David Guetta Q&A: The Superstar Producer Talks New Music, the Future of EDM & More
After three years, David Guetta is finally wrapping up his sixth album. Admittedly, it has been hard for the 46-year old French producer find studio time with his touring schedule: This month, hes doing sets Ibiza and Las Vegas every single weekend, with festivals and a Miami show or two thrown in. But this is par for the course. The man largely responsible for dance musics pop takeover has been DJing in Europe practically non-stop since 1988.
Guetta's trendsetting 2009 album One Love was one of the first EDM albums to make waves on pop radio, and turned him into one of the busiest DJs in the world. In the past year, he has toured with Rihanna, co-written a song on Lady Gaga's Artpop, and produced parts of Britney Spears album Britney Jean. His last album, 2011s Nothing but the Beat featured Lil Wayne, Nicki Minaj, Snoop Dogg, Chris Brown, Timbaland, Ludacris, Jessie J, and Sia, among others. And his latest release, Lovers on the Sun" (feat. Sam Martin), was co-produced with Avicii and reachedNo. 1 on the UK singles chart.
Last weekend, Guetta headlined New York Citys Electric Zoo festival between performances in Ibiza and at Londons iTunes festival, and he found time to sit down with Billboard to discuss his forthcoming album (which he says is in the very advanced stages), what's next for EDM music, and more.
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Billboard: Youve long pulled for dance music to be on the radio, but did you ever foresee it actually dominating the pop charts?
Guetta: Thats always what I wanted, but I honestly never knew if it was possible. For so long, I couldnt understand why it wasnt on the radio like it is now. I was playing every weekend to thousands of kids who were going crazy for this music, and I could feel that everyone wanted to hear it. The demand was there. I thought, "we have the product, people want it, why does no one want to promote it?" It felt crazy to me. It was the fight of my life to make that music crossover.
As one of the most powerful ambassadors between electronic and pop music, what was the turning point?
I think, for me, it was I Got a Feeling and Sexy Bitch. Those two songs were when dance music hit pop radio, and Memories and Titanium followed. But I Got A Feeling was when radio seem to say, wow, okay, this is actually working, this is marketable. And then everybody changed their format. Now, of course, were way beyond that and onto something completely different.
What's the biggest misconception about dance music right now?
That its stagnant. Between that moment that we just described and now, the situation has completely changed. What was big in the dance music world then is completely different whats big now. The electro-pop sound turned into something way, way harder, and soon, well see a reaction to that. Music is always actionreaction. It works in cycles. Rock n' roll did, disco did, people want something fresh and exciting and then they get tired of it and they go for the opposite.
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David Guetta Q&A: The Superstar Producer Talks New Music, the Future of EDM & More
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