[Interview]
Music is continuously evolving; whether it’s rock, rap, or dance, genres continuously cycle through artists, and time stops for nobody. To gain toughness as a musician is a wonderful accomplishment, especially in dance music, wherein the marketing cycle could be very unmarried driven, and tastes and tendencies are constantly changing. One act that has accomplished this reputation needs to be W&W. Hailing from the EDM hotbed. This is the Netherlands; W&W has controlled to stand out from the gang over the higher part of this decade.
Ward van der Horst and Willem van Hanegem were some of the early pioneers of the EDM movement that rode into the US around 2013. They produced big tracks like “Bigfoot,” “The Code” with Ummet Ozcan, “Don’t Stop the Madness” with Hardwell, “Rocket” with Blasterjaxx, and perhaps their most iconic track, “Rave After Rave.” Through their manufacturing prowess and consistent journeying schedule, it’s easy enough to trap a W&W set, whether or not it’s at EDC, Ultra, or Tomorrowland.
Ward and Willem currently rebranded their label and aesthetic as Rave Culture with the accompanying identification of the song and a slew of latest releases, which have visible them dabble in psytrance and hardcore, as well as collaborate with some of the largest names in the industry, and their near buddies, Armin van Buuren and Dimitri Vegas & Like Mike. We got the risk of sitting down and talking with Ward and Willem before their set at EDC Las Vegas more than one week ago. I spoke to them about Rave Culture and the evolution of their sound, and they were relatively enthusiastic, sharing their thoughts with us. Here’s our distinctive Interview with W&W:
Tell me about the rebrand and Rave Culture and what the origins are.
Willem: “A lot of things are true. We used to have Mainstage Music, and the song we sang became pigeonholed in that sound. With Rave Culture, Rave is bigger than most effective EDM or trance.”
Ward: “We have a few truely cool techy-stuff developing.”
Willem: “But, additionally, several humans need us to host the second degree, so you couldn’t have a Mainstage 2nd level. We have a network following, like a culture, because of them. It’s like an ode to them.”
Ward: “They already created this Mainstage family.”
Willem: “We didn’t even understand about them; they confirmed most of these businesses with all of the songs we’re not releasing.”
Ward: “A massive WhatsApp organization, it’s also one hundred% natural.”
Willem: “That stimulated us to try this, the whole movie, “That leaves you men open to pursuing new sounds; you’re no longer pigeonholed into one style. Tell me about the belongings you men have been experimenting with; I recognize there’s been plenty of psytrance.
Willem: “Last year, we did a psytrance collaboration with Vini Vici; we did one with Maurice West, which is also greater psy-ish, futuristic. Because with Vini Vici, we did extra tribal, that form of sound, the sci-fi one is with Maurice West, to balance it out. And recently we’ve been coming returned to those old Eurodance days, like while we have been young, like ‘God is a Girl'”
Ward: “Very uptempo.”
Willem: “Nostalgic, here they call it techno; however, for us, it’s referred to as ‘German palms-up.’ Because while we were young, those songs were played in the club. The funny component of approximately ‘God is a Girl’ is that I desired to have that track when I was young, but it was constantly played inside the membership, and you didn’t have Shazam return then. The DJs had been dicks back then; I got here as much as them. Can you tell me which tune? Nope, they ignored me? We’ve been doing quite a few hairstyles properly. The final year was the only one with Darren Styles. They call it UK hardcore; it has the energy of hardstyle, but it’s like a softer kick.”
Ward: “Yeah, it’s extra happy.”
Willem: “So, every 12 months, we attempt to dive into a number of the styles we love that might be new, and of course, we do the energetic major stage huge room and trance. That’s what we continually do. We always try and change it up; we don’t need to play the same set each year.”
Ward: “We continually need to do more trancey stuff. If you work at the same stuff the whole time, it gets boring, so it’s first-rate to switch between all the distinctive projects.”
Willem: “We love to supply; we are able to’t just make one sound.”
Ward: “After two days of producing a big room or something, you name it, it’s like, oh, let’s do some trance once more, and after every week of trance, like, allows get this performed.”Tell me how you guys have provided you with your timetable of collaborations. There’s been stuff with Armin van Buuren and the new tune with Blasterjaxx. How have you ever been lining that stuff up?
Willem: “The Blasterjaxx one, they sent to a demo to us, and we were like, this is unwell, permit’s paintings in this. And the Armin one, we despatched a demo to Armin for Ultra, and he turned into, like, I already finished my set, but I love this a lot.”
Ward: “He became stressed out because he felt like I hadn’t any room in my set for this, so I needed to cut something out. I sincerely feel sorry for the track that couldn’t make it; a few guys became excited; he will play my music.”
Willem: “But, yeah, we’re all buddies, and we share a variety of demos; if we feel like this has a few Armin vibes, we’ll ship it to Armin, Blasterjaxx will. Do it with us.”
- Ward: “The one we did with Dimi & Mike, there was a tiny setup.”
- Willem: “Yeah, Armin and Dimi started, looped us in, after which we all labored together on it.”
- Ward: “It’s all a minimal network.”
- Willem: “It’s now not like we plan, permit’s do a tune collectively, something starts offevolved, and we simply share it around.”We’re right here at EDC Las Vegas; what does it mean to be gambling right here on the optimal North American dance song competition? How does it experience to be on that primary stage?
Ward “Great”
Willem: “Amazing, EDC usually became one of the festivals we wanted to play while we started. There are always a few galas we need to play every 12 months, this and Tomorrow Land, those fairs we want to play for the revelry.
Ward: “A festival like this is sincerely tough to locate elsewhere. It’s simply pIt’scular in many aspects—the place, the production. When you walk around right here, you seem to be in a specific international. It makes it very unique.