InFiné was born out of a desire to build new bridges between musical worlds, while still keeping one foot firmly on the dancefloor.
From its very first release, Francesco Tristano reinterpreted Derrick May’s Strings of Life as a solo piano version, while Apparat offered his own remix-driven vision, setting in motion a constant back-and-forth between head and feet that has continued ever since.
Nearly twenty years later, the list of artists the label has collaborated with reads like a map of the musical affinities that have shaped its history: Daniel Avery and Michael Mayer, Robert Hood and Juan Atkins, VTSS, Clark, 33EMYBW, Shed, Laurence James and Ben Klock, KMRU, Laurent Garnier and Malibu, Ital Tek and DJ Plead, Eris Drew or Prins Thomas… Few labels can boast of bringing together so many sensitivities, generations, and aesthetics around the practice of the ‘remix’.
We continue to approach remixing with consistency, because for artists it is an opportunity to share their universe with people they admire, to confront their sonic signatures, and sometimes even to open the door to longer-term collaborations. The remix is a space of surrender in which a work ceases to belong solely to its author and becomes a shared playground.
One of the most striking examples remains Carl Craig’s remix of Francesco Tristano’s The Melody. While Tristano was taking part in the Versus project at the Cité de la Musique in 2008, writing orchestral arrangements of key Carl Craig tracks, the Detroit producer—then at the height of his remixing powers—delivered his own version of the piece. The result quickly went beyond the scope of a simple reinterpretation: championed by DJs worldwide, the remix became a classic in its own right, to the point where the track is now as closely associated with its remixer as with its original composer.
For the label’s team, it is also an opportunity to meet artists we admire, to share visions not only of music but of the world itself.
Some of the most striking surprises come from wide leaps. When Holy Other transforms Indigo by O’o into a haunted electronica apparition. Or when John Talabot completely inverts Aufgang’s Channel 7, layering it with Balearic-tinged vintage textures and a resolutely DIY spirit that made his debut album so distinctive. Or when CFCF injects an irresistible pop energy into Basile3’s You Stole the Summer. In these cases, the remix reinvents the original track and opens it up to a new audience.
Other remixers prefer to work along the edges, at the crossroads of subgenres, highlighting highly specific know-how tied to the history of electronic music, but also to academic or improvised traditions. When the legendary Akufen takes on Philip Glass’s Metamorphosis as performed by Bruce Brubaker, he reveals an unexpected dimension where jazz seems to merge with the sacred. Clara Moto and Tyler Pope, meanwhile, shift Rone’s Belleville into the realm of buoyant, escapist nu-disco—a distinctive piece in the InFiné catalogue that has aged remarkably well.
Remixes have often served as a springboard for discovering new artists. This was the case with Downliners Sekt through their version of Cubenx’s These Days. Kaito delivered a luminous take on Rone’s Motion, offering a perfect entry point into the Japanese producer’s sensitive universe. More recently, Toh Imago and Nathan Micay transformed La Napoule into a visceral journey, where harmonies emerge through the cries of seagulls.
And then there are remixes that push a track so far it seems to belong to another world entirely. Such as Abul Mogard’s reworking of Carl Craig’s iconic At Les—still allegedly a retired Serbian man—where the original nearly vanishes behind an entirely new sonic architecture.
Expect some very beautiful surprises on upcoming EPs from Vanessa Wagner, Nathan Fake, Rone, as well as Julianna Barwick and Mary Lattimore. In the meantime, we invite you to discover or revisit our InFiné Remixes playlist, featuring around fifty tracks available on streaming platforms, along with a digital pay-what-you-want compilation and a selection of archival 12” records on our dedicated Bandcamp page.