Function

Ini­tial­ly releas­ing records under their own iden­ti­ties, as the label’s suc­cess grew, it came to be seen increas­ing­ly as a col­lec­tive enti­ty, releas­ing tracks and albums anony­mous­ly part­ly in revolt against the increas­ing­ly celebri­ty-ori­ent­ed DJ cul­ture of the time, cul­mi­nat­ing in its 2010 col­lec­tive album Feed For­ward. Their sound has been high­ly influ­en­tial across the fol­low­ing gen­er­a­tion of tech­no musi­cians, and has informed a major shift in world tech­no. By the time the label announced its ​“glo­ri­ous death” in 2012 (con­tin­u­ing only as a per­form­ing act) the Amer­i­can Bill­board mag­a­zine would write that ​“Sandwell Dis­tric­t’s influ­ence on under­ground tech­no can hard­ly be overstated.”

The move to Berlin proved suc­cess­ful, bring­ing both Func­tion and Sandwell Dis­trict to enig­mat­ic sta­tus. Head­lin­ing fes­ti­vals world­wide, his sets at Labyrinth, Japan from 2009 – 2011 became things of leg­end; Sandwell clos­ing Sonar’s main stage in 2010 proved their impact, with reg­u­lar Time Warp, Awak­en­ings and Dek­man­tel appear­ances (to name a few), com­bined with fre­quent club appear­ances at Berghain, Berlin; Fab­ric, Lon­don; and The Bunker, New York, and oth­er key tech­no clubs/​parties around the world, Sum­n­er’s sta­tus as one of tech­no’s most impor­tant fig­ures became evident.

After dis­band­ing in 2013, their final trans­mis­sion being; Fab­ric 69: Sandwell Dis­trict, Sum­n­er was invit­ed to join the Ostgut fam­i­ly, releas­ing his debut album, the crit­i­cal­ly acclaimed, Incu­ba­tion on Ostgut Ton, and becom­ing a Berghain res­i­dent. In 2015 he con­tributed to the notable Berghain mix series releas­ing, Berghain 07 — Func­tion; the game-chang­ing series which left behind the mix CD for­mat, mak­ing the mix avail­able as a free .WAV down­load and Sound­cloud stream along­side two EPs with eight exclu­sive tracks by var­i­ous artists.

The album Incu­ba­tion land­ed on Ostgut Ton in 2013 and was a heavy impact­ing reminder of Func­tion’s sin­gle-hand­ed tal­ents, solid­i­fy­ing his sta­tus as a solo artist. The album flows very flu­id­ly and is metic­u­lous­ly detailed with a futur­ist and fore­bod­ing sci-fi feel­ing through­out. The LP cir­cles in hyp­not­ic loops with unset­tling tones lur­ing you into the dark­est cor­ners of your mind. From the day of release, Incu­ba­tion is right­ful­ly con­sid­ered as a land­mark in tech­no’s ever grow­ing history.

In addi­tion, in 2014, he col­lab­o­rat­ed with Vat­i­can Shad­ow on Hos­pi­tal Pro­duc­tions, releas­ing Games Have Rules, a beau­ti­ful full length ambi­ent affair. Feel­ing the need for a plat­form to explore devel­op­ing new artists and an out­let for solo mate­r­i­al, he then decid­ed to relaunch the 9 years dor­mant, Infra­struc­ture New York, in 2015 — releas­ing a string of beau­ti­ful­ly craft­ed 12“s and albums, devel­op­ing a camp of new exclu­sive artists; Camp­bell Irvine, Post Scrip­tum, Mar­i­ano DC and Function/​Inland, as well as involv­ing tech­no clas­sics such as Steve Bick­nell and Altern8’s Mark Archer (Track­man). Going on to release the quadru­ple pack vinyl/​CD label com­pi­la­tion; Infra­struc­ture — Fac­tic­i­ty, in 2016.

In 2017, Func­tion estab­lished a new res­i­den­cy, being the only inter­na­tion­al res­i­dent at Bassiani at the time, in Tbil­isi, Geor­gia. He also cel­e­brat­ed near­ly 25 years as a record­ing artist, releas­ing a ret­ro­spec­tive com­pi­la­tion for the new­ly formed Ostgut Ton off-shoot; A‑Ton.

Along­side an already event­ful year, Func­tion engaged in a new project which would form the tech­no super­group LSD in col­lab­o­ra­tion with Luke Slater and Steve Bick­nell that they would described as ​“lyser­gic machine music”. The trio debuted on Ostgut Ton with a 3 track EP titled ​“Process”, too much acclaim, in con­junc­tion with mes­meris­ing per­for­mances at both ADE and Berghain which led to them play­ing head­line shows ever since. In 2019 and 2020 they fol­lowed up with ​“Sec­ond Process” and ​“Third Process” which were both self released titles. 

2019 saw Func­tion re-invent­ing him­self once again: releas­ing a fresh batch of new­ly orches­trat­ed pro­duc­tions on Berlin’s leg­endary Tre­sor Records and roar­ing with his typ­i­cal ener­gy play­ing shows across the globe. His next album Exis­tenz got released and marked a new era in Func­tion’s already long last­ing car­reer. Sounds becom­ing more col­or­ful while still main­tain­ing the haunt­ing and dystopi­an feel­ing he is known for, the album feels as an ode to New York, the city he grew up.

As always, Func­tion keeps on shift­ing to the next gear with this year see him relaunch­ing his Infra­struc­ture New York imprint with a new EP of his own mak­ing. There’s no doubt he’ll be turn­ing a lot of heads in the years come and be the enig­ma he’s always been. One thing is sure, when Func­tion is mak­ing waves, the world is pay­ing attention.