Speaker 1: Welcome, Welcome, Welcome to the Bob Left Sets podcast. My
Speaker 1: guest this week is DJ Cascade. Great to have you here. Yeah,
Speaker 1: thanks for having me. This is awesome. Now, of course
Speaker 1: it's all over the interday. Your name is Ryan Radden.
Speaker 1: Is it okay to call you Ryan, call me whatever
Speaker 1: you whatever your preference is, okay, So Ryan, some of
Speaker 1: the audience will people will be very familiar with your
Speaker 1: music and with the scene. Do you like the moniker
Speaker 1: E d M or not? I think today I don't.
Speaker 1: I used to not bother me at all, and I
Speaker 1: mean really and truly it doesn't bother me that much. Um,
Speaker 1: But I think E d M has kind of become
Speaker 1: a bad word in the last couple of years. I
Speaker 1: think now almost represents a genre of electronic music that
Speaker 1: I'm not necessarily that closely affiliated with. It's more of
Speaker 1: this big room kind of mayhem, uh, very loud, noxious
Speaker 1: music within electronic music. It's kind of become its own,
Speaker 1: little like sub genre. But for me, I'm just glad
Speaker 1: anyone's calling this music anything. Look, I thought from the
Speaker 1: day when it was you know, we were unnoticed. Okay,
Speaker 1: but let's stay there for the uninitiated. They read all
Speaker 1: the different genres of dance music, house music, chill, etcetera.
Speaker 1: Can you go through and explain those to the audience
Speaker 1: and maybe unfamiliar with them. Uh, I'll do as good
Speaker 1: a job as I can in a in a short,
Speaker 1: little concise way. Um, house music is just I think
Speaker 1: for me, that's kind of just the very general broad term.
Speaker 1: That's just post disco. Just think of disco, right, It's
Speaker 1: kind of what made it through the seventies. It's kind
Speaker 1: of the the eighties version of disco music, and that's
Speaker 1: kind of survived this entire time. That's kind of the
Speaker 1: backbound Disco is the backbone of electronic music, is the
Speaker 1: way I see it, Kid from Chicago. That's my perspective,
Speaker 1: very much so. Um. But then chills just like what
Speaker 1: you would think it is. It's relaxed down tempo um.
Speaker 1: Trap is kind of a version of hip hop music.
Speaker 1: That's uh, you know, modern version of hip hop music.
Speaker 1: That's the way I see It's very aggressive um. And
Speaker 1: I mean within each one of these big genres, there's
Speaker 1: fifty subgenres, you know. I mean with trap there's bro
Speaker 1: staff and hard staff, and and then you have drumming bass,
Speaker 1: which A lot of this stuff is differentiated by tempo.
Speaker 1: Drum basis, you know, sixty per minute, beats per minute yep,
Speaker 1: and then houses you know around one tw kind of
Speaker 1: like a disco groove. UM. You know, trance is very
Speaker 1: fast like one forty, very synthetic sounding, UM, very synth driven. UM. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't know. There's so many genres out there, it's
Speaker 1: hard to even I think trance house electro is uh
Speaker 1: similar to house but um but much more aggressive sounding.
Speaker 1: And that was made popular with kind of E d
Speaker 1: M and Steve Aoki in that wave of artists bloody
Speaker 1: beat roots and that kind of thing that was happening
Speaker 1: a few years ago. So what would you consider your
Speaker 1: music to be? Um. I mean, I like to say
Speaker 1: house because I think that's a very broad general term.
Speaker 1: But within that, yes, I make chill music. I make
Speaker 1: ambient music that doesn't have it's a tempo, real tempo.
Speaker 1: It's just kind of chill stuff, you know. That's that's
Speaker 1: me I mainly make and then I and then I
Speaker 1: have those kind of bigger more I call them big
Speaker 1: room sounds. You know, that's another kind of subgenre of
Speaker 1: house music that's more popular on the main stage, and
Speaker 1: that's basically what I played at the sun Soap Festival.
Speaker 1: I had those more chill moments, but you know, I
Speaker 1: kind of go take it up and down. Um yeah, okay.
Speaker 1: So you're from Chicago, yes, and uh were born in
Speaker 1: Chicago nineventy one. And what did your father do for
Speaker 1: a living? H? Finance? This is why we're in Chicago.
Speaker 1: This is kind of a hub of a financial center.
Speaker 1: Um helps out savings and loans, has his own business,
Speaker 1: goes out there and is helping small banks and savings
Speaker 1: and loans kind of. Um. He developed programs to kind
Speaker 1: of help them the way. So nothing music related at all. Okay,
Speaker 1: did your mother worked outside the house? Uh? She did.
Speaker 1: She helped my dad a lot, and then she was
Speaker 1: always doing stuff she was what was she doing? Her
Speaker 1: best job was working at the the ski shop there
Speaker 1: that was pretty close to my house. We gotta stop
Speaker 1: here for a second. So you're a snowboarder, Yes i am.
Speaker 1: How often do you get to snowboard? Uh? I usually
Speaker 1: go up about one week a year. Okay, yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: of all those kinds of sports. I love to surf
Speaker 1: and run and do all this stuff that snowboarding. I'm
Speaker 1: the best at out of all those. Okay, did you
Speaker 1: snowboard when you lived in Chicago? I did? Okay, what
Speaker 1: do you know, I forget the little will you know?
Speaker 1: That's just get in there. Woman. Woman is a terrible hill.
Speaker 1: But I had a lot of fun. My mom on
Speaker 1: Saturday morning would drop me off at the y m
Speaker 1: c A. And for like, I don't know what it was,
Speaker 1: twenty or thirty bucks. They would bust the kids up there.
Speaker 1: You know, we'd ski for the day and then come back,
Speaker 1: you know, come back down. Were you ever skier first?
Speaker 1: Were you always snowboarder? Now? I grew up skiing. I
Speaker 1: mean I'm old enough that you know when I first
Speaker 1: started out, snowboarding didn't even really exist. I was there
Speaker 1: for that first wave when Burton Snowboards were putting out
Speaker 1: these wood snowboards that you would strap in. You know,
Speaker 1: you were you wearing Surrell boots that didn't right right
Speaker 1: right right right? You know, I'm going to the sled
Speaker 1: hill and strapping in and going down and testing this out.
Speaker 1: Because I was skateboarding from a really young age. So
Speaker 1: when snowboarding came along to me for me, I was like,
Speaker 1: oh man, that's what I want to do. And then
Speaker 1: you said your mother worked in the ski shop. She did. Yeah,
Speaker 1: she's That's exactly why she worked in the ski shop,
Speaker 1: trying to outfit to older brothers, to your sisters, trying
Speaker 1: to outfit five kids kids in ski gears, you know, expensive.
Speaker 1: So I think she worked there so she can make
Speaker 1: that happen. Okay, so you're in the middle. I'm the
Speaker 1: middle child, so you know, I'm a middle child tooth
Speaker 1: theoretically overlooked. You know, the hopes and dreams were in
Speaker 1: the older ones. The younger ones you're babied and you're
Speaker 1: kind of ignored and go your own way. I'm pretty
Speaker 1: convinced my parents didn't know my name until, like I
Speaker 1: graduated high Well, how much older your older brothers and
Speaker 1: younger sisters. So, and that's another interesting thing. They waited
Speaker 1: a while for my sister. So I was never in
Speaker 1: high school with them. I was in his school with them.
Speaker 1: I was like on my own completely my older brothers. Also,
Speaker 1: the brother'spread above me is four and a half years
Speaker 1: older than me. So by the time he left high school,
Speaker 1: I was going in when I was a freshman, he
Speaker 1: was already a freshman in college. So Uh, yeah, I
Speaker 1: was kind of on my own. And then how much
Speaker 1: older your oldest brother, Um, he's only a year older
Speaker 1: than one above me. So, and then what's the age
Speaker 1: of your sisters. Um, let's see they're my sister is
Speaker 1: five years younger than me, and then the youngest is
Speaker 1: seven years younger than On some level, when you you know,
Speaker 1: the older ones were so old, you know, you you
Speaker 1: never really coexisted, you know, everybody was like so much
Speaker 1: older or younger. Yeah, in the house, we did, we
Speaker 1: definitely co existed. But outside of it, no, we're all
Speaker 1: kind of doing our own things. And you know, in
Speaker 1: the eighties is a different time. We're running around riding
Speaker 1: our bikes. Everybody's just like having fun. There was no Okay,
Speaker 1: now you're from north Brook, Illinois. Yes. The only thing
Speaker 1: I know about north Brook, Illinois supposedly the speed skating
Speaker 1: capital of the world. That's wow. You have done your research. Yes,
Speaker 1: I watched a lot of TV. I don't know how
Speaker 1: to do. Wow. Yeah, that's right. They practice over there,
Speaker 1: right at the sled hill. Um. Uh and uh yeah,
Speaker 1: there's a pool over there that I was a lifeguard
Speaker 1: at from many years. Um. But they that's where they
Speaker 1: practiced right by the sled hill. But in the community,
Speaker 1: is it like, is it something where they're trying to
Speaker 1: drag people into the sport or which just happens to
Speaker 1: be there, just happens to be there. And I think,
Speaker 1: you know, they had some success early on, and then
Speaker 1: those guys kept going back to north Brook and it cultivated,
Speaker 1: you know, this small group of people and it's it's
Speaker 1: still around. I mean I talked to one of my
Speaker 1: friends the other day and I forget the gold medalists
Speaker 1: that still lives there and you know, trains people there.
Speaker 1: I mean they you know, they've got a small facility
Speaker 1: and I don't know, just became one of these things
Speaker 1: that happened in north Brook, Illinois. Okay, so you're in
Speaker 1: north What are your sisters and brothers do for a
Speaker 1: living now or what are their lives about. Um My
Speaker 1: oldest brother, Russ is um Um. He sells satellite dishes
Speaker 1: to trucking companies so truckers can have TV on the road.
Speaker 1: That's pretty good. It's an interesting thing. That's his own
Speaker 1: business that he started with a buddy of his. Um
Speaker 1: Rich is uh here in um he was into movie producing.
Speaker 1: He lives in the Palace Stads as well. Um, but
Speaker 1: he stopped that and went into the internet side of things.
Speaker 1: He does Zephyr, which their office is actually very close
Speaker 1: to where we're sitting here. Zephyr is a kind of
Speaker 1: a um YouTube analytics company and they, you know, work
Speaker 1: with YouTube channels. Okay, and your two sisters, two sisters, Um,
Speaker 1: let's see, my youngest takes care of her her two kids.
Speaker 1: She's in the Bay Area, San Francisco. Um. And then
Speaker 1: my other sister lives close to my mom in Salt Lake.
Speaker 1: My mom after my dad, Mom and dad retired, they
Speaker 1: made their way out west. They were in Las Vegas
Speaker 1: for a few years, and then they made their way
Speaker 1: to Salt Lake because a few of my brothers and
Speaker 1: sisters are there. And now everybody's still alive. My dad's
Speaker 1: passed away, but my mom still here and all the
Speaker 1: kids are still here. Okay, So what does everybody think
Speaker 1: of your success? Disbelief? Disbelief because of the genre where
Speaker 1: they never believed in you. No, they always believed in me. Becau,
Speaker 1: It's like, how Ryan will be fine whatever this guy
Speaker 1: wants to do. My mom's like my youngest sister told
Speaker 1: that story recently. Mom said, you're the golden child. Okay,
Speaker 1: I don't remember hearing that, but that's awesome. Um yeah,
Speaker 1: I think you know, I was a hard worker coming up,
Speaker 1: so I think they thought I would have success no
Speaker 1: matter what I You know, all my brothers and sisters
Speaker 1: are successful, you know what I mean. Yeah, but we
Speaker 1: all know if you're successful in dance music, it's incredibly lucrative.
Speaker 1: You know. It's not like you go on the rail.
Speaker 1: It's like being a comedian. You take your microphone and
Speaker 1: maybe a road manager. There's a little bit more. Maybe
Speaker 1: take your laptop or USB stick or your turntables. But
Speaker 1: there are these high fees which are paraded everywhere in
Speaker 1: the news now, and you have to pay an agent,
Speaker 1: maybe you have to pay a manager. But it's very lucrative. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and they like to rib me about that. I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, typically my family gets together once a year,
Speaker 1: at least once a year, and it's usually around July four.
Speaker 1: My mom's got a cabin in Idaho over by Jackson Whole, Wyoming,
Speaker 1: beautiful part of the country anyway, But typically because of
Speaker 1: my schedule, me and my family, we fly private and
Speaker 1: this causes a lot of you know, hey, what's going
Speaker 1: on here? Guys? Fancy plane coming? So my siblings love
Speaker 1: to you know, where's the airport there? I usually find
Speaker 1: Idaho Falls, but sometimes I've flown into Jackson. Just depends,
Speaker 1: you know. Okay. Then another question. You've made all this money.
Speaker 1: Your relatives asked for money? Not too much? No? Um,
Speaker 1: I don't know. Are they scared? This might be listening.
Speaker 1: I don't say anything you don't want to say. No,
Speaker 1: I listen. On my side of family, I mean people
Speaker 1: have done okay. I don't think anyone is you know,
Speaker 1: and whatever. I've been there a few times to help
Speaker 1: out when now needed. But okay, and then you know,
Speaker 1: a lot of times rock stars or famous musicians like
Speaker 1: by their parents a house or a car or something.
Speaker 1: Did you go through any of that? I haven't. I
Speaker 1: haven't needed to. My dad was he did well? And
Speaker 1: he set it up so that my mom, you know,
Speaker 1: it's fine and everyone. Okay. Well let's stay with the
Speaker 1: money because around this topic, what do you do with
Speaker 1: the money? Um, I have a couple of houses. Uh,
Speaker 1: but there's a lot more money than a couple of houses.
Speaker 1: Yes there is. I mean you have it in stocks?
Speaker 1: Do you have it in companies. What do you do
Speaker 1: with that? I've invested a lot of it. Um, I've
Speaker 1: been very conservative. This is this is where I wish
Speaker 1: my dad was alive. You know, he would help us
Speaker 1: the way as things really started to go crazy. Um,
Speaker 1: And yeah, you've been able to help me out. But
Speaker 1: you know I've done well. I've I've been very conservative. Okay,
Speaker 1: conservative means were like index funds or you're buying blue chips. Okay,
Speaker 1: all of that. And are you aware of where all
Speaker 1: your needs? Yes? I am, okay, because you know the
Speaker 1: legendary stories of people not so much recently being ripped
Speaker 1: off by their financial advisors. My wife forwards me every
Speaker 1: single one of those articles. She was my business manager
Speaker 1: for ten years. She's been very involved in my business.
Speaker 1: And she was my business manager for ten years and
Speaker 1: that was a hard one to pass over. And you know,
Speaker 1: she's always so scared, like where is everything? So yeah,
Speaker 1: we keep a close eye on it, and I'm fairly
Speaker 1: involved with where everything is and I get updated. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't know the biggest thing. You know, I bought
Speaker 1: a really nice car recently, but well I was just
Speaker 1: sort into what car did your body my I should
Speaker 1: say my wife bought a really nice car, Naomi. My
Speaker 1: wife loves to drive. She loves to drive. And now
Speaker 1: she's getting her pilot's license, which we probably get it.
Speaker 1: She's getting a helicopter pilot's license, and so we'll probably
Speaker 1: be buying a helicopter here fairly soon. Okay, once time,
Speaker 1: once subject, one time. What car did you get? A
Speaker 1: Porsche Targa. Okay, But the only thing about helicopters is
Speaker 1: when there's a problem, they go right down. Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, I remember I've told her about this,
Speaker 1: and I remember flying in videos on YouTube. I remember
Speaker 1: flying in the helicopter to E d C. Okay, in
Speaker 1: the way over there. You know, it's a it's a
Speaker 1: helicopter full of people or they were all talking and
Speaker 1: whatever on the way back the four thirty in the morning,
Speaker 1: and it's just me who's awake, and the thing is
Speaker 1: bouncing up and down. It's not like being in a
Speaker 1: commercial airplane. We said, well, this thing will never crash.
Speaker 1: Well it good crash. I think it's still a fairly
Speaker 1: safe way to travel. Okay, just since we're on the
Speaker 1: plane thing, let's go the point. So when you fly private,
Speaker 1: do you have a net jet account or an equivalent,
Speaker 1: or do you just book every time you go? Typically
Speaker 1: a book every time I go. That's what I'm doing.
Speaker 1: Nine nine percent of the time I joined one of
Speaker 1: these things and I haven't even been able to use it.
Speaker 1: So why haven't you been able to? Just it doesn't
Speaker 1: work for me. It's one of these like kind of
Speaker 1: you know, jets on demand kind of thing, and you
Speaker 1: get on there and you pay a fee, and every
Speaker 1: time I go on there to use it, it's like
Speaker 1: never working for me. But I don't want to put
Speaker 1: this image out that I'm flying around plat private all
Speaker 1: the time. Well no, Well, with the point being that
Speaker 1: people don't understand that it's not about luxury, it's about convenience.
Speaker 1: It's like, okay, uh, you know this is why you know,
Speaker 1: I don't want to sound go between the halves and
Speaker 1: have nuts. But if you talk about corporations, etcetera, they
Speaker 1: feel the value of time of the CEO. They don't
Speaker 1: want them sitting on the ground waiting to get on
Speaker 1: the plane. For those of us who have flown private,
Speaker 1: the greatest things you show up and you leave, so
Speaker 1: you're not burning two hours, you know, right there, So
Speaker 1: you and I'm sure you've had this because all successful
Speaker 1: DJs have where you're playing multiple gigs in a day
Speaker 1: or night. Yes, and the only way to do it
Speaker 1: is to fly private, and it economically makes sense. So uh,
Speaker 1: you know, I completely understand that, even though people might
Speaker 1: want to judge you on that. But going back to Chicago,
Speaker 1: so you grew up into Chicago, when are you interested
Speaker 1: in music right away? Right away? And your parents playing
Speaker 1: music in the house, Yes, they do, mommy and everything
Speaker 1: from Mormon Tamanac acquired to the b G East, you know,
Speaker 1: and everything above is like we're getting everything in the house. Um,
Speaker 1: and my mom's got a piano in the front room
Speaker 1: and everyone's required to take lessons. So you did take
Speaker 1: piano lessons. I did too for how many years now?
Speaker 1: I quit very quickly, which is the funniest thing. I mean,
Speaker 1: my youngest sister is actually a really great player. I mean,
Speaker 1: she lasted the longest, I don't know, the baby of
Speaker 1: the family. I don't know. Maybe she was very diligent,
Speaker 1: I should say, Um, but I was the guy who
Speaker 1: quit the quick I mean I lasted like a few
Speaker 1: months and I just threw a tant from my mom.
Speaker 1: I think by the third kid, she's like, good, fine, whatever,
Speaker 1: you know, she's worn out. So now, did you have
Speaker 1: a record player or stereo system in your room? I did?
Speaker 1: And then in high school I got a bigger system
Speaker 1: in my room. And okay, so when you're in high school,
Speaker 1: you say you're an entrepreneurial, did you have jobs? I
Speaker 1: did what you do? I did everything in bad groceries,
Speaker 1: at lasco h Valet, parked cars. I mean, and you
Speaker 1: did that because you wanted the money or your parents
Speaker 1: said you have to work. Both. We worked in the summer.
Speaker 1: In my house, we always did that, you know. My
Speaker 1: dad made me mow the lawn and mold bonds. I
Speaker 1: was a lifeguard for many years. Um, but I enjoyed
Speaker 1: having money. I enjoyed having my own money. I mean,
Speaker 1: with five kids, there wasn't a lot of extra and
Speaker 1: if there was, it wasn't trickling down to me. Right, Okay,
Speaker 1: So you brought the stereo with your own money? Yep?
Speaker 1: And do you remember what it was? I don't. But
Speaker 1: the big amp that I had was my buddy Chad Calibix.
Speaker 1: It was his amp that he would the very first
Speaker 1: keyboard a profit. No, no, no, no, no, no, okay.
Speaker 1: First off, talking about listening systems, did you have with
Speaker 1: your money that you made, did you buy a stereos
Speaker 1: you could play room music and not make music, but
Speaker 1: listen to music. Yes, okay, remember what that was? Okay,
Speaker 1: nothing flashy, okay. But you were then buying cassette, c ds,
Speaker 1: vinyl what uh vinyl? There was a dog Ear Records
Speaker 1: very close to my house, which was a thing in
Speaker 1: the Midwest, I believe, and they had an arcade and
Speaker 1: a vinyl section, and I liked vinyl and vinyl was cheaper.
Speaker 1: I just liked the format. And so what the kind
Speaker 1: of music? Were you buying a lot of classic rock?
Speaker 1: Because I had told her brothers, you know, led Zeppelin,
Speaker 1: the Who, um, you know, the Police. I'm buying all
Speaker 1: this classic rock stuff. This is all coming through. And
Speaker 1: then when my brothers went to college, when the first
Speaker 1: one he came back, and it was like the Cure,
Speaker 1: the Smith's And this is when I'm in middle school
Speaker 1: and I started getting into this new wave stuff. Um yeah,
Speaker 1: I just man that stuff. Then it was you know,
Speaker 1: craft work and more into the electro and technopop and
Speaker 1: like the early electro stuff, and it was a bit
Speaker 1: of everything really Okay. Now, famously Chicago is the home
Speaker 1: of house music, that's where it started. Were you aware
Speaker 1: of that to a degree? And I think this play
Speaker 1: is a big part in my story. Well then lay
Speaker 1: it on us. Yeah, I think. Look, I'm growing up
Speaker 1: in Chicago. My that summer before, I was a freshman,
Speaker 1: so I've graduated eighth grade, amount of middle school. Um,
Speaker 1: my brother that's right above me, Rich is going into
Speaker 1: nightclubs in the city. He's going to college. And they
Speaker 1: had a lot of like all age clubs were a
Speaker 1: thing back their team clubs, juice bars, you know whatever,
Speaker 1: juice bars. Kids are going, they're doing drugs, they're doing whatever,
Speaker 1: but they're staying out. Um, you could go to these things.
Speaker 1: There wasn't really an age requirement. I mean, I just
Speaker 1: think it was a much more care free time. I
Speaker 1: don't even think that stuff exists now. Um. Anyway, that
Speaker 1: summer I went to my first night club and it
Speaker 1: was a lot of Wax tracks, which was like an
Speaker 1: early industrial ministry and you know, early depeche Mode and
Speaker 1: kind of like heavy sounding stuff but mixed with early
Speaker 1: house records because they're similar tempo. Right, So these things
Speaker 1: that kind of on craft work and all this is
Speaker 1: kind of happening, and that first experience, I was like,
Speaker 1: this is it. I mean, I was in I went
Speaker 1: to Medusa's was the name of the club, um, whatever.
Speaker 1: I'd liked getting on the train, you know, going into
Speaker 1: the city with my brother, We're going out, We're staying
Speaker 1: out til midnight. You know, this was a big deal.
Speaker 1: And I just everything about it, the culture, the people,
Speaker 1: everything around this scene amazed me, and I just was like,
Speaker 1: I want to be a part of this. Of course,
Speaker 1: I was up at the booth watching what the DJ
Speaker 1: was doing, and the DJ at that point didn't play
Speaker 1: as an important noble role as it does today, but
Speaker 1: it was still kind of an art and a craft
Speaker 1: and I understood that, and I was just very interested.
Speaker 1: You know, technically, what is this guy doing. See two
Speaker 1: record players, see this mixer? What is this guy doing?
Speaker 1: You know, he's doing these blends, and you know he's
Speaker 1: playing four in five hours and has this big arc
Speaker 1: through the night and controls the crowd. The whole thing
Speaker 1: was very interesting to me. And the music was very
Speaker 1: simple at the time, so me, you know, I had
Speaker 1: musical ideas. I was like, I could do this you know,
Speaker 1: I was looking at the DJ. I'm like, I think
Speaker 1: I understand what he's doing. I could do this anyway.
Speaker 1: Fast forward a few years, I kept going to this
Speaker 1: nightclub and going more often, and you know, midweek parties
Speaker 1: started having Okay, but what are your parents saying? My
Speaker 1: parents were cool. They were just kind of like, what
Speaker 1: are you doing in the city. What's going on? I'm like,
Speaker 1: I'm dancing, you know, and they're like, how do you dancing?
Speaker 1: What do you My dad thought that was funny, you know,
Speaker 1: show us how you dance. What are you doing. I'm like,
Speaker 1: we're dancing like this and it's awesome and it's you know,
Speaker 1: hundreds of people there and it's a fun time. And
Speaker 1: I think my parents were just happy that I was
Speaker 1: out doing something. Not they didn't care that you were
Speaker 1: out till midnight. As long as I was home on time.
Speaker 1: They were cool with it. Because my parents, I was
Speaker 1: a middle child. I mean, they really cracked down on
Speaker 1: my older sister, but they just trusted me I could
Speaker 1: do whatever I want to come out. Oh yeah, my
Speaker 1: brother's got the beat down, especially the oldest one. And
Speaker 1: that's the way it is. Even my oldest child. Now,
Speaker 1: if she for sure gets the worst. You know, by
Speaker 1: the time you get to the second one, you're like
Speaker 1: loosening up. The third one you're like whatever. So in
Speaker 1: any event, you go to the club say hey, I
Speaker 1: think I can do this. What's the next up really
Speaker 1: for me? Then I just started buying all these records
Speaker 1: that I'm here because it's not stuff you can really
Speaker 1: get on the radio. And I think this is where
Speaker 1: Chicago comes into play, right, because it's accessible. Right, I'm
Speaker 1: part of this scene and this click of people that
Speaker 1: are listening to these records and these DJs are playing.
Speaker 1: I mean, there's parties going on. Gramophone Records is not
Speaker 1: too far from the nightclub that I'm frequenting, you know,
Speaker 1: it's like three blocks away, so it's in the same neighborhood.
Speaker 1: So I could go to Gramophone, which is arguably the
Speaker 1: first specialty like house music record store in the world. Um,
Speaker 1: and I'm flipping through there and I'm it can listen
Speaker 1: all my money at that points going into records and
Speaker 1: I'm like flipping through this stuff. I think my first
Speaker 1: time with a set of turntables because this stuff is
Speaker 1: too expensive, equipments too expensive for Ford, you know, I
Speaker 1: can get a record here and there and whatnot, but
Speaker 1: to get a set of twelve and a mixture that's
Speaker 1: way beyond my reach. Um, A kidd ripped some off
Speaker 1: and we're at his house, one of these houses. He
Speaker 1: ripped off some turntables from where, you know, he's like,
Speaker 1: I saw him in a car, but I could care less.
Speaker 1: I just was like, I want to try this. And
Speaker 1: you know, that night, instead of going to the club,
Speaker 1: we're up, you know, for hours, just trying to figure
Speaker 1: out what they're doing and understanding the beat matching and that.
Speaker 1: I mean, it wasn't until years later that I got
Speaker 1: my own set up. And then I was like, okay, cool,
Speaker 1: you know, Okay, so you're in a high school. How
Speaker 1: old are you when this friend, uh lifts these turntables? Okay,
Speaker 1: So at this point you're just collecting records, collecting records, okay,
Speaker 1: and you do this at the friends house. What do
Speaker 1: you say, Oh, this is just a fun night, or no,
Speaker 1: this is a career path. No, man, just a fun night.
Speaker 1: I never thought career path until very recently. In the
Speaker 1: in the big picture of this story, it was a
Speaker 1: recent thing. Okay. So when you graduate from high school,
Speaker 1: you still don't own any turntables okay. And how many
Speaker 1: records do you think you own? You're an avid collector. Okay.
Speaker 1: So now it comes time to go to college, you
Speaker 1: go to b y U. Okay. Having lived in Utah
Speaker 1: for a couple of years. Although back in the seventies,
Speaker 1: you know, b y U is the epicenter of LDS
Speaker 1: and although religious and you are LDS, you are more men. Uh.
Speaker 1: And that would be a place, but it's known as
Speaker 1: being a relatively conservative place. Okay, So how does that
Speaker 1: work for you? Uh? Is eye opening? Look a kid
Speaker 1: growing up in Chicago. My my brothers both went to
Speaker 1: be by you and they're like, hey, it's great, it's fun,
Speaker 1: it's cool. And I think that for me, I wanted
Speaker 1: to go there because I wanted to be around other Mormons.
Speaker 1: We'll take a quick break and come back with more
Speaker 1: of my conversation with Cascade. Recorded at the tune In
Speaker 1: Studios in Venice, California. This podcast is brought to you
Speaker 1: by tune In, which brings together all the live, sports, music,
Speaker 1: news and podcasts you love, original live and on demand audio,
Speaker 1: all in one place. Go to tune in dot com
Speaker 1: slash left sets to download and listen. Okay, let's get
Speaker 1: back to my conversation with Cascade. Okay, so you've gotta
Speaker 1: be yu and your expectations. Recording to your brother is
Speaker 1: gonna be great, but what's your experience. I loved it,
Speaker 1: and I think once again, this kind of plays back
Speaker 1: to me launching my career. So I've got creates of
Speaker 1: records and my brothers. I'm in one of these uh
Speaker 1: you know, for lack of a better term, fraternity, it's
Speaker 1: more like a social club. They didn't call fraternities there.
Speaker 1: They get suspended or whatever, but it's essentially a social
Speaker 1: club of fraternity. And they're like, we need to throw
Speaker 1: a party and raise some money. And I'm like, I
Speaker 1: got create some records. I know how to spend these things,
Speaker 1: I think. So we hire some mobile DJ guy and
Speaker 1: I'm like, yo, I'll play the music that night. I
Speaker 1: just need your equipment. So that was my first like
Speaker 1: real gig. This is nine okay, and how many nights
Speaker 1: had you spend on the turntables? Very few? I mean
Speaker 1: this is like, you know a bunch of kids from
Speaker 1: southern you know, these are all like transplants that are
Speaker 1: living in Provo, Utah. I'm like they're not going to know.
Speaker 1: The difference I'll try is that your attitude in life
Speaker 1: in general, you fake it till you make it. No,
Speaker 1: not really, but I just knew I listen. I was
Speaker 1: confident that I could do it. Okay, So but once again,
Speaker 1: to what degree do you fit in? Kid from in
Speaker 1: Chicago and going to nightclubs every night now in conservative Provo, Utah. Um.
Speaker 1: I made lifelong friends there that first year because I
Speaker 1: was meeting kids. I met a kid from San Francisco
Speaker 1: became a really good friend, another kid from Cocoa Beach, Florida.
Speaker 1: You know, I was meeting people from all over the place.
Speaker 1: Some kid from Venezuela. So I was meeting all these
Speaker 1: different kids and hearing about their experiences growing up Mormon whatever.
Speaker 1: For me it was it was cool. I not everyone
Speaker 1: has a good experience there, but for me it was great.
Speaker 1: I was the only reason I asked because you didn't
Speaker 1: go back there, you ultimately talking through the University of Utah.
Speaker 1: That was because my lack of studying that first year.
Speaker 1: I had a lot of fun that first year. I
Speaker 1: was really tan when I went home. It was a
Speaker 1: very warm spring. So when I showed back home, and
Speaker 1: when I showed it back home in Chicago, I was
Speaker 1: like tan from playing frisbee out at the park and
Speaker 1: you know, but let's speak English here. Were you not
Speaker 1: asked back to be while you So I went on
Speaker 1: a mission after my first year, okay? Just so I
Speaker 1: know for traditionally is that when people go, Yes, now
Speaker 1: a lot of kids go before they start school. That
Speaker 1: kind of seems like a better time. Now people are
Speaker 1: just you know, go to high school, go on the mission,
Speaker 1: then come back and start college. I went to my
Speaker 1: first year, my freshman year, okay, and then you go
Speaker 1: on the mission to Japan, Japan. But so that's for
Speaker 1: two years. Two years. In those two years, do you
Speaker 1: come back to the States at all? No? And you
Speaker 1: go to Japan with how many other people as a
Speaker 1: group of eight of us, but there's already like a
Speaker 1: hundred and sixty missionaries living in might I say Tokyo.
Speaker 1: It's like northern Tokyo and the northern suburbs of Tokyo.
Speaker 1: It's a large area that that covers. So like in
Speaker 1: your town, say Santa Monica, there would be two missionaries,
Speaker 1: you know, a station there, and then you go to
Speaker 1: like Culver City, there would be another two missionaries, you know. Okay,
Speaker 1: so you're living with another guy in some sub of
Speaker 1: Tokyo and then you have your own apartment with his job. Yes,
Speaker 1: and what's the what are you supposed to do every day? Uh? Proselyte, teach,
Speaker 1: but you talk to people about Yeah, but you don't
Speaker 1: speak Japanese right now? I mean I took a crash
Speaker 1: course for two months before you go out, um, which
Speaker 1: is you know, crash course. And how how are you
Speaker 1: going to talk to these people one language wise? And
Speaker 1: what are you going to talk to them about? What's
Speaker 1: what's the right way to approach this? In my life
Speaker 1: up to this point, you know, my conversations about being
Speaker 1: Mormon were like just with my friends from high school
Speaker 1: and whatever, and like oh, hey, this is what I
Speaker 1: believe or what do you believe? And so kind of
Speaker 1: refining that process. And then then really it takes me.
Speaker 1: You know, luckily learning Japanese wasn't it wasn't that hard.
Speaker 1: I would say, it wasn't that hard for you? People
Speaker 1: are good with languages. I was that was it? It was?
Speaker 1: Which is weird because I failed out of Spanish in
Speaker 1: high school. It's like one of those things I wanted
Speaker 1: to do. I wanted to learn Janace and I was
Speaker 1: there and early on the second place that I lived,
Speaker 1: I was actually living with the Japanese guy. So I'm like, man,
Speaker 1: I better start really hitting the books. And I studied hard.
Speaker 1: I mean every day I would up, you know, at
Speaker 1: the crack of dawn, studying for an hour or two
Speaker 1: before we went out. And you know, we're meeting people.
Speaker 1: So I was studying and carrying around vocabulary words. But
Speaker 1: I'd say a year into it, I felt like confident
Speaker 1: I could have a discussion. So you how does it
Speaker 1: actually work you knock on someone's door, and Japan that's
Speaker 1: kind of culturally a little not so nice. Um So,
Speaker 1: we spent a lot of time because I was in
Speaker 1: or really close to Tokyo the majority of my mission.
Speaker 1: Um So I would hang around the train station a
Speaker 1: lot of times, or and just like walk up to
Speaker 1: random people, Hey, you know, what do you know about
Speaker 1: Jesus Christ, and like have a conversation if they want
Speaker 1: to or not. You know, there's a lot of ceto
Speaker 1: desks like I'm okay, I'm okay, okay, cool um But
Speaker 1: and then other times people just referrals they hear about
Speaker 1: somebody who's Mormon and their friends Mormon and they want
Speaker 1: to learn about it or you know, so there's that. Okay,
Speaker 1: So sometimes you're educating people who have already been converted
Speaker 1: to a degree as opposed to trying to find Now
Speaker 1: it's sort of like being a salesman. I would think
Speaker 1: you get a lot of rejection, Yes, a lot, And
Speaker 1: how does that feel? How do you handle? That? Didn't
Speaker 1: bother me really, I mean I grew up in Chicago,
Speaker 1: so I was like, okay, not everyone interested in religion
Speaker 1: like I am. You know, I grew up in a
Speaker 1: Jewish neighborhood. I knew that. You know, this is part
Speaker 1: of the deal. You know, people have different thoughts and
Speaker 1: ideas and and whatever. I think. Missionaries are there and
Speaker 1: my primary job was to speak to people that are
Speaker 1: looking for something and that want help. You know. So okay, cool.
Speaker 1: The key is to find those people, right, to come
Speaker 1: in contact with those people. Okay. So two years go
Speaker 1: by and then you go back to Utah. Yeah, why
Speaker 1: do you not go back to b y Uh? Actually
Speaker 1: I went to New York and worked for a Japanese company.
Speaker 1: I went to New York for a year, which Okay,
Speaker 1: so it's important. So okay, so you gotta b y
Speaker 1: U for a year, you go to Japan for two years,
Speaker 1: then you go to New York to work for a
Speaker 1: Japanese company. How does that come together? Uh? I just
Speaker 1: interviewed with the company. I was like, I'm going back.
Speaker 1: I didn't have any money, you know. I was like,
Speaker 1: you know, I got to go back to school. I
Speaker 1: could use the job. So I interviewed with this Japanese
Speaker 1: company that was hiring like a lot of Mormon kids
Speaker 1: because oh cool, these kids can speech Japanese. So we're
Speaker 1: tour guides around the city of New York. Um, which
Speaker 1: is funny. I've been to New York a few times,
Speaker 1: but I didn't know the city that well. So, you know,
Speaker 1: like telling these people about New York City And I
Speaker 1: actually didn't know that much, but I learned. How long
Speaker 1: were you a tour guide? For about a year? And
Speaker 1: you know, wouldn't most people go back to college instead
Speaker 1: of having a tour guide job? Yeah? Probably? Did your
Speaker 1: parents where your parents concerned that you might not go
Speaker 1: back to college? No? Not at this point, I think
Speaker 1: there's still like what's he doing? I mean they were
Speaker 1: like that a lot around me. What's Ryan doing? Okay?
Speaker 1: So if you're living in New York, do you need
Speaker 1: any of their money or you can make enough money
Speaker 1: to make it. I was making money, okay, So New
Speaker 1: York epicenter of dance music are you involved in? I'm
Speaker 1: going out. I'm going out every night that I can.
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm working like a dog. The place worked
Speaker 1: me like crazy. I mean I kept my time sheets
Speaker 1: for a long time because I was like, man, we
Speaker 1: could sue these guys, right, we need over time, you know. Um.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I'm going out. A lot of stuff is
Speaker 1: happening because it's two thousand three, two thousand four, I mean,
Speaker 1: dance music is in New York and full swing can't
Speaker 1: be They kept gonna be like, yes, sorry, you very
Speaker 1: much have lost the techade. Okay. I trying to make
Speaker 1: sure here, Okay, okay, so yeah, so but not the
Speaker 1: dance music isn't happening. But if we're working on the timeline,
Speaker 1: so there's a lot of stuff happening up going out
Speaker 1: club USA. It was in full swing. That was right
Speaker 1: there in Times Square, right off of Time to Square.
Speaker 1: Um lion light was happening, um, which there was a
Speaker 1: line Light in Chicago as well that I went to
Speaker 1: in high school. So you know, it was just cool
Speaker 1: dance music had matured a bit more. I'd become more musical.
Speaker 1: It was less just drums and bass, less industrial um.
Speaker 1: But that's really at that point. I saved up enough money,
Speaker 1: bought my own setup, went back to Utah. I went
Speaker 1: back to you and bought my own set up. Okay,
Speaker 1: I've got some records, I've got some equipment. I'm playing
Speaker 1: some stuff here and there. I go back to Utah.
Speaker 1: Let's just be clear. You buy the turntables in New
Speaker 1: York or in Utah. In Utah, E mail ordered this stuff. Okay, Okay,
Speaker 1: So if this when you leave New York you're just
Speaker 1: interested in the scene, you go back to Utah, and
Speaker 1: what's your plan get through college? Okay? Why do you
Speaker 1: go to the U as they say and salt like
Speaker 1: the University of Utah as opposed to by you? Uh?
Speaker 1: Because I knew I wasn't getting back in to by U.
Speaker 1: My first year was terrible. So if you wanted to
Speaker 1: go back to b y U, that would they that
Speaker 1: would have been a problem. It would have I didn't
Speaker 1: even reapply because after you've taken a break, and I've
Speaker 1: been off too and have three years now, and like, okay,
Speaker 1: either reapply and get rejected. I can go to the
Speaker 1: U and the University Utah is a great school, and
Speaker 1: salt Lake is happening place. Thing is when I lived
Speaker 1: in Salt Lake, I lived in the Avenues and we
Speaker 1: were all ski bumps, and uh, I'd already graduated from college.
Speaker 1: With my two roommates. They would go to the U
Speaker 1: and they would sign up for the winter some you know,
Speaker 1: for the spring semester. It would snow when they drop out.
Speaker 1: They eventually graduated, but right up there, I took a
Speaker 1: few winners semesters. Basically off, I'd take one or two classes,
Speaker 1: right and you and you'd go snowboarding. Where would you go?
Speaker 1: Brighton had a season passed the Brighton for four years? Okay,
Speaker 1: big cotton Wood can Okay. So now you go back
Speaker 1: to Utah and you do buy the turntables, and you
Speaker 1: buy the Wolf hundreds. Second, and you buy a mixture,
Speaker 1: you say, you buy a mail order. You remember who
Speaker 1: you ordered it from? Prose, sound and stage. Okay, this
Speaker 1: is where everybody's buying the stuff from. They saying these
Speaker 1: catalogs and this is kind of like they were the
Speaker 1: DJ place, you know, but this is back before the internet.
Speaker 1: You know, you'd get these catalogs and right yeah, so okay,
Speaker 1: so you have an apartment where you're living in Utah,
Speaker 1: uh just right downtown third East. Um. Yeah, and then
Speaker 1: I moved to the avenue is I had an ane.
Speaker 1: I had a house on eleventh Avenue in between D
Speaker 1: and E. Okay, so I mean I was in that
Speaker 1: little area. Okay, So you have your turntables, you're going
Speaker 1: to school. How much you work in the turntables and
Speaker 1: practicing a lot at that point a lot because I
Speaker 1: had time on my hands. I thought I was busy,
Speaker 1: but being a Japanese guid in New York, you weren't busy.
Speaker 1: And at this point you're just having fun and you say,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna get good, I'm gonna work. I'm having fun.
Speaker 1: I'm having a lot of fun. I'm snowboarding a and
Speaker 1: I'm spinning records a lot record at this point, at
Speaker 1: this point of a much better student because I had
Speaker 1: put my mind that I can get through school. I
Speaker 1: had learned a lot of good study habits while I
Speaker 1: was in Japan. I'll say that I've learned some discipline
Speaker 1: while I was in Tokyo, so that was a good thing.
Speaker 1: Came out of it much better student. But I'm spending basically,
Speaker 1: I'm spending my days and nights going to school, spinning
Speaker 1: records and snowboarding. That was it. Okay, when you're spinning
Speaker 1: records just for yourself, you're playing gigs a lot in
Speaker 1: my bedroom, just hanging out playing records. And in nine five,
Speaker 1: this is kind of when at all changed for me.
Speaker 1: It was the first time like, oh, you can make
Speaker 1: money doing this. We all of a sudde a part
Speaker 1: time job selling jeans at the Chalk Garden. Do you
Speaker 1: remember Trollie Square of course seventies. I worked at this
Speaker 1: place called the Chock Garden Tarlie Square, and I lost
Speaker 1: my job and I still my parents were helping me
Speaker 1: out at this point. But you were losing You lost
Speaker 1: your job. War Oh, I don't know, they're cutting back.
Speaker 1: I don't know. And deeans weren't selling like okay, but
Speaker 1: it was this wasn't wasn't your behavior? No, no, no, okay.
Speaker 1: So your parents were still helping you out a little
Speaker 1: selp me out a little bit, but um, not enough
Speaker 1: that I could just like live on what they're sending me.
Speaker 1: You know, there was a small monthly stipend, and like
Speaker 1: I needed a job to supplement that if I wanted
Speaker 1: to eat um and put gas in the car in
Speaker 1: my Honda Accord. So anyway, that's I approached this club
Speaker 1: called Club Manhattan. Was a small club. The capacity was
Speaker 1: two people. That was not making that up the sign
Speaker 1: on the door people and I said, what's your worst
Speaker 1: night of the week, Because I've got crates of records
Speaker 1: that nobody has heard. And by this time, I mean,
Speaker 1: I'd put a lot of time into the craft, you know,
Speaker 1: to three years, I'd honed the craft a bit um
Speaker 1: and he's like, Monday night, I can't get anybody in here.
Speaker 1: Let's start from the beginning. Now, you're living in Utah,
Speaker 1: where you're buying your records. A lot of mail orders
Speaker 1: still from Grammophone, so you could call guys up and
Speaker 1: be like, all right, I've got seventy five box, you
Speaker 1: know what's hot this week, and they'd send you stuff.
Speaker 1: But San Francisco has got a great tweak. In was
Speaker 1: another record store in San Francisco, Lower Hate. They were
Speaker 1: mail ordering stuff here in l A beating non stop.
Speaker 1: Um was a massive record store in melrose Um. So
Speaker 1: there's a lot of guys you could call up and
Speaker 1: they were shipping you stuff. So I'm getting records sent
Speaker 1: to me and is there anybody doing this in Utah?
Speaker 1: Prior to you? Is there anybody there is? So there
Speaker 1: is one record store in Utah. But in terms of
Speaker 1: in terms of DJs, there was some guys doing it.
Speaker 1: There was a dude from San Francisco, Nick Cameron, another
Speaker 1: guy from l a Um. You know, there were guys
Speaker 1: doing it. Okay. So you got to this club and
Speaker 1: you say, and he says Monday nights by weeknight. You say,
Speaker 1: I'm like give it to me. And he's like, all right,
Speaker 1: cool um, and he's like, we'll just split the door.
Speaker 1: I'm like, all right, cool, We've got to charge a
Speaker 1: couple of bucks at the door. You know, it was
Speaker 1: mainly students. I was gonna, you know, just hit up
Speaker 1: my friends, you know, call him up. Anyway, Monday night
Speaker 1: was a smash. The first night we did, like foreignered
Speaker 1: people showed up. Okay. That must have been because you
Speaker 1: worked your phone so to speak, you told all your
Speaker 1: friends to come. You know what it was. It was
Speaker 1: snowboarding because me and my roommates, it's a very social thing.
Speaker 1: Just like you said, you had all these skier buddies.
Speaker 1: There's like this community of people, I mean people that
Speaker 1: are coming from like Amsterdam, that lived there for the season.
Speaker 1: So we knew all these people because it was not
Speaker 1: only I'm not the only guy snowboard every day, me
Speaker 1: and all my buddies that we're all living together, and
Speaker 1: do we just put the word out? Sure enough foreignered people. Later,
Speaker 1: I'm like, this is a smash. The club owners freaking out.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm walking home with like three hundred bucks
Speaker 1: in my pocket. I'm like, I am king of the world.
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna sell jeans again ever, you know. So
Speaker 1: I that was a lot of money at the time
Speaker 1: for me. Okay, So now it's the following Monday night,
Speaker 1: so it just keeps going. I was there at that
Speaker 1: club for five years doing Monday nights and I only
Speaker 1: missed a couple of them the entire time. So after
Speaker 1: you tap the snowboard crew, does word get out in town? Yeah,
Speaker 1: because it's a small town. I mean you're talking like
Speaker 1: what a million people or something like this, So that
Speaker 1: whole valley and dude, there's no other competition on Monday night. Like,
Speaker 1: so that was the place if you went out Monday night,
Speaker 1: that was the place to go. So then, you know,
Speaker 1: we raised the door price to five bucks. The entire
Speaker 1: cities showing up at this place, it becomes a problem.
Speaker 1: The city is trying to shut me down. They wrote
Speaker 1: me a few citations to the club, you know, over overcrowding,
Speaker 1: all this stuff, you know, serving a mind, you know.
Speaker 1: So it was a hit, and then I started doing
Speaker 1: other I did a Thursday night for them, and then
Speaker 1: people around town started hiring me. Um. But all of
Speaker 1: this is happening, and it's the first time I had
Speaker 1: a little bit of cash. So I started buying studio
Speaker 1: equipment about my first day to eight drum machine, rolling
Speaker 1: nine O nine and other drum machine and s H
Speaker 1: one O one small keyboards. I started like amassing equipment
Speaker 1: and that's how it's spending my days, so that by
Speaker 1: this time I'm out of school. I'm like, okay, I
Speaker 1: I love this Madonna record, Vogue whatever, but I don't
Speaker 1: like the arrangement. So I start getting in digital audio workstation.
Speaker 1: I had a you know, a Mac you know, pretty
Speaker 1: basic Mac but I had a four track pro tools
Speaker 1: set up on there on my first copy of Logic,
Speaker 1: and that's really where I just started getting into it.
Speaker 1: And then it's just like all in. Once that happened
Speaker 1: and I had a small setup, I was like, okay,
Speaker 1: this is what I was doing every day. UM. And
Speaker 1: I put together put together my first kind of record
Speaker 1: that I sold commercially. Um, and it's a bad record.
Speaker 1: How did you do that? Though? You recorded it, and
Speaker 1: how did you get it in terms of press distributed, etcetera.
Speaker 1: So press the Rainbow Records, Rainbow Records, Yeah, it used
Speaker 1: to be. Okay, I've been marrigelist, right, So I called
Speaker 1: those guys up. And that's what people on the West coast,
Speaker 1: that's where who they were, right, We're kind of like
Speaker 1: the premier guys. Um. And uh. During all this the
Speaker 1: records store UM that was local in town, which I
Speaker 1: basically was hanging out a lot. You know, it's very
Speaker 1: John Cusack, you know, like hanging out just like arguing
Speaker 1: over what records are better. And you know, this is
Speaker 1: where you know, practice tej. It's just like where all
Speaker 1: the DJs were hanging out. Um. But one of the
Speaker 1: owners left, uh to to go work in Korea for
Speaker 1: the Olympics, so I bought her half out. So I
Speaker 1: was part owner in this record store. But I had
Speaker 1: a relationship with the record distributors. So I was like, listen,
Speaker 1: I buy thousands of dollars records from you guys every week.
Speaker 1: I've got a record I'm gonna sell to you, and
Speaker 1: you guys are gonna buy it. I don't care if
Speaker 1: you think it's crap. And they did. They bought it. Okay,
Speaker 1: but did anybody vided retail? Uh yeah, I mean listen,
Speaker 1: we're talking back then. A couple of thousand copies was
Speaker 1: the success, right, You're making like a thousand bucks, Oh
Speaker 1: my gosh. Yeah. But you know, so the people in
Speaker 1: Utah bought it. They knew who you were. Yeah. But
Speaker 1: and it was a drum and bass record, so it's
Speaker 1: a very niche thing. It was a very like London
Speaker 1: sounding record. Um. You know, it's hard to even track
Speaker 1: at that point because you're just selling it. But the
Speaker 1: point is you make a deal, you ship the records.
Speaker 1: If they don't tell, they usually come back. Yeah, they
Speaker 1: didn't come back, so so you assume they sold such
Speaker 1: a small quantity. Okay, but even so a thousand records,
Speaker 1: somebody had to buy it. Okay, so you make that record,
Speaker 1: what's the next step? Um, well, this is kind of
Speaker 1: you know, late nineties, so things are starting to happen
Speaker 1: again for dance music because the late nineties early two
Speaker 1: thousand's that was kind of that first wave of moby
Speaker 1: and you know what do they called it? Electronica? And
Speaker 1: you know, everybody was bracing for this thing that was
Speaker 1: coming that never came. But um, you know, so I
Speaker 1: was getting gigs and I was starting to do stuff,
Speaker 1: and um, my wife at this point, uh, well married
Speaker 1: in ninety six, so a little a little bit slower.
Speaker 1: How do you meet your wife snowboarding? Really? And did
Speaker 1: she what was she doing in Salt Lake that She's
Speaker 1: from northern California. She was one of these girls who
Speaker 1: would come to Salt Lake. I met her, Um, she
Speaker 1: came back and I met her again, because it would
Speaker 1: just come up for the season, right, this is where
Speaker 1: these people do these guys, Yeah, they exactly, yeah, and
Speaker 1: you know, and they'd ride and you'd see them and
Speaker 1: you'd be friends with them, and then they'd leave and
Speaker 1: I'd stay there. Did she go to college? She she
Speaker 1: graduated from you. So then so you know her for
Speaker 1: a couple of years before becomes of romance. No, I
Speaker 1: knew her. I met her, she came back, and right
Speaker 1: away I was interested in. I was like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: I remember her from last year. She's awesome, you know,
Speaker 1: and she responds, yeah, it's good. Okay, Okay, So how
Speaker 1: long after you meet or do you get married? Eight months?
Speaker 1: Eight months? Well, it's last day, so it's good. I mean, listen,
Speaker 1: in Mormon world, that's like that's that's ten years. So yeah,
Speaker 1: I was quick because okay, so you get married, how
Speaker 1: big a ceremony is it? Um? Hundred friends and family
Speaker 1: in San Francisco? Um, what's the entertainment? Okay? No, DJ okay.
Speaker 1: So anyway, you're living in Utah, you're married, You're on
Speaker 1: the half of this record store. So what happens next?
Speaker 1: You put out a record, put out a record, you
Speaker 1: know whatever, a little bit of success. Um, well, I
Speaker 1: just kind of start noticing the industry. I'm like, who's
Speaker 1: successful in this industry and what's working? And I'm kind
Speaker 1: of just trying to pay attention because I'm like, can
Speaker 1: I make a living doing this? Like? How does it work?
Speaker 1: You know? Um? Because here I am the kid of
Speaker 1: a conservative family, and my dad was just conservative across
Speaker 1: the board, meaning financially. He was very like, you know,
Speaker 1: go to college, get a degree, get a job, you know,
Speaker 1: just follow the path, you know, stay on course, you know.
Speaker 1: And here I am like, I want to do music
Speaker 1: like and I wasn't even necessarily saying that because I
Speaker 1: was scared to say that out loud because I didn't
Speaker 1: want to. I wanted to be successful. So I was like,
Speaker 1: I don't know, music is fun and right, right, right, right,
Speaker 1: but I'm trying to do all this other stuff. I
Speaker 1: was working in an ad agency for a brief period
Speaker 1: of time, you know, doing graphic design for them, and um,
Speaker 1: you know, I felt really comfortable on a computer. So
Speaker 1: I was doing various jobs here and there. Um, but
Speaker 1: really I just started to understand how the business of
Speaker 1: independent music was working. And I should say, independent dance music, Okay,
Speaker 1: you can press the record, you can sell it, Okay,
Speaker 1: you can get these gigs. And I slowly started getting
Speaker 1: gigs outside of Utah, very slowly. Where the very first
Speaker 1: gig I went to outside of Utah was in Soul, Korea.
Speaker 1: This guy is like he's passing through salt Lake gets
Speaker 1: one of my mix tapes. He's like, this is brilliant.
Speaker 1: I'll fly out here for a ticket and you play
Speaker 1: for nothing, but you can stay on my couch. And
Speaker 1: I'm like, all right, cool. Late nineties. I go to Korea,
Speaker 1: I get a you know, I get a gig in
Speaker 1: Orange County. Like little things are happening, very small things,
Speaker 1: but I think it was enough to be like, Okay,
Speaker 1: potentially this could work. You're just gonna keep doing it.
Speaker 1: Not only that, the club is still happening at this time,
Speaker 1: so I'm still making money doing it, um, you know,
Speaker 1: and I'm just buying I mean, dude, I'm buying so
Speaker 1: much music because I'm just a junkie at this point.
Speaker 1: I'm just buying music, buying studio gear, and you know,
Speaker 1: putting nothing into like where I live. You know, I'm
Speaker 1: still living like a college student, needing like five dollar
Speaker 1: pizza every night. You know. So it's all going into
Speaker 1: music and studio equipment. Um. And really, when my wife
Speaker 1: graduated in two thousand, uh, she's like cool, she's not
Speaker 1: from salt Lake. She didn't feel any attachment to that
Speaker 1: play ace. And you know, I've been there for seven
Speaker 1: years or eight years whatever, adding all this time up
Speaker 1: of me going in and out of that place. I
Speaker 1: didn't really either. And I was like, okay, cool, you know,
Speaker 1: I'd spent some time in New York, and so let's
Speaker 1: go to New York. She's like, no, let's go to
Speaker 1: San Francisco where she's from. She's from Reading, which is
Speaker 1: way north. Oh yeah, that's not San Francisco. No, it's
Speaker 1: not not at all. Um, that's a stretch. But her
Speaker 1: grandma lived in San Francisco, and she felt like that's
Speaker 1: a place, and that's happening. And I think a lot
Speaker 1: of Reading people kind of end up in San Francisco
Speaker 1: at her you know, or Santa Cruz or you know,
Speaker 1: in that area. We just were like, okay, whoever can
Speaker 1: get a job first, that's where we'll go. So at
Speaker 1: the time, you know, I'm emailing my attaching my resume
Speaker 1: and sending it out to these job places in New York,
Speaker 1: which was a very tech thing at the time. I
Speaker 1: was very proud of me to be able to do that. Um,
Speaker 1: and she just got in the car. I mean maybe
Speaker 1: like not even a week after we graduate, she packed
Speaker 1: up the car and drove San Francisco calls me up
Speaker 1: like three days later. It's like, I got a job. Okay, wait,
Speaker 1: just stop you a little bit. You're married, you living
Speaker 1: in a couple. She's leaves, she packs up the car
Speaker 1: and goes to York and says it goes San Francisco
Speaker 1: and says, what I've got it because we had this
Speaker 1: kind of thing going. Whoever gets a jibo. But when
Speaker 1: you say when she left Salt like she didn't have
Speaker 1: the job. No, She's like, I'm gonna go there and
Speaker 1: get a job. Which, if I'm sure, if I would
Speaker 1: have flown to New York, I probably have been a
Speaker 1: lot more successful, you know, Okay, should be there in
Speaker 1: people's faces. And she understood that. Okay. So she goes
Speaker 1: San Francisco, gets what kind of job? I'm just working
Speaker 1: for like one of these dot com you know things
Speaker 1: that's happening. Okay. So she calls you and says, this
Speaker 1: is our deal. You gotta move out. She's like, I
Speaker 1: got a job. It's a great job, pays okay, you know,
Speaker 1: loaded up, And I'm like, oh man, she did it.
Speaker 1: So I loaded up, we moved to San Francisco. UM,
Speaker 1: definitely take a step back in lifestyle move into a
Speaker 1: crumby apartment that was terrible. I couldn't fit my studio
Speaker 1: into you know, my gear, my racks of gear. I'm like,
Speaker 1: I can't fit into this. This is but it's all
Speaker 1: we could afford at the time, So don't What do
Speaker 1: you do with the stuff? I put this stuff in
Speaker 1: storage momentarily, um and until I figured out something. You know,
Speaker 1: it took me a while to figure some stuff out,
Speaker 1: a few variations of living. You know, we're bouncing around
Speaker 1: in different apartments. When we first got there, we just
Speaker 1: lived with a friend you know, crash on his floor
Speaker 1: apartment and it was tough. I mean, but saying the
Speaker 1: cool thing, and this is crucial to my story, I think, Um,
Speaker 1: I kind of saw this wave again of excitement. I mean,
Speaker 1: San Francisco in the early two thousand's was just crazy.
Speaker 1: There's piles of money being loaded into the city. The
Speaker 1: dot com thing is going crazy. Rents are going through
Speaker 1: the roof, but everyone's out partying every night. So the
Speaker 1: club scene and just deejaying is just it's going crazy.
Speaker 1: The whole thing is going crazy. So I recognized that
Speaker 1: because I had experienced that first wave in Chicago when
Speaker 1: I saw house music break, which it took me moving
Speaker 1: to Salt Lake to be like, oh man, not everywhere
Speaker 1: is experiencing this. That was That was Chicago, New York, London. Wow.
Speaker 1: You know. I had to get that separation, that distance
Speaker 1: to be able to look at it and be like, wow,
Speaker 1: I was in the middle of something that was a
Speaker 1: cultural phenomenon and I had no idea. But I was
Speaker 1: more of kind of onlooker, you know. I wasn't like
Speaker 1: actively participating. I mean, I was going out and dancing,
Speaker 1: but I wasn't like making waves. I wasn't one of
Speaker 1: these guys setting the trends. I was just following them.
Speaker 1: But in San Francisco, I kind of realized that a
Speaker 1: second wave was happening, and it was going on there
Speaker 1: in the city. And part of that, I think was
Speaker 1: because the arts were flourishing, because there was so much
Speaker 1: money around, so all these artists and studios and just
Speaker 1: so much was going on in the city. Um, and
Speaker 1: this is when Naked Records and Home Records and all
Speaker 1: these little like boutique small labels that I was paying
Speaker 1: attention to really started to thrive. Um. And I got
Speaker 1: a record at I got a job at Own Records.
Speaker 1: Just to be clear, you moved to San Francisco, your
Speaker 1: wife has his job before you get the job at
Speaker 1: Own Records, or do you have a different job. I
Speaker 1: went to the distributor that I was buying records from
Speaker 1: in San Francisco, TRC Distribution, and worked for them for
Speaker 1: a few months until I got my job with the label. Okay,
Speaker 1: how many people worked at home when you work there? Um,
Speaker 1: it's about ten full employees. How hard was it to
Speaker 1: get that job? My timing was good, the owner needed
Speaker 1: an assistant, and I had been pitching the music. I
Speaker 1: had been sending them some of my demos and had
Speaker 1: bought one of them under a different Moniker. Skylight was
Speaker 1: this other thing. So I had a relationship with the owner.
Speaker 1: I showed up. I didn't, you know, have anything going on.
Speaker 1: I'm working at this distributor. It's like basically just at
Speaker 1: an art you know, a warehouse fulfilling record store orders,
Speaker 1: you know, and talking to record stores on the phone. Um,
Speaker 1: And he's like, yeah, the guy who has your job
Speaker 1: is just left. He left to do this digital thing.
Speaker 1: iTunes are going to start this thing over Apple. I
Speaker 1: don't know if this is gonna work. You know who
Speaker 1: knows Bruno you Bara had just recently left. That was
Speaker 1: his old assistant, and he was there at the ground
Speaker 1: floor when they started iTunes um And you know, funny
Speaker 1: to think back on that. Um, but yes, I stepped
Speaker 1: into his spot and they needed somebody and it was
Speaker 1: cool because I could I could listen to all the
Speaker 1: demos and filter stuff through to the boss. And and
Speaker 1: but I was also a DJ, and I was also
Speaker 1: pitching him demos, and I could run their studio. They
Speaker 1: had a small studio, so I was running sessions at
Speaker 1: that studio. By this time, I've got some time under
Speaker 1: my belt and I feel, you know, fairly comfortable at
Speaker 1: a at a mixing desk, and like, I know what
Speaker 1: I'm doing. Um. And it was a help that I
Speaker 1: had graphic design stuff too, so you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: at these small labels, everybody does everything right. We're all
Speaker 1: pitching him to make this thing move on, and it
Speaker 1: was working and it was a good time for them.
Speaker 1: They had a compilation series, the you know early two
Speaker 1: thousand compilations were doing really well. Um. That a compilation series,
Speaker 1: the Home Lounge that was doing awesome. And Mark Farina
Speaker 1: with Mushroom jazz. He's one of their premier artists on
Speaker 1: that label, and it was a fun time and I
Speaker 1: was there for a couple of years until well, I
Speaker 1: launched the name Cascade really soon after I got there
Speaker 1: and got more demos in the mix and my my,
Speaker 1: I was making music then that I felt like, Okay,
Speaker 1: this is commercially viable. And I was influenced by the
Speaker 1: scene and what was happening. It was kind of this
Speaker 1: hybrid of Chicago meets San Francisco because San Francisco house
Speaker 1: music was very melodic compared to Chicago. Chicago stuff was
Speaker 1: very gritty, very you know, eight bits sounding very low fi,
Speaker 1: and San Francisco was more smooth and beautiful and melodic.
Speaker 1: So I was like, I can marry these two worlds
Speaker 1: and I make my own sound. Um. But that was
Speaker 1: another thing. I think that was the first time I
Speaker 1: experienced then this is kind of like remember sneaker pimps
Speaker 1: and stuff. That wave of kind of down Tomple electronic
Speaker 1: music was happening, and it was clear to me that
Speaker 1: songwriting was an important part of what electronic music was
Speaker 1: going because back dude, even to this day of electronic music,
Speaker 1: instrumental you know, uh, and I sat in on these
Speaker 1: sessions and I was getting hired for remixes and the
Speaker 1: remixes were doing well, and I was like, man, production
Speaker 1: styles here and are there? I mean, I have my
Speaker 1: own preferences of how I like things to sound, but
Speaker 1: songwriting is really the key. I mean, if you write
Speaker 1: a good song, it stays, you can produce it this
Speaker 1: way or that, when it doesn't matter, people are gonna
Speaker 1: love it. So that's what with that idea is where
Speaker 1: I launched Cascade. I'm like, this is going to be
Speaker 1: melodic based. Because up in the until Ryan Radden tracks
Speaker 1: and raid On tracks and all these other little names
Speaker 1: that I was testing out, we're just me experimenting. But
Speaker 1: with Cascade, I was like, it's going to be more melodic,
Speaker 1: it's gonna be song based, and I'm gonna try my
Speaker 1: handed songwriting. Because I had a friend who was like, man,
Speaker 1: your dude, it's all about songwriting, and you're a pretty
Speaker 1: good writer. You should you know. You need to try
Speaker 1: and put your ideas into a song and that's really
Speaker 1: what's gonna set you apart. And I agreed. So then
Speaker 1: I was like, Okay, cool, that's my that's my lane.
Speaker 1: Because I could see that the guys that were doing successful,
Speaker 1: they all kind of had their thing. You know. Mcgallen
Speaker 1: Niggs was huge in the city at the time, and
Speaker 1: he was like, you know, he had his thing. He
Speaker 1: had a whole vibe and his music had this style.
Speaker 1: So anyway, that's that's kind of we're up to that point. Okay.
Speaker 1: Two questions. How long after you moved to San Francisco
Speaker 1: do you move to a place where your equipment can
Speaker 1: be in the apartment? Yourn a couple of years, okay,
Speaker 1: so you really can only work when you're at home.
Speaker 1: Actually it was a year and a half now that
Speaker 1: I think about it. I was on Polk Street. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was working at home, So was a bunch of
Speaker 1: my equipment into home, now that I think about that, Okay,
Speaker 1: And although one can look it up on the internet,
Speaker 1: people are certainly going be fascinated. How do you come
Speaker 1: up with the name Casscade? I had sold some music
Speaker 1: to a Chicago label and it was the first kind
Speaker 1: of jaunt in this more song based stuff. And it's
Speaker 1: funny the A and R over there Lady D who's
Speaker 1: an accomplished DJ in her own right and producer and whatnot.
Speaker 1: I was like, I don't want to name it Ryan
Speaker 1: Rad and she's like, well, you got two weeks to
Speaker 1: come give me a name, you know, because this thing
Speaker 1: is gonna go to press and we've gotta do art work.
Speaker 1: So take the two weeks and you know, whenever two
Speaker 1: weeks goes by, and like, literally the night before I'm
Speaker 1: just like flipping through a nature book and there's a
Speaker 1: picture of a waterfall and I'm like cascade. And I
Speaker 1: go to my wife, Hey, what do you think a cascade?
Speaker 1: And then you know, the next day at launch, you know,
Speaker 1: we're all sitting there in the office and what do
Speaker 1: you guys think a cascade? And they're like, yeah, it's cool,
Speaker 1: it's memorable. Cascade is super memorable. And I just liked
Speaker 1: the idea because I wanted it. I wanted the sound
Speaker 1: of this project to be more organic. I wanted it
Speaker 1: to feel and I always liked nature and I thought
Speaker 1: cascade is cool. And then my wife is like, oh,
Speaker 1: but there's you got to change the spelling. I'm like,
Speaker 1: I'll just use kids instead of seas and no, I
Speaker 1: don't know because she's like, oh, there's a dish detergent.
Speaker 1: That's that. And I'm like, okay, we'll change the spelling.
Speaker 1: And that was it. And it's funny when I called
Speaker 1: the and are like, all right, I've got the name,
Speaker 1: She's like, it took you two weeks to come up
Speaker 1: with that? Are you serious? Oh man? To like, she
Speaker 1: just brought me right back down to earth. You're listening
Speaker 1: to my conversation with Cascade, recorded at the tune In
Speaker 1: Studios in Venice, California. I hope you're enjoying this episode
Speaker 1: of the Bomb Left Sets podcast. If you want to
Speaker 1: see videos, photos, and sound bites from Cascade and our
Speaker 1: other guests, visit apt tune in on Twitter, Facebook, and
Speaker 1: Instagram to see them with me in the studio. Now
Speaker 1: more of my chat with Cascade on the Bob Left
Speaker 1: Sets Podcast. Okay, so at this point we're in what year, um,
Speaker 1: two thousand three, two thousand three. What's your wife doing?
Speaker 1: She got a job? The dot com thing fizzled out, whatever,
Speaker 1: she got a job working for Levi Strauss. Their headquarters
Speaker 1: is there in San Francisco, is working at their office?
Speaker 1: And what about that? What about issues of kids? No
Speaker 1: kids yet? Okay, we're still just loving life. Okay. Okay,
Speaker 1: so you suddenly your a cascade and they press up
Speaker 1: this record, cascade. What's the next step? Um grinding it
Speaker 1: really from two thousand and three to the first like
Speaker 1: seven eight nine years. Really things started change in two thousand,
Speaker 1: eight thousand, nine thousand and ten. I think two thousand
Speaker 1: ten was kind of like a two thousand, nine thousand ten.
Speaker 1: That's when things changed. But up until then, just grinding.
Speaker 1: I was working the job, you know, fifty hours a week,
Speaker 1: and then I'm just in the studio every waking moment.
Speaker 1: It's good that we didn't have kids, because I'm sure
Speaker 1: our relationship would have been destroyed. I was already hanging
Speaker 1: on by a threat because it's like, I'm in the studio,
Speaker 1: I'm at work. I'm in the studio, at work. But
Speaker 1: it was fun because you know, we're young, and we're
Speaker 1: enjoying the city and having a great time. And she's
Speaker 1: got a lot of friends in the Bay Area. So
Speaker 1: it worked. But I was putting out more records, putting
Speaker 1: out more records, seeing a little success, and I started
Speaker 1: touring a lot. Okay, how did you start touring? Um
Speaker 1: after Home? Put me out on a couple of compilations
Speaker 1: and put out a couple of singles, That's when people
Speaker 1: started taking note because that record kind of had had
Speaker 1: cloud within this little scene, right and uh so when
Speaker 1: they kind of were like, hey, this guy's cool and
Speaker 1: he's making cool music, that changed things. So people started
Speaker 1: phoning me up, and I got a booking agent and
Speaker 1: it was very She was in house at Owned Records
Speaker 1: for all the little small time artists that are big
Speaker 1: enough to have a real booking agent. They would call
Speaker 1: through her and all the requests would come through her,
Speaker 1: and um I started digging, and then um I did
Speaker 1: my first like, uh, Australia to where I did, Like, well, well,
Speaker 1: before you get to Westralia, you're digging in the United
Speaker 1: States all over the place, how often almost every weekend,
Speaker 1: almost every weekend, and you're driving yourself there. You're flying flying.
Speaker 1: I'm solo, no tour manage or nothing like that, just
Speaker 1: flying to these places. I mean, these gigs are playing
Speaker 1: like five, so you need a couple of those a week,
Speaker 1: you know, seven, eight, nine thousand bucks. O man, Okay, cool,
Speaker 1: I can make a living. You know, I'm doing anywhere
Speaker 1: from like five gigs a month to ten gigs a month,
Speaker 1: and you're still working, a still getting paid, a still
Speaker 1: getting paid at on that came to a crash landing.
Speaker 1: I kind of screwed up one of the projects while
Speaker 1: I was away. Um, the artwork files weren't right. And
Speaker 1: I came back and he's like, look, it's cool, You're
Speaker 1: things starting to take off. You're not gonna be able
Speaker 1: to do both of these, but I wasn't at a
Speaker 1: point where we could survive. I needed both incomes really
Speaker 1: um to be living in San Francisco. So uh, he
Speaker 1: cut me away, which was very nice of him. Um.
Speaker 1: Chris Smith, the guy ran, I was really nice of him.
Speaker 1: Where was he today? He's still running own records, still
Speaker 1: in San Francisco, um um. And I took my wife
Speaker 1: out to a very nice dinner that I couldn't afford
Speaker 1: and said, hey, I've lost my job, but we're gonna
Speaker 1: be all right. And I felt that way. I was like,
Speaker 1: we'll be all right. I think this is gonna work.
Speaker 1: You know. I started feeling more and more confident when
Speaker 1: I was out there. I just needed some more time
Speaker 1: to kind of like gain get some steam going. Um.
Speaker 1: And I don't know, I think back then it was
Speaker 1: just such a hustle because there was so little money.
Speaker 1: I think back then people were seeing me as successful.
Speaker 1: But you know whatever, I'm making sixties seventy thousand dollars
Speaker 1: a year living in San Francisco. We're dying. We're going
Speaker 1: under each month, just a little bit farther um. But
Speaker 1: I just kept that at you know, I don't know why,
Speaker 1: just because what I knew how to do it. By
Speaker 1: this time, I've got a decade or more of history.
Speaker 1: I understood the industry. It's like, I don't know what
Speaker 1: else ide do at this point, you know, and you're
Speaker 1: talking about going to Australia. So ine to Australia. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's when the Debaco happened. I came back and he's like,
Speaker 1: you're screwed up. Okay, So now you're continually living in
Speaker 1: San Francisco and it's not working economically. The same woman
Speaker 1: at Olms still booking you. Yep, okay, So what's the
Speaker 1: next step? And then I get a manager, uh, Stephanie Lefera.
Speaker 1: I forget what year that was. It was about let's see,
Speaker 1: I knows it was just two thousand four, two five, Yeah,
Speaker 1: right around there, two thousand five, two thousand and six,
Speaker 1: something like this. She hears my music, she's based in
Speaker 1: New York. She's working at the office that books mobi
Speaker 1: and manage them. And she's a young intern kind of
Speaker 1: assistant coming up, finds my music, loves it. Hey, can
Speaker 1: I help you out? I'm like, sure, how much does
Speaker 1: that cost you? How do you do this? You know? Um?
Speaker 1: And so then I kind of had a small team going.
Speaker 1: I had me a manager, a booking agent, and it
Speaker 1: slowly started to grow. And how many nights to work
Speaker 1: week are you working? Then I'm taking every gig that
Speaker 1: I can take. It didn't even matter. I mean they
Speaker 1: didn't know that at the time, that they referred me
Speaker 1: two d dollars or a thousand dollars that I would
Speaker 1: take it. It didn't matter. I mean I was playing
Speaker 1: gigs for next to nothing. But back then that was
Speaker 1: super crucial because nobody there's no radio stations. There's no
Speaker 1: way to get people to hear your music. You know,
Speaker 1: there's no Spotify, there's no there's no The only way
Speaker 1: they play people your music is to get out there
Speaker 1: and play the nightclubs. And there are a clique of
Speaker 1: kids that were very devoted to the underground. Like there
Speaker 1: is now, it's just much bigger and it's more of
Speaker 1: a festival scene now, but you know there's underground house
Speaker 1: music clubs and every city from New York to l
Speaker 1: A and Tokyo whatever. They're all over the place. There
Speaker 1: have been a wave of guys that had come before me,
Speaker 1: that Eric Morrillo's and the Junior Vasquez and Derek Carter's
Speaker 1: and Mark Freenez that had already kind of set up
Speaker 1: a platform for me to exist in UM. So I
Speaker 1: just was kind of following suit and doing what I
Speaker 1: could do UM. But I was definitely like that second
Speaker 1: or third generation of guys coming. So it's hard to
Speaker 1: break in, you know, it's very hard. So what was
Speaker 1: the break? I never really had that ah ha moment.
Speaker 1: I had a few things along the way. I think
Speaker 1: for me. The biggest moment where I knew things were
Speaker 1: changing and I knew like the old guard was that
Speaker 1: didn't matter as much anymore. As much as I love them,
Speaker 1: I think their relevancy was wearing off. Was two thousand
Speaker 1: and nine when I played E. D C. I played
Speaker 1: the main stage and I had had a string of
Speaker 1: hits and when I say hits, hits in the underground
Speaker 1: where I could play them to a club of three
Speaker 1: people and people were singing along, and I'm like, damn,
Speaker 1: this is working, right. I didn't no matter where I
Speaker 1: was in the world, these people knew this record. So
Speaker 1: not only am I playing it my FM station, was
Speaker 1: these thousands of DJs across the planet that we're getting
Speaker 1: there and playing my music on Friday and Saturday night
Speaker 1: in their local clubs. So they're playing these mixes. I'm
Speaker 1: showing up and people are knowing them. So more promote
Speaker 1: as are like, man, the club's packed when you're here,
Speaker 1: you know. So at this point, I'm just rolling. I'm
Speaker 1: doing two fifty shows a year. I'm starting a family.
Speaker 1: At this point, I mean, it's just getting chaotic. It
Speaker 1: sounds like and so Okay, you continue to have the
Speaker 1: same manager in the same agent. Yes, small change agents
Speaker 1: a few times along the way, Okay, how does that happen?
Speaker 1: You realize that person is not big enough for what
Speaker 1: you're doing, or someone approaches you this person is not
Speaker 1: big enough for what I'm doing. I gotta start looking elsewhere. Okay,
Speaker 1: you're starting a family and you're on the road for
Speaker 1: two and fifty days a year. That doesn't sound like
Speaker 1: it's gonna work. It's a freaking miracle that it did.
Speaker 1: I can't when I look back to those times. So's
Speaker 1: some dark days there, but I was having so much
Speaker 1: fun and my wife Naomi, bless her so she stood
Speaker 1: by me this entire time. I mean, I don't know
Speaker 1: how we made it work. Okay, back on it. We
Speaker 1: were young and dombint we didn't know any for getting
Speaker 1: the family. Just talking about Naomi. Did does she like
Speaker 1: your music? She does? She loves house music, okay. You
Speaker 1: know she was driving from Reading into San Francisco and
Speaker 1: going to their rave scene that they had then and
Speaker 1: with similar tastings. Okay. And did she believe in you?
Speaker 1: She did? She didn't. She didn't tell me no, but
Speaker 1: was she You're like your greatest champion saying she was?
Speaker 1: She was like out there do it okay, and she's
Speaker 1: you know, a really hard worker and understood that. Okay,
Speaker 1: this is important for you to keep doing these gigs.
Speaker 1: It is slowly getting better and better with each year. Um.
Speaker 1: But going back two thousand and nine is when E
Speaker 1: d C. I sat down with the Pascuala and I'm
Speaker 1: good friend. I mean, I DJE DJed his wedding, I
Speaker 1: played his mom's funeral. I've known Pascual for years. This
Speaker 1: guy's booked me so many times I could had lost
Speaker 1: count um and he was a champion of me and
Speaker 1: my sound. So that was that helped. It was a
Speaker 1: game changer. But I think a lot of American promoters
Speaker 1: felt the pressure and they saw electronic music as a
Speaker 1: European thing, you know, house music, and it was always
Speaker 1: it was such, it had that kind of you know,
Speaker 1: people listen to house music are the people who ordered
Speaker 1: the cheese platter. You know. It's kind of like it
Speaker 1: was a different kind of thing. What was funny because
Speaker 1: where I came from it was very blue collar. It
Speaker 1: was like the working class music in Chicago was like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I get down and dirty and a you know, in
Speaker 1: a ugly nightclub. So I had a very different thought
Speaker 1: process and they did. Anyway, around two thousand and eight,
Speaker 1: two thousand nine, a lot more guys are coming over
Speaker 1: because money starts kind of pouring into the scene. These
Speaker 1: rays are getting bigger, the clubs are getting bigger. Things
Speaker 1: are changing. I'm making a good living now. Um. But
Speaker 1: I sat down with him in a room and pounded
Speaker 1: on the he he had booked the Swedish house Mafia.
Speaker 1: Nobody really knew at the time in America. And I
Speaker 1: sat down and I pounded on the table and like,
Speaker 1: this is freaking crap. Man, you gotta have my back.
Speaker 1: These guys. Nobody knows these guys. That's wonderful that they're
Speaker 1: huge in Stockholm or that they are massive in London.
Speaker 1: I don't care. I'm here in freaking California. Man, you
Speaker 1: can't do me like this. I got really upset. And
Speaker 1: he remembers me, and I was pounding on the table.
Speaker 1: He's like, I've never seen you like this. You're so passive.
Speaker 1: I'm like, well, I'm not going to take these guys scraps, dude.
Speaker 1: I'm playing rooms three times the size of what these
Speaker 1: guys are doing when they come here, because I'm here,
Speaker 1: I'm this is this is my circuit, bro. And I
Speaker 1: think they felt a lot of pressure from the European
Speaker 1: agents and promoters and all that that well there's you
Speaker 1: know over there. This was the first taste of well
Speaker 1: on social media, they have these numbers and on this
Speaker 1: and that. Because up till this point in the underground
Speaker 1: it was hard to distinguish had value and who didn't.
Speaker 1: It was mainly who just thumped their chest. The loudest.
Speaker 1: That guy must be huge. You know. Then YouTube came
Speaker 1: along and you start pictures of these peoples and videos
Speaker 1: of their shows, like, wow, they're huge anyway. But in
Speaker 1: two thousand nine, I played that main stage, so you
Speaker 1: can played the main stage because you basically bang your
Speaker 1: hands on the table for Pasqual. I think he was
Speaker 1: he was gonna put me there that year anyway, because
Speaker 1: I played some previous years and was attracting these massive crowds.
Speaker 1: I mean like I was kind of like the people's
Speaker 1: choice at this point um and a California favorite, so
Speaker 1: I think he was gonna put me there just on
Speaker 1: the building. I was like, I'm not going underneath these people.
Speaker 1: I'm happy for them that they're huge overseas, that's wonderful,
Speaker 1: but when they come here, this is this is my place.
Speaker 1: They can be billed below me or beside me, but
Speaker 1: I'm not going to play under these guys. And he
Speaker 1: heard me out and he gave me a chance. In
Speaker 1: two thousand nine was one of those moments where I
Speaker 1: was standing at E d C in front of you know,
Speaker 1: fifty six d thousand people whatever it was, that Colosseum
Speaker 1: was full and the place was it was a giants
Speaker 1: sing along to my stuff, and I think at that
Speaker 1: point he was like, Okay, yeah, you really have done
Speaker 1: something here, you know, so and that kind of solidified
Speaker 1: our relationship and um, I mean he was really great
Speaker 1: and kind to me before that. But and then a
Speaker 1: lot of people and promoters around the world we're watching
Speaker 1: what ADC was doing. So the fact that I had
Speaker 1: clout with them and things were playing so well, that
Speaker 1: just helped. And then I think another important piece in
Speaker 1: the touring story. I mean, whatever, we can talk about
Speaker 1: so many different facets of this, but in two thousand
Speaker 1: tents when Vegas got involved, and that was a game
Speaker 1: changer that changed everything. I mean, that's forward for those
Speaker 1: people who are not deep into the scene. So I know,
Speaker 1: Vegas goes into UH dance music and there's Pakistan. They're
Speaker 1: all these different clubs. But when you're there as part
Speaker 1: of the scene, suddenly you just get a call and
Speaker 1: they say, okay, you know, we're ready to do this.
Speaker 1: Two thousand seven, two eight. I'm going out there occasionally
Speaker 1: and playing for these casinos and some shows are good,
Speaker 1: some they're not so good. But it's different because everything
Speaker 1: is hip hop. It's all radio right up to that point.
Speaker 1: And then I show up and I'm playing stuff that
Speaker 1: these clubs people have never even heard this stuff, like
Speaker 1: what is this? You know it exists in the underground.
Speaker 1: But it was working because I'd have enough fans at
Speaker 1: this point, I'm close enough to l A. People were
Speaker 1: coming out and they'd fill the club and they drank
Speaker 1: and there was a party. Um, so Vegas got interested
Speaker 1: in the music pretty quickly. In two thousand and nine,
Speaker 1: Steve Winn and his team called me up and they said,
Speaker 1: we want to build a pool and have an outdoor
Speaker 1: pool party. And I'm like, hallelujah, let's do this. And
Speaker 1: I said I got a better they want to They're like,
Speaker 1: we want to book you once a month during our
Speaker 1: peak season during summer. And I said, I got a
Speaker 1: better idea for you from Memorial Data Labor Day. I'll
Speaker 1: play every Saturday for you guys, and we'll make it
Speaker 1: a thing and we'll brand it. And they're like, yes,
Speaker 1: this is what we want. Perfect, let's work a deal.
Speaker 1: Whatever this is happening. I mean, there's only one other
Speaker 1: pool party in town at that point. It's rehab, but
Speaker 1: it's very it's hip hop. It's a hip hop driven,
Speaker 1: considered urban, so nobody is doing this in this country.
Speaker 1: But I had been to a Beasa several times and
Speaker 1: I had seen how these guys are doing it, and
Speaker 1: I'm like, man if I didn't have to fly all
Speaker 1: the way to a Besa because that's twenty four hour travel,
Speaker 1: or I'm like, this changes my life if this works.
Speaker 1: And I remember coming home from the meeting. I flew
Speaker 1: back home. They showed me the big pit in the ground.
Speaker 1: This is where we're digging the pool, and it's going
Speaker 1: to be cool. And we want it, you know, they're
Speaker 1: we want a very European we want it, We want
Speaker 1: it cool. We wanted Sheep play your cool house music.
Speaker 1: You know. Anyway, we opened up that Memorial Day two
Speaker 1: thousand and ten, and five thousand people are inside and
Speaker 1: there's probably another ten thousand people lined up down the block,
Speaker 1: and that town had never seen anything like it still
Speaker 1: to this day hasn't. I mean, it was just like
Speaker 1: dynamite Adam Bomb went off on the I mean, dude,
Speaker 1: it just changed. It was just a massive shift from
Speaker 1: whoa we've got hip hop to like this kid from
Speaker 1: San Francisco can show up and attract ten thousand people
Speaker 1: and we can ring a million dollars? How much are
Speaker 1: we paying this guy? Okay? And everyone was flushed with cash.
Speaker 1: Um So I was there that summer and it was
Speaker 1: just I mean, dude grins from ear to ear, the staff,
Speaker 1: the owner's Mr. Wynn, was my body. I mean, it's
Speaker 1: just everything was firing on all fronts, you know, four
Speaker 1: gigs into it. I'm like, okay, we need to readjust something.
Speaker 1: I need to get paid some more money, you know. Uh.
Speaker 1: And at this point I have an attorney, Had Shapiro.
Speaker 1: Great guy has been with me almost since the beginning.
Speaker 1: Um and he's the longest member of my team. I
Speaker 1: should say seventeen years I've been working with this guy.
Speaker 1: But anyway, he uh, you know, he really helped me out,
Speaker 1: and that my you know, agent, and everybody kind of
Speaker 1: rallied behind me. And I think we knew that that summer.
Speaker 1: I'm like, because if something works in Vegas, every casino
Speaker 1: is going to copy it. Right. Of course, they can't
Speaker 1: make me making tens of millions of dollars and have
Speaker 1: people not rip off the idea, not in Vegas. So
Speaker 1: of course that next year, more and more stuff showed
Speaker 1: up and then you know, Cosmopolitan came online, Hakkasan came inline,
Speaker 1: and I mean they were just were buying talent like crazy.
Speaker 1: And what happened is there's so much competition and there's
Speaker 1: only a few artists, so the fees just went through
Speaker 1: the roof. I mean it was just, Yeah, I could
Speaker 1: move from San Francisco down here. I was already feeling
Speaker 1: that because I was writing and producing a lot of
Speaker 1: stuff in two thousand and I moved down here in
Speaker 1: two thousand and nine, and I wanted to be closer
Speaker 1: to l A. And I had a studio in Santa Monica,
Speaker 1: and I was commuting from Orange County. I couldn't afford
Speaker 1: l A. So I was living in Orange County and
Speaker 1: commuting back and forth. Um, but I knew things were
Speaker 1: changing and there was a shift, uh musically because I
Speaker 1: was doing all these remixes and then six months later
Speaker 1: versions of that remix with a new song, we're showing up.
Speaker 1: That production style was going closer and closer to the radio.
Speaker 1: So I'm like, I gotta be in l A and
Speaker 1: be closer to this, even if the d J thing
Speaker 1: kind of creps out because Vegas wasn't locked in, right,
Speaker 1: I was like I could produce people's records. I mean, wow,
Speaker 1: you know, a little teeny bit of a Madonna record
Speaker 1: or Beyonce record is gonna that will take care of
Speaker 1: us by these producers there they're listening to my remixes.
Speaker 1: I know they are. They have to be. It's too
Speaker 1: close stylistically. Anyway, that all kind of happened in a
Speaker 1: very quick time that Vegas came online. I moved down here,
Speaker 1: and yeah, I changed my life. I mean, even to
Speaker 1: this day, Vegas accounts for about forty of my revenue
Speaker 1: touring wise. I mean it's a it's a large number. Okay,
Speaker 1: so how often do you work in Vegas? Um? This year,
Speaker 1: I'm doing a little over thirty shows, thirty five shows
Speaker 1: something like. Okay, and you're working. We're in Vegas now.
Speaker 1: I'm with the Hakkasan group and that's Caesar's Omnia Um
Speaker 1: Hakkasan the club what Republic is at the MGM, So
Speaker 1: they have you know, they manage multiple clubs there, but
Speaker 1: I kind of rotate between those three venues. And if
Speaker 1: this late date, how business for them? It's cooled off
Speaker 1: a little bit. I mean we're talking about two thousands
Speaker 1: ten where it was so then every club opened up,
Speaker 1: and so now you've got you know, twelve fifteen clubs
Speaker 1: on the strip, and you know, six pool parties, eight
Speaker 1: pool parties. Wherever it is, everyone's doing it. So when
Speaker 1: I say it's cooled off, it's cooled off for them.
Speaker 1: For me, it's it's as wild as it's ever been.
Speaker 1: So pay for you, because I know from talking to
Speaker 1: people to the business, pay for you has stayed the
Speaker 1: same or going up. It's grown up. I kind of
Speaker 1: hit a ceiling about three years ago, but it's essentially
Speaker 1: stayed the same. They got a little bit smarter. Used
Speaker 1: to be in a locked in fee, it didn't matter
Speaker 1: five old people. There are five thousand people were there.
Speaker 1: Now they've built in bonuses, so they've hedged their bets
Speaker 1: a little bit um just because the club's kind of
Speaker 1: got smarter and started talking to one another and hey,
Speaker 1: what are we gonna do here? We can't pay for
Speaker 1: these guys. You know, it doesn't matter five thousand people
Speaker 1: show up, We're not you know, because it just became
Speaker 1: more competitive. There was more real estate, you know, there's
Speaker 1: more tables, there's more clubs to go to, and you
Speaker 1: know that lowered the entrance fee for the patrons, and
Speaker 1: it changed it a little bit. Well, pause here for
Speaker 1: a reef moment and get right back to my conversation
Speaker 1: with the Cascade. You know, I'm primarily a writer, and
Speaker 1: you can read my work and left sets dot com.
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Speaker 1: with world famous DJ Casscade, recorded live at the tune
Speaker 1: In Studios in Venice, California. Okay, So in that ten
Speaker 1: year period and when you start with Vegas to now,
Speaker 1: what else changes for you? M I think the music
Speaker 1: just continued. I just continued to be an album guy,
Speaker 1: and there were there weren't many of those in my world,
Speaker 1: and a song guy. You know, I sticked with my
Speaker 1: original kind of two thousand to two thousand three idea,
Speaker 1: and everybody kind of came around to that, like E.
Speaker 1: D M was kind of centered around that, like oh,
Speaker 1: as to have a vocal, this could potentially cross over
Speaker 1: to radio. That was never my thing, And I don't
Speaker 1: really particularly right like that. I've never had any radio success. Um,
Speaker 1: I still kind of right for a nightclub. I don't know.
Speaker 1: It's a hard lane to get out of, the hard
Speaker 1: thing to change my mindset. But I'm I'm comfortable with that.
Speaker 1: That's fine. Um but um yeah, So I just continue
Speaker 1: putting out records, and my fan base grows and grows
Speaker 1: and grows, and social media. With the onset of social media,
Speaker 1: I mean, dude, I could talk directly to the people.
Speaker 1: Where before I had to go to St. Louis to
Speaker 1: meet my fans and playing a club and fill a club.
Speaker 1: Now I can on Twitter, I can get on Facebook,
Speaker 1: I can send a direct message directly to them I'm
Speaker 1: coming here. And it totally helped me. So to what
Speaker 1: degree do you participate on social media? I am it's
Speaker 1: nauseating how much I'm on there. I apologize to anyone
Speaker 1: who follows me. But um, I think it was so
Speaker 1: important because we have no other way. People in my world,
Speaker 1: there's no other way to broadcast a message. I can
Speaker 1: playing a club here, I'm playing festival there. It's important
Speaker 1: for me to talk to these people. And I think
Speaker 1: it's really gratifying. I mean, when SoundCloud was the thing,
Speaker 1: it was so awesome for me to like whip something
Speaker 1: up and edit a mash up, a remix or whatever
Speaker 1: it was, a new song, put it on there, go
Speaker 1: to Twitter and like, hey, check it out and post
Speaker 1: it up and just get that instant feedback before I'm
Speaker 1: pressing a record that takes two and a half months
Speaker 1: to press. I shipped the record out, it goes to
Speaker 1: the store, comes back. I go to that city six
Speaker 1: months later, you know, a couple of people have found
Speaker 1: that record. Go there year later, everybody's singing. It was
Speaker 1: like this eighteen month twenty four month lag of me
Speaker 1: creating this thing to when people like it absorbed it.
Speaker 1: Now it's like I can put it out and have
Speaker 1: this conversation immediately with people. So I loved it. And
Speaker 1: to what degree on social media is it all primarily
Speaker 1: I'm coming, this is what I'm doing. Or do you
Speaker 1: also communicate with fans and talk about subjects that have
Speaker 1: nothing to do with you, particularly you'll have to do
Speaker 1: with music or the world at large. Um, I talk
Speaker 1: about a lot of random stuff. Um, I let people
Speaker 1: into my world Somewhat. I'm pretty private, but I still
Speaker 1: share songs of like I should still share thoughts of hey,
Speaker 1: this is how I wrote this song, and this is
Speaker 1: what the catalyst was for this, or you know, this
Speaker 1: is why I'm touring. And I have a lot of
Speaker 1: discussions in and around music just about like whatever, this
Speaker 1: is what I'm doing on Thursday afternoon. And I think
Speaker 1: people like that and they appreciate it. And what platform
Speaker 1: is your platform of choice? Sadly I'm I'm a Twitter
Speaker 1: guy because I don't know why. Sadly, well, because it's
Speaker 1: not as popular as it once was, and I think
Speaker 1: the younger kids have kind of lost that on Twitter.
Speaker 1: You know, they want Snapchat and whatnot. I don't. I
Speaker 1: don't want to feel like I'm producing a television show
Speaker 1: every day. I don't like pointing my phone at me,
Speaker 1: and I don't appreciate that. I like Twitter because I
Speaker 1: like to write, so I can get on there and
Speaker 1: show you know quick atlantic. Don't think that's how many
Speaker 1: followers you have today. It's over a million, one point
Speaker 1: three million, one point four millions, And what about Instagram
Speaker 1: about the same amount Instagram. I enjoy Instagram because it
Speaker 1: can be very curated, and I feel like it's still
Speaker 1: an art. I have a photog and videographer follow me,
Speaker 1: and we can still put stuff up that's neat, but
Speaker 1: it is more curated my my channel. I you know,
Speaker 1: I'm I'm aware of what's happening and put images that
Speaker 1: I like up. Okay, so you've achieved certainly far beyond
Speaker 1: most people's wildest dreams. What is left in the landscape
Speaker 1: that you would like to achieve? Um? I think now
Speaker 1: it's just more about legacy. You know, what have I
Speaker 1: added to this scene? I know what it gave me.
Speaker 1: It gave me a life and uh and I'm thankful
Speaker 1: for that. So I think, you know, I still feel
Speaker 1: like there's quite a bit of writing left in me
Speaker 1: and a few songs that I still want to share.
Speaker 1: I still feel that I still want to write and
Speaker 1: produce and continue sharing. I'm really interested in Sun Soaked
Speaker 1: and seeing that become a brand that can stand on
Speaker 1: its own. I mean, right now, it's essentially a cascade concert,
Speaker 1: a show that people are going to that's on the beach.
Speaker 1: Well that's special. Um, but I'd like to see that
Speaker 1: potentially be in more places. Um, something that I could
Speaker 1: be really having involved with. But um, you know, kind
Speaker 1: of transition and make it something more than just being
Speaker 1: about me, you know, bring other artists and make it
Speaker 1: multiple days. Have it been a few different looks? You know,
Speaker 1: we're sitting here on Thursday, the week following Sun Soaked
Speaker 1: in Long Beach. There were thirty one thousand people there. Uh,
Speaker 1: to what degree with your were you happy or unhappy
Speaker 1: with certain elements of the show? Thank you for your
Speaker 1: right up by the way that was I said it
Speaker 1: was great and people should only go the amazing thing here.
Speaker 1: And I just know because this promoter, Eric Kurtz, took
Speaker 1: me two thousand and ten or whatever to Hard Halloween
Speaker 1: and it really opened my eyes. And the funniest thing
Speaker 1: was people very good friends. And I said, you're not
Speaker 1: gonna believe. We gotta tell you a story. We went
Speaker 1: to the USC football game and walking by all these
Speaker 1: people and I said, I was there and there I've
Speaker 1: bucked out. So you know, that's how I really originally
Speaker 1: got into the scene. I've been to Abitha couple of times, etcetera.
Speaker 1: And what blows my mind is that people have no
Speaker 1: idea what's going on here, being its sunsoaked. The amazing
Speaker 1: thing was and it's not amazing to you, but for
Speaker 1: those of us everyone singing along to songs that are
Speaker 1: not mainstream songs mainstream meaning you know, the Spotify top
Speaker 1: fifty are written about in the media or whatever. This
Speaker 1: is obviously that important to them. And the other thing,
Speaker 1: of course, is a social atmosphere. You got to a
Speaker 1: regular show and you bump into something. It happens all
Speaker 1: the time, Okay, just walking along, Hey man, what are
Speaker 1: you doing? Hey? No, no, no, no, sounds like oh cool,
Speaker 1: no problem. It's very yeah, you know, so it's a
Speaker 1: great atmosphere. Now, the other thing, I was told that
Speaker 1: there were no trips to the hospital, okay, and this
Speaker 1: is very different from many other electronic music festivals. Why
Speaker 1: do you think that is? I think it's partly me
Speaker 1: as a person and the people that I've attracted, um
Speaker 1: through years of touring you know, my music. I think
Speaker 1: I'm emitting a message that that you know, it isn't
Speaker 1: like that helps that right, that environment, So it's about you.
Speaker 1: It's you're setting a tone. I think listen, dance music
Speaker 1: is like that generally speaking, right, But then I think
Speaker 1: I'm one of those guys that's in front of that
Speaker 1: kind of leading that charge. I like to think of
Speaker 1: myself as that anyway. Um, you know, I've been very,
Speaker 1: very fortunate with my live shows I've done. I mean,
Speaker 1: to my knowledge, that's the largest like single act ticket
Speaker 1: sales of anyone in my world, certainly in North America.
Speaker 1: I don't know about Europe, and I can't speak for
Speaker 1: some of these other places. But thirty one people, this
Speaker 1: is this is insane, and I think the thing that
Speaker 1: is so difficult for people in the music industry to understand.
Speaker 1: And I'm managed now by rock Nation and Jay Brown.
Speaker 1: They're just so fascinated because it is it's how do
Speaker 1: these people know these songs? How you got thirty one
Speaker 1: people singing along to a song that I released eight
Speaker 1: years ago. I mean, I could turn the record off
Speaker 1: and they'll sing the course with the hands in the air.
Speaker 1: It boggles my mind. It blows my mind. But that's
Speaker 1: the age of the Internet. People are finding this stuff.
Speaker 1: When you look at my spins on Spotify, there there's
Speaker 1: nothing special, you know, on like four and a half
Speaker 1: five million streams a month. This is you know, I'm
Speaker 1: not even in the top I don't think, you know,
Speaker 1: But yet I can go and sell these many tickets.
Speaker 1: Many popex have a very difficult time doing something like this,
Speaker 1: and that's really Listen. That's how I discovered your emails,
Speaker 1: because it was I'm outside of this music industry. I
Speaker 1: kind of sit on the outside. I'm looking in. But
Speaker 1: yet I've been able to find in carve my own niche.
Speaker 1: And I think that's what's been so fascinating to the
Speaker 1: people around me and even myself. I'm still kind of
Speaker 1: like shocked and scratched my head. Okay, you know, if
Speaker 1: you go back to you know, the classic rockers, the Stones,
Speaker 1: the Beatles, they said, hey, we'll do this for ten years.
Speaker 1: We'll go back to hometown, we go back to the factory.
Speaker 1: Do you anticipate if your forty seven now, you anticipate
Speaker 1: years from now you'll still be in Vegas or somewhere
Speaker 1: spinning records? No? No, why not? I don't think so.
Speaker 1: This is a young person's game. It really is. It's
Speaker 1: a it's very dance music is young, full of life,
Speaker 1: and I think it would be ficult to be like
Speaker 1: a really old guy up there trying to lead that charge. Um.
Speaker 1: I think listen, I'm always going to be writing and
Speaker 1: producing records on some level because that that satisfies something
Speaker 1: inside of me. Right. I love writing a song, I
Speaker 1: love working on music, I love remixing stuff. Um and listen,
Speaker 1: I'm sure I'll have the occasional tour like dust it
Speaker 1: off the turntaip, let me get out there and do something.
Speaker 1: But to the degree that I'm touring now and stuff, no,
Speaker 1: I mean I've slowly been kind of winding it down
Speaker 1: for the last sound of three or four years. I've
Speaker 1: you know, at that peak when I was doing two
Speaker 1: hundred plus shows a year too. Now, you know, do
Speaker 1: a hundred shows this year, hundred and ten shows or something.
Speaker 1: It's half of what it was. Um one, because I
Speaker 1: make so much more money per show, so to hustle
Speaker 1: is hard. Um, but I think it will continue to
Speaker 1: kind of go that way. Um. Okay, but a hundred
Speaker 1: is you know, you have many legendary acts who do
Speaker 1: sixty shows every other year, So a hundred shows there's
Speaker 1: still a lot of shows. Yes, it is, okay, not
Speaker 1: in my world, but yes, of course, of course you're
Speaker 1: in DJ but anybody as they become more successful, because
Speaker 1: we know I remember, I think I was talking to Metallica.
Speaker 1: They went all they went on the road. When they
Speaker 1: all came back and got a divorce. You know, you're
Speaker 1: on you're working so hard on what you do, your
Speaker 1: life completely changes. So when you get to the point
Speaker 1: you want to get a certain point, you want a
Speaker 1: life work balance. But that does not necessarily mean you
Speaker 1: stop working, right, I agree with that, Okay. I mean
Speaker 1: you said twenty years from that. That just seems like
Speaker 1: a really long time. Okay. I think what you're saying
Speaker 1: is with the classic rock accent, they couldn't even imagine
Speaker 1: especially you know. Okay, but come on, further questions. What's
Speaker 1: it like to be on stage when and don't forget
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, but people listening dance music, it's
Speaker 1: a very active audience. They're not sitting passively. You don't
Speaker 1: have to wait for the song to end man to
Speaker 1: get applause. What's it like being on stage in front
Speaker 1: of that many people, getting that reaction, having them in
Speaker 1: the palm of your hand. It's insane. I mean, it's
Speaker 1: impossible for me to describe. It's the energy flowing through
Speaker 1: me is crazy. It's very difficult for me to sleep
Speaker 1: after a show or to calm down. It takes a while.
Speaker 1: I mean, dude, I've I'm it's electric. It's funny you
Speaker 1: say that because people, you know, people always say they're
Speaker 1: criticisms of musicians. You know, go into a minor. One
Speaker 1: would be, well they date models. Well, models have the
Speaker 1: same lifestyle, you know, traveling around the world, staying up
Speaker 1: all night whatever. The next thing is, well, why do
Speaker 1: they all do drugs? I know you don't do drugs,
Speaker 1: but I always say it's very hard. You know, you're
Speaker 1: loved by twenty people in an arena, you get back
Speaker 1: into the bus with the same guys that you know
Speaker 1: since high school. You can't come down for hours. They
Speaker 1: use the drugs. I'm not saying that's a good thing,
Speaker 1: but the average person has no idea what it's like.
Speaker 1: You know, It's like if I write and I get
Speaker 1: most inspired later at night, you know, I can't write
Speaker 1: and go to bed. You're just all fired up. You
Speaker 1: gotta get the idea. You gotta and I mean it's
Speaker 1: very physical as well. You see you on stage, I'm
Speaker 1: jumping around. I'm running to this side, run and that side.
Speaker 1: It's just and I have to do that because so
Speaker 1: much is flowing through me. I feel like I could
Speaker 1: lift up a car and throw it into the audience
Speaker 1: at certain point, you know, I mean, it's it's great.
Speaker 1: So that's a great analogy. Just you know. Another thing
Speaker 1: that people have criticism electronic music. They say that basically
Speaker 1: it's all on hard drive and the guys just pressing
Speaker 1: and play. When you are on stage, how much are
Speaker 1: you creating on stage? Great question. I'm gonna make this
Speaker 1: as short of answer as I could possibly make. There's
Speaker 1: weren't an interesting spot with electronic music for a very
Speaker 1: long time. A lot of it was being created. And
Speaker 1: what I mean by that as I show up and
Speaker 1: I've got two or three records behind me, I know
Speaker 1: the first record I'm gonna play, sure, but I have
Speaker 1: no idea what's gonna happen. And then it's this interesting
Speaker 1: relationship that you have with the audience. And this is
Speaker 1: certainly true in the nightclubs where you're kind of like
Speaker 1: weaving this tapestry, this audio tapestry right with them, and
Speaker 1: you're going in and out, and there is a skill
Speaker 1: of lining this up and blending knees and picking the
Speaker 1: next song. And it's very it's very organic thing, and
Speaker 1: it is a talent and whatever, I'll sitting here and argue,
Speaker 1: even if I'm not in this business, how I'm telling
Speaker 1: you there are guys that do it really, really well,
Speaker 1: that have learned and honed that for a very long time.
Speaker 1: As it became digitized and it changed things a little bit,
Speaker 1: it was a lot easier to have less talent and
Speaker 1: be able to pull it off because then it became
Speaker 1: more about the song. Okay, write a good song, get
Speaker 1: up in front of the audience and play it. That's
Speaker 1: good enough, and you are just pressing play. I am
Speaker 1: trying to blend those two worlds of the old and
Speaker 1: the new. I mean, I still show up on stage
Speaker 1: and I have a playlist with a hundred songs on it,
Speaker 1: and I think I know what I'm gonna play. And
Speaker 1: to my two ring parties, Dismay and and and I
Speaker 1: mean they hate me for this that I still kind
Speaker 1: of go off on these tangents. They want me to
Speaker 1: provide them a set list so all the pyrotechnics and
Speaker 1: everything can be all in sync and it can be
Speaker 1: this beautiful show. And I refused to do this because
Speaker 1: I'm like, look, man, even if I give you a
Speaker 1: set list, I'm not going to stick to it. Then
Speaker 1: it would be no fun. And for me, well, and
Speaker 1: I came up in a time when that didn't exist.
Speaker 1: I mean, I toured for ten years by myself, like
Speaker 1: I did whatever the hell I wanted to do, Like
Speaker 1: I didn't have to answer to anyone. So they hate
Speaker 1: me in a twenty four hours of the gig. They're like,
Speaker 1: what are you starting with? You know, what are you
Speaker 1: gonna do? And I'm like, okay, I think I might
Speaker 1: start here, and I'm pretty sure I'm an end here
Speaker 1: in between, you know, but the guy. But what we've
Speaker 1: discovered is the guys that do the best with me,
Speaker 1: they just go and play every show with me. So
Speaker 1: as I incorporate new mixes and finished new songs, and
Speaker 1: I can incorporate that on my show, and they're hurt
Speaker 1: and they're familiar with it, and so they become a
Speaker 1: season as I am. And that's the best way to
Speaker 1: to it. Instead of these guys just shown up at
Speaker 1: the big shows that they're at the big shows, the
Speaker 1: small shows. I'm playing five people they're they're they're listening
Speaker 1: to it. They work in the video of the lights.
Speaker 1: So what about the health of the scene at this point.
Speaker 1: I think it's great. Uh, it's kind of broken into
Speaker 1: two things. So there's kind of like a pop lane
Speaker 1: where you got David Getta's and Calvin Harris's that have
Speaker 1: taken dance music and opened it up to a wider audience,
Speaker 1: which is awesome, um, and that angered some of the
Speaker 1: people when we were all in one scene, when we're
Speaker 1: all just one group of guys. But now it's kind
Speaker 1: of fractured, and the underground has become like all ships
Speaker 1: rise with the tide, right, So even the underground is
Speaker 1: much bigger and more profitable and healthier because this pop
Speaker 1: stuff is there. But I think it took a moment
Speaker 1: for people to realize like, oh, that's them over there,
Speaker 1: that's the pop stuff, and this is us where the underground.
Speaker 1: So they're kind of separated now. Before there was that
Speaker 1: weird period of time where we're all together, well I
Speaker 1: don't like them, and that guy doesn't like this. But
Speaker 1: now they've kind of they've gone their separate ways and
Speaker 1: there's a divide between them, um, which is weird. Because
Speaker 1: I kind of coexist in both worlds. I mean, I'm
Speaker 1: over here straddling defence. Um right, what would you like
Speaker 1: to have a radio hit? Sure? Yes, So whatever you
Speaker 1: sit at home saying, you know, whatever your process is,
Speaker 1: whether it be a premeditator after the fact, well this
Speaker 1: might this might work. Are you still strive? Are you
Speaker 1: striving to reach that pinnacle? Uh? Yes, for a few reasons. One. Now, listen,
Speaker 1: I've done a lot and I've written a lot of
Speaker 1: music over twenty years. So now in the last like
Speaker 1: three or four years, as I got signed to major
Speaker 1: labels and went out of the indie scene, I mean
Speaker 1: before I used to turn in an album and it
Speaker 1: was here's the track order. I mean, it wasn't didn't
Speaker 1: give me input. I was like, here it is. Then
Speaker 1: I signed with Warner and I had any and Our
Speaker 1: signed to me, and he's like, listen to the songs
Speaker 1: and give me feedback and hanging out in the studio.
Speaker 1: And I kind of liked it. Why not five years
Speaker 1: ago I would have told him to f off and
Speaker 1: get out of the room. But now I'm like, cool man,
Speaker 1: You've got some ideas. What's up? You know, I've been
Speaker 1: around I've written a song, I don't. It's not about ego.
Speaker 1: For me. I'm kind of like, just make something cool
Speaker 1: and have a good time. So I kind of had
Speaker 1: to check myself and rearrange how I thought about the process.
Speaker 1: And not only that, Now it's like, I feel like
Speaker 1: I'm such a part of what the sound of what
Speaker 1: modern dance music is. I feel like songwriters coming and
Speaker 1: pitch me on songs. I'm like, wow, did you do
Speaker 1: you know this song by me? Because this is very
Speaker 1: similar to something I wrote five years ago or seven
Speaker 1: years ago or ten years ago. Oh my gosh, I
Speaker 1: love that song. Yeah, I can see the influence there.
Speaker 1: So to me, it's cool when other songwriters come and
Speaker 1: want to work with me. Where before I was closed
Speaker 1: to that idea, now I'm like, well, let's collaborate. Two minds.
Speaker 1: Three minds are better than one. I've kind of learned
Speaker 1: to enjoy that process now, the part about do I
Speaker 1: want a radio hit, it's more about me because in
Speaker 1: this independent world where we could try and be like,
Speaker 1: this person is worth as much of this guy's worth.
Speaker 1: That much goes back to that conversation I had, you know,
Speaker 1: a long time ago with Pasqual I deserved here. You know, Um,
Speaker 1: there's still a lot of guys that, oh, well, we're
Speaker 1: gonna build him here and build them there. Okay, then
Speaker 1: just don't include me on your festival. I'm fine, I
Speaker 1: don't need your dollars. Although that's a lot of money.
Speaker 1: Of course, I'll be playing for cheeseburgers right But to me,
Speaker 1: it was like, I don't need to be a part
Speaker 1: of that that that guy that you're putting on ahead
Speaker 1: of me or claiming that he has more value. I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't subscribe to that cool you know. And so
Speaker 1: for me, the touring numbers became a really big deal.
Speaker 1: And I understood when you know, the Swedes and all
Speaker 1: these guys came around, they're like, I sold out Medicine
Speaker 1: Square Garden. I understood why they did that, because they're
Speaker 1: trying to, you know, put their value up to these
Speaker 1: promoters and show them things. So for me, when I
Speaker 1: come back, I mean promoters around the world right now,
Speaker 1: the country you're emailing me. They can't it can't be
Speaker 1: thirty one people. You meant thousand people. Really, Oh, I
Speaker 1: had a promoter. I'm not going to say who's when
Speaker 1: I told him, like you mean three thousand, Like, no,
Speaker 1: this is thirty one thousand paid people. Guess what with
Speaker 1: another couple of thousand jumping the fence and probably a
Speaker 1: couple more thousand on my guest Listen. I mean, this
Speaker 1: is the thirty five thousand person party we're having here.
Speaker 1: This is a show that we're creating waves and those
Speaker 1: those moments, because to me, whether it's five people or
Speaker 1: fifty thousand, it's more about success and not having to
Speaker 1: answer to the promoter and prove my value to them.
Speaker 1: So for me, the radio hit is like it's here
Speaker 1: nor there. But I can't stand answering to these guys
Speaker 1: that are like, oh, well, we're gonna put this kid
Speaker 1: who's eighteen on in front of you, and I'm like, no,
Speaker 1: you're not You're not cool. I don't have to play
Speaker 1: your party, dude, I'm busy that day. Well, certainly the
Speaker 1: cutthroat business like this, but traditionally traditionally is a funny
Speaker 1: term to use. For over the last twenty years, but
Speaker 1: dance music has waxed and waned in popularity outside of
Speaker 1: its core audience. Yes, do you think that it will
Speaker 1: continue to grow or go back to base or do
Speaker 1: you have a viewpoint on that it's going back to base.
Speaker 1: Now we're in the middle of a shift. It's going
Speaker 1: back to base, which is cool, it's fine. I think
Speaker 1: there's a handful of guys that it doesn't matter. They're
Speaker 1: just part of the pop cultural landscape. Um, so they've
Speaker 1: kind of risen above that here in this country. I'm
Speaker 1: very fortunate to be part of that small club of guys,
Speaker 1: um and girls. I think there's a girl in there somewhere, maybe,
Speaker 1: I hope. So I'm not touching that right, um, but
Speaker 1: I think we'll make it through. And I think the
Speaker 1: underground as strong as it's ever been. But it's it's
Speaker 1: weaning because every listen everything is hip hop right now,
Speaker 1: and even a lot of successful dance song songs have
Speaker 1: to have okay, we gotta have a verse from g
Speaker 1: easy this or whatever. And it's becoming more you know,
Speaker 1: lab created music, right, everyone's got to have an opinion
Speaker 1: and make this and make that and make this. And me,
Speaker 1: I'm kind of like comfortable to sitting back doing what
Speaker 1: I've always done. Sure the poppit, yeah cool, I take
Speaker 1: one of those. Cool And I listened to am I
Speaker 1: open to listening to somebody else's ideas and what I
Speaker 1: should being. Yeah, sure, is most of it a waste
Speaker 1: of time? Yes, I'm like because I'm perfectly comfortable what
Speaker 1: I'm doing. But if somebody's got a great idea and
Speaker 1: there's a brilliant songwriter out there, I love good music,
Speaker 1: and I'll spend a day in the studio with them,
Speaker 1: and you know, maybe some magic comes out of that. Well,
Speaker 1: there's a whole another podcast getting into the creation and
Speaker 1: the scene. But you've been listening to the Cascade on
Speaker 1: the Bob Left Sets podcast. This has just been fascinating
Speaker 1: and edifying just to hear. And when people have no idea,
Speaker 1: all they see is like the Forbes list a successful DJ.
Speaker 1: They have no idea of the hard work that's put in,
Speaker 1: and especially in your case, that you were attracted to
Speaker 1: the scene when there was barely any scene to begin with,
Speaker 1: when you're growing up in Chicago, and to use the
Speaker 1: old cliche, that started music businesses and every walk of life.
Speaker 1: Now you paid a lot of dues, so you're at
Speaker 1: the pinnacle. You have a smile on your face. It's
Speaker 1: been so great to have you here. Thank you so much.
Speaker 1: Thanks appreciate it. Until next time, it's Bob left Sets.
Speaker 1: Tune in next week for another podcast that wraps up
Speaker 1: this week's episode of the Bob left Sets podcast, recorded
Speaker 1: live with the tune in studios in Venice, California. I
Speaker 1: hope you enjoyed my conversation with Cascade as much as
Speaker 1: I did. What do you think of the interview? You
Speaker 1: can email me at Bob at left sets dot com.
Speaker 1: Until next time, I'm Bob left Sets. Can't think of
Speaker 1: me reason and I don't know me. Saly one must
Speaker 1: be o