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Krooked Drivers Talk Stage Presence, Integrity, and Forming Unity Through Music [WRR Exclusive Interview]

September 11, 2014 By Tyler Almodovar

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It is a rare treasure in music to experience love at first site. Not the kind of love that occurs between two people, but the kind which manifests between music lover and musician. Sacred moments such as these leave a lasting impression, eternally bonding you to the artist on an emotional level. It’s in these instances that you are reminded of how music is supposed to make you feel. The sensation is like a drug, potent and hypnotic, lingering in your consciousness long after the moment has passed.

A couple months back during my first stint at Sonic Bloom I found myself at a show which heightened my appreciation for music. In the oftentimes shallow world that has become the EDM scene, moments of true connection and emotion between performer and crowd are scarce, and sadly, the benchmark of popularity among artists now revolves around who can throw the biggest party. Talent and integrity take a backseat to outlandish stage tactics, and every day the stigma of vulgarity grows stronger. Luckily, sad truths often posses a fine silver lining, and in this case, it comes in the form of an intensified gratitude for truly inspiring acts.

When I heard Krooked Drivers at Sonic Bloom, my feelings about music shifted. I no longer wanted to waste my precious time listening to anything uninspiring. When I attended a live show, I wanted to feel a tangible connection, as if the artist was communicating with me through sound. Powerful stage presence became more important to me, and I began to expect more from the artist. All of these desires materialized after I was gifted a groundbreaking live music experience, thanks to a young Denver duo who have dedicated their lives to refining an exceptional craft.

Five years ago Maddy O’neal and Donnie Dalbora made the decision to stop dead in their tracks and rededicate their lives to a greater purpose. They met when Maddy was attending the University of Colorado at Boulder, and after acquiring Abelton from her musician brother, the couple began pumping out tracks. In 2013 they released their first EP, Somewhere in Between, and since that moment the duo hasn’t skipped a beat. With three well-received EPs produced in a short two-year span, and one full length album only five days away, the Krooked Drivers have established themselves as a mainstay act in Colorado and beyond. When asked what keeps them motivated, the pair accredited both altruism and necessity.

DD: It’s a deep obsession and you can always get better, no one’s a master at this. To be able to bring a new thing to people and to make them actually think and remember past times with family and friends, that’s just something in itself to keep you wanting to do it. It’s like building a house for a poverty-stricken place, you feel really good about yourself after doing it. It’s forming unity.

MO: We were talking about this the other day. With music it’s like a never ending to-do list. There’s always more gear we want to get, or something we want to improve, and no one is ever a master at it. From the beginning it was all about making music that we wanted to make. We didn’t want to bend to any trends, we didn’t start making trap or dubstep or anything, I think the most important thing is to stay true to yourself. There is always going to be ways we can get better and that keeps us going and keeps us driving as well.

Both O’neal and Dalbora refuse the easy way out, and their creative road is paved with hard work and diligence. Traveling around the country visiting record stores and collecting potential samples, the sound of Krooked Drivers is one that proves not only a gifted ear, but also an immense drive and determination to create interesting music.

DD: We go home with the records and you can tell with your ears which ones are in key with each other, and which ones are going to work together, and then it’s just a process of making something. You love two songs so much, they have such an amazing feel and vibe to them, and then you piece them together and they create something that causes even more of a feeling and emotion. It’s a really mind-bending process, but it’s very relaxing and calming at the same time.

MO: It kind of means more, the samples that we actually went out and found at a record store, sampled them, made our own library and then collaged them together. It has more meaning when you actually go out and dig for those records, rather than googling or whatever a lot of people do these days, like just looking for loops.

Lacking formal music education, Dalbora and O’neal have taught themselves everything from scratch. Careful to never get ahead of themselves, the pair acknowledges a perpetual room for growth, but also pays credit to an inherent musical talent. Years of practice have cultivated a respectable craft, but at the end of the day musical creativity is something few people are born with.

DD: You definitely evolve, messing with the software more and more, it’s like anything though, practice makes perfect, and you do have to have some kind of ear for rhythm and what you want. Sometimes I’ll plan a song before it’s even made, and people are like ‘wow you’re really doing that? Your mind works like that?,’ and yeah, I already know where this is going. It’s really the feeling of creativity and imagination when it comes down to opening a blank page and being like, okay, we have to use what we have and make something that’s fresh, something that people are going to bob their heads to and say ‘ah damn I like this, this is different than the normal EDM standard these days.’

MO: We’ve definitely learned a lot since we started. Any producer will tell you to go back and re-dig, so we will listen to records we picked up a year ago and will find stuff we totally overlooked because we are thinking about it differently now. So our skills have definitely evolved over time, and we can pick those out a lot better.

One obstacle the duo had to overcome was the intimidation of performing live in front of a crowd. The gap between producing music and performing live is a significant one, and both Dalbora and O’neal confessed that the transition has not been easy. I was shocked to hear this admission, since my love for Krooked Drivers was based almost entirely on their ability to connect with their audience.

DD: Maddy and I were never the kind of people who would get up in front of a room of people and do a speech, and now we are thrown into ‘you need to perform, and you need to perform well.’ It’s kind of like when your mind goes blank and you’re just up there and people are like, ‘wow you really rocked that! And you’re like, ‘Really? You really liked that?’ You can’t really put your mind around it. The differences between sitting in a bedroom producing music for two weeks straight and then being thrown into being social, we are learning to grasp with it. Playing live is a whole different beast than producing the tracks in the studio because you can make the best music ever, but if you can’t play on stage it’s not really going to go to far, you’ll just be a studio producer.

MO: We used to be, and still are, out in the crowd raging to other people’s music too, so we knew what we wanted to see once it was our time to be on stage and play live, and we set up our set so that we can play off of each other and keep that vibe going. Knowing that people are out there digging your music, it’s hard not to get down.

A thriving epicenter of creative inspiration and experimentation, Denver has allowed Dalbora and O’neal to become the artists they aspire to be, and on their own terms. The pair feels indebted to the supportive, open-minded musical community that epitomizes the Mile High city, and wishes to keep the tradition going as new musicians enter the scene.

MO: The community is unbeatable. The people who have been around, like Mikey Thunder and all those people, they know that it’s important to pay attention to the scene, and they are always all about promoting the up-and-comers and getting them shows, and it’s kind of like a cycle of community where people are always helping each other out and trying to make people aware of what’s going on.

DD: I think everyone’s just really open-minded out here. This place is amazing. In Colorado you can go to so many different shows and draw so much inspiration each weekend. All the homies – us and Late Night Radio kick it all the time – it’s been great. We bring each other to the airport, we are basically each other’s runners, we come over and check out each other’s tracks; it’s a really really great community. With Super Best Records coming into the mix, with Michal Menert and Mux Mool, it’s a really cool thing because you’re hanging out with the people who really influence you, and you’re influencing them, and it’s competitive, but a super friendly tribe that is really unstoppable.

The brainchild of fellow Colorado producer Michal Menert, Super Best Records is a collective of electronic musicians, made up of Menert, Mux Mool, Krooked Drivers, Late Night Radio, Mikey Thunder and JK Soul. The label allows the artists to own their rights, with record profits being split 50/50. Artists involved are responsible for promoting their own brand while also advocating for the sacred nature of vinyl records. O’neal explained that by creating a brand that consists solely of musicians with musical integrity, Menert hopes to fortify the harshly-criticized electronic genre.

MO: That’s what Super Best is all about, and why Michal started it. He wants to prolong that movement of integrity in music, and actually making stuff with emotion and not be afraid that it doesn’t go too hard. It is a movement, and that’s what we are trying to do with this whole collective and scene out here.

DD: It’s a good influence on other artists. You need that yin and yang, but it would be cool if more people really cared about their performance and actually took the time to play stuff and not get wasted on stage, and played out their whole entire set, and not having time to throw cake at people.

As someone who is attentive to the lack of female representation in electronic music, I am always curious about what it is like to be a girl artist in a male-dominated scene. When asked whether the combination of a male and female duo worked to their advantage or disadvantage, Dalbora and O’neal expressed mixed feelings.

DD: I think chicks look at Maddy up there playing on live pads and bass pads and putting down neck-breaking hip-hop beats, and think ‘holy shit, I want to do that.’ There’s people that can relate to me as well. I think we really play off each other, because we have so much fun on stage, and you get to travel with the person that you love, and you get to live your life and follow your dreams. It’s been a really great time.

MO: It’s been interesting for me as well, because I’m a girl in the scene and it is very male-dominated. In the beginning a lot of people assumed that I didn’t make the music, they just classified me as the girlfriend, so I kind of had to push past that and not let it get to me. And I get it, because people don’t see that as much as they should. I kind of want to prove myself in the scene as well, and kind of show that girls can do this too.

DD: Some girls focus on going to the mall and buying a new material item, and I think it’s cool that Maddy goes to a record store and wants to dig for records, or go to a music shop and find an old instrument.

MO: The girls that are in the scene don’t get enough recognition, which is why people aren’t as used to it as they should be.

With a sound that constantly evolves and flourishes, I was curious to find out what the next big challenge was for Krooked Drivers. It has recently become more prevalent in the electronic scene to include live instrumentation, and Dalbora and O’neal expressed their intent to explore this area further.

DD: We are planning on expanding because we aren’t musicians, and while we play live we have controllers to be able to play our songs. We aren’t instrumental musicians, we aren’t playing guitar. So we really want to dive into the live instrument aspect of everything and get Maddy into a studio and put some vocals down and really expand, buy more gear and stuff like that and continue to evolve.

The pair also gave details about their first full-length album, Finding the Way, set to release next Tuesday, Sept. 16, on Super Best Records.

DD: We have an album coming out in September on Super Best Records, it’s being mixed and mastered right now. It’s really dope, we’re excited, it’s a big one. It’s our first album, full-length LP, it’s 12 tracks with two bonus tracks, so when you go to BandCamp or SoundCloud to download it you’ll end up getting two bonus tracks, and it’s really cool. We have Michal doing a remix, we’re gonna get Late Night Radio to do a remix, Manic Focus, the Geeks and VRB out of France, so there are a couple big dudes that are going to be doing some remixes, so we’re excited about it, it’s fresh.

MO: It was definitely a process because we are used to putting out EPs or single tracks, so having 12 of them and trying to make it all cohesive and fit as a whole was definitely a big step for us.

While we wait with bated breath for next week, check out the two released singles from the album, “Something in the Air” and “Take Me Back,” and make sure to purchase Finding the Way next week through the Krooked Drivers BandCamp page.