Here we go! New Spinnin’ superstars stepping up with a magical piece of dancefloor bliss
Interview by Dan Prince
Guys welcome to DMCWORLD, where on planet earth are you today?
Hey Dan, we just got back from our summer tour, hit a lot of countries and we closed our festival season in our home country The Netherlands at two festivals
What was the last piece of music you heard last night before going to bed?
Lucas: Tinie Tempah – Not Letting Go (feat. Jess Glynne)
Steve: The Weeknd – Can’t Feel My Face
Massive news for you right now with the release of your new single on Spinnin’ Deep…please talk us through the sound and history of your take on Laurent Wolf’s classic ‘Calinda’ track…
The original track was released back in 2003/2004, Lucas was 12 and Steve was 10. We weren’t friends yet back then, but when we were listening to some classics a few years ago we both picked ‘Calinda’ as one of our all-time house-favourites. Back then the idea to rework it was already born, but we wouldn’t have known how to do that officially/legally. At the beginning of this year we discussed with our label whether it would be possible to do an official rework and we were thrilled that it even became an original track
Can you remember where you first roadtested it?
Oh we roadtested ‘Calinda’ A LOT!! We tested it for the first time around March, I wouldn’t know where exactly. Since then we revised the track – especially optimized the mix – several times. The last revision was even in August this summer. We tested this last (and final) version for the first time at Sziget festival (Budapest, Hungary) and the crowd went completely nuts. Fun fact is that that night we actually decided that this version should be shared with the world and this is the final version
A mighty weekend for you two weeks ago with your debut in the UK…at none other than Creamfields!!! Tell us some of your highlights…
YES!! Creamfields was just amazing! We have to admit that Creamfields as a first UK gig was quite overwhelming. The crowd was crazy and with that Yahoo-Live stream, all our social-media channels exploded. Some other highlights of our summer were Sziget festival (below). We had about 10.000 people jumping in front of us to that latest ‘Calinda’ version, so Sziget is a festival we will never forget. ElectroMusicFestival (EMF, France) was also crazy. Amazing and huge crowd. Also Ibiza treated us well this summer. We had some great parties at Ushuaia and a sick gig at Amnesia
What would you say are the biggest differences in your production stye/technique/approach since the days of your Red Carpets remix?
A lot has changed: our drops are way more melodic nowadays, we use different sounds, different synthesizers (also a lot analog). Our mixing techniques have also changed drastically, partly due to our new studio
Tell us about your production set up – who excels where?
We have our own studio in a studio-complex nearby Amsterdam where we can go whenever we want to. We have some analog toys and a set of decent but not too special speakers. When we want to work out our mix/master in more detail, we can use one of the bigger studios with high-end speakers, which is where we always finish our tracks. We both do work kind of the same in the studio, but Lucas is a bit faster with the creative/melodic part and Steve is a bit faster with mixing/mastering all parts together into a smooth track. This division was a process that grew this way spontaneously over the past years, that suits our mutual energy best
What are the 5 big tunes in your box this weekend…
Laurent Wolf vs Lucas & Steve – ‘Calinda 2K15’ – Obviously haha
Fox Stevenson, Curbi – ‘Hoohah’
Tiesto, KSHMR ft. Vassy – ‘Secrets’ (Don Diablo’s VIP mix)
Alesso ft. Sirena – ‘Sweet Escape’ (Pep & Rash Remix)
We made an edit on Sander van Doorn & Oliver Heldens – ‘This’. We mixed the break with Knife party’s ‘Internet Friends’. This edit made people jump everywhere this summer.
You just mentioned Ibiza, the island has probably had it’s best summer yet. You rocked Ushuaia a few weeks back warming up for Avicii…what was your white isle experience like this year?
Ibiza was GREAT! We were there three times, of which Amnesia once and Ushuaia (below) twice. We made some friends (DJs, stage managers, party people) at both clubs so after our sets we usually had some amazing parties and we saw a lot of the Island. We can’t wait to get back there next year!
How do you guys chill away from the decks and the studio…?
Steven plays a lot of FIFA’15 and Lucas is hooked to the gym, but for both of us goes that chilling and working are strongly intertwined. We just love what we do, but sometimes deadlines are necessary and then our activities may start to feel a tiny little bit as work
Not many people know this, but Lucas & Steve are really good at…
Karaoke, shuffling, and especially shuffling during karaoke!!
What other tunes remain on your remix wish list?
‘Something’ by Michael Jackson would be really cool!
And finally, what is coming out next from you guys studio wise…
This is one of our least-favourite questions, since we always want to shout out everything that is coming up next, but we are simply not allowed to reveal too much. What we can reveal though is that there are two really cool collabs scheduled for the upcoming months. Also we did a remix for two of the hottest artists of the moment. As soon as we can reveal anything we will get back to you guys first!
Beatport: http://btprt.dj/1EKctzE
SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/spinnin-deep/laurent-wolf-vs-lucas-steve-calinda-2k15
YouTube: https://youtu.be/o8paIJpr0OU
