Check out this fun mix created by Bones of GottaDanceDirty. He's included a few of my current favorites by Crookers + Felix Cartal + Popof + Sound of Stereo + more. If you like what you hear you can usually find him spinning at the Control nights at Avalon.
Our friends Vincent and Jochen from Sound of Stereo are gearing up for their upcoming release titled, Hurricane EP. It's slated for a March 14th release date and to help us deal with our own impatience, they've compiled their current favorites and provided us with a fun mix. They've sprinkled in a few of their tracks, a few from their friends that have yet to be released, and a few personal favorites of mine (Harvard Bass - Pruno and Siriusmo - Feromonikon). Dank Radio supporters from Australia be ready. Sound of Stereo is set to perform throughout the Future Music Festival 2011.
A little over a week has passed since our good friend Nightfox started her Dank Radio infiltration mission with her interview with Sound Of Stereo and she's already putting in work with her next installment. To be honest with you, it's a welcome surprise and boy is she putting me to work with these deadlines [It's all good! You know how we work. 24/7 365, all day, everyday, until the end of days.] The interview that follows entails her encounter with the funky producer/dj Treasure Fingers [Fool's Gold]. Keep on reading to find out about album updates, the status of Evol Intent, and his hometown of Wewoka Oklahoma.
Hey Dank Radio! In a recent conversation with DJ Shaun P, we discussed the pros and cons of my job. He told me that although I was extremely lucky to be able to meet the people I get to meet, he would never want my job in fear that his love of music of a certain artist would be marred if he turns out to be a dick. Luckily, I’ve been blessed in that every artist I’ve met so far (minus one, I won’t name him here but you can ask me later) have been the nicest, most humble people I’ve met, welcoming me into their rooms, backstage, and going out of their way to lend me twenty minutes of their time. Probably means little to them, but it means the world to me. My impression of an artist has yet to be marred (thank God). So here’s a recent interview with Treasure Fingers, and thanks to my friend Jack Daniels, probably the most random interview I’ve held to date. Thanks again Treasure Fingers. Enjoy, Nightfox
Nightfox: So I see you’re in the middle of a big tour, how are you enjoying it so far? Treasure Fingers: It’s been good. I was actually off for three weeks so it’s good to be back again.
Nightfox: Do you find yourself finding the time to produce and work on tracks while touring? Treasure Fingers: Not really when I’m touring. I try to but I really like working in my studio, and when I’m on the road I only have my laptop so it’s a big difference. But I like it though because when I’m on the road I don't have a lot of time to produce but I have all these ideas in my head. Then when I actually get home I can get a lot of stuff done.
Nightfox: So does that mean we can expect the album anytime soon? Treasure Fingers: Yeah hopefully! I need to just take a break and actually finish it when I’m not doing gigs.
Nightfox: And are you still working with Evol Intent through all this? Treasure Fingers: Yes. We have two new singles almost done. Four tracks broken up into two separate 12" single releases, and maybe an album in the works? I don’t know, we’ve been really productive lately.
Nightfox: When it comes to producing, are there any rules or codes of ethics in your opinion? Any do’s and don'ts? Treasure Fingers: Um, not really. I mean, I’m not a fan of just ripping stuff off, you know. If I sample someone I try to do something creative with it. I just try to be original. Besides that, no rules, I guess.
Nightfox: Describe the differences between your live set and your DJ set. Treasure Fingers: I’ve never actually done a live Treasure Fingers set. We’ve done live Evol Intent, and that’s still less on computers and controllers and stuff, but it’s kind of programming on the fly, just doing effects and stuff like that. But if I wanted to do a live Treasure Fingers show, it would probably be with a band but I’d kind of like to stick to DJ’ing for now.
Nightfox: I see your doing Korea for New Years! Have you ever been there before? Treasure Fingers: No! I’m super excited! Well, they put in the offer and I was really excited and then North Korea bombed them so I thought the gig was off and my agent was going to cancel it. But the promoters came back and promised it was all good and things would be safe.
Nightfox: Interesting, will there be any extra security or anything like that? Treasure Fingers: I don’t know. I’m not too worried about it actually. I’ll go anywhere. Like, I feel like I could die here tonight as well as I could there, so I’m not really afraid of anything. I’ve always wanted to play crazy places. I don’t know if they’ll have extra security or not but it will be super fun, I’m sure.
Nightfox: What do you expect from Korea? Treasure Fingers: I’ve played Asia a couple times, like, Taiwan, Singapore, and Jakarta, places like that and it’s always really cool but I’ve never played Korea before so it’ll be a new experience.
Nightfox: And after Korea you head to Australia. How do you like it there? Treasure Fingers: That’s probably my second home. I would live there if it wasn’t so far from everything.
Nightfox: What do you like best about it? Treasure Fingers: It’s just really nice. It’s got a nice climate, you know. The continent is big so it’s kind of like America, you could go to a really nice beach or you could go way out in the wilderness. It’s just a cool place with laidback people.
Nightfox: So I see you used to play in punk and hardcore bands as a teenager, and when you were younger you were into hip-hop. Why make the transition to dance music? Treasure Fingers: Well, lately, the Treasure Fingers stuff is definitely the most dancey I’ve ever done. I did Evol Intent before that and before Evol Intent I did even weirder experimental glitch stuff so it’s just been sort of a progression. I’ve always liked and made house music but I’ve never focused on producing it heavily until recently.
Nightfox: Do you plan on keeping up with Treasure Fingers? Treasure Fingers: Oh yeah, yeah. I’ve thought about starting a couple side projects just because I have all these ideas for new songs and they don’t fit within what I like the Treasure Fingers sound to be. You may see a new project from me soon. But, Treasure Fingers is top priority right now.
Nightfox: Care to elaborate? Treasure Fingers: Um, I really shouldn’t (laughs). It’s really just sort of the brainstorming stages now so I’ll keep it under wraps until it’s ready to launch.
Nightfox: So what city are you from in Oklahoma? Treasure Fingers: Wewoka. It’s ridiculously small. About 4 thousand people.
Nightfox: Oh wow. So what was your first big gig that got you out of Oklahoma? Treasure Fingers: When I was coming up there were these big raves coming up in Oklahoma City. And they also had an underground club that went until like, ten in the morning or something. They have been playing house there since like, 1989 or something crazy. Which, I wasn’t around of course, back then but that was my influence for the whole club scene or rave scene. So I guess I was 16 when I started going out there for raves and getting into the clubs. I met Jeremy Dawson who is now in Shiny Toy Guns, and he booked me for my very first rave. After that I started playing neighboring states and it kept spreading from there.
Nightfox: Growing up did you always have a feeling you would go into music or did you have a Plan B? Treasure Fingers: I feel truly blessed to be this successful but I always knew it would be a hobby. I actually went to school for graphic design. I have a degree in that and I worked in that until probably about four or five years ago. Then I would freelance on the side. As of the past three years, it has been all music.
Nightfox: Do you ever design your own stuff? Treasure Fingers: Sometimes but I don’t even like to touch my own stuff. I just got burnt out. I like art directing and having someone else do it now (laughs).
Nightfox: So who are your favorite 90’s hip-hop artists? Treasure Fingers: I was all over the LA west coast stuff as a kid. I liked Eazy E, Dre, Snoop. I liked all the San Francisco stuff too like Spice 1 and E-40. And I don’t know, there was all this weird underground gangster rap stuff I was super into when I was 12. And even now I go on last.fm sometimes and stream Spice 1 radio and they play all these amazing artists that never really made it big. It’s amazing. That was definitely the big golden era of rap for me.
Nightfox: So what’s your favorite 80’s funk artist? Treasure Fingers: Oh man. Zapp and Roger. No question.
Nightfox: Any music makers you’re especially diggin’ right now? Treasure Fingers: I love all the new guys coming up. Bit Funk in Chicago. Le Zebra, who’s actually from out here I think. Night Riders, from Boston.
Nightfox: What are your plans after your tour? Treasure Fingers: I have a heavy schedule up until May I think. I’ll probably take a couple weeks off and chill then. I haven’t even thought about it really.
Nightfox: Are you going to rest at all? Treasure Fingers: (laughs) I should but I’ll probably just go into the studio. That’s kind of relaxation for me. It would be nice to just take a month off and just go into the studio.
Nightfox: I hear a lot of complaints from artists about airlines. What is the worst airline in your opinion? Treasure Fingers: Aw man. There’s a lot of them. I’m really not a fan of Continental. So definitely Continental.
Nightfox: Ever lose anything? Treasure Fingers: Oh yeah. I was on a Delta flight and the panel next to my seat was broken and I had a little bag with all my important stuff like my passport and my iPod and it fell all the way under cargo into the belly of the plane. They said they couldn’t get it until they did maintenance there so I had to file report and do all this stuff. I think I was going to Canada a few days later so I had to expedite a passport and replace all my stuff. But I sent them the receipts and they paid for everything. So thumbs up to Delta. But they need to fix their planes up (laughs).
Nightfox: What do you think of the explosion of dubstep? Here in LA, it’s developed a huge underground following. Treasure Fingers: I like a lot of it. There’s some that I can’t stand but there’s a lot of really good stuff out there. And with the Evol Intent project we do a lot of dubstep too.
Nightfox: Ever thinking about going into dubstep? Treasure Fingers: Not as Treasure Fingers. I thought about doing some collaborations with people and just blending some funky kind of synths & talkbox vocals so there might be a collaborations with that soon, I don’t know. I’ve been talking with 12th Planet so we'll see where that goes..
Nightfox: What’s your favorite track that you released this year? Treasure Fingers: I would say Keep Up, which just came out on Fool’s Gold, because it was the first full song released where I wrote and played all the music, no samples, and co-wrote the lyrics with a friend. We took about a week cutting the vocals and had an engineer mixing them. It’s more of a process than I’m used to. I’m used to just doing everything myself so for that one we put the most time into and I’m really proud of the outcome. Aside from that, probably It’s Love, the B side to Lift Me. That one came about because they wanted something else to release with Lift Me so I kind of had to make it under pressure. And it all just kind of came together. I wanted some female vocal samples, yet without sampling, on it so I slowed it down and sent it to Haley Small, who sang on Keep Up and gave her a rough idea [of what I wanted]. Then I pitched her vocals back up and chopped them a bit. It was kind of unexpected how well it turned out.
Nightfox: Well, I loved it! So do you like playing bigger gigs like raves or do you prefer smaller, more intimate settings like Avalon? Treasure Fingers: I like the big raves but I feel like it’s hard to read the crowd sometimes, so you kind of just do your thing and hope it’s going over well. Whereas Avalon or smaller clubs, you see peoples faces and really see how’s it’s going. Also with the smaller clubs, well, tonight it’s me and Burns so hopefully everyone who came out either came to see him or I or both of us. But at a big rave you don’t know who is there for you. They could have came to see Tiesto and just wandered into your tent. If you’re playing funky house and their into trance, they might just stare at you for an hour waiting for whoever is next.
Nightfox: So when you play do you read the crowd mostly and see what they like? Treasure Fingers: Well mostly. I try to do my own thing, I never compromise as far as what music I’m going to play. I go between really synthy, kind of melodic stuff to really funky house or whatever. If I can sense they are ready for something else and or not feeling it, then I'll start switching it up a little. I'm helpless in the "pop and rap requests" type clubs though, I don't even have that sort of stuff on my laptop or CD wallet.
Nightfox: What is your favorite gig or venue so far? Treasure Fingers: Well, Avalon has actually been amazing every time I've played here. Tonight I think someone hit me up at 11:30 or something and told me they were at capacity already, so it’s amazing to fill a venue this big. Also, Voyeur San Diego where I played last night, there’s always really good shows there.
Nightfox: Oh yeah, I have yet to make a road trip down there. Treasure Fingers: Oh, you’ve got to go check it out. They’ve made it slightly bigger since they took down a wall. It’s still a very intimate venue and the people there are super into the music.
Nightfox: So you do you know Harvard Bass pretty well then? Treasure Fingers: Yeah I met him a long time ago, I think before he was even doing Harvard Bass. Then I started hearing his tracks and he pretty much blew up overnight. He's awesome though. Good guy too.
Nightfox: When you’re in LA are there any places you need to visit or people you need to see? Treasure Fingers: I try to hang out with all my friends when I’m out here and eat good food. Definitely try to hit up Roscoes and In N Out.
Nightfox: So when you wind down at the end of the day, what do you like to listen to? Treasure Fingers: Probably my favorite band is Mono, this band from Japan that’s all instrumental. Like, 12 minute tracks, all super melodic and moody, really beautiful music.
Nightfox: Well, thank you Ashley! As a writer and a fan I want you to know that this has been an awesome experience! Treasure Fingers: Yeah no problem! Happy I could help.
Tour Dates: Dec 18, 2010 - Brooklyn, NY (US) @ Public Assembly - BEMF Dec 31, 2010 - Seoul, Korea @ Club Rococo Jan 5, 2011 - Washington, DC (US) @ U Street Music Hall Jan 12, 2011 - Las Vegas, NV (US) @ Ghost Bar Jan 21, 2011 - Byron Bay, (AU) @ The Great Northern Jan 22, 2011 - Canberra, (AU) @ Trinity Bar Jan 25, 2011 - Brisbane, (AU) @ The Bowler Bar Jan 26, 2011 - Adelaide, (AU) @ Shore's Complex Jan 28, 2011 - Melbourne, (AU) @ Colonial Hotel Jan 29, 2011 - Wollongong, (AU) @ The Grand Hotel Jan 29, 2011 - Sydney, NSW (AU) @ Civic Hotel Jan 30, 2011 - Gold Coast, (AU) @ Titanium Bar - Dirty Sundays Feb 5, 2011 - Perth, (AU) @ The Bakery Feb 12, 2011 - Auckland, AUC (NZ) @ De Club Feb 25, 2011 - Salt Lake City, UT (US) @ Salt Palace Convention Center
Everyone here at Dank Radio loves it when our family and friends get involved with our creative processes. Not just with our music, the radio program, but this site as well. With that said, we will be featuring a piece from one of our trusted friends every so often [haven't worked out the schedule just yet]. To start us off, I would like to introduce you all to my good friend Nightfox. Here she is to explain how she managed to secure an interview with Sound of Stereo by the use of modern day technology.
Dank Radio: Here’s my not so recent interview with Sound of Stereo from their show at the Avalon on October 22. I had so many other questions I wanted to ask, but with the limited amount of time I had and the excitement of it, I found it hard to formulate coherent thoughts and focus long enough to create a through interview.
I was already in Hollywood that night to cover the wrap-up of LA Fashion Week, along with a fellow writer.
I didn’t even expect to interview them that night. But much to my surprise, the guys responded to my request to speak to them- via twitter. It’s a good thing Mando Fresko was spinning at the time so no one could hear me screaming my ass off.
I met up with the duo right next door at The Redbury hotel, the newly refurbished hotel adjacent to the Avalon. The duo was in the US for about two more weeks before heading back to the motherland (Belgium) to play the fifteenth annual I Love Techno Festival, the music event that kicked off the duo’s careers. In March they’ll be headed to Australia for Future Music Festival. Hopefully by then their album will be finished and they’ll head back to the states!
I want to note one of my favorite parts of the interview was when my forced partner Cherelle got up and started moving a coffee table around in their room, in order to get the voice recorder in prime position for picking up sound. It made me cringe when it happened (moving other people’s furniture around during an interview doesn’t exactly put the interviewee at ease) but I laugh at it now, and hope that Vincent and Jochen forgive me for that, haha.
Nightfox: How different is the Belgian music scene compared to the music scene in the U.S., specifically Los Angeles? Vincent: I don’t know, I think the European crowd is more used to having dance music around, so they’re more snobby about it, I think. So when we play in the U.S., it’s more fun, and we can do whatever we want. Jochen: It’s not more fun then playing in Europe, it’s just different. It’s a bit more over the top, especially in L.A. It’s different, but it’s both a lot of fun.
Nightfox: What is the ideology behind your band’s name Sound of Stereo? Vincent: Where did the name come from? I have no idea. We were thinking about changing it but we just kept it. Jochen: I was making music, producing electronic music, and I was like, we need a name. And that was it. So there’s no real nice story to it.
Nightfox: As far as your sound goes, do you find your musical style still evolving, or have you pretty much found your voice? Vincent: Oh no, it’s evolving like, everyday. We’re getting inspired all the time by different artists. If we pick up a CD from someone, well, I don’t know, it’s constant. Jochen: That’s the cool thing about DJ’ing. When you play in a band it’d difficult to make rapid changes to the style you play. Playing so many different places and meeting so many different people it’s nice to pick up other stuff. Like, yesterday we met some people and today we got some tracks from them that were really cool so we may play them tonight. Vincent: It’s all really instant.
Nightfox: I know you guys have been doing this a long time. Do you still get excited playing venues like Avalon and traveling? Do you still get that thrill? Vincent: Absolutely. Jochen: Sure. Vincent: It’s cool to play all these different places all the time, yeah. It’s always exciting because every club is different, every crowd is different. Jochen: Even every night in the same club is different. Vincent: Yeah, we’re still excited as much as we were years ago. Years? Yeah years. Two years ago. (laughs)
Nightfox: How did you guys meet each other? Vincent: Uh, I got some music from him through a friend and I was like, we have to meet up! We did a party together and after that it just took off. Jochen: He was already DJ and I was already playing in rock bands before I started producing electronic music. He picked up a track that I did and then we kind of decided to work together. Vincent: And it’s funny because we live really close [to each other]. Jochen: Yeah, we didn’t know and we live like, I don’t know, 5 kilometers from each other. And we say kilometers, it’s like 2 or 3 miles. Like 15 minutes.
Nightfox: What motivates you? Would you say one of your goals would to be to gain international stardom or do you just do it for the passion? Vincent: You have to do it because you love the music. Jochen: I hope it’s the second one. At this point, it still is. Vincent: Definitely the second one. Yeah, if you don’t like it you’re not going to push yourself. Jochen: Stardom is not something we pursue at all but it’s fun to be able to get rooms like this and talk to people like you. It’s just fun you know, and I don’t consider it stardom it’s just so much fun to be able to travel and do what you love. Vincent: Yeah! Jochen: It’s cheesy but that’s what it is.
Nightfox: So what have you guys been up to lately? Anything the fans should know? Vincent: Album, album, album, right? Jochen: Yeah. It’s all about the album at this moment. Vincent: And trying to tour in between, playing gigs and just trying to combine both and get things moving. We are really trying to think about what we’re going to do with the album. It would be stupid to do all club bangers on an album because no one cares. We were trying to find a sound. I think now we found it, or kind of found it, so now the process has started. Jochen: And like, playing wise, we’ve been in the states for three weeks now and we’ve got one more week playing shows. Then it’s every week somewhere else in Europe and then in March it’s Australia and probably U.S. again. Vincent: By then the album should be wrapping up.
Nightfox: How do you feel about electronic dance music and the direction it’s headed now? I know EDM is a big thing in Europe but here in the U.S. they are starting to play it a lot more on the radio and it’s kind of becoming more mainstream. What do you think about that? Do you think it’s a good thing? Vincent: It’s cool because it gives us a bigger platform to do our stuff. And more people are getting more into dance music so that’s good. We get a bigger fan base, I think. But when something gets mainstream, the whole charm of the underground goes away. Jochen: It’s always difficult to make that crossover. Vincent: Yeah, you have to find something in between, but it’s cool exposure for dance music, really. Jochen: It’s cool because it’s fresh in the U.S., fresher than in Europe. Yeah, at first it’s strange to have it now on the radio here cause… Vincent: …our radio station plays it all the time. Jochen: Yeah. Like, our national radio plays it all the time, even during day rotation. But it’s good. I like it.
Nightfox: Who are your biggest influences at this moment? Jochen: I think the guys we listen to and the guys we meet a lot are our biggest inspiration, like the other DJ’s we meet on tour. We really like Harvard Bass, Wolfgang is doing really well too. The guys from MSTRKRFT, we talked to them too. Erol Alkan, Brodinski and Boys Noize are still DJ-wise and production-wise the guys who… Vincent: And there’s some cool new guys coming, these guys called Mumbai Science. They’re on the same record label as us (Lektroluv) and they’re like, blowing up right now. Then there’s another guy from Scotland, his name is Clouds. It’s like, those guys, they keep it alive. Jochen: It’s like, they’re friends, we know them so it’s not like when you say it’s Daft Punk and you really look up to them. It’s just friends and we keep each other fresh. Vincent: Yeah, we unintentionally push each other to do better stuff.
Nightfox: So you motivate each other? Vincent and Jochen: Yeah!
Nightfox: So when you produce music, what is your artistic process? I know a lot of artists like to ‘put themselves on lock down’ so to speak, for a couple weeks to focus on their album. Do you find that you need that as well? Vincent: He’s on lock down (laughs). Jochen: He locks me down (laughs). Vincent: I have a chain (both laugh). Jochen: No, uh, [all my stuff] is at my house so whenever I feel like it. Like, the last few months, I’ve been doing more and telling myself “Okay, now produce.” Otherwise if you’re just doing EP’s, when you feel inspired, you go to the studio and you make some tracks. Now I’m sitting in the studio more and really making ideas and keep writing. It’s a different process but it’s fun. I don’t lock myself down yet. There’s a lot of demos and I think once we’ve chosen [them] then we’ll be on lockdown to mix down everything.
Nightfox: What makes you stand out as DJ’s? What makes you different? Jochen: We want to make everyone have a good time. We just like to play stuff we really like and adapt to the public that is in front of us. We never have a steady tracklist. We always have our CD’s and our music with us. We have our selection of what we like and try to match what the crowd likes without making too many compromises. You wanna have a good time but you want the crowd to have a good time too so the interaction is important. I think that’s the thing about being a good DJ that makes a difference. I’m not saying we’re really good at it but I think that’s something that’s really important to do.
Nightfox: So where are you off to next after LA? Vincent: We’ve got a couple days off. Jochen: Then Sacramento, Calgary, London, Canada. And then back. Rest for a couple days. Vincent: And then an extra show on Sunday. Then it’s back home for I Love Techno. Jochen: We’re doing a big Dim Mak show in Vienna, too. Vincent: Yeah, just back to Europe for touring.
