KORMAC: THE SOUND OF A CITY IN MOTION

There’s a certain electricity that hums through Dublin at night — the shuffle between venues, the flash of streetlights, the laughter of strangers briefly bound by rhythm. On his new single “Hazy”, producer and composer Kormac bottles that exact feeling — a sodium-lit memory of first nights out in the city that shaped him.

Following the modular grit of Down Below, Hazy finds Kormac turning inward, blending atmospheric house with the mechanical soul of Detroit techno to capture not just the music of those early club years, but the moments in between — the anticipation, the blur, the buzz. It’s another step in a career defined by reinvention, as the Dublin artist continues to blur the lines between DJ, composer, and storyteller.

We caught up with Kormac to talk about Hazy, the nights that inspired it, and how he’s translating those late-night memories into a new live AV experience.

Hazy evokes the blurred excitement of your first nights out in Dublin. How did revisiting those memories shape the track, both musically and emotionally?

For some reason, I’d been thinking a lot about the journeys between the various clubs that I used to make over the few days before I started working on Hazy. I think it was quite a subconscious thing, with those memories in the back of my mind as I was writing.

The song was written entirely on analog hardware, blending melodic house with gritty Detroit techno elements. How do you approach choosing instruments and textures to capture a specific mood or memory?

Generally it’s a process of trial and error. I mean, there are obvious places to start - in this case with analog, slightly unpredictable, hardware synths and drum machines - but from there I generally let my instincts guide me and try and trust myself when I land on a sound that feels right.

Your work spans DJ sets, orchestral albums, and screen composition. How does creating a club track like Hazy differ from scoring for film or performing with a live ensemble?

Apart from the differences you’d expect (no picture to write to, no orchestra to think about!) the process is not as different as one might expect.

No matter what I’m writing for, there comes a point where I try to stop thinking about it and just get parts recorded. Like I mentioned above, I find there just comes a point where it starts to make sense and if I trust my instincts, and keep what I’m working towards that idea in the back of my mind, it generally starts to take shape.

With your new live AV show incorporating electronics and 3D visuals, how important is the visual component in shaping the audience’s experience of your music?

The visuals start life as a series of still photographs where I’ve sourced imagery from photographers I know or really admire that form a narrative with the music. They’re then manipulated into more abstract forms using the software I’m working with on stage.

The visuals are really important as I always try to create a proper “show” when performing live and, as it’s just me and lots of synths/machines on stage, they play a big part in creating a more immersive experience. This is very much V1 of the show and I’m really excited to show everyone the next steps we’ve planned for it. 

Looking back on your early DJ days and first encounters with Dublin’s club scene, what lessons or influences from that period continue to inform your sound today?

I’ll always remember arriving at the (now defunct) Kitchen nightclub in Dublin. Whatever way they fit it out, it used to have this metallic, kind of mesh stuff on the walls as you descended the stairs into the main room. I remember there was drum n’ bass playing and the metal used to vibrate in sympathy with the basslines creating this really rattly, buzzy sound that screamed excitement to me. I’m pretty sure, when I create basslines these days, I’m still reaching for that sound…