These days acclaimed techno producer Charles Siegling may be more Pompidou than Bank of China, but he tells Oliver Clasper why he just can't let go of this city

Born and raised in Paris, Charles Siegling first moved to Hong Kong in 1995 after meeting fellow electronic music afficionado Amil Khan. Along with Khan, a Hongkonger of Pakistani and Japanese heritage, they started Technasia records and a production duo of the same name. Two powerful and timeless singles, Hydra and Force, released at the turn of the new millennium, were followed up by a debut LP in 2001 entitled Future Mix, followed by a second, Popsoda, in 2006.

Fast forward two more years, and Siegling and Khan parted ways (musically not personally) with Siegling taking on sole responsibility for Technasia as a musical outfit. “The last few years I could tell he [Khan] was going away, little by little, from the whole thing. We still run the label together, but he’s not part of Technasia anymore.” Siegling then returned to Paris, where he now resides. It seemed, momentarily, as if the Hong Kong connection had been interrupted.

But then, last month, up popped a third LP, Central. With the cover art depicting Kong Kong’s most recognisable MTR station – replete with intricate red tiles and the bilingual station name – there is no doubt where Seigling’s affection still lies. And as he admits with resplendent pride, the new album was “mastered in Paris, but born in Hong Kong.”

Today Siegling still courts Khan for advice and support, another link that remains unbroken: “I always send him demos, loops and anything I do. You know, 15 years of working together with him I can’t completely do things on my own.” He also continues to travel to Hong Kong every few months, in between playing his hugely popular live sets across the world, from London’s Fabric and Tokyo’s Womb to Berlin’s Berghain. It seems it can’t be stated enough that the new LP is very much a marriage between the sounds emanating from Europe and the ingrained inspiration that Siegling derives from repeat visits “back home” to Hong Kong.

And musically there has been progression as well as a certain familiarity. The three LPs do not differ much in their sound, in their drive, or in their mood: a classic concoction of dark, minimal techno and uplifting soaring house that moves and mutates. It’s dance floor and chilled at the same time – like the best electronic records. But Siegling, like most true artists, is reluctant to pigeonhole himself, amiably describing Technasia’s sound as “something different. Something like a fusion. A bit more funky, a bit more exotic.” As if on the crest of a new wave he also acknowledges that this more soulful, uplifting sound is making something of a renaissance of late: “The last four or five years there were a lot of dark sounds in dance music. Now the 90s old school is getting more popular again. It’s happy, it’s positive.” It is somewhere between these two moods that forms the central spine of the new LP.

But it’s not all sweetness and light. One of the most surprising contradictions of this agreeable interpretation of Technasia being “of Hong Kong” is that these days Technasia rarely, if ever, plays here. From here the conversation drifts from the positive reception of the new LP (“I think it’s the most acclaimed album I have done”) to the oft-heard frustration with the indigenous clubbing scene. It is something that has had a very clear effect on Siegling who, much like another doyen of the Hong Kong creative scene, Wong Kar-wai, has enjoyed considerably more success outside than in: “It’s not the limit of the actual venues. It’s not the limit of the management or the DJs. It’s the limit of Hong Kong, simple as that. It never worked here, never worked in China. There’s no culture of being on the dance floor and raving.”

Yet this image of an artist at once content and then frustrated is one we are all too familiar with. There is a constant pull between Paris and Hong Kong (without a shred of irony, Siegling says: “in Hong Kong people come and they go”), but it seems that whatever happens, Siegling is sure the Franco-Asian production will prevail. “Hong Kong is the centre of my life. Without this place I would never have been able to do everything I did.”

As he sits in a small café in Soho, reminiscing about the days of being wild, and with a new LP that has this city written all over, it is clear that you can take the artist out of Hong Kong, but you can’t take Hong Kong out of the artist.

Central (Technasia Records) is out now in all good record stores.