but also a real challenge. It feels like an album. It was fun and it is an honor for me also to be remixing stuff from the Defected catalogue, including some pretty legendary artists. It’s been an honour to work on this project. I really tried to provide a real listening experience over both mixes, so hopefully it takes you somewhere.

Do you ever get into the studio to work on music and think ‘I just can’t do it today’?

Lately I’ve been having these days where nothing works. It’s usually it’s the day after you play because your ears are tired. But then you’ll have those days when you’ll go into the studio and make three or four remixes or tracks in one day. It just all flows naturally, but it’s very random. That’s why I get into the studio as much as possible and if it doesn’t work I’ll go outside, have a break and come back to it fresh.

Does working with other people help keep you inspired?

Of course, and I’ve done a lot of collaborations in the past. But lately I’ve really wanted to do my own thing. For me, music is very personal; sometimes it is difficult to combine my ideas with someone else’s.


One of the major things that you launched a year or so ago was your Flow radio show. Tell us a bit about that…

I was doing a guestmix every month on Slam FM which is a Dutch radio station. They really liked it and asked if I wanted to do a weekly show, to provide some more diversity in their radio program. At the time they only had shows playing the more progressive EDM sounds. They asked me to do something different and switch it up For me it is really important when you listen to the radio that is has a flow, that it goes somewhere: it’s like a journey, so that’s why I called it Flow. It’s house music – deep house, tech-house even a bit of techno in there. It’s been going great so far: we’ve been doing events as well and hosted some stages at festivals this year here in Holland like Dance Valley and Free Your Mind Festival with artists like Dennis Ferrer and Matthias Tanzmann. These parties were amazing and we have a lot of new parties coming up in 2015.

You always seem to be working with new bits of kit in the studio… do you think that changing up what you use to make music is important?

It keeps you inspired if you have a new toy or have your set up a little bit different. I just like to keep myself entertained throughout the whole studio process. I get bored with sample banks really easily and I like to get new stuff in. I recently got the Push controller from Ableton so I’m now completely diving into making tracks with that, but then the next month I’ll do something different. It’s nice to keep busy and keep being inspired by all the stuff available because there’s a lot available so I like to change it around and switch things up.

It’s all about staying inspired. Sometimes you’re just in the right moment on your laptop and it’s you can make some really great music, and then you’ll be in a really nice studio somewhere in the world and nothing will happen.

Tell us about playing with Hardwell at Ushuaia this summer…

He asked me to do it and at first I thought ‘you know I play house music?’ But that was what he wanted me to do, and I thought ‘why not?’ I have to say my set at Defected doesn’t differ that much to my set at Ushuaia. It might be more crowd pleasing or energetic, but its house music. At first I have to admit I was a little nervous: it was an EDM crowd and was there to play house music. But it was great. I just played all the stuff that I like and people were really into it. Hardwell really enjoyed it, so I think I’m doing it next year as well!

You also have a new EP out... 

‘Troubleman’ is one of my new tracks; I’m really excited about that. It is a bit of a darker vibe. It features a really cool vocal that has been pitched down and doubled so it’s pretty dark. I’m excited to get it out there, and we’ve also been working on a video for it which I can’t wait to show it to people. It's out on Defected together with a track called ‘Heater’, a track I made a while ago which is just a really fat groove for seven minutes.

Finally, what are your plans for next year?

For 2015 I’ve got a lot in store. What I really want is a consistent line of releases in the New Year. I’m really excited to let people here all the new stuff and I’ll be working a lot with Defected as well as some other labels. That is my most important thing for next year: to get this constant flow of releases and remixes, and also to expand the Flow concept. We’ll be doing more festival stage hosting next year and be doing a lot of parties and going abroad. It’s really exciting times and I’m really enjoying it.

Franky Rizardo 'Deep Down & Defected EP' is out now - buy from Beatport  / Traxsource / DStore

Deep Down & Defected Volume 7 mixed by Franky Rizardo is out 07 December (digital) on Defected Records - order from iTunes