The Toronto titans ripping it up all over the world
Interview : Dan Prince
Julian, Luis welcome to DMCWORLD – where on planet dance are you today?
“We are actually in our home town, Toronto! Enjoying some quality studio time.”
Exciting news revealed this week that your new track with Tiesto will be coming out on his album as a bonus track! Talk us through the making of this little bomb
“It kinda just started on a laptop on Tiesto’s kitchen table in New York. Just messing around at like midnight one night, and then we re-listened to it the next morning and were all like ‘wow this is actually pretty good’. Luckily we were in NY for the rest of the week, so we managed to bang that out and our John Martin remix in 5 days. Lots of espressos!”
We were in the crowd at Hakkasan last weekend where you played alongside Tijs…there can’t be too many better clubs in the world that this?
“There really aren’t. Hakkasan is the perfect balance between the bottle club and the actual ‘raging’ dance club. You can really experiment with your sets there, and especially for us when opening for Tijs…we are able to start with tech, move up to some groovier/bouncier stuff, and just kinda move all over the map after that and the crowd usually likes it.”
“Five years ago I went to my first electronic concert and it was Tiesto. Two years ago I had a dream…we were pulled up on stage by our idol and mentor and two years later it happened.” What is about the great man you love so much?
“There is just no better example of success in this industry. A lot of people call him the ‘King’ of the electronic dance music industry, and after working with him for the last little while, we’ve realized why. He knows all the little ins and outs that we should be looking out for, and usually its things we would have never thought about of on our own.”
When you saw his DJ all those years ago and decided to go and buy some DJ equipment, was the dream back then to DJ or produce?
Dzeko: “I mean yeah at the time I was only really looking at DJing and practicing how to DJ. The dream was to just be able to play in front of a crowd.”
Torres: “Yeah when Julian bought the equipment I remember him being obsessed with learning it. I had Fruity Loops on my laptop and I would try and mess around with it when I was bored in class, but had no real ‘dream’ of being a DJ at the time. I guess I just thought it was fun back then.”
What did your families think of your new career dream?
“It was a tough sell, that’s for sure. Dzeko started doing this right out of high school, and Luis was still in university when we started. I know not many parents out there look forward to the day their son tells them they wanna be a DJ, but over time both families have become super supportive!”
What is the biggest tune you are currentl spinning?
“MOTi & DVBBS – ‘This Is Dirty’.”
Miami WMC seems but a distant memory now, what were some of your ‘take home’ memories from that crazy week in Florida?
“We don’t really remember much…whole week was kind of a blur! Just kidding, sort of. The big memory was being brought out on stage by Tiesto at Ultra to play our John Martin remix and premier our new collab. That was nuts. Also, playing the Sirius XM party and the Musical Freedom party were two standout memories of us.”
Tell us about your studio set up…
“It’s actually super simple. We have a 8 core Mac Pro and a Focusrite Saffire Pro 40 sound card sitting in the studio but we never use them anymore. We are on the road too much to worry about transferring projects back and forth between the studio computer and our laptops, so now we just work off our laptops. Straight out of the headphone jack into an old Panasonic Ramsa mixing board we were given, and from that into our KRK VXT 8’s. Favourite studio monitors for sure.”
Who excels in what department when you are producing a new track?
“Torres is more technical still cuz he’s been doing it longer, and took piano lessons as a kid. Dzeko is better at keeping things simple…Torres always wants to add too much stuff LOL.”
You spend A LOT of time with each other, working, playing, traveling the world. If you could change 1 thing about each other, what would it be?
Dzeko: “I wish Luis would stop snoring. It’s terrible.”
Torres: “Omg, I’m not that bad! I only do it if I’m really tired. I wish you wouldn’t talk so loud on the phone. I can hear you through the walls bro.”
What is the last song you heard today?
“It was actually an unreleased remix we just finished. Can’t tell you what exactly though…”
Who is a great up n’ coming producer we should be looking out for in 2014?
“Maestro Harrell from LA/Chicago is doing some GREAT stuff, Hunter Siegel from Toronto, Kaaze out of Sweden, and of course MOTi has been on fire too.”
What is the best and worst thing about living in Toronto?
“The winter is by far the worst thing ever. The worst. Not so sure what the best thing is though…there are a lot of good things here…great food, great people, great music…the EDM scene has been alive and healthy here since the 90s…that’s a really good thing for sure.”
What is the worst job you have ever had?
Torres: “I worked at McDonalds for a year…first job. Wasn’t terrible though. My dad also used to pay me 50 bux to help wash the Concrete yard he worked at like once a month at like 6am on a Saturday. That was terrible…and I was seriously under-paid LOL.”
Dzeko: “Worst one I had was working at a store front for a cellphone company. People just don’t seem to understand that there’s certain things I CAN’T do for them. Really tried my best to keep cool, but it wasn’t easy when people are calling you a dumb ass for doing your job.”
Who are the artists you love at the moment away from dance music?
Dzeko: “Kendrick Lamar.”
Torres: “I haven’t really gotten into much outside of dance music lately. Even when I’m chilling it’s usually deep house on the playlist, but I’m gonna say Kelis.”
Where are some of the stand out gigs you are looking forward to this summer?
“Playing a few festivals in Canada that we are really looking forward to. Love playing our home country!”
And finally, what is coming out next from you guys studio wise?
“Got a few remixes coming out really soon, as well as at least 2 originals in the next few months. Also, some pretty good collabs that we are very excited about, so look out for those!”