Over the last year we have seen a lot of electronic dance music artists stray away from their roots in an effort to work on new sounds that don’t necessarily subscribe directly to the “EDM” label. The thought of acts like Afrojack and Avicii starting that trend on a mainstream level is inspiring. In the end, a lot of big room/progressive giants within our realm are starting to get bored and, in turn, this is sparking much more creativity. Although that’s not to say that the original big room electro/progressive styles will die out – they won’t – because they will always have their niche audiences.
After all, in order for electronic dance music to stay relevant on a mainstream level it needs to change constantly… trends need to die out and new ones need to sprout. Avicii has shown that he can embrace change by releasing an album that features a ton of crossovers. Afrojack has been doing the same by bridging together EDM and pop music.
Recently, Afrojack sat down with Mixmag.net to talk about his new album. One of his most notable comment was that his forthcoming work has “almost no drops“.
“It’s like upside down world, it’s completely crazy. My whole album has almost no drops.
“The album is not meant to be put on at a festival to jump to for 70 minutes. My album is meant, as most musical albums are meant, to listen to and enjoy. I want it to be an experience.”
He continued: “To me a good album is like a good movie. I hope my album will be at least as good as the trailer for [the movie] Inception. It has the build-ups and it has a lot of musical stuff, it’s like a journey, you go a little bit through different kinds of genres.”
However, Afrojack assuaged ravers concerns by added that he will also be remixing the album for the purpose of festivals and the like.
Having turned 26 towards the end of last year, his impending 30th birthday has appeared on the horizon, and with it, aspirations for the next four years:
“I just hope I get my shit together before I’m 30…big shit. I already do a lot of balling things but before I’m 30 I want to take EDM to a Jay Z level… like ‘EDM’s so hard mother*ckers wanna find me!’”. – via MixMag (read the full article)
In the above quote, Afrojack also mentioned his desire to take EDM to “a Jay Z Level” before he reaches the age of 30. Right now EDM has a lot of unique innovators, but we’re still lacking a creator/businessman/artist combination, similar to Jay Z.
Nick van de Wall could absolutely fill that role.
WhiteRaverRafting is sure that he has got some game changing surprises for 2014, starting with the release of his album. We’re very interested in seeing what direction he takes his career in next.
[H/t: DoAndroidsDance.com]
[Source: Mixmag.net]
Share On
