This past June, I attended Electric Forest in Rothbury, Michigan to experience all the magic I had heard about over the past couple of years. While I was there, I got to sit down and talk with Apashe, a Belgian producer on the Kannibalen Records team who has been slowly gaining momentum and establishing himself as a force to be reckoned with in the bass music scene. I first caught him onstage at Webster Hall in February while he was touring in support of Black Tiger Sex Machine’s “Welcome to our Church.” The energy and dark orchestrations that he uses to produce his music make his live performances entrancing yet mercilessly intense.
I made a point to keep an eye on his releases over the past six months, which include a collaboration with RIOT dropped this June entitled “Fire Inside,” a short collection of remixes from his hit track “Tank Girls,” and a single featuring Lena called “Skeleton Dance.” “Fire Inside” starts as a really solid breakbeat track with a poppy vocal line in the intro, but soon breaks to reveal a dark and intense house beat through the build and drop. It’s a grooving and energetic track that you can absolutely hear Apashe’s influence in. Meanwhile, “Skeleton Dance” encapsulates a different side of Apashe. Offering modulated synths and a heavily effected vocal track by Lena, the slow build gathers momentum until about a minute in where it breaks into a growling and chopped electro masterpiece.
Electric Forest always has a few artists who perform more than one set throughout the weekend, and this year Apashe was one of them. Starting off his weekend of performances, Apashe was slated to play the Forest stage Thursday night. Tucked away in the festival’s central wooded area, the Forest is possibly the smallest stage at the event. However, it hosted some pretty heavy-hitting sets throughout the weekend. Winding through a pretty consistent set of electro-bangers and heavy-hitting bass music, Apashe put on a thrilling performance late into the festival’s opening night. With such a phenomenal performance already in the books, less than twelve hours into the festival, it was crazy to think that he still had another left in the weekend. It was on Saturday, a few hours before his bigger, and much more conflict-riddled set that we sat down in the Electric Forest to talk about his set, and the upcoming release of his album on September 30th.
Electric Forest is one of the biggest US fests you’ve ever played, right? How does that feel? What were you thinking coming to Forest?
It’s crazy, this festival is insane. You know just the fact that it’s in a forest it’s such a different mood from everything I know. I like the response so far, and the atmosphere here has such a good vibe. I played the forest stage already and that energy was crazy. I really had no expectations you know, and I was so surprised. Super stoked. So now I’m f*cking excited for tonight.
Since you’ve got two different sets, how do you switch it around? What do you go through when you’re planning something where you’re splitting yourself between two performances?
So, the set I played in the forest was kind of like the sets I used to do in clubs. For the bigger stage tonight, I prepared something a bit more “festival” I guess, but still like with lots of my own tracks. I’ve got a big like surprise with some new tracks and some new remixes. I’m previewing lots of tracks from the album, so it’s a completely different approach, really. Like, I kind of kept all the good sh*t for this stage. Even though I made sure my set at the forest would be the best I could, you know? I just I felt that I needed to keep some secret sh*t for the other stage.
So I’ve been playing like a few of their tracks, and then we started talking on Twitter to send over some tracks. They wanted to collab, and then we decided on an intro and the beginning of a drop that they made, and just started working on it.
Actually, and I don’t mind mentioning it, I worked and I changed everything. I changed the entire track and I made it super different. I made it completely funky, weird, kind of like rock, soul, with a California vibe… But they weren’t super motivated with that weirdness, so we were like “all right you’re right, we can keep it bass house.” However, I really liked what I did and I showed it to so many other people that were like, “yo, this is like so different. This is super weird but it’s f*cking awesome you should keep that!” So we’re actually going to release that on the album.
So speaking of the new album. What kind of what information can you give us about what the album is going to be like?
Right now I have about fifteen tracks, but I want to keep the best dance tracks out of that. I would say all the tracks — they’re not done, but they’re there, you know? I would say I need to put like a good thirty to forty percent of work into it just to make the mix downs better, and rework everything. Most of the tracks are being done on tour, on my laptop, and I’m really like a studio rat, you know? I need to be in the studio to actually make proper things. So I’ll need time to actually take what I made on the road with shitty headphones and just rework them into something clean and professional. I want everything to sound like super crystal clear, you know? So now I’ve got like two months to just finish that.
What kind of atmosphere can we get from the album? Is there any theme, or general feeling that you had going into this?
Well if you know my music you know my orchestral side. I pushed my little weird personality into the music again, but I pushed it really far. Sometimes if I’m just going to make one track, it’s going to be a banger. I always keep it weird, but sometimes I’m like, “I’m not going to make it too weird,” you know? At least it’s going to be DJ-able. For the album, I really made zero boundaries, I just went full on into what I really love.
So it’s really orchestral, and it has lots of heaviness — I love mixing both. However, it goes in all directions genre-wise. We can’t say it’s a trap album, or it’s an upbeat bass house, or an electro house, or whatever album. Everything is mixed in all different ways. So there’s even chill tracks, and then some heavy bangers and everything. Some hip hop related stuff. So expect some variation of my own genre. Because my signature kind of orchestral feel is present in all these tracks.
Unfortunately for myself, I was off in other parts of the Forest for Apashe’s second set of the weekend. However, the last day of the festival and all over social media, all I heard were murmurs of how amazing the performance was, and how many people were beginning to get turned on to Apashe’s energetic live show and hard-hitting tracks. After the festival, fans on social media were blowing up comments sections about favorite sets from the weekend, and one name kept appearing everywhere: Apashe. Most of the comments revolved around who this new producer was and how crazy his set was on the Tripolee stage (one of the larger stages constructed for Forest which also saw the likes of G. Jones, NGHTMRE, Slander, Adventure Club, and Flosstradamus). Seeing this response, I had to get back in touch with Apashe and ask him what had happened.
You’ve been receiving a lot of praise for your Tripolee set at Electric Forest this year, many people seem to have enjoyed it, and you gained a lot of fans. Can you walk me through what happened at that set, and what made it so special?
I will remember that day for the rest of my life! I never thought it would turn out like this. When I got the offer to play twice, I was super happy, but the timing for my big set at the Tripolee stage was tricky because Bassnectar was playing at the same time on another stage. To be honest, that stressed me quite a bit. Right before my set, so many people left to go see Bassnectar and I had to start with a really small crowd with my true fans; I was super happy they were already there waiting for me to play. Then as soon as I started, the field started filling up and I ended up playing in front of a packed field. It was epic! I also brought my good friends Black Tiger Sex Machine to share that moment with me. I still don’t quite understand what happened but it was magical. I’m truly humbled. It was one of these moments you can’t describe with words but I can still feel it today! I just love Electric Forest and I can’t wait to go back!
Have you seen the effects of your set’s reception in your fan base, or any other growth since Forest?
I saw countless people talking about it on social media, sharing live videos and pictures. I guess many people probably discovered me because of it, and I can’t be more thankful for it. All I want is to share my music with more and more people. Also, I’m planning a tour in the fall and hope to travel around the States and hope to see people from EF there!
How does this set the bar for future sets, specifically your set coming up at Moonrise? Do you feel any pressure now that there’s some more buzz circulating around you?
I’m super stoked for Moonrise! It definitely makes me want to put as much effort, if not more, into my set as I did for EF but I don’t feel like it’s a pressure, I would say it’s rather a pleasure. I’m just going to keep doing what I like, make music, have fun playing it, and share it with people.
This coming weekend, Apashe will take a more modest performance slot at Moonrise Music Festival (2pm Saturday), but he’ll be taking stage at the fan-favorite “Solar Stage.” Affectionately known to attendees as the “Bass Tent,” this stage has been home to many memorable Moonrise performances, including Apashe’s Kannibalen label-mate Snails just last year. Despite the early time slot of 2-3pm, I have no doubt that Apashe will have a crowd of many, eager to see what all the buzz has been about since Electric Forest.
Coming this fall, we’ve got not only the release of Apashe’s new album (which I’m anxiously waiting to hear), but we’ve also got rumors of a tour as well. Considering the massive buzz surrounding Apashe, I’m sure he’s pulling out all the stops for this album; and the tour is likely to follow suit. I’m super stoked to know that I’ll have multiple chances to see him in the upcoming months, and can’t wait to see what he has in store.