Jump Smokers

The Chicago remix giants in the DMC house! World exclusive

Interview by DJ Cola

 

Wikipedia describes a remix as “a song that has been edited or completely recreated to sound different from the original version. For example, the pitch of the singers’ voice or the tempo might be changed…”. The Jump Smokers are no stranger to the remix and are a highly sought after production team from Chicago, Illinois who have created house and dance bangers for the likes of Pitbull, Mariah Carey, P!nk, Calvin Harris, Justin Timberlake, Britney Spears, Katy Perry, and lots more! They are Flipside, Roman, Marquee and Johnny Digital. I spent some time getting the nitty gritty on their current 2014 North American tour with Pitbull, Enrique Iglesias and J Balvin.

Welcome to DMCWORLD Jump Smokers!  What are you up to and where are you right now?

“What up DMCWORLD! We’re currently in New York City about to perform at Madison Square Garden! We’re still pinching ourselves that we get to perform at such a legendary place! All thanx to Mr. Worldwide.”

It’s such a pleasure to talk to you guys! I admire your remixes so much and have played them when I DJ at the local clubs. My number one question for you is where did this Jump Smokers “whisper drop” come from and do you think every DJ/Producer should use their own drop in their productions?

“Haha…best thing we ever did! OK, long story short: we were making some DOPE remixes, but how would anybody in club or listening to the radio know that it was a Jump Smokers Remix? We actually started with a robot voice at the beginning of our remixes but realized that it was too easy for DJs to skip past that. So we decided to drop the robot & use Roman’s whisper drop over the build right before our 1st drop! Now there’s no mistaking whose remix you’re listening to.”

Tell us about the whole experience you’re having right now touring in North America. What is special about the electronic music scene here in places like Las Vegas and even Canada? I think people across the pond who haven’t experienced this side of the EDM world would love to know your thoughts…

“One thing that we’ve noticed about the EDM scene here in North America is that is much quicker than overseas. Here’s the intro, here’s the build, here’s the crazy part…repeat & then mix out all within a matter of minutes. One of the positives of this is that the energy out here stays very high – you definitely need endurance to rock at a Jump Smokers show.”

I’ve read some DJs don’t like playing Pitbull in their sets because he’s too commercial. After seeing Pitbull on a cable channel, live and in concert, I have a new found respect for him. He was playing with a full band, wearing a suit, and sweating bullets because he was rockin’ it so hard!  Tell us your thoughts on touring with Pitbull, Enrique Iglesias and J Balvin…

“It’s a shame that some DJs would purposely not play one of the biggest artists on the planet. We actually feel bad for their audiences if that’s really the case. Dude puts out nothing but hit after hit after hit. Not to mention he’s the most down to earth, nicest, hardest working artist we’ve EVER met. He deserves every ounce of success he has!
We can go on & on about Pitbull and how truly great he’s been to us from day one, but y’all will get sick of it! lol But the fact that we get to tour w/ two gigantic artists like Pit & Enrique Iglesias is an absolute dream come true.”

You guys have remixed so many famous singers, P!nk, Britney, Rihanna, Jessie J., Selena Gomez, Mariah Carey, Celine Dion, One Direction– just to name a few! What are some are your personal favorites when it comes to your remixes?

“Our Selena Gomez “Come & Get It” Remix was a big one for us because we originally made it with a standard dance tempo…and to be honest, it was SO boring! We easily could have handed it in that way, but we decided to just scrap it entirely and use a tempo that felt better with her vocals…Trap! It was a huge risk cuz we didn’t ask for her label’s permission, they probably would have said no if we did. But even tho it was our 1st “Trap” Remix, it was SO frickin’ good! The label freaked out when they heard it & it became one of our biggest remixes to date. There’s even a cool YouTube video of that entire process over atYouTube.com/JumpSmokers.”

Can you tell us maybe one funny experience you had with one of these famous artists you’ve remixed?

“We record all of our stuff at Flipside’s house, our entire studio is in his basement. But he has one rule, everybody has to take their shoes off before entering. So it’s always a funny / awkward moment when we have to tell artists like Jason Derulo, Baby Bash & many others that they need to take their shoes off! HAHA…”

You guys are a Chicago based act and were given the title Kings of the Dancefloor. It was also the name of your album in 2010. How did you get that nickname and tell us how it all began for you guys?

“Once we starting killing remix after remix, Jullian Boothe (who is actually the person that introduced us to Pitbull in the 1st place) made some comment like “man, with all these beats you got, y’all are officially the kings of the dancefloor!” We loved that title, so it just stuck with us.”

Tell us about the scene in Chicago and which DJs/Producers do you admire from the windy city?

“The cool thing about Chicago, is that every single night you can hear whatever kind of music you like. Whether it’s a Monday or Friday night, there’s definitely a club for you. Not to mention most of them are open till 4am & 5am on Saturdays! From a DJ standpoint, we grew up idolizing Bad Boy Bill. Dude is SO sick behind the decks. It’s actually an honor to call him a friend these days. Go look up his Bangin’ The Box mixtapes…we legit studied them all. From a production standpoint, Flosstradamus is killin’ the trap game. And have y’all heard about those original Jump Smokers tracks?!?! Those guys are on the come up!”

Definition-of.com defines hip-house as “a genre of music that fuses elements of house music and hip-hop” also “It’s a style of Hip-Hop that has it’s origin in the USA”. I would say this genre defines a lot of your tracks. Your thoughts on Hip-House?

“Growing up in Chi-Town, hip-house was huge! It’s basically when artists rap over dance beats…Fast Eddie was the undisputed KING of hip-house! Y’all need to look up his records like “Booty Call”, “Pump It”, “Hip House ’89”, “Yo Yo Get Funky” & tons more…we legit grew up to these records. The more we think about it, this is kind of what Pitbull has been doing the past few years. He embraced dance music early on, and just puts his killer flow on top of those beats…it’s like the 2014 version of hip-house.”

When you play on stage, who is in charge of what and what does your rig look like? Tell us a little about your DJ set up!

“On this Pitbull / Enrique Tour, Flipside is the DJ & Roman is the MC. We’ve actually got these sets down to a science, Flipside definitely drives the entire set by reading the crowd! That’s the thing about being a real live DJ, you have to be able to adapt to each crowd cuz no two crowds are the same! We’ve already found that tracks that work in New Jersey, might not work in Toronto. And songs that kill in Montreal, might not work in New York. Our sets are completely live & always different in each city.”

How do you get ready for your big shows and how do you unwind afterwards?

“It’s crazy, there really is no time for us to “get ready” for these tour dates. We always fly into whatever city we’re playing in late morning / early afternoon. Get a car, drive out to the hotel. Shower up & drive out to the venue. Get settled into our dressing room, grab some catering & then it’s almost showtime! And then after our show, we pack up and head back to the hotel just to do is all over again the next day! I guess we “unwind” by going to sleep! Lol…”

What kind of distributors do you work with? For example I know about your work because I subscribe to Promo Only. What was it like in the beginning when your work started to spread in DJ Pools?

“Our “distributors” start & stop with the DJs! We know that it’s the DJs that play our music in the clubs & on the radio…and we’re SO thankful for their support! We also got nothing but love for Promo Only, DJ City & all the other DJ Pools that blast out our music! And here’s a lil secret for anybody reading this interview…we give away ALL of our extended versions for free over at http://www.jumpsmokers.com/djsonly

You have this new track out with Mary Lambert called “Secrets”. Tell us about what it was like working with her?

“A lot of our remixes are done without ever meeting the artist. Once we’re hired, we get sent an acapella from the label & then we do our thang. Sometimes we don’t even listen to the original version cuz we don’t wanna be thrown off by it. We have not yet met Mary Lambert, but she has a great voice & has shown us mad love on Twitter!”

I have to ask about “Big Butts”. It’s a free download on your soundcloud page,https://soundcloud.com/jumpsmokers. What made you decide to recreate Sir Mix-A-Lot’s anthem?

“Ugh. This is a frustrating one for us, but let us explain. So last year on tour w/ Pitbull & Ke$ha, we did a cool thing w/ “Baby Got Back” during our sets. Pitbull heard it & said he wanted us to make an original track using that same part that we performed. We did…and it was BANGIN’! After a few months of waiting, Pit decided it would be better as a single for us, so Roman wrote two verses & was even more bangin’! The only thing is, because of the sample, we decided to wait on it until we signed with a new label…so they could deal with all the clearances w/ the original writers. Well, as we were still talking to different labels, Nicki Minaj released “Anaconda” which as you know, samples “Baby Got Back” as well. We knew at that moment that we could no longer wait for a label, cuz we’d look like copycats even tho we made this song / had this idea a year ago LAST summer! So we just decided to put it out for free to our fans. We always love giving tracks away for free, but “Big Butts” is bittersweet for us because we really thought it could potentially be our BIG radio record! Again, ugh!”

Alyssa Reid’s “Alone Again”, out on Ultra in 2011, is a stand out track for you guys as far as I’m concerned. I think a lot more people should know about it and play it out. How did this dance hit come about? I noticed there is an original version and a hi-nrg break remix called the Sunship Radio Edit, which I need a shovel for because that’s how much I dig it!

“Thanx! That’s definitely a sleeper song of ours. It was a #1 song out in Canada, and then our label at the time signed it for the international release. So Roman wrote two verses for it, and next thing we know…it was an international SMASH! It hit #1 in like 12 different countries & sold over a million copies! The original version is mid-tempo, kind of like Eminem & Rihanna’s “Love The Way You Lie” but there were a bunch of cool remixes that you’ve probably heard too. Another bittersweet moment of ours, because as big as this song was internationally, for whatever reason…our label at the time NEVER released it in America. No clue why. This music industry is veryyyyyy confusing sometimes. Regardless, big up to the beautiful & extremely talented Alyssa Reid for letting us be part of such an amazing record!

You guys make epic dance floor fillers and anthems. What advice do you have for DJs and Producers starting out who want to make their own anthems?

“Find your own niche. When we first started, people were making like 10 minute remixes. But as DJs ourselves, we NEVER play tracks for that long. So we made our remixes very club & mixshow friendly. We also kept the integrity of the original song. We use the verses, b-sections & hooks as they were written. Audiences LOVE singing along, so why mess up the words they already know by changing the vocals? Or even worse…by not using them at all?” We decided to focus more on the beats, we made the beats harder & made them bump in the club! We try to make our remixes the perfect mix of radio & club friendly! It’s that Jump Smokers sound.”

You’ve also worked with the NBA and NFL. How did you get these experiences with sports teams?

“We’re the official DJs for the Chicago Bulls! Which is awesome cuz we’re also die-hard Bulls fans! So don’t be surprised if you hear a bunch of Jump Smokers Remixes during Da Bulls games! lol…”

I like talking about studio gear. Would you be willing to tell us about some of the software or hardware you use in the studio?

“We’re use Logic to make all of our beats. Most of our sounds are thru Massive & Sylenth1. And we’re also big fans of Universal Audio’s Apollo & plug-ins!”

It seems nowadays the best way to sell music is to put one to two minutes of your track up online and not the whole song. Then people will be encouraged to pay for it at a place like Beatport, Itunes, etc. I also see a lot of free downloads in exchange for a Facebook like. Is this the system nowadays? How can up and coming producers make some cash promoting their tracks in a market saturated with free downloads? I’m sure people would appreciate any advice you have?

“Well our 1st piece of advice is to stop thinking about how to make money on your tracks. If your tracks are good enough, the money will take care of itself via potential sales, shows & other things. We’re the perfect example of that. We gave away our very 1st track for free, and after almost 30,000 downloads in the 1st few days, we put it up on iTunes & actually scored a record deal! Now, obviously that isn’t always the case, but we’ve given away TONS of tracks / songs for free regardless. Even if you’re not making money, you’re getting free promotion with every single download and sometimes that’s worth more than money. Especially when you want to be in this game for a long time!”

You guys are now repped by “S.K.A.M Artist”. What are the highlights of working with the crew over at S.K.A.M.?

“S.K.A.M. definitely has the hot hand so we’re honored to be part of the S.K.A.M. team. The timing of it all was pretty cool because a few days after agreeing to sign with them, Pitbull called and asked us to go on tour w/ him & Enrique Iglesias. So the fact that we immediately brought this huge nationwide tour to S.K.A.M. was pretty cool…plus we think it showed them how much potential this group truly has!”

What are your top 5 dance tracks in your record bag right now?

1. “Photobomb” – Jump Smokers


2. “On Your Mark” – Gregor Salto & Wiwek *Roman’s Pick*


3. “Fireball” – Pitbull (Jump Smokers Remix)


4. “That’s Right” – Jesse Slayter & Wuki *Flipside’s Pick*


5. “Big Butts” – Jump Smokers

Summer tune of 2014?

Radio: “Waves” by Mr. Probz

Club: “Tremor” by Dimitri Vegas, Martin Garrix & Like Mike

What should people look out for from the Jump Smokers in the coming weeks and months?

“We’re beyond excited to be producing records for some really huge artists! What most people don’t understand is that we’ve actually been producing original tracks with all our remixes anyways, there’s just an acapella of an existing song over it. So transitioning from remixes to original production has actually been seamless for us. We’ll never stop making remixes, but original production is definitely the next chapter for that Jump Smokers sound!”

Check out the Jump Smokers here :

http://www.jumpsmokers.com/

https://soundcloud.com/jumpsmokers

https://twitter.com/jumpsmokers

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About the writer :

Evan Hundhausen received his MFA in creative writing from Naropa University in 2001.  He’s published poetry in “The Asheville Poetry Review” and has won awards in prose, screen and playwriting, journalism and poetry.  He writes about music for DMCWORLD.net and The Colorado Music Buzz.  You can visit his blog at http://www.djcola.net