Derry isn’t the city most people associate with underground dance music but for L.A. DYSTO, that’s exactly the point. Built around the core trio of Jonny Mac, Steky and Shay in Derry, with vocalist Theo recording from a home studio in Ibiza, the outfit has spent years weaving punk, dub, acid house and trip hop into a sound that refuses to sit still.
Their latest release, Peace, Love & Ecstasy, began life as Jonny’s lockdown rant against leaders more interested in banks and wars than poverty and rising rents, grew into a two-sided statement, paired with a stripped-back, first-person flip of Robert Palmer’s “Addicted to Love.” With remixes from Viper Patrol, HiFi Sean and Chris Massey already out, and more incoming from Jordan Nocturne, Timmy Stewart and Defex, we caught up with the band to talk protest songs, remote studio sessions, growing up amid the Troubles, and why they’re not interested in AI writing their music.
Peace, Love & Ecstasy feels like a real journey across its different sections. Can you tell us about the inspiration behind it and how it came together?
Jonny: It was my rant during the lockdown in 2020. I wrote the original lyrics about how leaders across the globe were out to take everything they can for themselves at whatever cost to humanity, the most important thing to them is looking out for the banks and funding wars, not fixing global poverty and rent increases.We got the music sorted and laid down a demo for Theo, he came over to Derry from Ibiza.
Theo: It’s easy for people to take their eye off the ball of what’s happening in the real world, with the cult of social media and disinformation , when what we really need is a third summer of love. We’ve all been pulled in different directions, by divisive leaders and press .
Jonny: For the B side, we’d a few hours left on the day in the studio and for over 20 years I’d wanted to flip Robert Palmer’s Addicted to Love, lyrically it’s so obvious and literally takes a few words to put it on the path of the addict who is still awake on Tuesday morning when everyone else has long left the party, Theo has nailed it vocally and you can hear the Northerner with despair in his voice.
Theo: I changed the lyrics to first person and Jonny was my director of how to make the vocals sound.
Listening to the lyrics and the overall arc of the EP, it feels like there’s something being said beyond just the dancefloor. Is there a message you’re trying to get across with this release, and what do you hope people take away from it?
Theo: Just planting the seed in peoples head about our actions. Our rights are being stripped away whilst we pout in our echo chambers. It’s a peace song. I’ve had so many people talk to me about ‘addicted’ who say that it’s caused them to think about their own relationship with drugs and alcohol. Lyrics to help make the world a better place without ramming it down people’s throats.
Jonny: It’s the reality check the world and industry needs. Mr X on The Simpsons got it right all those years ago “There’s a bunch of creeps on an island somewhere who are secretly running the world”.
Jonny Mac, Steky and Shay are based in Derry, while Theo’s out in Ibiza. How does that distance actually work in practice? Are you sending ideas back and forth remotely, or do you make sure to get in a room together for the important stuff?
Jonny: The three of us in Derry / Ireland are the core set up of L.A. DYSTO with myself (Jonny) and Steky fronting the DJ side of it on a whole as well as the production side with Shay. 80% of the L.A. DYSTO sound is aimed at the weird and wonky, low strung, punky crowds. The 20% that needs lyrics and vocals, we send over to Theo.
Theo: I have a little vocal booth at my home in Ibiza. Jonny sends me things over, I record and it’s to-and-fro. However, for the final recordings, were all in the same room at Celtronic in Derry.
The EP comes with some big remixes. How involved were you in choosing who got to remix the tracks and what do you think about these new versions?
Jonny: We let the label pick the remixers initially. We know Viper Patrol from here and knew what we were getting, he nailed it so the label got it right. We had no connection to HiFi Sean but he really has delivered a raw slice of acid for those late night basements. Thankfully. Chris from the label’s wife liked the original of Addicted and kept at Chris to remix it. It’s got that Manc swagger of the early Northside meets New Order, a massive win in our eyes. Though it’s not stopping there, Next month we have 2 more remixes. Jordan Nocturne and Timmy Stewart also from Belfast and good friends of ours have turned in A TNI remix so we can’t with to drop that, Also Defex from Ibiza who’s a resident at Pikes, 528 and DJ’s across Europe has taken Addicted into the Tech House arena and is dropping a seriously heavy remix.
Theo: I’m very chuffed with all the remixes, trust in Chris Massey at Sprechen, he has an incredible ear for music and knows some pretty amazing producers.
Take us back to the beginning… What first pulled each of you into making music, and was there a specific moment you realized this was going to be more than just a hobby?
Jonny: When I (Jonny) was 11 my Mum passed away and I just lost all interest, a few weeks later Depeche Mode came to Belfast on the Black Celebration tour and I got to go with the youth club, I left that gig and decided to do something in music,I bought a bass guitar and got stuck in, Hooky from New Order has always been the greatest so along with my friend Maxi who bout a Keyboard and later a sequencer we got our heads down and ignored the daily bombings and shootings on the streets on Ireland.
Steky: It all started with a love of music and digging for records. We were always on the hunt for tracks that sounded a bit different from everyone else. I’ve been DJing since 1991, so it’s been a part of his life for as long as I can remember. There wasn’t really a moment where we thought, “Right, this is it.” It just grew over the years. One gig led to another for decades, then production then L.A. DYSTO. Before I knew it, it had gone from a hobby to something I couldn’t imagine not doing.
Shay: I (started DJing when I was around 11 years old. It began as an escape, but I quickly became obsessed with discovering music. Production came later because I wanted to create my own music, not just play other people’s. There wasn’t one moment when it became more than a hobby. It happened naturally through years of DJing, producing and working on different projects. Now I work full time in music as the inhouse engineer at Celtronic Studios in Derry, and what started as an escape has become my career, It was through this that Jonny & Steky came in to Celtronic with a few ideas and after the 1st session we all felt like this was a fresh sound that we could all get behind so 2 became 3.
Theo: There has never been a time without music. My mum is an incredible singer, my Uncle Vinny, who was 12 years older than me, indoctrinated me into Soft Cell, Depeche Mode, Yazoo at a young age. He was an incredible piano and flute player.
Your sound pulls from a lot of different places: old-school club culture, disco, house, even a bit of punk energy. How would you describe your influences, and how has your sound shifted since you first started working together?
Jonny: Looking at our record collections, there’s a lot of Punk, Ska, Reggae & Dub, NuWave Pop, Industrial, Grunge Hip Hop, Indie,old funk and hip hop, and disco. Then you have the likes of Pink Floyd, The Doors, Zappa and anything else that pretty much was against the mainstream sounds.
Add in Andrew Weatherall, Laurent Garnier and then the trip hop vibes in amongst the techno and acid house. I wouldn’t say our sound has shifted, it just sort of weaves its way when we get into the studio, it would be pretty boring to rely on the same old formula every time, retaining our roots is more important than chasing trends.
Theo: I can sing in a lot of different styles and in 3 octaves. I draw from Andy Bell, Dave Gahan, Alison Moyet, Bill Withers and Marc Almond more than Manc stalwarts like Liam and Ian Brown.
Derry isn’t the first city people think of when they picture a house or dance music scene. What’s it like making this kind of music there, and how has the local scene shaped who you are as artists?
Jonny: Derry had the Celtronic Festival for 25 years and the cream of the worlds DJ’s and live acts performed across the city during the week long party and it wasn’t the usual suspects but the cream of underground. You’ve David Holmes, Phil Kieran (Who’s just remixed our Covortex track) and the likes of Viper Patrol all up in Belfast, but we sail our own ship up the river Foyle.
Theo: I was amazed when I went there for the first time last year. Peace Love and Ecstasy is a protest song at the end of the day and where better to record a protest song than Derry?People have been through a lot there but they are forward thinking. And there’s music in almost every bar
AI is a hot topic in music production right now. Where do you stand on it, is it a tool you’d consider using, or does it feel at odds with how you like to make music?
Jonny: It’s a great tool for say cleaning up a sample but as for it playing a role in music it’s a no from me.
Theo: It’s funny, AI has started to plagiarize from me, both in terms of lyrics and in my day job, writing about electronic music for Suess Media.
What advice would you give to producers and DJs just starting out who are trying to find their own sound and break into the scene?
Jonny: Keep your head down and just believe in your sound, on a whole don’t follow trends. Remember those lanes are busy with everyone sounding the same, be yourself no matter who that is and you’ll stand out and shine way brighter than the many thousands chasing fame and insta likes.
Theo: A good writer reads a lot of books from different genres. A good musician listens to a large and diverse range of music.
Any exciting plans for 2026 that you’d like to share with us?
To date we’ve remixed 2 classics in Thrill Me & Hide U gaining support from Catz & Dogz, Purple Disco Machine, with those remixes being so well received we went into overdrive and banged out loads of music. In May we released the Covortex ep on Nein which has a remix from Phil Kieran that’s getting massive support from Sean Johnston. Justin Strauss and many others.
Peace, Love and Ecstasy Ep Ft Theo Suess on Sprechen followed in June and is making lots of noise. We have another ep Never Be Normal in September on Paisley Dark, a remix of Belfast Child for Valiant Kings on Astir called Echoes of Belfast and another due in October on Pets Recordings called The Acid Freq’s Society as well as one due by the end of the year on Hearce,
Were just back from a week in Ibiza and are heading back in September and October for another run of gigs and have our ongoing Frequency parties at Sandinos in Derry as well as the Frequency Show on Ibiza Sonica Radio on the 1st Monday of the month as well as it going out on Radio Starr outta Belfast at the end of the month, then we have several unfinished eps that we are working on and Theo is playing about with a few of them in Ibiza before recording them, maybe back in Derry or Ibiza who knows.
Check out L.A. DYSTO’s Guest Mix for In The Basement here