No electronic music blog would be complete without a tribute to one of the most legendary duos of electro of all time: Daft Punk. Although they haven't produced a full album since the album Human After All in 2008, there have been rumors circulating about an album release this next spring and even a possible tour. Daft Punk was my first electronic love after my brother introduced me to them i grade school. Their hits like Aerodynamic and One More Time have over 40 plays each on my iTunes, and I am not ashamed to admit it. Daft Punk is always a crowd pleaser at parties, because the French duo was one of the first big electronic artists, and therefore, remarkable. If the tour rumors are true, my wallet better be prepared because there is no telling how much money I will be willing to shell out to see Daft Punk.
As I have said in my post about GRiZMATiK, one of the greatest things about electronic music is the fact that certain artists' music does not belong to any one genre or belongs to multiple genres. One artist has managed to create an entirely new genre for himself, with very few DJs even sounding remotely similar. Pretty Lights, or Derek Smith, is an electronic producer out of Colorado describes his own music as "glitchy hip-hop beats, buzzing synth lines, and vintage soul samples." Derek doesn't just produce music, he creates an experience for his audience, putting a stung emphasis on the production of his shows. If anyone has been to a Pretty Lights concert (including myself), we can tell you just how spectacular it is. Of course, you're there to hear his music and see him on stage mixing it, but you have to remember that his DJ name is "Pretty Lights." And what Pretty Lights they are. When I saw him at North Coast Music Festival, he had his usual light up "city" behind him, dazzling us with neon colors, lights, and visuals. Halfway through the show, he turned on the lasers and introduced a rainbow spectrum of light which was amazing to see in the Chicago night sky. Pretty Lights' record label, Pretty Lights music, is a testament to the previously mentioned "pay as you see fit" theory when it comes to downloading music, so all of his music is available for download on http://www.prettylightsmusic.com/
Please enjoy some of my favorite tracks and if you like them, feel free to download!
PS: Pretty Lights was the first (before Avicii and way before Flo Rida) to use the "good feeling" sample.
This year, we have seen the release of many EDM albums and mix tapes. In my opinion, one stands out among the rest of them as probably the best album of 2012: Zedd's first ever album, Clarity.
Zedd is a 23 year old electro-house producer from Germany who was actually classically trained in music as a child. Under the wing of dub step superstar Skrillex, Zedd has become an electro-sensation in it seems like no time at all. He has collaborated with EDM greats like Tiesto and recently worked with pop sensations such as Lady Gaga and Justin Bieber. His album transcends electronic music, combining heart-breaking melodies with dirty beat drops. Clarity is an album to listen to from start to finish, as his transitions from song to song are so clean that you can't even tell that a new song has started. This album is great for EDM novices and experts alike. I've included a few tracks from the album and encourage you to listen and lose yourself in the sound as I tend to do when I am listening.
Here is also a link to a very interesting article from the New York Times about young electronic DJs with a spotlight on our friend, Zedd.
One of the biggest and most vocal electronic DJs out there today is Deadmau5, a Canadian house/trance producer known for performing in his iconic headdress, or mau5head, and releasing cleverly named albums. His latest album, <Album Title Goes Here>, features one song that I really can't stop listening to called "Fn Pig."
So most of the songs that I have given you have been from the same genre of electronic music, and therefore may sound similar to each other. I would like to introduce you to two of my favorite artists, Gramatik and GRiZ, or known together as GRiZMATiK (pictured below).
It is almost impossible to categorize their music into a specific music genre, but I would describe it as funky, dub, hip-hop, and glitch electronic. But you don't have to take my word for it, listen to some tracks and decide for yourself! The ambiguity of their music is one of my favorite parts about it, besides the fact that it is super fun to groove to. Respectively, I have put up my favorite Gramatik and GRiZ songs, and then I have also included their first collaborated track, Digital Liberation is Mad Freedom.
All of these songs are also available for free download from these following links because these DJs have a "pay as you see fit" policy, which I believe truly separates them from other artists. Since money is not the most important part, you know that these guys are truly producing music for the love of producing music. Time to get funky!
Today I received a text from my mom saying that I got a package from ticketmaster.com at my house and I immediately knew what it was: my ticket for Swedish House Mafia's One Last Tour! For those of you who don't know, Swedish House Mafia is a trio of Swedish (obviously) DJs/producers Steve Angello, Sebastian Ingrosso, and Axwell (pictured below, respectively).
Although the three have only been together for 7 years, they have produced and collaborated on a number of huge electronic hits and are said to be responsible for introducing the electronic genre "House" to the masses. Their hits range from the classic "From Miami to Ibiza" to the head banger "One." I have seen each of these DJs separately, but never together. Sebastian Ingrosso was actually my very first electronic show last February in Chicago, I saw Axwell when he performed at North Coast Music Festival in Chicago Labor Day Weekend, and I saw Steve Angello at a North Coast aftershow at The Mid, a club in Chicago. The three have very different styles of performance, in my opinion. Angello lives to perform in club scenes, throwing out banging club beats for almost 4 hours straight. Ingrosso was definitely more of a classic, feel good house DJ, playing all of my favorites and mixing with classics from the likes of Daft Punk and Coldplay. Axwell is the mastermind behind the trio and I would describe him as an architect of sound and an extremely fun DJ to see perform. Each member, therefore, brings their special skill set to Swedish House Mafia, which is one of the reasons that they are one of the most popular commodities in electronic music today.
This past summer, Swedish House shocked their fans by announcing that they will be splitting up after One Last Tour. They announced shows in Australia, India, Japan, all over Europe, and thankfully in the US. My friends and I obsessed over buying tickets, because we knew that they would sell out faster than Bieber tickets (or at least we hoped that they would). I'm not sure how, but I was able to purchase a ticket to their show in Chicago even though the show sold out in FIVE MINUTES! Their tour has started in Europe and the trio just played their last show in their hometown of Stockholm, Sweden.
Just from the looks of these pictures, you can tell that these guys are a bigger deal than Swedish Meatballs. Still don't believe me? Check out this video for their last big hit "Don't You Worry Child" and tell me that you wouldn't want to attend one of their final shows.
As I write this post, the end of the semester is rearing its ugly head. Final projects pile up, papers seem to appear out of nowhere (even though we've known about them for months), caffeine replaces blood in our veins, and sleep has become a thing of the past. Everyone has their own way of getting into a serious study mode, and mine is, of course, by listening to electronic music. So how do I focus when I'm listening to the same music that I hear when I am out, you might ask? When I listen to electronic music when I study, the beat affect me differently than when I am getting ready to go out. The repetitive beats almost put me in a sort of trance and also keep me up when I am working into the wee hours of the night (like tonight). Because I don't like to be constantly distracted by choosing a song to play next or have no time to make a playlist, I listen to mixtapes and radio shows made by EDM DJs. Because these are pre-made sets, it completely eliminates the worry of what song you're going to play next. My all-time favorite radio show is Tiësto's "Club Life." Tiësto is one of my favorite electronic DJs and is consistently ranked as number one DJ in the world by The DJ List. Every Saturday night he releases a new episode of Club Life, a two-hour mix of the hottest dance tracks. I just listened to this week's episode while working on some papers, and I am proud to say that the Dutch DJ did not disappoint.
You can listen to the first hour of Club Life right here on this YouTube video and also on soudcloud, but most DJs offer their radio shows on iTunes podcasts. I currently subscribe to Tiësto's Club Life Podcast, Avicii's Levels Podcast, Tommy Trash's Trashed Podcast, Hardwell's Hardwell On Air Podcast, Sebastian Ingrosso's Refune Radio, and Dada Life's Dada Life: The Podcast.
