This past weekend, the sixth annual Brooklyn Electronic Music Festival took over Williamsburg, bringing together national and international musicians––both lesser known and well-established––to New York City. We check in with some of our favorite featured artists for a fresh round of Sound Checks.
Anyone who quotes High Fidelity earns a spot in my good books, especially when that person is a predominantly hip-hop-based electronic musician. As I chatted with UK-based producer and DJ Star Slinger—in the hidden bar at the back of Brooklyn's Output club—we got past his reputation as the "King of Sampling" and got to know Darren Williams, a soulful, charming, pop music lover. Check out our pre-show conversation below, about bribes, kale salad, and making music the old-school way.
Photos by Alexander Attar
Grace Wang: I loved the mixtape you made for the festival. What’s your go-to track when things are heating up?
Darren Williams: Some of my faster stuff, like "Take This Up," because it’s half hip-hop and half house. It has this cool moment where people speed up and start dancing.
Your remix of Gold Panda’s "Marriage" was great! What elements of a track make you want to remix it?
Mainly the melody. When I first met my manager he tried to bribe me with a Gold Panda vinyl I really liked. But I told him he wouldn't have to bribe me if I could just remix "Marriage."
How do you usually approach mixing a track?
I used to do a lot of sampling, and I didn’t have access to the different parts of a song—the vocals, the drums—so when I first started remixing it was more of a rogue thing, taking the original track as a whole. I still do that now because it’s more old-school and it's different to what everyone else does. Even if I do make a house track I still want it to be in that Neanderthal kind of way.
I loved that you sampled Atlantic Starr. What are some of your other favorite soul and R&B artists?
Anita Baker and Luther Vandross. I like to find the best in a bad bunch, making something out of a track that isn't huge.
I hear that you make a lot of your music on tour.
I like to figure out what people want to hear. Recently I chopped up a Sade song because I hadn’t heard anyone do that. There’s so much music that sounds like her's these days so I took the weirdest of her work and turned it into a dance track.
Do you think it’s important for you to change and progress in order to keep up with the electronic music scene?
It goes back to that Nick Hornby quote from High Fidelity: "Do I listen to pop music because I’m miserable, or am I miserable because I listen to pop music?" I’ve always been drawn to what’s now. It’s like being a fashion designer: you’re not going to stick with what was fashionable last year, you’re going to do something else. But even though I’m changing my style I’m not changing my influences.
If your music were a soundtrack to a film, what would it be?
White Men Can’t Jump
What’s the best tour food you’ve had?
Gumbo from New Orleans. Today I ate a kale salad and drank a big juice, and I feel so good. If you fed every
Anyone who quotes High Fidelity earns a spot in my good books, especially when that person is a predominantly hip-hop-based electronic musician. As I chatted with UK-based producer and DJ Star Slinger—in the hidden bar at the back of Brooklyn's Output club—we got past his reputation as the "King of Sampling" and got to know Darren Williams, a soulful, charming, pop music lover. Check out our pre-show conversation below, about bribes, kale salad, and making music the old-school way.
Photos by Alexander Attar
Grace Wang: I loved the mixtape you made for the festival. What’s your go-to track when things are heating up?
Darren Williams: Some of my faster stuff, like "Take This Up," because it’s half hip-hop and half house. It has this cool moment where people speed up and start dancing.
Your remix of Gold Panda’s "Marriage" was great! What elements of a track make you want to remix it?
Mainly the melody. When I first met my manager he tried to bribe me with a Gold Panda vinyl I really liked. But I told him he wouldn't have to bribe me if I could just remix "Marriage."
How do you usually approach mixing a track?
I used to do a lot of sampling, and I didn’t have access to the different parts of a song—the vocals, the drums—so when I first started remixing it was more of a rogue thing, taking the original track as a whole. I still do that now because it’s more old-school and it's different to what everyone else does. Even if I do make a house track I still want it to be in that Neanderthal kind of way.
I loved that you sampled Atlantic Starr. What are some of your other favorite soul and R&B artists?
Anita Baker and Luther Vandross. I like to find the best in a bad bunch, making something out of a track that isn't huge.
I hear that you make a lot of your music on tour.
I like to figure out what people want to hear. Recently I chopped up a Sade song because I hadn’t heard anyone do that. There’s so much music that sounds like her's these days so I took the weirdest of her work and turned it into a dance track.
Do you think it’s important for you to change and progress in order to keep up with the electronic music scene?
It goes back to that Nick Hornby quote from High Fidelity: "Do I listen to pop music because I’m miserable, or am I miserable because I listen to pop music?" I’ve always been drawn to what’s now. It’s like being a fashion designer: you’re not going to stick with what was fashionable last year, you’re going to do something else. But even though I’m changing my style I’m not changing my influences.
If your music were a soundtrack to a film, what would it be?
White Men Can’t Jump
What’s the best tour food you’ve had?
Gumbo from New Orleans. Today I ate a kale salad and drank a big juice, and I feel so good. If you fed every