IN CONVERSATION WITH FELSMANN + TILEY
Interview by Samo Šajn
Felsmann + Tiley are a German producer duo known for their emotional, drum-free electronic sound. Formed by Dominik Felsmann and Patrick Tiley, they first met in Stuttgart in the early 2000s and later gained global attention through their reworks of tracks by artists like M83 and The Irrepressibles. Their upcoming album Protomensch, coming in February 2026, is their most ambitious project yet. A powerful mix of music, visuals, and ideas about life today.
How has your decision to stay anonymous shaped the way your music is received over the years?
Part of keeping a low profile was always about letting the music speak for itself, rather than our faces or personalities. That decision created space for the music to live its own life. It found its way into films, TV shows, exhibitions, fashion shows, and, maybe most importantly, into millions of very personal moments people shared online. Our anonymity allowed listeners to project their own imagination, memories, and thoughts into the work without us framing it for them.
With our new album Protomensch, this balance has shifted. There’s more we want to share, more context we want to provide, for example the album manifesto, music videos, or our immersive show. Even though this step has taken away some of the mystery behind F+T, it felt right to step out of the shadows and open up the world we’ve built.
The darker side of trance was your first common ground back in 2003. How much of that spirit still drives Protomensch?
A lot! When we first started making music together, epic synth riffs and dark melodies were at the core of our shared taste. Even though our palette has since expanded, that same underlying feeling still drives the music we make today. With Protomensch, some of the rougher tracks were directly shaped by those early influences. In fact, a few ideas had been sitting on hard drives for almost two decades before finally finding their place on this album.
What has leaving out drums and percussion added to your sound, and do you ever feel limited by it?
Just as we enjoy having concepts for our albums, we also approach the music itself in a concept-driven way. Not using drums has been part of the F+T identity since the very beginning. It shifts the focus toward melodies and textures to carry the emotional weight. Does it ever feel limiting? Yes, and that’s the point. Working within constraints sharpens your choices. We can always add more, but working with less puts the spotlight on the essentials, and that restraint often leads to deeper expression.
Your reinterpretations of tracks like M83’s Solitude have reached huge audiences. What draws you to rework certain songs?
It usually starts with hearing a song and thinking, “We would’ve done this differently,” or falling in love with a single element but not necessarily the rest of the track. We’re often drawn to pieces where we can sense an emotional core that could be reframed or magnified, or where we can add a different angle to the musical conversation. With Solitude it was that haunting, melancholic chorus. We wanted to give it more of a platform than it had in the original. With The Most Beautiful Boy it was about piecing together our favorite vocal moments into a new structure. And sometimes it’s simply that we’re huge fans of an artist and want to play with our favorite songs to see where they might lead us.
Protomensch is described as both an album and a statement. What do you hope listeners will take from it?
At its heart, Protomensch is about humanity’s paradox of being an idiotic genius, capable of innovation and empathy, but also of destruction and hate. We wanted to capture that absurd duality in music. The manifesto we released with Warum extends an invitation to existential inquiry, but as with all music, its meaning shifts depending on who is listening. What people take away is ultimately up to them, we don’t prescribe meaning. If the album sparks reflection on where we stand as humans, individually and collectively, then it has done its job. And if people simply enjoy the music for what it is, that’s equally rewarding to us.
Compared to Tempora, Weltschmerz, and Retrovision, where does Protomensch sit in your evolution as artists?
Every release has played a role in our musical journey. Tempora was us trying out the musical concept for the first time. Weltschmerz went deep into heavier emotional territory during Covid. Retrovision marked the beginning of creating songs with concrete visuals in mind.
With Protomensch, we brought together everything we’ve learned, but more importantly, we returned to what we originally envisioned for F+T. It’s essentially the album we dreamed of back in 2017 when we started the project. This time we finally had the network, support, and resources to expand into new territories, from songwriting to co-directing music videos to building an immersive live show. In that sense, it feels like our first real album, because it’s the first time we’ve been able to fully create what we always imagined F+T could be.
This album features more guest vocals than before. What did you want to explore by opening up your sound to other voices?
When working on reinterpretations, we always loved using vocals, so with Protomensch we wanted to try it ourselves. We chose artists whose voices felt instantly compelling, distinct in tone, with a strong emotional presence, and just as importantly, people we had an immediate personal connection with.
Bringing in other voices didn’t just add new layers to the music, it was also a way for us to grow as musicians and songwriters. Collaborating in that space pushed us to think differently about structure, lyrics, and emotional delivery, and the result is a record that feels more open and human than anything we’ve done before.
Can you share what stood out about your in-person collaboration with Danny Harley on Open Fields?
It was the first time we ever wrote a song with a vocalist for F+T, which already made the session feel special. Danny is our studio neighbor, a good friend, and we’ve always been huge fans of his music, but we hadn’t actually had the chance to collaborate before.
On the day of the session, he instantly understood what the song was about, how we wanted it to sound, and the moods and emotions it needed to carry. The very first scratch takes were already close to the finished version, and the whole thing was in the box in less than a day.
Even after hearing the track thousands of times, we still love how his voice pulls you in from the very first syllable and doesn’t let go until it fades into reverb. That sense of immediacy and immersion is exactly what we hoped for.
Your upcoming live shows are designed as immersive, seated experiences. What makes them different from a typical set?
An immersive show is something we’ve always wanted to do and how we want our music to be experienced live. When we started F+T, our initial idea was to perform concerts in movie theaters. The thought of a sit-down venue with a great sound system and a big screen felt like the perfect fit for our music (and still does!).
With Protomensch, we finally had the chance to bring that vision to life. We collaborated with dozens of creatives and built something we’re genuinely proud of. Earlier this year, we performed the show for the first time inside a huge infinity cove on a film stage. The space itself became part of the experience. The light show shifted the mood of the entire room, and a giant screen hovered above the audience, moving between abstract animations and full music videos. Instead of standing in a crowd, people lay on couches, and before the music even started there was a meditation session to set the tone. We played live versions of our songs and brought in several of the album’s vocalists, turning the performance into something that felt halfway between a concert, a film screening, and an art installation.
The combination of narrative, visuals, and performance turns it into a single, flowing work rather than just a sequence of songs. We’ll be posting a version of it on YouTube soon, with the hope of adding more live performances down the track.
Looking back at your journey, what moment feels like the biggest shift that set you on the path to where you are now?
It’s been an adventurous ride since the early 2000s, when we hauled synths across town on public transport between our bedroom setups, dreaming of being DJ superstars. There was never one big turning point, just a string of opportunities we chased, some leading nowhere, others opening unexpected doors.
That ride took us around the world as touring artists, through different styles of music, and into countless experiments. Through it all, we’ve stayed best friends. Every so often something sparks the next chapter, starting F+T, a track blowing up online, or replying to a random message that leads to collaborators who become long-term creative partners.
Looking back, it all fits together. No dramatic shifts, just curiosity and excitement carrying us forward. And right now, that ride has brought us to Protomensch, not the end of the story, but another launchpad for whatever comes next.
