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Ephwurd Talks Sushi, Bangers, and Genres at EDC Orlando [Exclusive Interview]

November 22, 2016 By Brian Schultz

Ephwurd 2016

It was another EDC Orlando for the books, and one group that has been gaining some serious traction has been Ephwurd. The nutty duo made up of Troy B., aka Datsik, and Bais Haus have been gaining a serious following, and this was no doubt shown with the attendance and energy of the crowd at kineticFIELD this year. We were able to get a few minutes of their time right after their performance for a quick chat.

RR: It’s hot as hell today, versus EDC NY in May which was cold as hell this year. Does that affect what you play or anything in terms of tempo while you’re up there?

Datsik: Well honestly we’re working on a lot of tracks right now that we think will probably get us bumped up like, probably 19 slots, so that we’re actually playing at night. But actually, our slots have been good, thanks to Insomniac, everything has been f*cking dope, like considering we haven’t put out too many tracks, but every single track we put out has been like, fire, and supported by Spinnin, and like everything’s been totally cool on that front, y’know, there’s much bigger acts that are above us, so I think the hardest part about playing during the daytime, is looking at the CDJ’s and not trying to see the reflection.

Datsik: It’s kind of difficult. And it’s funny cause like, coming from Datsik, I’m used to playing at the end of the night, so coming to the main stage and trying to do a new thing is a difficult task, but it’s fun! It’s fun because it’s so not what I do as Datsik, and it’s house music and it’s a lot of fun, and we just make it into a f*ckin party, and that’s what it’s all about. But you know, I think the reason why we do it, is to fund our sushi bill, because we always get sushi, almost every single day. Baisi doesn’t make it any easier, cause we’ll be sitting in the studio and he’ll just show me his phone, I’ll look at it, and it says Eat24, I’m like, shit dude, that’s like 180 bucks and he’s like, Ephwurd card? I’m like, alright, sure.

Bais Haus: We have to make the bangers to pay off our sushi bill.

Datsik: And like, that’s the thing, sushi delivery is never as good, but we found the gems, ya know?

RR: I dont’ think I’ve ever had sushi delivered what so ever.

Bais Haus: You’ve never had sushi delivery?

RR: I don’t think so, no.

Bais Haus: I don’t recommend it, because like, there’s a thing with freshness when you sit down, you want it instantly. But, if you’re trying to bang out a track, it’s not that bad.

RR: So you guys categorize your music as bass-house, what do you think really defines bass-house and the way you guys would make a track versus like, your normal electro house?

Bais Haus: We don’t categorize that. I feel like other people have put us in that bubble, like at the end of the day, we want to make, and just put out music that’s fire. We just want to get kids going crazy. The whole bass-house thing…

Datsik: …We gotta pay homage to some degree, because of the fact that, that’s kind of what brought us in. Like we did this track with Jauz, the Rock The Party track, and then all of the sudden it started this career for us. But that was never the intention of Ephwurd. It was more so just making house music, but like, some of the new sh*t we’re working on right now is different and vibey and weird, and dare I say mainstream-ish, but cool. The thing is, I find that if an artist is going to cross over into that mainstream category, it can’t be sh*tty. It’s gotta be something that the artist actually truly believes in, as opposed to just being like, “Yo, I see what Calvin Harris is doing, I see what Chainsmokers are doing, I’m gonna make that exact same thing.” It’s not like that. Because it usually ends up being a sh*tty copy cat of that.

Datsik: I don’t think that’s the way to do it, I think it’s about making something that’s original, that appeals to everyone, but still having your own flavor and your own taste. We’re working on a couple tracks like that right now, and it’s one of those things where it’s a very fine line. People can either be like “yo f*ck you Ephwurd”, and we’ll be like, “We don’t give a f*ck, cause that’s our name!” Or it can be like one of those things where like, *high pitch voice* “OMG I LOVVEE EPHWURD!”

Bais Haus: I feel like there’s going to be a lot of backlash, because our fans have placed the bass-house thing on us too much than we intended. We wanted to make hype music, like what we did back in the day, but at the end of it all, we’re artists, and we want to just make what we f*cking like, and that’s the bottom line.

Datsik: Coming from Datsik, the whole reason we started Ephwurd in the first place is to make that kind of sh*t.

Bais Haus: Cause we don’t give a fuck.

Datsik: So if someone’s like “Yo you guys have changed” we’re gonna be like “F*ck yeah we’ve changed!” That was the whole point of the f*cking project!

Bais Haus: It’s gonna be that comment like “Your old stuff is better than..” We’ll say “…but that was never the point to begin with!”

Datsik: …and that was like a month ago dude, go back to YouTube, you f*ckin troll.

Bais Haus: You know nothing of my work!

Datsik: You don’t define us, we define us!

RR: I was actually going to ask you guys about that, because, going from the style of “Rock The Party” to the track “Just Us” is a big change in tempo and not as heavy-hitting. How did that kind of come about?

Bais Haus: We actually wrote “Just Us” before “Rock The Party”. Our original intention, was we were trying to do vibey, super chill sh*t, and then Jauz hit us up, and we wrote “Rock The Party”, and then from there, it spun this whole banger thing. We started off doing pretty chill shit actually. All in all at the end of the day, we’re gonna write whatever the f*ck we want to write, cause, we’re not just like… if you look at a person, you always be “Yo that dude’s just bangers, all the time.”

Bais Haus: If I think about writing bangers all the time, that reminds me of some dude that drinks preworkout nonstop and is just always constantly jacked. It’s the dude at the gym who’s yelling when he’s lifting weights. Just “Arrghhh!” And you’re the guy in the background, like “That dude’s a piece of shit.” We like to encompass everything, we want to do chill shit, we love hype shit. Hype shit is always great.

Datsik: At the end of the day, the music will always speak for itself. If you hate it, whatever, we don’t give a f*ck. If you like it, then hopefully we’re gonna end up gaining a lot more fans, for sure.

Bais Haus: We love to produce music, that’s the bottom line. It doesn’t matter if it’s hype music, or if it’s chill music. One day we’ll be like “Yo, it’s raining outside, let’s write some chill, vibey shit.” Or if we just went to a crazy festival, and we saw somebody play something that inspired us, we’ll think “That sh*t was so hype, let’s write some hype sh*t.” It’s a constant variation.

Datsik: There can be no heavy without the soft, there can be no light without the dark.

Bais Haus: Troy’s the Yin, i’m the yang.. or vise versa.

Datsik: No dude i’m the yang!

Bais Haus: I’ll be the yin dude, I don’t care. With one comes the other.

Datsik: With sushi comes the yellow tail. With salmon comes the yellow tail.

RR: With sushi comes the sake!

Datsik: Sake is always involved, let’s not kid ourselves here.

Bais Haus: With hand rolls, comes the cut rolls.

RR: The only other thing we had, is kind of random, but if you weren’t producing music, what other thing that you were really good at, before you started producing music, as a career?

Bais Haus: I was in honors biology, so I’d for sure be a scientist. I killed it at botany. I killed it at biology. I don’t know what field I’d want to go into, but I figure I’d probably go into human biology, because it’s more interesting.

Datsik: I was always obsessed with snowboarding, but completely separate from that, I was in honors math as well, so like you said, finding something that’s separate from music, I’ve gotten into the stock market. So that’s my B job. You’ve gotta take everything with a grain of salt, you’ve gotta make your own decisions. You gotta do your own diligence with that kind of sh*t, because everyone has their own motives. That’s the only way you can make money in the stock market.

Bais Haus: I think as a duo, Troy and I would be the first people, to actually build Terminator. We’re gonna be the ones who design Singularity! Sorry Steve Aoki!

Datsik: It just means we’re gonna make more money on Steve Aoki, cuz Steve Aoki is gonna buy the product from us.

Bais Haus: Shoutout to Steve, I love Steve. No hate there.

Datsik: Yeah!

Thanks to Ephwurd for sitting down with us during one of the most fun interviews we’ve done. Smart, lively, and talented guys.

Be sure to check out the video that Ephwurd recently released for “Vibrations” as it’s the perfect representation of the quirkiness and hilarity of these guys as you have read above.

ephwurd