[Interview]
Music is continuously evolving; whether it’s rock, rap, dance, genres are continuously cycling thru artists, 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 of the acts that have 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 had been some of the early pioneers of the EDM movement that rode into the US round 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 identify 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 talked to them about Rave Culture and the evolution of their sound, and they had been relatively enthusiastic, sharing their thoughts with us. Here’s our distinctive interview with W&W:
Tell me approximately the rebrand, tell me approximately Rave Culture, what have been the origins?
Willem: “A lot of things truely, we used to have Mainstage Music, and the song that we signed became pigeon-holed as that form of sound. With Rave Culture, Rave is something bigger than most effective EDM or trance.”
Ward: “We have a few truely cool techy-stuff developing.”
Willem: “But, like additionally, several humans need us to host the second one degree, you could’t have a Mainstage 2nd level. We have like a network following, like a culture, because of them. Like an ode to them.”
Ward: “They already created this Mainstage family.”
Willem: “We didn’t even understand approximately them; they confirmed us a majority of these businesses, with all of the songs that we’re not releasing.”
Ward: “A massive WhatsApp organization, it’s also pure one hundred% natural.”
Willem: “That stimulated us additionally to try this, the whole movie.”
That leaves you men open to pursue new sounds; you’re no longer pigeonholed into one style. Tell me approximately the belongings you men have been experimenting with; I recognize there’s been plenty of psytrance?
Willem: “The last yr 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. To be honest, the funny component of approximately ‘God is a Girl’ is I desired to have that track when I became like eleven. But it becomes constantly played inside the membership, and you didn’t have Shazam returned then. The DJs had been dicks back then; I got here as much as them. Are you able to tell me which tune? Nope, they ignored me? We’ve been doing quite a few hardstyle as properly, the final year the only with Darren Styles, they call it UK hardcore, it has the energy of hardstyle, however 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 which 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 equal set each year.”
Ward: “We continually need with a view to perform a little bit extra trancey stuff, if you most effective work at the identical sort of stuff the whole time, it receives boring, so it’s first-rate to interchange round among all the distinctive projects.”
Willem: “We love to supply; we are able to’t just make one sound.”
Ward: “After two days of producing 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 collabs; there’s been stuff with Armin van Buuren, the new tune with Blasterjaxx; how have you ever men 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 changed into stressing out because he becomes like I haven’t any room in my set for this, I need to cut something out. I sincerely feel sorry for the track that couldn’t make it; a few guys turned into really excited, he’s going to 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 all of us 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 becomes one of the festivals we wanted to play while we started. There’s always a few gala’s we need to play every 12 months, this and Tomorrow Land, those fairs we want to play for the revel in.
Ward “A festival like this is sincerely tough to locate anywhere else in the global, it’s simply particular in so many aspects, the place, the production. When you walk around right here, it seems like you’re in a specific international. It makes it very unique.