Dance
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This week in dance music: Tokimonsta announced the cancellation of her fall tour and postponement of her new album, Charli XCX and Troye Sivan hit NYC with their Sweat tour, Massive Attack announced a new series of climate action gigs, artists including SG Lewis and Mary Droppinz were announced as players in the electronic industry charity soccer tournament Copa del Rave, Barry Can’t Swim released his blazing hot “Still Riding,” the posthumous Sophie album was surprise-released weeks before it was scheduled to drop, Dom Dolla scored six ARIA award nominations, Kylie Minogue talked about the bananas success of “Padam Padam” then released another dancefloor banger, we premiered a performance with DJ Mita Gami and a 37-person orchestra that happened at Burning Man last month, FORM Arcosanti dropped the set times for its upcoming fest and we spoke with the founder of an annual dance show for charity that happens on the Vanderbilt University campus in Nashville.
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Beyond that, so many albums! These are the best new dance projects of the week.
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Eli & Fur, Dreamscapes
The London-born, Los Angeles-based duo release their second album, Dreamscapes, with the project sounding as hypnotic and ethereal as its name suggests. The pair maintain a depth and delicacy throughout, even when they dial up the bass lines and BPM. Altogether it’s a sleek, sophisticated, no-skips effort, with a song for each phase of the night — from getting yourself ready, to falling in love on that dancefloor to the moment of sunrise that’s as much a feeling as a naturally occurring daily event. The pair play a tight trio of shows in Los Angeles, New York City and London starting Oct. 12.
Lane 8, Childish
Earlier this month it became clear something was happening, or about to happen, in the Lane 8 universe when the artist wiped his Instagram account. Not long after, an assemblage of footage of the producer as a child — playing the piano, dressed up for Halloween, pulling his sister in a wagon — was posted. Three days later, on Sept. 16, he announced his fifth studio album, Childish. There would be no singles, just a complete album, out today. The artist himself summarizes the project’s ethos best, writing that as he’s watched his own children become more creative, “I understand now how important creating has always been for my own mental well being, and my sense of pride and worth. I remember such vivid feelings of infinite possibility while creating as a kid.
“Thinking about all of this made me realize that my own approach to art has changed a lot over the years,” he continues. “When you make a living off your art, people need to like what you make for the whole thing to work. A pressure to please others starts to creep into the creative process, whether you want it to or not. It was only by watching our kids create that I fully appreciated how much my own process had changed. It hurt to admit it at first, but what followed was a new sense of liberation and motivation, because i knew it didn’t have to be that way.”
The 10-track project, which features collaborations with Kasablanca, Sultan + Shepherd and more, is out on Lane 8’s own This Never Happened label.
Ben Böhmer, Bloom
The inimitable Ben Böhmer returns with his third studio album, Bloom, a nine-track demonstration of all the depth, lushness and absolute feeling the German producer is a master of. Out on Ninja Tune, the project finds him collaborating with luminaries like Lykke Li, Oh Wonder and Enfant Sauvage, the producer who’s also one half of The Blaze. Together this latter artist and Böhmer absolutely send it one of the album’s centerpieces, “Evermore,” a cinematic showstopper that balances an exquisite string arrangement, a shimmering bridge and production with serious muscle. Böhmer plays this weekend at Portola in San Francisco.
TSHA, Sad Girl
Almost exactly two years after the release of her debut album, Capricorn Sun, TSHA returns with its followup, Sad Girl. The album, out on Ninja Tune, opens with a spoken word collab with London-based poet Dan Whitlam, who proclaims the album’s thesis statement, “sometimes the sad feels better than feeling good, and that’s okay.” And in a music scene that’s perpetually pushing ideas of dancing! and fun! and that any given night at the club just might be the greatest night of your life!, TSHA here acknowledges that life sometimes the world and the dancefloor get awful blue, too — expressing the idea over a dozen tracks, and for the first time putting her own vocals on a few of them. The punchy, swirly “Take” is a standout, and the album closes with the equally tough and stylish “Fight.”
Justice, “Neverender (Kaytranada Remix)”
“Neverender,” a single and standout from Justice’s April album Hyperdrama gets an edit from fellow master Kaytranada, who strips the song or much of its heft, trading out the punchy layers of the original and swapping them for echo-ey drums, strings and a lot of chimes. Kaytra’s airy take comes alongside another warm edit from Rampa of Keinemusic. In addition to all that, Justice has released a new video for the original “Neverender,” which bathes the eyes in vintage anime. Justice plays Portola in San Francisco this weekend and will make their Hollywood Bowl debut on October 4.
Lszee, Lszee
After months of hype, French bass titan CloZee and the proudly heady producer Lsdream release their collaborative self-titled album. Playing like ear salve for anyone who enjoys camping festivals, bass music and tie-dye (preferably all at the same time), the album melds each producer’s celestially-leaning, world music influenced and thoroughly pummeling styles into a groovy, deep, totally fun 13-track collection. The spacey “Wook Whistle” is a sly nod to the fact that these two know exactly in which realm their hardcore fans exist, with the pair headlining the genre nexus of Red Rock Amphitheatre on Oct. 5-6 before headlining the Brooklyn Mirage October 12.
Conventional wisdom says getting down on a dance floor can be a healing experience. In this case, that’s literally true.
In the spring of 2011, Teddy Raskin was a sophomore at Vanderbilt University in Nashville. Student life was treating him and his friends well until a close buddy of his, Luke (who requested his last name not be used to protect his privacy), broke his neck in a boating accident after jumping off and hitting a sandbar, fracturing two vertebrae.
The friend group was devastated by the accident. The good news was that with rehabilitation, Luke could relearn how to walk. The problem was that the machine he needed to do it cost $90,000 and wasn’t covered by insurance. But Raskin saw a way to make it happen: a splashy dance set on the campus lawn.
“Instead of just asking people for money for this machine,” says Raskin. “I thought we could put on a concert to raise the money and do it in the spirit emblematic of Luke, ourselves and the University and turn tragedy into a celebration of life.”
Raskin had already been hosting events around town and had always wanted to put on a dance show in Nashville, a city not necessarily known as an electronic music hotbed, especially in 2012.
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So he started hustling, asking fraternities at the school to each pitch in between $500 and $1,000 for the event and also agree to not throw their own party on a fall Friday night set aside for the show. While Raskin says Vanderbilt was “a bit terrified” about letting a bunch of fraternity brothers throw a dance show on the Alumni Lawn, the chancellor and other officials ultimately agreed to let it happen, even making it possible to purchase tickets through student ID cards.
Meanwhile, through friends of friends, Raskin made connections at the Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation, which focuses on curing spinal cord injuries.
They just needed a DJ. Raskin’s sister worked in the mail room at WME, and a good friend worked at NUE agency. With their help, he reached out to agents. “I was asking for Afrojack for like, $10,000 and Swedish House Mafia for $20,000,” he says. “These agents were like, ‘Did you leave a zero off the offer letter?’”
Ultimately, the house duo White Panda signed on to play. On Oct. 18, 2012, more than 1,500 students gathered on the Alumni Lawn to see them play, with the show making $96,000 through ticket sales and donations. Within the year, Luke was walking again.
With this, Lights on the Lawn was born. Taking place each year since that 2012 debut, the show is now a staple of the Vanderbilt events calendar. Over the years, it’s hosted marquee dance acts including The Chainsmokers, Diplo, Afrojack, Oliver Heldens, Two Friends, Loud Luxury and Louis the Child, simultaneously expanding to become a training program that teaches student organizers from Vanderbilt the ins and outs of the live events industry.
This year’s Lights on the Lawn happens tomorrow (Sept. 27) with headliner Gryffin, who was originally one half of White Panda and has since gone on to have a massive solo career. The lead up to the show now includes Lecture on the Lawn, which this year featured execs including Kris Lamb of Big Machine, Az Cohen of 300 Entertainment and Alessi Nehr Alessi Nair, the general manager of Nashville’s Ascend Amphitheatre speaking to students about getting into the business.
More than 500 students have gone through the program, with many of them getting jobs at Live Nation, Wasserman, WME, CAA and Spotify, along with banking firms like McKinsey, Bain, BCG, Goldman Sachs and Bank of America.
“Vanderbilt’s a very competitive university,” says Raskin. “If someone’s passionate about music, this gives them a path to [learn about] producing, promoting, marketing, putting on an educational series, then going to get a job at one of these places.”
With the original need that inspired Lights on the Lawn solved with the first show, in 2013 the event started sending 100% of its profits to East Nashville’s Mary Parrish Center, which provides domestic abuse survivors short- and long-term housing. The organization was chosen in the wake of a case that rocked the Vanderbilt campus in 2013, when four football players were accused of raping a student, which ultimately resulted in each of them being sentenced to prison time.
Donations over the first three years made it possible for the Mary Parrish team to purchase the building they’d been renting. “This was in 2015, right before things started getting insane as far as the cost of housing in Nashville,” says the Mary Parrish Center’s executive director Mary Katherine Rand. “It was such a gift that we were able to purchase it at that time.” The organization, which was founded in 2002, has been able to completely renovate the facility with subsequent donations from Lights on the Lawn. Other donation money has paid salaries for the facility’s resident therapists, with Vanderbilt students also volunteering at the facility. Rand says that annually, Lights on the Lawn is one of the biggest donors to Mary Parrish.
Over its first 11 years, the event has raised roughly $850,000. And this year, even those who aren’t attending can make donations through the Event’s GoFundMe.
After graduating from Vanderbilt in 2014, Raskin himself went on to work in the resale department at Ticketmaster for three years, starting in 2017. That year, he thought to ask the company to sponsor Lights on the Lawn, and it was suggested to him that he email Michael Rapino directly to ask for the money. He did.
“I didn’t expect a response,” says Raskin. Within 48 hours, however, Rapino wrote back. Raskin can still recite the email word for word.
“Dear Teddy on behalf of myself and the entire Live Nation family, we’re so proud of you,” the note went. “However, we are in the business of getting partnership checks, not writing them.”
“My heart went through the floor. I thought I was going to get fired,” Raskin recalls. But Rapino’s email continued.
“He said, ‘This show is so amazing. We are so happy to support. [COO Mark Campana] will reach out to you, and we will be writing a check for $50,000.”
The email came through when Raskin was with his parents on the way to a Lady Gaga concert at Wrigley Field. “I started crying in the cab,” Raskin says. The $50,000 sponsorship from Live Nation helped propel Lights on the Lawn to its best year ever, yielding $171,000 in proceeds and driving 2.1 million digital impressions and nearly 4,000 tickets sold.
In terms of music, agencies and DJs have also generally been generous, with artists typically playing for discounted or highly competitive rates. “No one’s out there trying to win over their top offer with us,” says Raskin. “If you’re coming to play Lights on the Lawn you know three things: One, it’s going to be a well-produced, well-attended show. Two, it’s an unbelievably impactful show. And three, you’re not going to get your Lollapalooza booking fee.”
Raskin, who now lives in New York City and is the CEO at KOACORE, the supply chain company he founded during the pandemic, says he’d love to expand Lights on the Lawn to other college campuses, a move he foresees being beneficial for nationwide charities and student bodies at large.
“You have all these educational experiences, you have this blowout concert, you raise a bunch of money, you have a sick time, and you get to learn,” says Raskin. “That’s what our deal is.”
A performance years in the making became dazzling reality in August at Burning Man, when DJ-producer Mita Gami played with conductor Meir Briskman and an orchestra assembled especially for the occasion.
The hour-and 15-minute performance happened mid-week at Burning Man 2024 on the festival’s famed Mayan Warrior art car, a new version of which made its debut at the event this year after the original was destroyed in a fire in April 2023.
The Israeli conductor came up with the idea for the performance years ago and brought it to Gami, with the pair performing together since 2022 with an electronic/classical fusion show for which Briskman wrote and conducted the orchestral elements, with Gami producing and performing the electronic components.
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For Burning Man, the orchestra was assembled after the pair put a call out to players, with 123 people applying to be in the orchestra and 37 of them ultimately selected to perform. On Instagram, Briskman wrote that the performance came together “after 3 years of work, 1467 phone calls, 4356 emails [and] 5942 WhatsApp messages”
“Our search to find classically trained players that were going to Burning Man began through posting via our instagram stories,” the pair tell Billboard in a joint statement. “The message rapidly spread, and we received an overwhelming number of responses. Despite the limited rehearsal time, we embraced the challenge and turned our dream into a magical reality, delivering a complex performance that flowed effortlessly.”
The performance was managed by Amal Medina, a member of Gami’s management team, a co-talent buyer for Los Angeles-based electronic events company Stranger Than and the talent buyer/events coordinator for Mayan Warrior. Medina helped manage the orchestra and handled logistics such as vetting the musicians, organizing rehearsals in San Francisco and at Burning Man and sourcing equipment and instruments and managing the orchestra. Tal Ohana of Stranger Than helped gather equipment and staging elements for the performance, The Mayan Warrior team worked on onsite and sound and lighting elements.
The performance was well-aligned with the goals of the new edition of Mayan Warrior, with the art car’s founder Pablo Gonzalez Vargas telling Billboard in 2023 that the team was planning to “slowly transition into a more diverse spectrum of musical and cultural performances. The goal over time is to have more live acts with real instruments that can provide new experiences.”
Other performers on Mayan Warrior during Burning Man included Rüfüs du Sol, whose set is also up now.
Watch the Mita Gami & Meir Briskman Orchestra Set exclusively on Billboard.com below:
After a years-long hiatus, FORM Arcosanti is returning to Arizona on Oct. 4-6, with the festival today (Sept. 26) announcing that Beck is joining the lineup as a Friday night headliner. Esteemed duo Ho99o9 has also been added to the Friday night bill.
Happening at the artist community of Arcosanti, two hours from Phoenix, the weekend’s lineup also includes heavy hitters like Kim Gordon, Thundercat, Skrillex, Floating Points, James Blake, Empress Of, Bonobo, Kevin Morby and many others. See set times for the weekend below.
Programming highlights include Friday’s late night shows, which will feature a four-hour b2b set from Four Tet and Floating Points from 10-2 a.m. On Saturday, Jamie xx will close out the dancefloor from 12-2a.m., and on Sunday, James Blake will give a sunset hour performance that will be immediately followed by a performance from Thundercat. Later that night, Skrillex will perform from 11-2 a.m.
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“In such a crowded festival landscape it’s a privilege to do a show with so much support from the artists themselves,” Zach Tetreault, who founded the festival with his band Hundred Waters in 2014, tells Billboard. “At only 2,500 capacity we don’t have the budget of other festivals, but we do have the heart. That’s clearly resonating, which is so inspiring. This year’s program has some of my favorite artists across genres from earth-shattering poets Aja Monet and Mustafa; to the most powerful living songwriters like Jessica Pratt, Angel Olsen and Sir Chloe; to my favorite DJs on the planet, Four Tet, Skrillex and Jamie xx. I feel like FORM attendees will take an emotional journey each day that ends in the best party ever each night.”
Along with the music, FORM will host daytime cultural programming that includes a discussion on global spiritual spaces and intentional communities, a talk on stopping state violence and protecting the freedom of reproductive decision making, a talk on decarbonizing the music industry, a discussion on the mythology of the afterlife, along with pool parties, nightly stargazing, a saxophone meditation session, a listening room presented by Discogs, an installation by land artist Jim Denevan and more.
“FORM celebrates those shaping the world we want to live in, despite the challenges,” cultural program curators Molly Hawkins and Kim Swift tell Billboard. “Through performance, discussion, social spaces, artworks, activities and partnerships, we explore different perspectives on how individual choices and creative acts can have positive and lasting impact on our world.”
FORM Arcosanti
Courtesy of FORM Arcosanti
FORM Arcosanti
Courtesy of FORM Arcosanti
FORM Arcosanti
Courtesy of FORM Arcosanti
Scottish producer Barry Can’t Swim has become a fixture on the global festival scene over the last year. He’s performed well-received sets at Coachella and Glastonbury following the release of his debut album When Will We Land? in 2023, which landed a Mercury Prize-nomination earlier this summer. Explore See latest videos, charts and news See […]
Goals will be scored for a good cause on Thursday, Oct. 3, when the annual electronic world charity soccer tournament Copa del Rave returns to Los Angeles. The tournament will include seven teams made up of employees from UTA, Red Light Management, Beatport, Infamous, Circa, Downtown Music and Symphonic Distribution. DJ players include SG Lewis, […]
In August, Massive Attack played a pioneering show in Bristol, England as part of their Act 1.5 programme. Held at Clifton Park in their home city, the show introduced an array of measures designed to reduce the environmental impact of live concerts, including encouraging the use of public transport, ring-fencing tickets for local residents and powering the show and festival site on 100% renewable energy and battery power.
Following today’s announcement that Liverpool had been named the first Accelerator City by the UN’s Entertainment and Culture for Climate Action (ECCA) programme, Massive Attack have announced a series of gigs to be held in Liverpool this November.
Across three nights, IDLES (Nov 28) Massive Attack (Nov 29) and Nile Rodgers & Chic (Nov 30) will perform at the M&S Bank Arena on Liverpool’s dockside area with a similar green ethos. The band say the shows “will test, operate & adapt a range of measures to dramatically reduce the level of carbon emissions & air pollution that would usually be produced at an event of this scale.”
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Some of the measures include an earlier show time finish to accommodate the use of public transport back home, a meat-free arena and a “plug & play” technical set-up for the performers. The show will also be powered by 100% renewable energy.
A localised pre-sale for fans in the Liverpool area will begin at 12pm tomorrow (Sep 24) to encourage local attendees, with a general sale held on Friday (Sep 27). Find out more about tickets here.
Massive Attack’s Robert Del Naja – also known as 3D – said in a statement: “Our recent Bristol show demonstrated beyond question that major live music events can be Paris 1.5 compatible, and that audiences will embrace change enthusiastically. The vast scope of work in Liverpool and UN recognition means we can now concentrate more dynamic pilots and experiments to rapidly phase out fossil fuels. This idea and this insistence are not going back in any box.
“We’re delighted to see artists like Coldplay testing elements like localised ticket pre-sales as recommended in the Tyndall Centre Paris 1.5 decarbonisation road map and encourage other artists to do so freely. The talking stage is over, it’s time to act.”
Earlier this month, Coldplay announced a run of shows in the U.K. for August 2025 that will be powered by solar, wind and kinetic energy, and also include a 10% donation to the Music Venues Trust to help support grassroots music scenes.
Act 1.5 Presents shows:
November 28 – Idles, M&S Bank Arena, LiverpoolNovember 28 – Massive Attack, M&S Bank Arena, LiverpoolNovember 30 – Nile Rodgers & Chic, M&S Bank Arena, Liverpool
Anyone who skipped Charli XCX and Troye Sivan’s Monday (Sept. 23) night concert at Manhattan’s Madison Square Garden will likely spend the rest of this week brat-green with envy. Not only did surprise guest Addison Rae beam in to duet with the Sweat Tour co-headliners on her bubbling viral hit “Diet Pepsi,” but Lorde descended from the heavens to give the Internet-crashing “girl, so confusing” remix its live debut.
While the New Zealand trailblazer previously attended Charli XCX’s Brooklyn Paramount concert in June, Monday night marked the first time that the two performed their therapeutic Hot 100 hit together. The historic moment was felt throughout MSG – quite literally, as a wave of sound from shrieking fans hit your eardrums the moment it became clear that Lorde herself had emerged from beneath the stage for the remix duet.
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If the “girl, so confusing” studio recording sounds like an olive branch, earnestly offered but swaying unsteadily in the wind, the live performance at MSG made it feel like the duo’s relationship was truly taking roots. Charli, who previously dominated the stage like a wildcat on the prowl, politely held back while Lorde delivered her confessional verse. But by the time they hit the “you walk like a bitch” lyric, both singers were strutting in unison toward the back of the stage with the kind of confidence and verve usually reserved for models during Fashion Week.
Addison Rae, the TikTok star-turned-pop singer whose viral hit “Diet Pepsi” is quickly establishing her as a pop singer to watch, also enjoyed a huge roar of applause when she made her surprise entrance to sing the aforementioned fizzy single. Even better, Charli and Troye joined in to provide vocal support (Sivan’s voice was particularly well-suited to the sugary song). And those two weren’t the only surprise guests: During “Apple,” Charli turned the cameras upon the audience, where Kelley Heyer – the creator behind the viral “Apple” dance on TikTok – was front and center, ready to deliver her signature moves while flaunting a brat-branded skirt.
Those pinch-me moments were social-ready highlights, but even without special guests, the Sweat Tour should go down as a model for other pop stars to follow. Instead of having one co-headliner’s set followed by the other’s, Sivan and XCX traded the stage every three-to-four songs, offering up a seamless, unpredictable two hours of sensual, thumping dance-pop that felt more like a Bushwick gay bar or a U.K. rave than Midtown Manhattan. Not too surprising given the spots where Charli cut her chops, but still quite an achievement to take an arena famous for Billy Joel residencies and Knicks games and turn it into a queer party.
A lot of the credit for the Sweat Tour’s unrepentant, inspirational and liberating queerness goes to Sivan. From the moment he hit the stage, it was clear that the Aussie singer-songwriter has found the perfect negotiation between the sweetness of the voice, the vulnerability of his lyrics and the dancefloor-ready grooves that make for a proper party.
Opening the night with “Got Me Started” (from Billboard’s third-best album of 2023, Something to Give Each Other), Sivan set the tone when he dropped to his knees toward the end of the song, crooning the last few lyrics while one of his well-toned backup dancers dangled the microphone suggestively in front of his crotch. Shades of Madonna, certainly, and not the only time during the night that Sivan drew on past pop icons, from his *NSYNC-esque choreography on “My My My” to some Shania Twain-styled line dancing during the evening’s encore. But despite paying homage to pop icons before him, Sivan’s Sweat set stood on its own – no small feat given that Charli’s setlist was centered around the summer-defining brat album.
Toward the end of the night, Sivan and XCX duetted on both “1999” as well as their “talk talk” remix. While the latter is certainly an unstoppable banger (though it’s kind of funny to watch the two cosplay seducing each other while singing the sex-drenched lyrics), the former offered up the emotional core of the night. As a platform stage housing both raised above the MSG crowd, Troye and Charli traded vocals on the nostalgic banger and fed off each other’s energy in a loose, friendly fashion. Both have been low-key luminaries of the last decade in pop, and we’re lucky to have a co-headlining tour that finds both of them at singular (and sweaty) artistic peaks.
Tokimonsta has cancelled her upcoming tour and postponed the release of her forthcoming album due to, she writes, “an extremely urgent personal matter.” The Los Angeles-based artist born Jennifer Lee announced the news on Monday (Sept. 23) in a statement shared to her Instagram. “I am pretty crushed to share this news with you, but […]
In London, New York and Los Angeles this past spring and summer, Jamie xx played 20 shows in a club of his own making, The Floor. Happening in warehouse spaces in each city, the nights featured a rotating cast of friends and fellow producers playing on lineups that each also included the U.K. producer, altogether bringing to life the nightclub of his dreams he’d long envisioned. The shows went late, with Jamie typically playing well after midnight, even in the middle of the week. Every show sold out.
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After it was all wrapped, the producer then traveled to the woods Norway, where he posted up on a mountain four hours from the closest city. He had no phone signal, and every night for dinner, he ate the fish he’d caught earlier that day.
It’s the type of urban/rural balance the London-born artist has carved out over the last nine years, since the release of his last album, In Colour. Jamie’s second studio album, the project reached No. 21 on the Billboard 200, becoming an essential of the era. Making it after a period of heavy touring with his band, The xx, when he was longing for home, he calls the project “sort of my fantasy version of U.K. dance music history.”
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Nine years later, the producer, now 35, is more focused on the present. Now living between his homes in London and Los Angeles, he’s today (Sept. 20) released In Colour‘s long-awaited followup, In Waves. Out on his own label, Young, he calls the project “a lot more current and about now,” with the 12-track project toggling between dreamy, cerebral IDM and equally smart but also joyful, extremely danceable tracks like the previously released singles “Baddy on the Floor” and “Life,” which features vocals from Robyn. The album also features his bandmates from The xx, Romy Madley Croft and Oliver Sim, with whom Jamie has recently been in the studio with.
Speaking to Billboard from London the week before the release of In Waves, the artist, born James Thomas Smith, is days away from going on tour behind the album, with the run including standalone shows in Europe, the U.S., Brazil and beyond, along with festival sets at San Francisco’s Portola, Las Vegas’ A Big Beautiful Block Party, FORM Arcosanti in Arizona and Miami’s III Points.
However, release day will be the last time he’ll listen to the album he’s spent the last nine years making in its album form. Here, he explains why.
In Colour is obviously considered a masterpiece of the era. Did you feel pressure in making its follow up?
Yes, there was a period of time after I finished touring for I See You, the third xx album, there was a period of time where I was so sure that I was going to come home off tour, and I had this whole plan of what I was going to do to make my second solo record. I did exactly what I thought I should do, then the music just didn’t turn out to be — I think basically I had too much of a plan, and it was rigid. It seems to take me just having fun and not really thinking about the end game to be able to make music.
Did you ultimately use any of the music you were making in that more rigid plan?
No. I mean, it exists, but I don’t think it’s worth hearing. When I really started getting into the album, the pressure of In Colour seemed to disappear, and I was just enjoying making it. The only thing I was aware of was trying to be as un-nostalgic as I could be. I mean, I’m quite nostalgic in nature, but I wanted this album to feel a lot more current and about now, or maybe about the future, rather than looking to the past.
Going from In Colour to In Waves, it sounds like you’re in the same narrative. Does that feel fair? And if so, where are you now that you weren’t in 2015 and how has the story progressed?
Well, when I was making Colour, I was on tour, and had been for seven or eight years nonstop. I was really homesick, and I was dreaming up ideas about the U.K. and music in the U.K. and the dance scene there and everything that has happened since the ’80s in dance music in the U.K., which is a lot. It was sort of my fantasy version of U.K. dance music history. Because I was missing home, it made me feel more like I was at home, I guess.
This time, I bought a place in L.A., I live between London and L.A., and I’ve really grown into being transient, and I enjoy being all over the place. I feel very lucky that I get to do that and explore the different scenes. I don’t really miss home so much anymore. So this one is more about just enjoying where I’m at currently.
How have you made being transient more palatable and sustainable for you?
I think it’s more of a change in mindset than anything else. I also feel like maybe London has changed, that the scene was so vibrant when I was a teenager to like 25 [years old] in London and dance music was kind of London/U.K. centric, so it was all coming from where I grew up. I didn’t want to miss out on any of that. Whereas now, scenes that pop up are so global instantly because of how music is shared and how everybody is everywhere at once on social media and the internet, that it doesn’t feel like I need to be in one particular place.
That said, are there cities that feel particularly exciting or fresh to you right now?
It’s a good question. There are places that are always amazing and always have been like Berlin. L.A. played a big part in making me a happier, calmer person in my brain. I spent some of the pandemic there when we were allowed to fly. But L.A. was still in lockdown, so nothing was open, and I was just going surfing every day, then coming back to the house and making music. It’s some of the best memories in my life. I still try to get back to that headspace, then I eventually bought a house in L.A. because of how much I enjoyed it. It’s a very different way of life to London, and it’s been very helpful.
L.A. can be so hectic and so dense, but it sounds like you found a certain amount of serenity here.
Yeah, definitely. It can definitely be hectic, but I love that you can just escape up into the hills or to the beach, and suddenly you’re in wild nature.
It sounds like having fun and enjoying yourself was a driving force in the creation process of this album, which is very fun and danceable and celebratory, and also thematically deep. I’m thinking about tracks like “Breather” and like some of Robyn’s lyrics. On that side of it, what experiences and ideas were you drawing from?
I’ve been very reflective since I turned 30, which I think happens, has happened, to a lot of our generation. With that comes a lot more peace of mind, but also it gets really exhausting and boring, and you also want to be able to have fun in a more sustainable way. It was about finding balance between all those things. I guess with some of the spoken word and the themes on the album, it was both poking fun at that and also wanting it to be meaningful, depending on your mindset when you’re listening to it.
Where is it poking fun?
For example, the vocal on “Breather” was taken from me doing a YouTube yoga tutorial every day during lockdown. The woman who spoke on my yoga video is the person I ended up sampling like that, to either refer to your state of mind, and or taking drugs on a dance floor.
Obviously you’ve been very active in the nine years since In Colour, and also the dance world moves so quickly. I wonder if you ever felt like things were passing you by and thought about how you were going to reinsert yourself when it was time. Was there any doubt in that way?
Yeah. I mean, I still feel like that now. But at least I remind myself that I can get to places where I don’t feel like that. I just went to Norway on holiday for a week, like four hours out of a city, up a mountain to this lake where there was no roads and no phone signal. I had the best time ever. I had to fish for my dinner every night. It was a very unique experience. I kind of got back to that mindset that I’ve been so searching for over these years, of just calmness, really. Just knowing that that’s there is super helpful.
It sounds like nature is a big piece of it for you, in re-centering yourself.
Yeah, it has become that. I never expected that because I grew up in the city, and I always said that I would never want to live in a countryside. I was never really bothered by it, but I think things have changed.
It’s an interesting contrast to a crowded dance floor, which is typically a very metropolitan concept. Coming out of The Floor in London, New York and Los Angeles, did those runs turn out how you envisioned? And what did you take from the experiences?
It all turned out way better than I envisioned. But, I mean, I was quite naive going into The Floor nights, because for so long I dreamed of being able to build my own club, that I never even thought about what it would be like to have to play at my own club every night, which was amazing, but it was exhausting.
But every time I got back into the room, it was so invigorating and just filled me with energy, and then I was ready to go every night. I got to hear people I loved playing, people who I’d never heard playing. Every night was different and inspiring. It was a beautiful thing. I just need to pace myself, because I’m not that young anymore.
When I saw the set times, I wondered how you were sustaining it. It sounds like it was maybe not that sustainable, but you got the adrenaline rush of being there.
Yeah, exactly. I miss it, already. And I probably miss that adrenaline rush too, but I hope that I’ll do some more.
Do you have to prepare differently playing The Floor versus a large venue or big festival?
Yeah, definitely. The joy of playing one of the small ones is that you have to improvise as much as possible, because you’re so connected with the audience — it’s a back and forth between the people that you’re staring into the faces of. At festivals, there’s a certain element of improvisation for me, and I enjoy that, but I have to play my songs, and enough of them that people don’t get pissed off.
Tell me about like, one peak bliss moment for you in that run of The Floor.
François K in New York. I mean, I don’t like to use the word life-changing, but it was up there. I’ve met him a few times and played with him in New York at his club nights, and he’s always been great and very insightful. This time, I got to hang out with him for an hour before he played and talk about the history of dance in New York and how he’s seen the different waves of dance music over the many years he’s been playing. That was great. Then he went and played one of the best sets I’ve ever seen in my life, and it unified everybody in the room in a way that only happens very occasionally, even though I go to a lot of shows.
Did you learn anything about In Waves in terms of what parts of it really worked, while you were playing it out at The Floor?
I got to play it in full to all my friends in the London club before one of the club nights started. That was a really lovely thing. It felt like a momentous occasion, at the end of making the album. Then during the all The Floors, all the songs that hadn’t come out yet, people seemed to recognize it was me, which was really nice considering this album is quite different to the last one.
What do you think are your signatures? What are people recognizing that they know is you?
I have no idea, but I guess I would assume that people know my music better than me, because after I’ve finished it, I really don’t listen to it unless I have to.
So you haven’t been listening to In Waves outside of playing it out?
No. I haven’t listened to it since the day I approved the master, but I will listen to it the day it comes out.
Why do you think that is?
I find it kind of excruciating.
Oh, why?
Well, I’ve listened to it a million times in every detail, but also it feels like reading a diary or something from the past, even if it’s not that long ago, like this album. I just find it quite difficult — and that’s why, when I’m playing my songs from In Colour, I try and rework them, to keep it interesting for me and give them new life.
When is the last time you listened to In Colour in full?
I think six or seven years ago, when I was really struggling with what to do about not being able to make another album. I went with my mate to somewhere in Italy, and we did a road trip and listened to every album I’ve ever made, which sounds like torture to me. It kind of was, and I’m very grateful to my friend for sitting through all of that. It was really helpful, and that’s the last time I listened to it.
Can you share any details about that experience, of what was going through your mind when you were driving around Italy listening to your album and not necessarily enjoying the experience?
I remember being really surprised by a lot of decisions I had made as a younger person, and remembering who the hell I was when I made those decisions.
Who were you?
I don’t know. I guess I was drunk quite a lot of the time [laughs], having a lot of fun in my mid-20s. It’s very painstaking, all these decisions you feel are so important. Then listening to them 10 years later or five years later, you can’t believe you made any of the decisions. And you think they’re wrong, or I would have made completely different decisions now, but I guess that’s a part of it.
I guess nothing is ever done. There just comes a time when you have to turn it in.
That is true.
Was there a sense of relief when you turned in In Waves?
Yeah, massive relief. The album was actually meant to come out in June this year, and I had the test pressing made, then it just didn’t sound good enough. That’s why it’s coming out in September. But because of that, it meant that I got to finish the song with Robyn, and I think it made the album better. So there have been several moments where it was almost finished, but it’s been a slow burn.
If it had come out in June, it would have been eligible for a Grammy this year. Was there a thought of getting it out in time to be nominated, or was that not a thing?
No, that was not a thing.
With the album complete, what else, if anything, are you working on? Or is it more about preparing for the live shows?
I’ve been in the studio with the band a little bit. We’ve mostly been talking, not making music. Those [sessions] have been really nice. I’m actually focusing on spending the last two days in my house before I leave it for a year and a half and enjoying London for the last little bit, then really getting stuck into all the live shows.
So you’re going to be on the road for a year and a half, more or less?
If things go well, yes.
How do you mean if things go well?
I mean, I hope I get to tour this a lot, because it’s kind of the only way I connect with the album after it’s done. I’m not looking at reviews, and I’m not on socials or anything like that.
Well, maybe you just answered it — but tell me, what does success for the album look like to you?
Basically, I get a few nice texts from people whose option I appreciate, and I get to keep doing all of this.