By now, Ferry Corsten fans will be familiar with the storm in a teacup around the producer’s recent single Check It Out. Unashamedly mainstage-ready and with a distinct pop lining, the track was met with vocal resistance from a fleet of Ferry’s followers. The bad buzz led to the Dutchman writing a lengthy Facebook post addressing the criticism. This week, inthemix got on the phone to Corsten to talk about his frustrations at the fans who want to keep him “in a box”.

“In dance music, the boundaries are disappearing,” he said. “There are still a lot of people left with a very narrow-minded view, and I was getting frustrated with all the idiots out there with so much to say about something that’s a bit out of the box. If we all start listening to people like that, then dance music will die. I’ve always been very diverse, and if people know me as a trance DJ that’s fine, but before that I’ve done everything from hardcore to drum & bass to ambient to techno.”

What jilted fans seemed to be worried about, though, was not Corsten’s desire to experiment, but the possibility that he was drifting into ‘trouse’ territory – or calculatingly doing a Swedish House Mafia. What does he make of that?

“Fair enough that they compare it,” Corsten replied. “Some of the big trance guys have stepped away from the trance sound, and I sense a bit of fear that I would do the same. I’ve always been in and around trance, my sound has always been melodic, and I’ve stepped away, then come back again.

“There’s so much more interesting music than just trance. I mean, house is combining a lot of trance elements. What the Swedish House Mafia did with One is nothing new. They just took a big trance riff and put it into a house track. So now if I do the same I’m copying the House Mafia?”

That’s probably the final word in this story, but there’ll be plenty more Ferry to come when his artist album arrives just in time for Stereosonic 2011.