Toni Rios
Toni Rios was born on October 13th 1971 in Wetzlar
In 1992, Toni takes the opportunity to play in Miami at the 'Halloween Rave' and in several clubs, making a quite good impression at his first gigs abroad. The first booking for the young Spaniard in the Techno stronghold of Frankfurt/Main takes place at the Music Hall just a year later. However, becoming part of the Frankfurt community didn't happen by playing so much but rather by Toni's profession: working for a textile company, he got to know the distribution manager of Sven Väth's label Eye Q. Soon he switched and started working for the then most important german Techno Label, combining music and job in an ideal way.
It appears evident that Toni soon starts to host occasional nights at the Omen, being well known for his technical skills as well as for his excellent music taste. Here, in Sven Väth's 'living room', Toni learns to lead a crowd through the night and refines his skills. He remains an essential part of the Omen Nights until the closing in 1998, having been Resident DJ from 1995 on and cementing his position as one of the four or five big names in Frankfurt Techno. The Berlin Love Parade sees his appearance for the first time in 1995, so does cult club Tresor and from then on, Berlin is part of each year's schedule.
After the end of the Omen, Toni was offered a new chance: Sven Väth gets him not only as an artist for his Cocoon booking agency but also asked him some time later to take the responsibility upon Cocoon Recordings, together with Pauli Steinbach. It soon became obvious that Toni could not do this job properly without neglecting his work as a DJ, because meanwhile, the amount of his bookings had reached an extent that didn't leave space for another job: His name appears on flyers all over Germany and the neighboring countries. He also plays in regions more far away, such as Spain, UK, USA, Dominican Republic, South America, Far East. In 1998, Toni plays in Ibiza for the first time – at least since then is he 'first choice' in the clubs and at the big festivals such as I Love Techno, Dance Valley, Mayday, Nature One und Rave on Snow.
Putting records on and mixing them was not enough for Toni Rios. Together with others (among them Chris Liebing) he founds 'Soap Rec.' in 1995, a platform for other artists as well as for himself. More recordings for Harthouse and other labels follow. Since 1998, Toni is working in the studio mainly with one musician: Jörg W. Henze, co-founder of Frankfurt record shop Delirium as well as distributor Neuton. It seems that in Jörg, Toni has found an ideal partner, and the result of this collaboration is Toni's first Artist Album Danzá Electrónicà on Jörg Henze's label Federation of Drums. The tooly record did strike a chord and colleagues such as Pascal FEOS and Chris Liebing have made remixes. The good musical relation between the both is manifesting in the foundation of the common label of the same name: Danzá Electrónicà.
After his Album Tour in 2001, Toni wanted to step forward (and back, somehow): together with his long time companion Frank Lorber, they appear behind the decks as Tony Montana & Lobby Lobster, playing House Classics and Tech House.
In 2003, Toni Rios is releasing his second Artist Album Kiss and with this record, he shows the wide range of his sound: from groovy to dark, from minimal to driving-percussive, from technoid to electro. Kiss is to be released at the end of January of 2003.
His current 12" release 'Duende', which he produced together with Martin Eyerer, is available in all record and internet stores. Since the end of 2006, Toni Rios is again working together with André Walter (who is the ex-producer von Chris Liebing), with whom he already produced his very first releases for Eye Q and Harthouse.
Besides that, new tracks of Toni are to be released on Speicher 51 EP on Kompakt, further releases on this label are already planned. In autumn, a new 12" is coming on LoFi Stereo, the label of CocoonClub co-resident C-Rock, as well as several remixes for miscellaneous labels. And some new longplay material is also in sight: currently, Toni is working on his new album.
