GTA Describe Their View On Death To Genres, Remixes, and Live Shows
GTA consists of two energetic guys that seem to have the musical spectrum mapped out and interestingly organized. Their performance during Osheaga’s first day was extraordinary!
Canadanightlife: How has the festival season seemed so far this summer across Europe? What have been your biggest highlights?
Matt: Well we just finished a three week tour across Europe where we played Ibiza, Tomorrowland, and a bunch of other festivals. Now we’re back here in Montreal starting off our North American stretch with Osheaga. Next weekend we’re playing at Shambala as well in BC.
Julio: So far it’s been mainly touring, but we’ve also been working on our Death to Genres volume 2 EP. We always like to take a few days off to work in the studio, for instance in Amsterdam we called in a bunch of producers we wanted to work with. On top of everything that’s been put out this summer, we have a lot of new stuff to share soon.
CNL: Is this your first Osheaga performance or have you played here before?
Matt: We’ve been in Montreal before earlier this year with TJR at New City Gas. Yet this our first time at Osheaga, let alone playing a festival in Montreal. We honestly love Montreal, every time we play here people go crazy to any music. Montreal is very into the death to genres mindset so we always like to come back.
CNL: How would you distinguish your style between both settings, here headlining the Piknic Electronik stage at Osheaga and your after party set at New City Gas?
Matt: Well the Terrasse at New City Gas is going to be a much smaller crowd than compared to the festival setting. For the festival we try to play bigger, harder, and crazier music. In a smaller setting though we try to take things deeper and play more underground stuff that we personally like.
CNL: Would you say then that you put a lot of effort into picking different tracks that you wouldn’t have already played during the festival?
Julio: Yeah definitely, we put a lot of thought into everyone of our sets. Especially when we play our deeper sets. A lot of the music we play during festivals sets are songs that people already know, while when we’re in the club we want to play music that people don’t know. The people that do know will though, since we’re blog users just as much as everybody.
Matt: We look everywhere for new music. We mainly use Soundcloud to find fresh tracks and listen to random DJs mixes. We follow Gregor Salto who puts out mixes all the time, which we listen to for underground stuff. He has been around for years and is a big inspiration to us.
CNL: You’ve always used the title Death to Genres with your mixes. Yet you don’t really see this attitude in other media like art or film. Why do you think music will often avoid categorization?
Matt: The way death to genres came about was actually in an interview. The last question was “death to (blank)”? At the time we just said genres and then kept rolling with it. As producers we like to producing everything, as listeners we listen to anything, as people we like different cultures. That is what the world is all together, every sound, every culture, every lifestyle, just mixed into one. Why not try to make people understand that instead of separating life into different sections? No matter the tempo, no matter the genre, no matter what it is, we look for the feeling of good music.
Julio: Our mentality about music is listen to it and if it sounds good to you then it’s good. At the end of the day you will listen to what you enjoy, it’s not about who listens to what specific genre. All that matters is that you give yourself to music because music is a gift that people share. Everything we do is not EDM because we enjoy every kind of music. When Matt and I first met, we talked about other kinds of music we like.
CNL: So will genres ever completely vanish or will we always have some sort of categorization?
Matt: We both still believe in musical categorization. Having genres is necessary because if you’re looking for a specific style then it becomes identifiable. There will always be some song within any musical category that you’ll probably like. You can often limit yourself by telling yourself to not listen to a whole genre for instance. Our whole theory about death to genres is just being open to different sounds.
Julio: To us what’s important is putting out the fact that there is different kinds of music. Every time we play live we’ll go through all those different vibes to find out what the crowd is feeling. As music listeners, we should all know everything. Don’t limit yourself to the genres you know, limit yourself to the genres you don’t know. Music is everywhere and a language everyone speaks. So if it’s good, people will respond to it.
CNL: How do each of you define what a remix is?
Matt: That’s a tough question. For us personally we look for the main hook or idea in a song. We delete everything else from the track and keep the key parts. A lot of the time we don’t even like to listen to the original song so we have no influence from the original. Remixes should be remakes of the song into something entirely different. We always try to do something completely new because it’s important to change music until you arrive at a final product.
Julio: My definition of a remix is a reinvention of the beat. Our remix of Iggy Azalea’s song “Fancy” for example, we took only the acapella that people knew and put our own beat under it. That beat is one hundred percent GTA produced. That’s what a real remix should sound like.
CNL: Are there any upcoming musicians that you suggest we keep an eye on?
Matt: There are so many man! Obviously from Montreal is Kaytranada. He’s so inspiring to us and we always call him the new J Dilla since everything he touches is gold. Mr. Carmack kills it as well!
CNL: Series of quick questions.
CNL: What’s the longest DJ set you’ve ever played?
Matt: When I was first DJing in Miami I would play 6 to 7 hours a night open format, which means anything goes.
Julio: I’ve only learned how to DJ from Matt so my longest period was 3 to 4 hours.
CNL: The weirdest place that you’ve been recognized together?
Julio: Definitely at a McDonalds in an airport. Some guy came behind us and asked if we were GTA. This guy was freaking out, asking for a picture, just loosing his mind to be meeting us.
CNL: The best remix you’ve heard of one of your own tracks?
Matt: I really like the Sleepy Tom and Zeds Dead remix of “Intoxicated”.
CNL: Your favourite remix that you’ve made of someone else?
Matt: It’s not released yet, but we’ve just made a remix of Girraffage for Mad Decent. It sounds unreal and is already finished. It should be out some time soon!
CNL: The first thing you do in a new hotel room?
Matt: The first thing anyone does in a hotel room is jump on the bed.
CNL: Something you can’t do without on a month long tour?
Julio: Wifi, cellphone service, and Twitter.
CNL: Weapon of choice in a post apocalypse?
Matt: A bow and arrow. I’m really good at using it.
Julio: I’d say a crossbow. With a knife for melee attacks.
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