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Artist Spotlight: Exclusive Interview with Sick Individuals

July 10, 2013 By Chad Downs

Sick Individuals caught my eye in 2012 with their remix of Icona Pop’s “I Don’t Care,” a track that shows off in-depth music theory skills and electronic dynamism, ever since then I was curious, what rooted this talented duo in the success it is today? As artist who grew up in the Netherlands scene, like Hardwell, R3hab, and many others, there’s alot of EDM influence in the culture.

Since graduating from Music Composition & Production at the Utrecht School of the Arts in Hilversum, their hard-work quickly started paying off. With each release, they gained world-wide popularity and support from big time DJ/Producers, like Swedish House Mafia (when they were together), Afrojack, and Calvin Harris. Their talents caught the eye of big and small recording companies like: Island/Def Jam Records, Virgin Records, Spinnin’ Records, are those are only a few whom worked with S.I. members, Ray and Jim.

Their most recent uploads include the music video for “Pepper (Original Mix)” and their latest track “We Are The Sun (SICK INDIVIDUALS Remix).” Both songs really hone in on their producing power and show off great performance value. Check WRR for future releases and news on their upcoming tour of the USA, Canada and Mexico.

So, being a big influence and favorite of mine, I felt compelled to get in touch with them. They were nice enough to do a interview, where we talk beginnings, success, and the future. Check out “I Don’t Care (Sick Individuals Remix)” and the exclusive interview below.

Interview

First off, I have to ask. Why do so many great DJ/producers come out of the Netherlands, is it the music schools, culture or both?

House music has been a huge part of Dutch culture for decades, so like many of the DJs and producers from here, we are all influenced by many years of electronic dance music. We are definitely proud to be part of it! But we would say it’s both; our culture and the music schools who are also into electronic music as well. We graduated on the School of Arts, that’s also where we met each other actually.

Do you both have the same degrees or different ones? How has this given you a competitive advantage?

Yes we both studied music composition and production, it’s just great to have the knowledge of producing music, we still do the same as before our studio but know we know why we do it, how to fix things and to handle things in a professional way.

It also makes working together with other artists from different genres a lot easier because you talk in the same language.

At what point did you realize “Holy Shit, Sick Individuals is really being taken seriously!” and how did that feel?

When a couple of famous DJ’s started to play our Icona Pop “I Love It” Remix on massive stages we got so much feedback and support, it was amazing. It’s great to get feedback from fans and DJ’s telling you that they have also discovered all the other tracks we’ve made the last couple of years.

How did the idea of Sick Individuals come along? Did you guys meet in music school?

We started making beats in the evening when we were finished with our schoolwork. We had fun and a great musical connection. Things got a bit more serious when we really decided to try to get a release on a Dutch house label.

What is the best trait that separates S.I. from other DJ/Producers?

We love to be creative, try to be different not for the sake of being different but because it keeps things fresh and exciting. We love to make music, but we just can’t make tracks that sound almost the same. Of course we use some of the same elements but after a while we really wan’t to do something new. That’s why our music is versatile.

What are your plans for fall 2013, any cool surprises?

We’re getting our U.S. Visa now and we’ve got some nice gigs planed in Canada, US and Mexico. Can’t wait to see how things roll over there !

What type of software to you use to develop you music?

We use Logic Pro, but before we used FL studio 5 and Reason. Because of our studies we had to learn with different kinds of programs like Logic and Pro Tools. We also make our edits in Ableton because it has a great workflow.

Any final words you’d like to share with your fans?

We’re getting a lot of nice tweets and messages from our fans and we wanna thank everyone who is supporting us at the moment and who is supporting us from the beginning! We read all of our feedback and really love that people are enjoying our music. Thanks !!!

Posted by: @ChadWRR

Sick Individuals