In the best moments of a club night, time vanishes. It’s taken out of the equation. To borrow from the writer Gertrude Stein: it’s when a groove is a groove is a groove. It must have been one of these transcendent hours that led techno maven Chaton to bestow a huge compliment. „Wandler is the best Swiss techno DJ“ the Geneva producer raved in October 2010, flanking his point by a dozen exclamation marks.

Needless to say, Chaton is no rambling prophet. When Michael Stutz AKA Wandler is in the groove, there’s hardly anything that can stop him. Having started to beatmix at the tender age of thirteen, Wandler’s spotless deep techno sets have graced not only his club residencies at the Zukunft and the Hive Club, but also countless gigs at venues like the Bar25 in Berlin, Batofar in Paris, the WMF in Berlin or the Registratur in Munich.

The head DJ of Zurich’s Motoguzzi label, it was the sound of Depeche Mode, Nitzer Ebb and the early Front 242 that made Wandler fall in love with electronic music. Plastikman and Studio 1 later intiated him to the sparse manners of minimal techno. Debuting in 2005 with the Tanzwut EP on Littlebig Recordings, Mr. Stutz has stepped up his release schedule of late: Three raw, clanging and intense EPs are to be released this spring on Motoguzzi, Kumquat and And then… . Plus, a joint collaboration with Mastra has crystallized into a staggering 12inch on Mike Shannon’s Cynosure imprint. You better believe the hype: Time is more than ripe for Wandler. Right, it’s that moment.

Text: Björn Schaeffner