Chris Talks Music with Darude

  • last year
In this week's episode, Finnish DJ and music producer Darude joins me for a chat about all manner of things music, life and skateboarding.

We also spend some time discussing his 1999 hit, 'Sandstorm', but not too long as there are so many other things to chat about, like his new record label and upcoming single, Nobody Listens with the excellent Gid Sedgwick.

From the idyllic peace of life in Finland (considered to be the 'happiest country in the world) to living in the United States and back again, Darude gives us a little peek into his life, passions and so much more. Along with some lovely anecdotes.

Darude will be one of the headliners at this weekend's 90s Fest at Don Valley Bowl, Sheffield on August 5, 2023. His new single, Nobody Listens feat. Gid Sedgwick is out on Friday, August 4 and will be available from all of the usual streaming outlets.
Transcript
00:00 Hello and welcome to this week's episode of ChrisTalksMusic.
00:05 This time around, ahead of the 90s fest which will be taking place at the Don Valley Bowl
00:09 this Saturday 5th August, I spoke to the Finnish DJ and producer Darude, world renowned.
00:17 Born in 1975, Darude has been an active part of the global EDM scene since 1999 when he
00:23 released his debut single and breakout hit Sandstorm which earned him the coveted title
00:28 of being the first Finnish musician to get a top 10 UK hit.
00:33 Since then, he's released all sorts of music and a string of successful singles such as
00:37 Out of Control and Feel the Beat when he's driving that amazing yellow sports car around
00:44 the coast.
00:45 He's also collaborated with a number of artists including the likes of Jair 16 who we get
00:50 onto later over the course of this episode, Ajax and Younes Hammo.
00:56 In addition to writing and performing music, he's also an experienced remixer and has worked
01:01 with numerous producers over the years.
01:05 Undoubtedly his most successful single to date is Sandstorm.
01:09 Released in 1999, it gained global recognition for its unique blend of melodic trance and
01:14 progressive house and it's considered by many to be probably one of the most influential
01:21 EDM songs ever released and continues to be played in clubs around the world today.
01:26 It's also spawned a popular internet meme which Google even jumped in on when people
01:32 would search for a song it would come up with the search request "Did you mean Sandstorm?"
01:39 by Darude.
01:40 His music style has evolved over the years and we'll talk about this over the course
01:44 of this episode and he typically creates a kind of instrumental track that are heavily
01:50 influenced by trance and progressive house.
01:53 He's cited acts such as Sasha, John Digweed, Dave Seaman and BTS major influencers on his
01:59 sound as well as the Nigerian-Swedish musician Dr. Alban who you would know for this song.
02:07 [Music]
02:17 Which is a definitive banger and it was great just kind of reading into Darude and finding
02:25 out about his influences and that song naturally came up.
02:29 He also creates music for video games and produces remixes for other artists and he's
02:34 recently started his own record label which we will jump into over the course of this
02:39 episode.
02:40 Thanks to his success as a DJ and a producer he's won numerous awards over the years and
02:46 he's been one of those rare artists that isn't defined just by one particular hit i.e. Sandstorm.
02:55 But we'll talk about that and we'll talk about many other things over the course of this
02:59 week's episode but I do hope you enjoy and once again thanks for listening.
03:03 [Music]
03:14 Darude is best because nobody definitely knows me with my real name.
03:20 Yeah, yeah I mean it's not something that you use all the time it's like your, it's
03:24 almost like your real name's your alias now isn't it?
03:28 Yeah.
03:29 So um, yeah I mean there's loads of things we could kind of discuss and talk about and
03:39 normally I've kind of looked up some of the interviews that you were doing with people
03:45 and so on but we'll get onto that in a minute but I'm Chris by the way.
03:51 So I'm Chris from the Sheffield Star and you'll be coming to Sheffield on this weekend won't
04:00 you?
04:01 Saturday at the 90s fest at Magna.
04:06 So you're up there on the top billing with like the likes of Armin van Helden and Example
04:12 and Paul Oakenfeld, gosh it's like a list of artists do you know that I grew up listening
04:19 to?
04:20 Yeah, yeah.
04:21 It's kind of like a trip down memory lane for me even like the likes of like Sonique,
04:27 I remember that song I was doing my GCSEs at the time.
04:31 You know what I have bittersweet feelings about Sonique.
04:35 How come?
04:36 She's amazing.
04:40 That amazing person beat me on my Pepsi chart list.
04:47 My Otyche.
04:48 In 2000.
04:49 Yeah, so Black Legend, You See The Trouble I think that was number one and Sonique was
04:54 two with.
04:55 Feels so good.
04:58 And then Sandstone was number three.
05:00 Oh no, I love her.
05:04 She's a firecracker and I met her several times early 2000s we toured several of like
05:09 the same festivals and stuff and just recently actually I played at the same festival with
05:15 her in Lithuania.
05:20 And I think then again I didn't have a chance to meet her again this time like there we
05:25 hung out for a good while but then there was another festival was it in Ireland maybe just
05:30 a couple of weeks ago where our paths crossed again but we basically just went like and
05:36 didn't have a chance to hang but yeah she's awesome.
05:41 Yeah, I haven't seen her name for years so just to see a name is just I remember that
05:48 I mean obviously she had that particular it was that one big hit in the UK.
05:54 Big as well and an amazing song as well.
05:56 Yeah, I mean she was also a talented DJ in her own right as well so it was just but a
06:03 lot of people we don't kind of see that and when it comes to popular chart music and you've
06:10 kind of discussed the in previous interviews the kind of the diversification of different
06:17 radio stations in the UK in comparison to the likes of America I think it was in your
06:22 interview with the ENT magazine and you were talking about how in America it was like hip-hop
06:28 was the only thing that generally tended to cross over.
06:32 Yeah, yeah I mean that was that was definitely an error there like I'm not a an expert in
06:38 American radio in that way but I've been touring there for 20 years and or 25 years soon actually
06:45 and I lived there for six years so.
06:49 It's Atlanta right?
06:53 Yeah near Atlanta yeah Roswell Georgia but the key difference to know and to realize
06:59 about the American radio and British and Finnish and many of the European countries that we
07:05 have our national radio that everybody can listen and actually a lot of people do listen
07:11 to and you know like Radio One for instance in UK our national radio also has sort of
07:21 their own playlist and their agenda is not money based directly because it's you know
07:26 it's a you know taxpayer funded so they they don't have to play that narrow 12 track playlist
07:35 day after day and then also they have these specialty programs like you guys have as well
07:41 and more so probably like dance music wise and so on and in America there's no general
07:48 all covering public radio at all.
07:51 No.
07:52 They have have radio stations and most of those are commercial radio stations anyway
07:58 so they're all based on just pure numbers basically and some of them are really good
08:06 in some areas there are for instance from my perspective there are a lot of dance music
08:10 folks and there there have been successful and big radio stations dance music wise but
08:16 a flip of a coin is that for instance there used to be this amazing channel in in Miami
08:22 area in Florida called Party 93 One and one weekend when the people went home on a Friday
08:31 and then when they came back on a Monday it had changed from that had grown to be a big
08:36 huge successful and much loved dance radio it changed to like this Latin pop radio just
08:44 because somebody up the chain saw that another dance I mean Latin station went out of business
08:53 for whatever reason and all of a sudden there was a huge marketplace for Latin radio that
08:58 was way bigger in that area even though the dance radio was huge and then they just decided
09:04 like okay it's gonna be a Latin station from now on and the people who came on Monday they
09:09 could either stay or they could go but I don't know it's you know imagine that