Radio Helsinki: Colleen in conversation with Jukka Hätinen

On August 13th 2025, Colleen joined radio host Jukka Hätinen for an interview, which was part of Radio Helsinki’s Flow Festival recap.

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The interview can be heard here:

Jukan ja Lotan Flow

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[Jukka]

Yeah, Colleen Cosmo Murphy, welcome to Helsinki, welcome to Flow Festival and welcome to Radio Helsinki. Thank you so much. Now let's start with the radio.

 You have a long history broadcasting and DJing on radio. Can you give a couple of highlights on the top of your mind about that?

[Colleen]

Sure, I mean it was great starting in the radio when I was 14 years old, we had a high school radio station. But then in the 1980s, I was the first woman program director of WNYU, which was a really big college radio station. And that was just a really magical time in the 1980s, you know, to have like, be broadcasting in New York City, all this alternative music.

And after that, I landed a job in syndicated radio. And I interviewed loads of bands. And one of the highlights actually was interviewing Nirvana, the week that Nevermind came out.

It was incredible because I was a big Nirvana fan from college radio days, we all got the cassette of Nevermind. So they get the bounce cassette, and you knew it was just going to be huge, went to see them at their last small show in New York, I think it was the Marquee. And then they came over on the weekend to my studio.

And it was where I was working out of. And that was just a really incredible transitional moment for radio and America and music in general. So college radio, all of a sudden it became overground, and became more like alternative. 

They had a new alternative format. But then I got the club bug, and I started doing a house show and a soul show. And I had loads of guests up, I didn't mix myself.

But throughout the 90s, I had people like Little Louis, Rom Anthony, Louie Vega, Dmitri from Paris, Danny Krivet, Francois Kay, Joe Clouseau, David Mancuso, my, my dear mentor also came up and did a show, no interview, because he was too shy. And, and I would say the other major highlight was actually during the pandemic, strangely, because people were trapped inside their homes. And radio is such an amazing way to communicate with people.

And it reminded me that I am probably a broadcaster first. So I'm glad you asked that question first. But it was a great way to build community and to have musical conversations with people who were, you know, everyone was pretty stressed out and isolated. 

So broadcasting seemed especially important then.

[Jukka]

Well, radio is quite old media. But what do you think as a listener? What's the meaning of radio in 2020s?

[Colleen]

Well, the thing that's interesting now is that, you know, when I was growing up, it was all terrestrial radio, it was all even FM or AM frequency band. And now there's so many different radio stations, because it's online. So the key, you can be a lot more niche.

It's definitely a different way of operating because, you know, on the FM frequency or AM frequency, people could randomly find you, they were just tuning in their car, and they might discover house music for the first time. They weren't looking for it, it just happened to be there. Whereas online radio is a little different, because people are searching out the online radio stations, but it is much more niche, you know, you can really lock into something that's a lot more fine tuned.

So it's just a different, a different way of broadcasting.

[Jukka]

Well, another format you've known to praise is vinyl. So what is on a 12 inch wax that still fascinates you?

[Colleen]

Well, it's interesting. I mean, I do play digital as well. And I also play vinyl.

And the thing I love about vinyl is the actual object as part of it, because I have so much love for the object, if that makes sense. Like, I don't have any love for a series of ones and zeros, I might love the song, but I don't love the format. It's not like I go through my old hard drives looking for old tunes.

And then once I kind of played it, and it's on a hard drive, and it's kind of gone, whereas my record collections all around me, and I can kind of dig through like, Oh, I forgot about that. Oh, I forgot about that. And, you know, also the tangibility, holding it in your hand, the smell, the artwork, all of those things.

And digital nowadays can sound really great. I mean, we are, you know, do 24 bit, we could do higher sampling rates. There's also great DAX digital to analog converters that can really make the digital sound sound more analog.

But on the right system, and the right pressing, I mean, there's something about vinyl, it just has a certain kind of esoteric magic to it. Yeah.

[Jukka]

Have you done any crate digging in Finland now or before you've been here?

[Colleen]

I haven't this time. No, this time I went hiking yesterday in the mountain park. It was beautiful.

[Jukka]

Do you think we live in a culture of like devaluation of music happening? Because of the streaming services and stuff like that?

[Colleen]

100% I do believe that I think the artists are really suffering.

[Jukka]

Yeah.

[Colleen]

And you know, when I was growing up, people would sell so many records that get royalties. And now the streaming formats, they're a great way to discover music, there is a good thing about them. But I have unsubscribed from Spotify, because the you know, the owner is plowing hundreds of millions into AI weaponry.

And so you start to think this is what music has become a platform and a means of a way for someone to build weapons. It's crazy. It's like, it's really disheartening.

And you know, artists have to work so hard now to make a living. You know, it's all about performing, and they're not getting as much royalties from their sales, and they get next to nothing from streaming. And it's interesting because sometimes people expect music for free, they'll spend five euros, six euros on a cup of coffee.

But you know, they could spend four times that on an album. And I think, sadly, partially, that has to do with the invention of the mp3, I think did put music in terms of the artist's kind of remuneration, it kind of sunk us into a hole a little bit, very much so at that time, it's just because, you know, files are traded for free, and then people got used to music for free.

[Jukka]

Yeah. Do you have any tips, us music fans and listeners could do to, like, give the respect back to the artists?

[Colleen]

I always buy from Bandcamp where I can, because it's direct to the artist and to the independent label. So whenever I can, I always will buy digital or vinyl from there first. And I think this Bandcamp, I think it's fantastic, because it's just a means where artists can communicate or independent labels can communicate directly with their fans. 

And, you know, they get to keep the money.

[Jukka]

Well, you are releasing Balearic Breakfast No. 4 next month, I think, on Heavenly Records. Tell us a bit about the concept of those compilation albums.

[Colleen]

Sure. It arose out of a radio show I hosted for Worldwide FM, in which I continue to host on my Mixcloud Live every Tuesday from 10am to 12, British time. And, you know, Jeff from Heavenly Records is a really great guy. 

I mean, he's an independent label owner, he's been running an independent label for 35 years, I have a lot of respect for him. And he's also a music head. And he started following my Mixcloud and got into all the mixes and he wants to do a compilation.

But a lot of this older stuff I was playing is all owned by major labels. So I suggested why don't we do Balearic Breakfast because I also alongside the old stuff, I play some obscure old stuff, some less obscure old stuff, I play new things as well. And one of the concepts behind Balearic Breakfast is to reflect all the different kind of musical sounds that come on the show.

So it can go from ambient to something jazzy or spiritual jazz to disco to soul to house to more techie stuff to, you know, kind of more dancey kind of rock stuff. There's a lot of different things I try to get a lot of different sounds on. And then I try to look for three or four tracks that may be out of print that are difficult to get on vinyl.

And then the rest of it's all new stuff that hasn't come out on vinyl before. So I kind of go through all the records I've played on the show and I go through Bound Camp and I see which artists were only releasing digital because they can't afford to do vinyl. And then I get, you know, we do the vinyl for it.

So at least there's a, you know, anyone that is a vinyl lover can have that on vinyl. And then we do the compilation of the volumes on CD as well. So it's all physical format. There's no digital downloads. But I also love the artwork as well.

[Jukka]

It's beautiful.

[Colleen]

Oh, thank you. It's a beautiful series. It's Ardnex from Indonesia who does it.

[Jukka]

Yeah. How did the fourth edition turn out?

[Colleen]

Pardon?

[Jukka]

How did the fourth album turn out?

[Colleen]

I mean, I'm happy with it. You know, I kind of do something that I've moved on. I mean, I put this track list together probably end of last year. 

So now I'm like thinking, you know, I'm already thinking about another volume, which hopefully I'll get to do. And it's the same with remixes and things. I do it, I play it a bit and then I'm kind of on to the next thing.

So I'm always kind of looking forward, propelling forward and forward motion. But people seem to really love it that have heard it so far. So, yeah, I'm happy with it.

I'm proud of it.

[Jukka]

Yeah, there's a remix of Saint Etienne there. Tell us about it.

[Colleen]

I think it's really nice because I love Saint Etienne, Fox Bass Alpha when it came out, even though I was living in the States. It was a very British sound. I absolutely loved it.

Also on Heavenly Recordings. And they asked me to do a remix and they had put out an ambient album at the end of last year. So in a sense, there was like a wide open, you know, kind of invitation to translate that into whatever kind of music I wanted.

And I felt like a samba sound would be really nice. And I kind of went down a Dorothy Ashby trip because a friend of mine, Alina Zizhinska, she is a Ukrainian-Polish harpist and she's a big Ashby fan as well. And she plays beautifully.

And I think that Sarah Cracknell's voice has that kind of breathy sound that some of the Bossa Nova singers just doesn't have a big diva voice. Didn't make sense to make it a big soul track, you know, so it made more sense to have more of a laid back, samba-esque, you know, harp jazz kind of thing. And I'm really happy with it because, you know, I just used only a couple of the parts, the vocal and I think one other thing and the rest we all put we put in.

And I'm really happy with it. It was something I've never done before. I did one other song that was kind of mellow and samba-esque for Jacob Gurevich, Elevation and Minor, which was a bit similar.

But one thing I like to do is lots of different styles. So that was nice.

[Jukka]

Yeah. Another track you recently remixed is by The Cure. That you didn't do alone, but a couple of friends.

[Colleen]

Yeah, my friends, Joe Goddard of Hot Chip and Al Doyle of Hot Chip and LCD Sound System. And we're working on a project called Electric Eden and making new music, original tunes. But when I got the offer from Robert Smith, I couldn't believe it. 

There was a tight turnaround. I already had some studio time booked with the guys of Al and Joe. But I also thought their sound, because they do bridge that indie dance thing quite well, that they'd be the perfect partners to do it with.

And, you know, I went in with a load of ideas. And they're really fast and they had loads of ideas. And we really, I would say most of the track was done in one day.

And the rest was tweaks. It was just like, yeah. And I love working quickly when you're just fully inspired.

And it's not laboring over something like, oh, I don't know where to go. This goes, we had strong, it was a strong move, do it. And I'm really happy with it.

I mean, Robert Smith, when I listened to the stems, listening to his voice, he sounds great. And the original, he had drenched in reverb. And then we kept it dry.

And when I listened to everybody else's remixes, too, there's so many great remixes on that. Most people kept it dry. Because his voice sounds amazing.

Still sounds the same as it did in the 80s.

[Jukka]

So what are your plans with the Electric Eden project?

[Colleen]

Well, we finished two songs for the most part. We're also working with Alexis from Hot Chip and Lou Hayter. We've had some guests doing stuff, too. 

Justin Strauss joined us in the studio the other day. We have two tracks kind of done pretty much. We want to do one more because I didn't want to do one song and then you put it out.

And then trying to figure out our schedules to coordinate between LCD sound system, Hot Chip and my own stuff and Joe's solo stuff and Joe's other projects. Hot Chip have a new album coming out, too. There's loads of stuff going on.

It's hard to schedule studio time. So I thought, let's just get three things done. And then we can kind of put it out and we can work slower in terms of getting a fourth one.

And I don't know where it's going to go. But it's fun because I've just been doing remixes for the last... I stopped making original music maybe 10, 15 years ago.

It's just been remixes. And so I love collaboration. I love working with these guys.

They're so much fun to work with. They have great ideas. They're also really nice.

It's just so lovely. And it's inspiring.

[Jukka]

Well, the next question might be a bit difficult because there are so many good songs coming out all the time. But what would be your personal pick for the soundtrack of Summer 25?

[Colleen]

Oh, gosh, there's so many. This is one artist I've been playing a lot of. His name is Josh Ludlow, younger producer from the UK.

He's also in Make a Dance. And he's also in a group called Pigeon. And in fact, I think the last Balearic Breakfast compilation has one of his remixes of Pigeon, which is kind of long and psychedelic.

He's done a lot of great stuff. And I've been playing a lot of his stuff. And there's one song everyone keeps asking about.

I think it's called Push It Up. And it's just like a housey track. And it's weird.

I go through musical phases and I'm kind of in a house vibe again. I'll go through a disco vibe or I'll go through a rocky vibe, psychedelic rocky vibe. And now I'm back in a house vibe and kind of that classic kind of sounding house, which I was playing as it was coming out 35 years ago or over 35 years ago.

So it's really interesting that the younger generation are looking at that as a kind of a classic sound, you know. And yeah, I'm really into that. I'm really, really into it.

I always loved Joe Clausell's stuff. So anytime he has something, I think the Fatback Band I've been playing and Far Out Orchestra. And yeah, it's just loads of great stuff.

[Jukka]

Yeah. Well, you're hitting the stage here at Flow Festival in a bit and later tonight at Kaiku Club. What do you expect?

[Colleen]

Well, I love Kaiku Club. First of all, I love Little Tony. I have so much respect for him.

He has done such a great job in Helsinki and he has good taste in sound. So I love the Danley Sound System at Kaiku. I've played there a few times and it's such a great setup 

I love it as a club. I don't know what I'm going to do yet. I never know.

I have vinyl for that one. You know, you have to read the crowd, you read the room. So it's like, you know, I don't really know.

[Jukka]

Last year here at Flow Festival on Friday on the very same stage you're playing, Buddy and Soul played and you're playing today. And my question is, who would you book for next year's Flow to the same spot?

[Colleen]

For the same spot, I might book some of the younger DJs like Muscle Cars from New York or Lovey from New York or Tribio or Love Injection, like maybe some of the other artists that are coming through that are kind of the next people in this kind of deep house tradition from New York. That's who I would book because I think they're kind of the new sound of New York.

[Jukka]

Yeah. Thanks for your time, Colleen, and have a great festival.

[Colleen]

Thank you.