Right now it feels like we’re playing a role, like me and a couple of my friends, in where popular culture is going. That’s a very rare thing in a person’s life to be able to be a part of that. It’s a responsibility I take seriously.
A-TRAKIt’s a good feeling to have something to stand for in any part of your life. It’s like personal integrity.
More A-Trak Quotes
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At the end of the day, Fool’s Gold is a label that, when I hear something I like, I try to grab it for the label. There’s a ton of great music coming out.
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I’ve been doing it since I was prepubescent when I loved to scratch records and play good music. As it happens, you know I sort of fell into the mix. I really feel like I played a role in bringing dance music to America years ago.
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We have to wake up early and make songs everyday. I run my record label. You work at hours where your body isn’t designed to work. But it’s fun.
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I think whether dance music had exploded in America, I still would’ve been a DJ a long time. This is my first love.
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There’s a lot of producers that are much more technical or gear-skilled than I am. But I have a pure idea of what I like and where I want to go and I follow that.
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One thing that I learned in recent years from working more with other people is this idea that part of a producer’s job is to make people comfortable and confident.
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That’s what a DJ is at the end of the day – someone who leads where the music goes. The only thing that’s changed is that in America, people have woken up in the last few years and realized it.
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The essential component of being a DJ is setting the mood; it’s playing to the context. So that if you’re not able to adapt from one context to another, then you’re not a DJ.
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Building the scene, going out and doing shows and connecting with the fans, cultivating the fanbase in all these cities. I’m very glad that it’s happening.
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I’m not even a trained producer. I just keep following my ear and working on stuff until it sounds the way I like it.
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I worked with him for years. I still think Kanye [West] is one of the most important people in music in the last ten years.
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I think one of the biggest things that’s changed in terms of the rapport with the crowd is that now crowds come to hear our songs. We’re getting closer and closer to an artist performance.
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That was my challenge then, how to make scratching still fun for someone who didn’t necessarily come to hear that. It was fun to develop that technique. And now in dance music – I’m still a hip-hop guy at heart, but I love dance music.
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When I get up I still check the rap blogs before I check any kind of dance stuff.
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There’s a ton of amazing music that’s not getting heard.
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