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Aeyde Radio—Mix 10
In Conversation with Josef Laimon
"An Artist's Mystique"

Words: Whitney Wei
Date: 28.12.2025
The shapeshifting composer behind Aeyde's tenth anniversary performance finally allows himself to be perceived.

The drums clicked and echoed like metallic hooves, filling the room with tension. Disembodied vocals bubbled up like truncated moans underwater. Suddenly, these transformed into a siren song—only to be overtaken by a frenetic violin that sounded as if it were scribbling invisible hexes into the air. At Aeyde's 10th birthday, the experimental artist Josef Laimon took the music helm, having composed the score for "The Crone," a bespoke 15-minute performance by choreographer Sharon Eyal. What resulted was equal parts taut and haunting. The dancers, with their muddied ballet shoes, twitched like possessed marionette dolls through the venue's main hall. Laimon seemed to clench the atmosphere in his fist.

Not unlike the score he composed that late November night, Laimon is rather mysterious. There isn't much to be uncovered about him online, which is rare in the age of hyper visibility. One might be forgiven for thinking, as I did, that he was a novice. Rather, he's had well over a decade of experience, shapeshifting every five years or so—from touring in a Brit-pop-inspired band out of Tel Aviv in his late teens to becoming an electronic music DJ in his early twenties who "vanished quite quickly" within the excesses of Berlin. Now in his mid-thirties, he's moved to France, where he's dedicated himself to a daily studio practice with work that ends up in all sorts of decentralized monikers and alter egos—some belonging to him, but others, like his ghost productions of hard techno, claimed by others.

"This is a separation that's very important to me for some reason," he told me. "I get advice to not do that and put it all under my name, but I insist. Anything under my personal name, like under Josef Laimon, I want it to be something very specific." That specificity, perhaps, is his ambition for the next chapter of his maturing career, which involves scoring for dance, theatre, and his loftiest dream, film. Versatility and mutability are his greatest strengths.
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Image: Dan Shpigelman
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Image: Dan Shpigelman


For Aeyde's 10-year anniversary, Laimon presents a mix that delights in its own tinkering. He weaves his own original productions, like his score for "The Crone" and the track "DFU," which he created "as an imaginary score for a melancholic summer motion picture," alongside tracks by Speakers Corner Quartet and Sega Bodega. Overall, his selections show an affinity for weathered vocals and playful instrumentation, where off-kilter xylophones and toylike whirs all find a welcome home in his offering.
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Whitney Wei: Tell me about your musical influences growing up.

Josef Laimon: I had tons of influences. I think it was TV on the Radio, The Libertines. There were tons—a band called Foals. I was so into them. You know, all that [Brit pop] scene. Then, of course, there was my parents' influence. Ian Dury and, strangely enough, Supertramp. My dad was more into jazz like John Zorn and Steve Reich, so that's what I grew into. All these influences I'm talking about by my parents I didn't really love until after. Today they're still massive influences of mine.

Whitney Wei: Let's talk about your work with Sharon Eyal. Obviously you've gone through so many different iterations, working with various people in a band, then you were more solo through DJing, and now you're navigating a "high culture" space. How has working with her changed your relationship with music?

Josef Laimon: She has this unbelievable ear. Every time we work together and I—I don't know—let's say I use a kick drum for a split second, she feels everything. She has a great ear for that. We worked really closely. She inspired me to think differently, to not be afraid of specific things or to care about other things, and where to put my focus. Maybe the sound doesn't matter as much as the idea at times, so she inspired me to be ‘me’ much more than I've ever been and do things I never thought I could do.

Whitney Wei: It's interesting how someone else can inspire you to be more you, because you would think it would be the opposite.

Josef Laimon: For me, it's not strange. For me, it makes a lot of sense because a lot of the time we hide from ourselves or we're not aware, perhaps. But then someone just says, this is you and it's what you want to be, but you're not sure if it's what you are. So for me, it makes sense that someone can focus you to know—oh, this is who you are. If it feels right and you agree with it, then it is. Meeting her and her husband and her whole family really was great. It's something I cherish a lot and I feel grateful for. 


"Maybe the sound doesn't matter as much as the idea at times, so [Sharon Eyal] inspired me to be ‘me’ much more than I've ever been and do things I never thought I could do."

Whitney Wei: And you said that you've worked on four performances at this point, so The Crone was the fourth one.

Josef Laimon: The Crone was the fourth one, right. Two years ago, we worked in Stuttgart on a small piece, I think 15-minute piece. I joined that project by accident. See, Sharon was my neighbor for two years in the countryside in France. We knew each other, we became friends there, but we didn't start working together. Then I remember I had dinner with her husband one night, and she was away working in Stuttgart. He told me, yeah, they're a bit stuck with the music. So I offered just, honestly, from a pure place of like, oh, maybe you guys should try this and this. I think that could help you solve that. Then I ended up doing the piece somehow. I stayed there for, I think, 10 hours that night, and we just worked until 5 AM, had the best time, and it continued. We finished that piece, and then I was offered to do a full piece in the Gothenburg Opera House. I think that was a year later, maybe a bit less. I approached [this project], with tremendous fear, but of course I said yes. I always say yes if I'm interested.

Whitney Wei: What is your creative process like with Sharon?

Josef Laimon: Most of the meetings, we hear music and she always sends me inspirations she has—like pieces of music she likes or she feels are relevant to the piece. But most of the meetings we sit down in the garden connected to a bluetooth speaker and start creating. I like to come prepared for everything I do, so I come with a few sketches or demos and we listen to things I did years ago. I'm also always very scared of sharing my demos. I'm very confident sharing a final product, but sharing demos is something I'm very insecure about, but in that experience, I overcame that fear of it.

Then, if there's like a little bass line we like, we take that and a little nice drum loop from another piece and kind of put them together. That was a process more for The Crone actually, of listening to those small pieces and putting them together. But in general, we sit and we work for hours. It's pure joy. It's really just fun.

Whitney Wei: What are some things along the way that have helped you push through any kind of insecurities around your music?

Josef Laimon: That's a good question. There have been many, because, as I told you, I always say yes, and then I'm like, I have no idea how to do this. I have no clue. Then I struggle with that.

I think I've dealt with it better by going back and seeing what I have done. There are a lot of moments where you lack inspiration and confidence. I think most of the moments are like that in my life, at least. But then I have something to go back to and say, but wait a minute—look at what you've done recently.

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Whitney Wei: For The Crone, how would you describe the sound palette of the composition?

Josef Laimon: I used a lot of dry drums, a lot of original vocals, which were made by [Sharon's] son's friend, from one session from a year ago. A lot of my personal vocals are in there too. Some of the elements in The Crone were created a year and a half ago for the Gothenburg piece, which never made it because it completely changed the vibe. This time it fit a bit more when I got the theme, which was witches, and how the shoes were supposed to be as if they were covered in mud. Those references helped me a lot to understand where I'm going. So at the opening of The Crone, I was looking to create mud sounds and something that grows from the ground, and then it opens up and becomes a little bit prettier. Those were my guidelines there. A lot of witch voices coming out of the mud, I'd say.


“At the opening of The Crone, I was looking to create mud sounds and something that grows from the ground, and then it opens up and becomes a little bit prettier. ”

Whitney Wei: You are living in Paris now, but when you were living in the countryside, how did your relationship to music change? Most of the time, I would believe that when you're in a city, because you're consuming a lot of culture, you would be more inspired because you're with these artists, you're going out, you're seeing all sorts of things, but you're saying that this wasn't necessarily the case.

Josef Laimon: In the countryside, there's something about the silence and the peace and the fact that you have days sometimes without seeing other people. I think being alone and having a studio and waking up and all you do is just create—that's it. I think that inspired me because I had a moment to be with myself in the good times and the bad times like I never have before because my whole life has been in the city until now. When you're not distracted, you can really go deep inside, whether you want it or not, and find different ways of creating things.

I realized that I had been creating very different music there. More ambient music sometimes, and not necessarily with a beat or something I didn't allow myself to do. I always create, every day, all the time. Maybe in an unhealthy way sometimes. I always push. If I don't, I feel guilty.

That's why I find it hard to even sit and watch a full-length movie. I just feel guilty if I don't work and create. Every moment that you create, something special can happen. There is the fact that usually it doesn't, but it's a possibility. When I create a beautiful piece, in my opinion, I'm like, imagine if you wouldn't have opened your computer today.

Tracklist
Tracklist
Mix 10 by Josef Laimon is broadcasting on Aeyde Radio now.

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Aeyde Radio—Mix 09
In Conversation with KRMU

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