INTERVIEW: CAZZETTE Talks ‘Returning to roots, Preserving Creativity, The Importance of Balance

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INTERVIEW: CAZZETTE Talks ‘Returning to roots, Preserving Creativity, The Importance of Balance to avoid burn out.

We recently caught up with Swedish duo CAZZETTE, as they reveal the secret to their success, the pair’s decision to stop touring as a duo, what keeps them grounded and more.

First garnering attention with the anthemic ‘Sleepless’ (90 million Spotify streams), Alexander Björklund and studio partner Sebastien Furrer formed CAZZETTE as a Cassette helmeted duo during the progressive house boom, playing countless shows and festivals worldwide, including Creamfields and Electric Daisy Carnival, as well as supporting the late Avicii on his worldwide tour. Signed to the same PRMD label as their fellow countryman, the pair decided to stop touring as a duo in 2016.

Asked to describe those unfamiliar with their music, Duo half Alexander Björklund shares, “I  would pin it as ‘coming together.’ Lately, I’ve been really reconnecting with house music and it’s been a lot of fun. In my sets, I play a lot of Deep House which is like 125 bpm so it’s not so slow.”

On the duo’s decision for Sebastien Furrer taking on more of a studio role while Alex fronting the band. Alex describes the transition over the last 2 years, “it was kind of natural for me to take over that side. Whereas he’s like the crazy professor and studio engineer. He has an amazing energy and he’s really good at coming up with these those ideas that you don’t really you understand how he came up with them. I think he was in Norway once and recorded himself walking on some gravel path and ended up like making a kick out of that. He’s that kind of guy. I’m more about song structure. So, together we make a really, good duo, but he just wasn’t down for the performance part of things.”

Duo half Sebastien adds, “As the project became more and more successful, the need to tour and take the music to fans became more important. For me, this became a distraction from my creativity, and by the end of 2015, I knew it was something I had to take control of. The decision allows Alex and I to continue to work together whilst also keeping ourselves at peace on a personal level.”

When pressed about the decision to go into a new direction with the EP (“Stereo Mono“); returning to CAZZETTE’S house roots, Alex shares, “It was all natural. When I first started getting involved and listening to electronic music, I was listening to a lot of house music which was raw and very loop-based. It sounded very different back then. So much happened for me during the year; touring and the evolution of the electronic music scene. I think there was a mass confusion of sorts. Or at least for me, it was very confusing.”

As for how the American crowd compares to the Swedes, “There are certain clubs and festivals that you go where the crowd is either more or less educated in electronic music. Meaning that electronic music has been around longer or shorter in certain regions. Therefore, they expect a different sound because they’re at a particular stage in the whole cycle of music trends. If you go play a festival in China and you drop a bunch of sick tech house, you’ll find that the crowd is not really reacting whereas if you do a festival in Spain, you’ll get a massive reaction. It’s just different places being on different cycles. With the clubs, it’s a similar thing. I recently had a show in San Francisco at a place called Audio where the crowd was very educated and it allows me to do a lot of the things that I wouldn’t be able to do if I was in some places around Vegas. Everything is about context and your surroundings.”

On new music and tour dates set to release for the rest of the year, “There’s a lot of music being made at the moment, which is something we were missing in the past. We would tour all the time and there was no new music being made.”

When it comes to what he enjoys most about performing live, Alex beams “It would have to be the crowd!”

As for a fun fact that hardly anyone knows about, Alex reveals “I got a lot of pet food. I don’t know if that’s a secret. One thing that I rarely talk about is that I like I’m a big fan of like meditation and things of that nature. I think it’s an important aspect state of being a human being. It’s something that everyone should do. Finding pauses in life in general, I think it’s something extremely valuable. Especially when a lot of people run from A to B basically until they’re dead.”

CAZZETTE feat. Amy Grace – Old Habits (Stereo Mono EP):

Keep up with CAZZETTE: SoundCloud | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube

 

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