Maurice West Discusses Rave Culture, Big Room, and Future Plans [Exclusive Interview]

Maurice West Discusses Rave Culture, Big Room, and Future Plans

4/20/2019

For the past four years or so, you've be regularly playing at festivals and releasing top-tier tracks on the biggest labels in the scene. What have been the most significant changes you've had to make in your day-to-day life to meet the demands of the industry?
Reading that question actually made me take a step back and think about the past, which is something I very rarely do. I think I've only been doing shows where I get to present myself and what I stand for musically for only two years to be honest. In those two years, I've learned so much stuff about the industry from people that I've met and from the experience of touring. That kind of stuff that has put me on the right track mentally and musically to keep moving forward. One thing I learned was that I don't get to have any rhythm or regularities in the life that I want and I'm completely fine with that. There's actually not a lot that I had to change about my lifestyle. I've been envisioning myself being a DJ and musician for a living ever since I was twelve I've got a lot of big plans and I really feel like I'm still just at the very beginning of it all.

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DROP 1ï¸âƒ£ or DROP 2ï¸âƒ£ ??? Comment which one you like the most â–¡â–¡â–¡â–¡â–¡â–¡

A post shared by Maurice West ,\\\â€™ (@mauricewest) on Apr 19, 2019 at 7:51am PDT

You've just released your remix of Dimitri Vegas & Like Mike's track with Era, "Selfish" which goes back to big room's kick-heavy roots for the first drop and then takes things to your signature style of euphoric progressive house for the second. Tell us about how you approached this remix and some of the challenges you faced while tackling this track!
The hardest thing in my musical process is that 90% of the time it's me sitting in the studio all by myself. I listen to A LOT of music and A LOT of different sorts of music to keep me sane and inspired. One thing that also really helps is being able to send voice notes to my non-producer friends, which is what I did while working on this remix. I actually requested the parts for Selfish myself because when I heard the original for the first time I knew exactly what the Maurice West remix would sound like - also I love Africa by Toto, which they sampled for the melody.

So the breaks and the second drop is what I had in mind before I started but I also wanted to do some crazy bigroom drop in the first section of the song. The very first thing I tried was playing around with the vocal hook as a lead sound. I made that first drop and thought "nah this is just too simple" and I sent a voice note of it to a few friends as a joke. Everyone actually loved it. I then tested it out at a festival. Everyone went crazy. So now it's my fastest made drop that ever made the cut.

Ever since coming into the spotlight, you've kept your personal life out of the public eye in your social media post. We were hoping you could give us a glimpse into what you like to do when you're not onstage or in the studio!

I'm actually planning on taking people a lot closer to my personal life on social media but I've always wanted my musical qualities to be the most important. Now that I've sort of established that and created a fanbase that follows me for the music, I feel like opening up a bit more. I don't do anything too crazy that I would have to hide from the public to be honest.

When I'm in Holland and not locked up in the studio, I spent a lot of time hanging out with friends in Amsterdam. Amsterdam is amazing when the weather is nice, so whenever that's the case, we meet up with a lot of people and chill in the sun at a terrace or whatever. We also go out at night and visit random bars or clubs. The other night we ended up at a cafe with a lot of old people and a live jazz band, best night ever. When I'm in a certain city for a show, I like to go explore and try to find cool places. I'm also really into trying the country's local food or drinks that I've never heard of.

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ready to not get hit by people on bikes... oh and ADE

A post shared by Maurice West ,\\\â€™ (@mauricewest) on Oct 16, 2018 at 8:41am PDT

After Mainstage Music rebranded over to Rave Culture, there has definitely been some notable changes. Can you shed light on some of the internal goals of the label as you and W&W move forward?
I think the way in which we present a track to the people has changed a lot in a good way. I've always seen music and visual experiences as one. Whenever I hear or make a song it's like my mind comes up with a short movie, a certain vibe, certain colours that fit the song and the sound design. With the releases on Rave Culture and the videos and other visual content that comes with it, we found a way to make our subgenre of dance music a lot more interesting. We're also really trying to set the bar higher for the bigroom and hard-dance sound in general, which I think is working.

One point of criticism that I see a lot is people complaining about is me being the only artist, besides W&W, that releases on the label. I think one of the main reasons that there hasn't been anyone else yet is because other artists needed time to understand our vision and what we were trying to work towards musically. The good news is that there's a lot of cool new music coming out from other artists on Rave Culture in the near future, which I hope people are gonna love as much as we do.

Undoubtedly you've amassed countless memorable moments while performing onstage over the years, but what are some of the backstage or fan moments that stick out the most to you?

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I forgot my usbâ€™s what do I do now

A post shared by Maurice West ,\\\â€™ (@mauricewest) on Jan 5, 2019 at 6:49am PST

The backstage moments that I loved the most mostly consist of meeting artists that I have been looking up to ever since I was like fourteen when I making music in my bedroom. Guys like Tiesto - I first met him at World Club Dome on the outside ring of a stadium overlooking a huge crowd. You'd think he's always surrounded by a lot of people but somehow it was just the two of us standing there. We drank champagne together and talked about music. He's one of the nicest people ever.

I also really cherish the moments when I get to talk to people that have been following and appreciating my music for a long time. I've been given a lot of insane drawings and cool gifts from these people and I keep all of them at home. All the people I meet that love my music are actually always so cool and nice and I really feel connected to them.

Looking back over your discography, what are three tracks that you feel helped you grow the most as an artist?
I think that it was the implementation of certain sounds and styles of other music that helped me grow as an artist. Finding cool combinations of different genres and, for example, merging an Aretha Franklin-sounding piano riff together with big synths and a festival drop was the kind of stuff that helped me create my own sound. That song was talking about, "Don't You Say", together with my earlier song "Dojo" really made listeners understand more about my musical background for the first time. Later came "Rhythm Of The Night", together with SaberZ, where I found a way to combine bigroom with influences from a song that came out before I was born. I think this is still my most played song amongst DJs to date. One of my songs that is closing in on that is "The Kick." That song is a perfect exhibition of how I approach making a song based on a concept. I'm really happy with the huge response and appreciation for that track.

We know that announcing specific new tracks and collaborations can be tough to do in written interviews, but do you have anything that you can tease about upcoming tracks, new musical directions, or other projects?
I'm working on a lot of really exciting new solo tracks that I'm trying to push the bigroom sound forward with. I'm also still trying to find a way to get the perfect blend between my energetic sound and something that would fit on the radio (which I think is possible). I have to say I'm getting really close to it and it could be pretty dope. Furthermore, my whole summer already looks packed with amazing festivals and I'm super excited for that. Oh by the way, while writing this interview I was wearing a sample of a new Maurice West merchandise hoodie and I'm not lying when I say it's super comfy and swagged out.