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We recently sat down with one of the living legends of Dance music for a chat.
When you hear the name Hardwell, whatâs the first thought that comes to your mind? âSpacemanâ? Ultra Miami? Electro House? Whatever you think of, though, theItâs incredible that artists like you, as big as you, still have problems clearing samples. Itâs a whole world.
You donât want to push that, you know? Iâm not really a sample kind of guy. 80% of my songs are original songs that I wrote myself. But sometimes itâs super cool if you have an idea and you love a track so much, why not sample it? And introduce a completely new crowd and⊠you know, my fans are so much younger! They donât know that song from 2001. They were probably born after 2001. Sometimes itâs really cool to sample something and introduce a new generation to a record that I loved when I was younger. It makes me feel old when I say this kind of stuff. [laughter]
Haha! Well, howâs the reception been on the track? How does the crowd react to it? Is it kind of a highlight moment in your sets?
Definitely, yeah. Especially at Ultra, when you play the new, new music.
That no one knows.
No, thatâs always the most anticipated moment. People know that Iâm always dropping a lot of unreleased stuff. I think thatâs the coolest thing when you see a DJ live. I think the best part of my job is to introduce and educate people about new music, instead of playing out the hit songs. Itâs super easy for me to go on stage and bang out my âEvery Time We Touchâ remix which everybody loves, and thatâs fine. I can play out Spaceman, which everybody loves. But in the end, I think itâs always cooler to play the new stuff and the unreleased stuff, and educate them with new sounds and new directions of music.
And it gets you excited as well, because if you play Spaceman every single time for 10, 15 yearsâŠ
But I have to, though, I have to. You get what Iâm saying.
Another topic, the sample pack you released a little while ago with Apple. Well, thatâs absolutely neat! What inspired you to share a piece of your sound, your textures, even your identity with other producers, new producers and everything?
Well, even with Revealed, my record label, I always try to help out new talents, guide them, do the A&R. Iâve been working with Logic, which is a digital audio workstation (DAW) from Apple, since I was 18, so Iâve always been with Apple. And when they approached me and asked if we could do something together like a sample pack, I had just finished the album REBELS NEVER DIE, I was like, âYou know what? I can take inspiration from all of those kick drums and from the album itself and finally release thatâ. Because I got so many questions about the kick drums, about how I programmed the basslines and everything. I mean, first of all, if Apple approached you to do a collaboration, you canât say no. [laughter]
Absolutely.
And secondly, itâs a perfect collaboration to be able to finally put out a sample pack in this way. I donât ask for any money. Itâs a free sample pack, I donât want to be that guy, âFollow me on YouTube, buy my sample packs!â, I donât care. If you really want to help people out you should do it for free.
The last question to close this. Do you hope you can keep inspiring and shaping the sound of EDM like youâve been doing for the last decade or so, or do you feel like itâs time to leave that to someone else?
Hardwell: No pressure. Good question. No pressure. [laughter] No, I always try. I love Dance music so much. I need Dance music more than my own oxygen, Iâm not even kidding! I always try to push every single boundary in Dance music. I want to keep it interesting for myself and for the crowd. Obviously, everybody follows, kind of, trends. Even after the REBELS NEVER DIE album, I took a lot of inspiration from my childhood, from the Dance music from back when TiĂ«sto was coming up in 2001. 99 even. Around that time. Itâs always like a cycle of music. I just try to make my version out of it, and Iâm glad to see that so many people got inspired by that. Iâll always try to look out for new genres, new ideas. If somebody gets really bored real quick, thatâs me. So when Iâm in the studio, I always try to do something different.
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Itâs incredible that artists like you, as big as you, still have problems clearing samples. Itâs a whole world.
You donât want to push that, you know? Iâm not really a sample kind of guy. 80% of my songs are original songs that I wrote myself. But sometimes itâs super cool if you have an idea and you love a track so much, why not sample it? And introduce a completely new crowd and⊠you know, my fans are so much younger! They donât know that song from 2001. They were probably born after 2001. Sometimes itâs really cool to sample something and introduce a new generation to a record that I loved when I was younger. It makes me feel old when I say this kind of stuff. [laughter]
Haha! Well, howâs the reception been on the track? How does the crowd react to it? Is it kind of a highlight moment in your sets?
Definitely, yeah. Especially at Ultra, when you play the new, new music.
That no one knows.
No, thatâs always the most anticipated moment. People know that Iâm always dropping a lot of unreleased stuff. I think thatâs the coolest thing when you see a DJ live. I think the best part of my job is to introduce and educate people about new music, instead of playing out the hit songs. Itâs super easy for me to go on stage and bang out my âEvery Time We Touchâ remix which everybody loves, and thatâs fine. I can play out Spaceman, which everybody loves. But in the end, I think itâs always cooler to play the new stuff and the unreleased stuff, and educate them with new sounds and new directions of music.
And it gets you excited as well, because if you play Spaceman every single time for 10, 15 yearsâŠ
But I have to, though, I have to. You get what Iâm saying.
Another topic, the sample pack you released a little while ago with Apple. Well, thatâs absolutely neat! What inspired you to share a piece of your sound, your textures, even your identity with other producers, new producers and everything?
Well, even with Revealed, my record label, I always try to help out new talents, guide them, do the A&R. Iâve been working with Logic, which is a digital audio workstation (DAW) from Apple, since I was 18, so Iâve always been with Apple. And when they approached me and asked if we could do something together like a sample pack, I had just finished the album REBELS NEVER DIE, I was like, âYou know what? I can take inspiration from all of those kick drums and from the album itself and finally release thatâ. Because I got so many questions about the kick drums, about how I programmed the basslines and everything. I mean, first of all, if Apple approached you to do a collaboration, you canât say no. [laughter]
Absolutely.
And secondly, itâs a perfect collaboration to be able to finally put out a sample pack in this way. I donât ask for any money. Itâs a free sample pack, I donât want to be that guy, âFollow me on YouTube, buy my sample packs!â, I donât care. If you really want to help people out you should do it for free.
The last question to close this. Do you hope you can keep inspiring and shaping the sound of EDM like youâve been doing for the last decade or so, or do you feel like itâs time to leave that to someone else?
Hardwell: No pressure. Good question. No pressure. [laughter] No, I always try. I love Dance music so much. I need Dance music more than my own oxygen, Iâm not even kidding! I always try to push every single boundary in Dance music. I want to keep it interesting for myself and for the crowd. Obviously, everybody follows, kind of, trends. Even after the REBELS NEVER DIE album, I took a lot of inspiration from my childhood, from the Dance music from back when TiĂ«sto was coming up in 2001. 99 even. Around that time. Itâs always like a cycle of music. I just try to make my version out of it, and Iâm glad to see that so many people got inspired by that. Iâll always try to look out for new genres, new ideas. If somebody gets really bored real quick, thatâs me. So when Iâm in the studio, I always try to do something different.
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