Two artists, one genre.
When you think about the myriad pop hit-makers who call Colorado home, it’s an ever-lengthening list of familiar names. The Fray. 3OH!3. Flobots. OneRepublic.
And among the more talented is Pretty Lights, the Denver-based producer/DJ born Derek Vincent Smith. Pretty Lights is the guy who rose from obscurity with a singular talent for piecing together older music and samples to create vibrant, occasionally visionary dance songs.
He sold out five consecutive Colorado theater dates earlier this year — at the Ogden, Gothic, Fox, Boulder and Aggie — and then sold out his very first headlining date at Red Rocks Amphitheatre. He released his third EP of 2010 in October. And he also recently surpassed the 1 million download mark — a massive accomplishment for the artist, who is a firm believer that offering music on a pay-what- you-can model is the future of the industry.
And that brings us to the second artist. Hip-hop heads and electronic-music fans alike can hear the one obvious influence in Pretty Lights’ songs after just a few listens: DJ Shadow.
Through his legendary opus, “Endtroducing . . .,” Shadow still is a towering presence in DJ culture nearly 15 years after the album’s release. “He’s my biggest influence ever,” Smith said of Shadow, a.k.a. Josh Davis. “When I first found out that ‘Endtroducing . . .’ was made completely with vinyl, I had no idea what that meant. I didn’t understand sampling and hip-hop production. I couldn’t grasp the concept. And it ignited a curiosity I needed to satisfy. It was me trying to figure out what was going on, and he really affected my ideas of how to create new and original, cutting- edge, classic and organic, vintage music.”
In advance of Shadow’s headlining gig tonight at the Ogden Theatre, we asked the master (Shadow) and the student (Pretty Lights)some questions about electronic-music culture. (Pretty Lights’ next Colorado dates are next month, and all three shows — Dec. 3-4 at the Telluride Conference Center and Dec. 5 at the Belly Up in Aspen — are sold out.)
Q: What do you think about electronic music in 2010?
DJ Shadow: I actually think electronic music is one of the few areas where anything is really happening, and primarily I’m talking about the hybrids of the grime scene and the dubstep scene overseas.
Pretty Lights: There are pockets of the good and pockets of the bad. There are a lot of really cool and exciting things happening as far as new genres and artists pushing the evolution of electronic music. Electronic music is where the most musical evolution and originality is happening right now, because there are so many unexplored ideas happening. In Denver, it’s very vibrant and healthy — it’s expanding and growing. The shows are big, and it’s also very trendy to a point where a lot of electronic shows are selling out and getting really big — because it’s the cool thing to do.
Q: Do you think the proliferation of producer culture and acts touring with little more than a couple of laptops has been good for the electronic music?
DJ Shadow: It’s only natural. With dubstep, most of the music is made on a laptop and with Fruity Loops and everything else. As that music gets hot and there’s a demand for people from that scene to tour and be seen and heard, it’s only natural that they would bring their instrument with them.
Pretty Lights: I don’t really feel like I have a grasp on the scene as a whole because there’s so much going on. I try to focus on my own music in writing music and creating styles that I feel are going to have a positive aspect on the scene and the development of the genre.
Q: Are you a dubstep fan?
DJ Shadow: I’m a passive fan. I can pick up 20 12-inches, and four will hit with me as far as being the best of the bunch. Dubstep is the kind of genre where if you’ve heard about 20 songs, you get the idea what the genre sounds like. The rest is filler. I mean that respectfully.
Pretty Lights: The dubstep thing is a little out of control. People like dubstep because it’s dubstep. When the dust settles, not all this music will have longevity. I love dubstep just like I love rock music. But there’s great rock music and there’s horrible rock music.
Q: Are you a mash-up fan?
DJ Shadow: To any hip-hop DJ who is age 35 and up, mash- ups were never a new concept. We used to call them blends, and it was simply the practice of taking an a cappella or part of one song and mixing it on top of another. It was always there in the hip-hop scene. To me a mash-up is a blend of two songs with irony … I don’t tend to be the biggest fan of ironic music. The novelty of hearing Marvin Gaye over Britney Spears has worn thin. It was a good party trick, but it’s not sustainable as something that holds my attention.
Pretty Lights: I’m a fan of any creative interpretation of music. … It’s an awesome thing that this resurgence of electronic music has happened simultaneously with a surge of consumer technology that enables anybody to create and perform this music. The scene is expanding, and it’s so cool and popular that all the people at the show have the potential and ability to go home and do it themselves.
Q: You encourage interaction with your fans online more than most artists. What do you, as an artist, get out of that?
DJ Shadow: Feedback is a double-edged sword. I’d be lying if I said I was super-thick skinned. I also have to confess that I’m mystified and have always been by the general tone of discourse on the Internet. The anonymity fosters sentiments that are best left repressed on some level. Saying all that, though, I see the other side, and it’s nice to get people’s feedback.
Pretty Lights: I’m able to get feedback or suggestions or criticism immediately from my fans, and at different times, that can be intimidating. … Sometimes I want to have a dialogue with my fans. And sometimes I want to be cut off from the world and want to focus on my own ideas and creativity and not have it affected by what other people want me to do.
Q: Can you talk about the importance of a stage show — touring with your own screens and lights and effects?
DJ Shadow: You have to be prepared to present a show to people who may or may not know who you are. You have to hold their attention. In the ’90s, it was a field of 10,000 people staring at me. I’m not the kind of DJ who’s pumping my fists and taking my shirt off and throwing it in the air. So the next time I toured, I thought, “I really want to have visuals.” That was a novelty back then. Obviously they’ve been factored into live performance since the beginning of live performance. But I’ve tried to remain a step ahead of my peers as I go along.
Pretty Lights: My ambitions with the whole production of the stage show revolve around me wanting to heighten the experience of the music. I by no means think that a stage show is completely necessary to enjoy good music in a live setting. But it has the potential to escalate the experience. And that’s what I’m aiming to do. We have an awesome show, and it’s flashy and psychedelic and intense and stimulating, but there’s always room to evolve the integration of the music and the production of the visuals. I’m aiming to create an experience of the music that can’t be had listening to the music at home.
Ricardo Baca: 303-954-1394 or rbaca@denverpost.com;
DJ SHADOW
Hip-hop/electronic. Ogden Theatre, with Pigeon John. Today, 8 p.m. $32.50.
