“The Bangin Beats” met up with Sultan & Ned Shepard whilst they were touring India! Here’s an exclusive chat with the duo, and definitely one of the best interviews we’ve taken!

Q) First of all welcome back to India. We know you love playing here. What draws you back to the country?

SULTAN: Thank You, we just love India, the crowd is so good! Submerge has been really good with us, they’ve taken us all over India and we’ve come to know about the fans here and the people and the scene. Been to the Sunburn Festival a few times as well and it’s just one of the best places in the world to be playing at.

Q) What’s playing at Sunburn like?

NED SHEPARD: (Laughs) It was crazy. One of the coolest things was; that it was streamed live and people around the world could see it and see what the scene in India is like. They were really surprised and excited about it!

Q) Have you seen the “scene” evolve over the years?

NED: Yeah, Big time!

SULTAN: Actually we’ve seen it the most this time around because we feel like the new generation is now here, the younger kids are coming out, people are much more educated and want to hear a certain track which they know and so the scene has been booming so much over the year. Every year we come back and it’s grown more and more and professionally bigger and bigger and we’re at a point where it’s kind of like the rest of the world.

Q) What are your thoughts on EDM going mainstream? Obviously you’ve been doing the same gig.

SULTAN: Yeah, I mean our style has changed as well, we’ve gone more mainstream. In the US, where we do most of our shows now, it’s blown up! I mean you hear it on radio, on youtube and it was never like that before. 90% of the clubs were playing Hip Hop, now 90% of the clubs are playing dance music. It’s just a whole explosion and so it’s alright to expect people to listen to it while growing up and for it to go mainstream, really is.

Q) We read up on you a little and Wikipedia labeled you guys as Canadian producers. Could you tell us a little about your past, a brief background and how did both of you start out and meet?

NED SHEPARD: Well I grew up in New York and ended up in Montreal for school and I met Sultan, he was already there, he was DJ’ing and I gave him a CD of tracks that I was working on and he liked it and we became friends and we started working together just as a fun project and we got more and more serious because we got into working with each other and we enjoyed it and eventually it became this brand that we decided we wanted to do together. And this summer we moved to LA, the scene in the US right now is amazing and we wanted a change, we wanted a new inspiration, so we’re pretty happy being in the US right now.

SULTAN: Yeah and we just landed a major residency at Wynn XS in Vegas and so we’re doing 24 dates next year which is again right next to LA.

Q) We’ve seen you incorporate different instruments in your live setup, like a keytar and also a guitar, tell us how your live setup works?

SULTAN: Well we don’t do it very often, we used to do it quite a bit in the last few years, we did it when we played a couple of shows with Nadia Ali or we would bring in a guest vocalist we featured on one of our records, when we do that it’s me on guitar and Ned’s on keytar and we do a 20 odd minute set within our DJ set so it’s a continuous flow, we just get up on stage with our instruments. It’s one thing we would want to evolve in the future but right now our focus is on DJ’ing and Production.

Q) Are you classically trained musicians or were you part of a band when you were growing up? What are your influences?

SULTAN: I was in a rock band for 10 years before getting into dance music. Never took any lessons, taught myself the drums and guitar. That’s my background.

NED: I’ve been playing the piano since I was about 5, so I did classical, blues and jazz and when I was a teenager I got into electronic music basically and since then it’s been pretty much that.

Q) As artists what are your thoughts about people pirating or downloading all these big tunes which you put your heart and soul into making?

SULTAN: It really doesn’t bother me whatsoever because I think the goal is to get the music out to as many people as possible and if you’re not going to go out and buy and if you’re just going to download it, you actually can come down to our gigs and support us and that’s another way of generating what our records can give us, from a fan base to money. Right now there isn’t much money in record sales all around so I’m happy knowing that people are hearing my music and that for me is the most essential thing.

NED SHEPARD: There are instead the new streaming services like “Spotify” and stuff where actually it’s so great, I mean it’s providing people an avenue for listening to stuff because that’s what any artist wants to do, provide people to listen to their music and it’s providing for that to happen with there still being some kickbacks to the artists and labels so I think that’s kind of like the future. The record industry is coming back from a bad phase and right now everyone’s kind of accepted that. Like you know, if you want to download something you can but people still do buy music and if you can give them a way to pay for it then they might do it even if it’s through subscription or something like that.

SULTAN: Also, in the industry people want a record from you most of the time, so if you can give them a record every month or every two months you’re sort of feeding the family and benefits artist by putting it out through the social media. So being here would actually put that music out there on a constant basis is really good for the family whichever way they get it and we like to give our tracks for free, I mean its all part of the whole movement now.

Q) There’s actually a big fuss about streaming service where they pay artists and all the artists are raging about stuff like they’re getting a raw deal like they don’t get their fair share in terms of money. What do you reckon?

NED SHEPARD: There’s not much money involved. In fact Spotify hasn’t figured out a way of how they pay the artist.

SULTAN: I mean you’re paying 20 dollars a month and you have access to everything you can imagine under the sun. I don’t know how much money artists are making out of that but the point is that as a fan, as a person who likes this kind of music I have access to everything and not only do I have access to music that I know and I like but I also have access to music that I don’t know. It allows me to explore other music, introduces me to other genres, to other bands.

Q) We had EDX touring Delhi about a month back and we asked him for his 3 #bangin tracks and one of them was “Walls”. Could you tell us a bit about it?

NED SHEPARD: EDX likes the vibe of “Walls” (laughs)

SULTAN: EDX has been a great supporter of our stuff. He’s a good friend of ours and “Walls” was a big record and he was very out spoken about it which is great! Thank you Maurizio for those kind words!! “Walls” is a track we recorded recently with our friend “Qila” and she’s great, we’re very happy to have discovered her and now she’s on her way to being a great singer actually and she’s a special person and yeah we recorded the track a couple of years ago, we just had different versions of it, we had a kind of an indie version and then we finally did the version you heard now, we sent it to Tiesto and he was like, I love it, I wanna put it out and so we were like yeah let’s do it and yeah it’s been getting a lot of radio support all over the world which is really cool and the reaction from fans every time we play it, it’s the biggest track in our set so yeah it’s pretty cool.

Q) You’d like to know that we here in Delhi hosted our first Sunburn a little more than a week back, and DJ Shaan dropped your track, “Send me your love” and the crowd went into a frenzy, dancing. Tell us something about it?

SULTAN: It was a very organic record and we didn’t know to what extent it would reach people. It was a remix initially and then turned into an original, it’s nice to know it’s getting recognition, it’s great.

NED SHEPARD: Wow, I think we should add it in our set tonight! (laughs)

Q) Your tracks usually have a massive melodic breakdown and then the bass kicks in and it starts #bangin again but when you sit down to write a track, do you have a melody in mind or do you start with the drums?

SULTAN: We never start with drums

NED SHEPARD: We used to back in the day.

SULTAN: I guess we’re musicians so we hang out and jam. Play chords and try different keys and that kind of stuff. I’d rather hang out till like 2 in the morning in the studio and not hear the kick and bass and actually just listen to the melody and relax and call for something and then develop it into a big dance floor track because it’s more about the song than it’s about a record for the dance floor. You tune into a song and you get the right riff for that and it can become a good track for the dance floor.

Q) Give us a little insight of your studio, of the analog vs. digital war. Have you picked a side?

NED SHEPARD: Something’s are good for analog and some for digital, there are a lot of good synths that are digital and they sound great but obviously if you’re recording vocals, you need analog gear, you need compressors and some analog synths just sound better. I mean Moog Voyager is still the best sounding synth. You need to figure what can mix and match.

Q) What’s your sequencer preference?

SULTAN: Ohhh ProTools! We’ve been on ProTools for the longest time. Don’t think too many people use it but that’s what we use. We love it, it’s become our choice and I think that’s what we will continue to use.

Q) When we sit down to write down to write our questions we do ask around if anyone wants to ask a question and we got one from New York, and it is that are you inspired by Marco V because there are a lot of similarities?

SULTAN: Marco V? That’s a new one!

NED SHEPARD: (laughs) We know Marco V’s music, we like it, not necessarily listen to it as reference. I think our older stuff, the stuff we were doing in the past probably.

SULTAN: Marco’s newer stuff is like our older stuff. It’s weird, we’ve done a lot of mash up’s with Marco’s stuff.

NED SHEPARD: Yeah we played some of his stuff on our sets

SULTAN: It was 2 or 3 records which we mashed up with his beats but that was more last year, wasn’t even this year but Marco, we love your stuff anyway.

Q) Going through your discography is like going through an electronic music bible, there’s everyone there, Tiesto, Madonna, Fedde Le Grand. Do you have a favourite artist that you love collaborating with?

SULTAN: I think Fedde is my favourite. Just as a friend and as a person we’ve learnt a lot from him being in the studio. Some of these collaborations we do in the studio and some we do by sending it back and forth by e-mail. For me personally Fedde has been my favourite to work with in the studio.

NED SHEPARD: Well that’s how it is, on the pop side of it we were lucky to have remixed Madonna, Lady Gaga, etc. who are artists we looked up to so to be involved in that session was pretty cool.

SULTAN: Just getting the request for remixing one of their tracks is amazing and is like Oh My God!

NED SHEPARD: Its cool like Lady Gaga chose our remix to be part of her remix compilation and it’s really cool to know that your music is being respected by artists like that.

SULTAN: We just finished collaboration with Fedde actually, so you got a new one coming.

Q) Any other future collaborations?

SULTAN: We do have an upcoming collaboration with NERVO which is coming out sometime soon, we don’t have an exact date. We just put out one with Thomas Sagstad. We do have some major collaborations coming up in the next couple of months, stuff we can’t talk about yet but major.

Q) Finally your 3 #bangin tracks at the top of your head?

SULTAN: I’d say Sultan & Ned Shepard vs.Thomas Sagstad feat. Dirty Vegas – Somebody To Love (Third Party Remix) is a track that’s on top for me as of now.

NED SHEPARD: There’s this crazy mash up we did of Dada Life and Calvin Harris and Example. Every time we play it everyone’s like it’s cool and every time we play it in a club the place goes crazy and Deniz Koyu’s remix of “Spectrum” is another amazing record.

Q) You’ve played all around the world what has been your most memorable gig?

SULTAN: I think our first gig together in Kiev was awesome; there were about 15000 people there. Sunburn with Nadia was great too.

Q) With VST’s and sequencers etc. all going digital any advice to kids who are trying to produce and for those who are looking at being budding DJ’s?

NED SHEPARD: A lot of people make something that sounds cool but I think if someone actually makes something which goes beyond just sounding cool. I mean there are a lot of new tracks which sound cool but after a month you’re over it but the artists that really stand out are the ones who actually make real song’s and it sounds cool.

Q) Any advice for blog’s that cover EDM like http://www.banginbeatsmusic.com?

SULTAN: For me some blogs are a bit monotonous, like they ask the same questions or cover the same artists, some blogs I feel want to focus on whoever is ‘hot’ in the scene right now rather than other people who’re doing the same thing. There’s a lot of great talented producers out there and right everyone seems focused on only a select few and it’s not cool because the scene over the years has been about so many different genres, so many different artists and it is some of those artists who have brought the scene to where it is right now and when you’re just focusing on what’s cool right now, it’s not thinking forward, and I think it’s essential to really the expose the many other artists that are out there.

Q) Finally a message to all your fans here in India?

SULTAN & NED SHEPARD: We love you, thank you for the support you’ve given us over the years, it’s been amazing and every time we come back it seems like there’s more and more love and we look forward to coming back again!

THANKS!

Follow the duo on;

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sultanshepard
Twitter: https://twitter.com/sultanshepard

Interview by Kanov Bagai. Edited by Aditya Seth

Special Thanks to Submerge & Kitty Su.