taking some time with david guetta…

While I was at EDC, I had the opportunity to catch up with David Guetta, a european master of Electro House, with his new single searing the top of the charts and reaching #1 on both the US and UK dance charts along with his Fuck Me I’m Famous parties all around Europe, the man is a machine.

David Guetta feat. Kelly Rowland – When Love Takes Over
David Guetta – Joan of Arc (Crookers remix)

Where were you before you came to LA?

I was playing at the Glastonbury Festival yesterday in the UK, Which is a huge festival of about 200,000 people. It’s really crazy, I was speaking to my agent about it, you know it’s only in the UK that 200,000 people can camp in the mud. It’s raining, but it’s a party.

It was probably pretty cold too?

Yeah! It’s terrible, it’s the worst nightmare for everyone, but they love it! It’s very hippy, very special. I love it.

It’s nice to see that many people come together under one central idea, which is music.

Yeah, it’s a big honor for me to play that type of festival.

….

So I wanted to talk a little about remixes, do you remix a lot?

I don’t remix a whole lot, but I do a lot of bootlegs for myself. Like tonight I’m going to play a lot of special edits. But I do a lot of producing and I want to get more into that area. My new album is all about the electronic culture of Europe meeting the urban culture of America. My album will be released at the end of August and it features artists like Akon, Kid Cudi, and Will.i.am. I don’t know if you know that I produced some of the Black Eyed Peas album.

No I didn’t.

Yeah the new single, ‘I Got a Feeling’ was produced by me. So that’s what I’m trying to right now, mix the cultures. That’s the future that I’m looking towards.

So what’s the biggest difference between our two cultures, Europe and the US? Is there just a different vibe or is it participation or what?

I think it’s just that dance music has been very underestimated in this country and it’s changing right now. So for me it’s extremely exciting to be here and witness these major changes that are happening. This is my favorite place to play right now because of that, because of the anticipation, because of the potential.

So are you trying to go somewhere totally different or are you building off things already created?

These people come into my world. Obviously because they’re a big artist they bring a lot artistically and a lot of them want me to produce tracks for their albums, and in exchange they come and get featured on my album. It’s just a give take relationship, and when I go over to their albums, I’ll adapt myself to their style, but when they come over to my world, it’s all me. It’s great, it’s very exciting to make new music.

So for some of the readers here in LA that are still new to dance music, because like you said it’s here it just hasn’t exploded yet, where did you draw influences from when you were growing up? Was it all electro, or was there another type of music that really affected you?

As a producer, I’d name people like Prince and Depeche Mode, that were very futuristic in their production. As a DJ, I’d have to say a lot of DJs from America really affected me. Everything was born here, you just kept it underground whereas Europe just grew and exploded. My single, ‘When Love Takes Over’ is getting really good airplay over here.

But the main reason for that is that Europe had a central radio station, BBC radio 1, that really pushed the culture out there. We don’t have really any of that yet.

Definitely.

So I’m writing a small paper on what’s happening right now with the industry and the internet and various aspects of the culture emerging, do you have any thoughts or observations you care to share with us?

For me it’s going to hurt a lot of the big artists, but for the smaller guys, it’s amazing. For me, I’m considered a big artist is Europe but not yet in America. My music would never be what it is around the world, if there was no internet. So I can not complain about this. ‘When Love Takes Over,’ within two weeks of the release, was all over the world. Everywhere, every DJ had heard it before we had even sent it to radio stations. So it’s amazing. I cannot complain, maybe I’m making less money, but it’s fine. Right now what I see as a DJ is the musical conscious of the younger generation is so much higher than it was. I think it’s great, people are so much more open minded. So let’s just say that the business is more into live than selling records.

It’s almost a renaissance.

Exactly.

So rounding out this interview, are there any underrated artists you want to shine a light on for us?

There’s a hundred. The Swedish House Mafia, they’re playing here Saturday. [two more artists named that were lost to music and french accents...]

Anything else you want to say?

I’m Happy! Look at this! It’s all fantastic. You cannot let anyone say there’s no scene in America. Here’s 100,000 people saying otherwise.