“Music Is My Life” is the brand new release from DJ Matt Warren, Chicago house music pioneer and platinum award winning producer. The eleven track full length album is set to launch October 15, 2018.
“This is my first release of my own music in 10 years. I’ve been producing, engineering and remixing for others, but have not focused on my creative needs for a long time. I felt like I wanted to do a record that reflects my journey as both a musician and DJ. I really wanted to give this old-school feel to the songs. I guess what I mean is to record “real music” with live instruments and arrangements which are kind of a homage of all the music I grew up listening to”…The Artist
I spoke with Matt who has remixed songs for artists including: Bjork, and Faith Evans. We spoke about his reasons for waiting such a long time to release his own music, and the birth of Nu-House…..
I’d like to know about your new project.
So “Music Is My Life” is my new album, and it’s the first of my own stuff in 10 years. I definitely want to go back to my roots, old-school and do some music that’s not 100% electronic, and back to like real music and real musicians. I think we achieved that.
Are you planning a tour?
Oh, definitely! I’m a DJ of course so when those opportunities come up I am more than happy to get out there and play. We’ve got our singers, my partner Maddie, so yes completely ready to go out and do that.
People these days come to see the DJ’s instead of the singer’s.
DJ’s fill arenas now it’s crazy.
What made you decide to revisit your own music?
It was a long time working on other people’s stuff and producing things for other people, and remixing, I just got that bug. That’s how it all came about. I was reunited with Maddie who I was not in communication with for a very long time, up until years back. We worked together a lot in the early 80s. It was kind of like her idea, she thought I should do the next album. So of course I started tooling around with some tunes in my studio, and then I called her up and told her I had a couple of tunes. We just kind of went from there.
What inspired the music on your record?
I would have to say just hearing everything that’s going on out there, and all the new music going on which is great. I mean I’m a DJ still so obviously I play all the current new stuff, but I just felt like there was kind of a lack of, I hate to keep using the term, real music. Not just synthesized and the electronic. I just really thought that it was time. Also we are talking about this new “Nu-House genre, and I like that. If we are going to do that then I want to associate that “Nu-House” with being a re-visitation of what everyone forgot about dance music.
Who is your favorite DJ?
Right now I do have to give it to Little Louie Vega. That’s my man, I love Louie and Ron Trent, who is a dear old friend of mine. So guys like that who bring in the real sound, that’s who I am partial to. I mean I love everybody, there’s room for Calvin Harris and all that stuff but I think that there is room for us too, us “Purists”. Put it like this, I was mixing Disco back when Disco was a live band and orchestra, and you had to have some skills to be able to mix two records together when I came up. You have to know how to keep those records on beat, it was just a whole different ballgame. I come from that school and not taking away from anyone else that is out there doing it now, but I will say in my opinion there is a huge difference between DJ’s who came up in our genre, the Little Louie’s, the Ralphie Rizario’s, the Frankie Knuckle’s who actually spun vinyl records back when Disco was out. These new guys have it a little bit easier. I just changed to Cerrado probably about two years ago. I wanted to stop carrying so much around and everywhere I went to play there were no turning tables. It’s actually cool, I like it, it’s OK.
Do you plan to continue releasing music?
I would love to. I would love to be out there and be playing in giving people the real stuff. If I can get with the right booking agent, then great!
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