Published in the August 2009 issue of DJ Times Magazine
Volume 22 - Number 8
By Emily Tan

One could assume a DJ’s career pinnacle might be achieved upon headlining a stadium show or performing on a festival’s main stage. Surely, massive success also becomes self-evident when radio stations throughout the world are playing your tunes and hitmaking artists like Kelly Rowland, will.i.am and Akon are offering to collaborate.

According to David Guetta, that’s all good and fine, but his real joy still comes from working behind the decks in a dark, dirty club, experimenting with new tunes and reinterpreting existing ones. Instead of creating a “live act” to showcase his own hits (like Basement Jaxx or fellow countrymen Daft Punk), the Frenchman prefers to maintain his connection to the club from the DJ booth. The hits have made him an international pop star, sure, but he self-identifies as a DJ.

The hits? You’ve heard them and probably played them. Singalongs like “Love Is Gone,” “Love Don’t Let Me Go,” “Everytime We Touch,” and “Tomorrow Can Wait”—all fronted by Chris Willis—plus “The World Is Mine” with JD Davis are among the few genuine dance tunes that have crossed over from clubland. His latest single, the Coldplay-ish, Rowland-fronted “When Love Takes Over,” recently topped US dance charts. Guetta’s roll continues.

A career DJ with a winning track record as a promoter—as well as creative director, host and resident jock for his hugely fashionable “F*** Me I’m Famous” parties—Guetta’s ascent has as much to do with his low-key likability as it does with his assiduous work ethic. Whereas some major-label releases loaded with marquee collaborators may be considered contrivances of deep-pocketed marketing teams, Guetta’s latest studio effort, One Love (EMI), essentially came about organically.

The tracks on the album (including “When Love Takes Over”) were crowd-tested and painstakingly tweaked over time—before the vocals were ever conceived. Recorded both in big-budget commercial Los Angeles recording studios as well as in home setups (like Willis’ Atlanta digs and Guetta’s own Paris crib), there is one underlying goal to Guetta’s music: To make people dance. He’s done it again.

After being granted a private preview at EMI’s New York offices, DJ Times spoke with David Guetta about his new album and life as a DJ/producer. Here’s what went down.


DJ Times: Your new artist album, One Love (EMI), is a very tightly produced collection of pop tunes with big, commercial collaborators. “When Love Takes Over” featuring Kelly Rowland is extremely catchy.

David Guetta: I’m very happy with the album! Actually, I feel very blessed. Usually when you start an album, everybody’s a little nervous because you need that big single and, until you have that big single to allow you to go to radio and get people excited about the album, you’re always very nervous. For me, the first track I did was, “When Love Takes Over.” So after that, I was feeling relaxed, because I knew I had that single. I felt like, “I’m gonna start to make music again.”

DJ Times: Did you compose the instrumentals to “When Love Takes Over,” as well as the melody and lyrics? Or was it Kelly Rowland?

Guetta: I had the instrumental done. I was playing in a club in the South of France and Kelly was there, and she was crying when she heard the instrumental. She proposed me to do the song. I was like, wow. We had the most amazing time in the studio together, and we worked on other songs, too.

DJ Times: I admit, I assumed your collaboration with Kelly Rowland was something dreamed up by studio heads.

Guetta: No, it was totally organic! It’s amazing. All those huge featured artists on the album. The two main things that started this was the meeting with Kelly and that song. At the same time, I had a phone call with will.i.am and he wanted me to produce tracks for the new Black Eyed Peas album. I said, “Listen, I’ve got to make an album. I will produce tracks for your album, but you have to give me tracks for my album!”

DJ Times: How did that process go?

Guetta: I didn’t know those people from that world. They started calling me and proposed me to do some tracks. I said I’d love to, but, again, they had to be on my album. It’s perfect, because it’s an honor for me to produce tracks for those artists like Estelle, which for me was very exciting, like the Estelle hip-hop track. Take Kid Cudi, for example. I was on my way to L.A. to shoot a video for the Black Eyed Peas’ “I Got A Feeling,” and I had a scene with Kid Cudi and I’d done that track on the plane. I told him, “Man, I love your work. I’d love to play you a song.” I played him the track in between shots….everything happens for me like this. I think I have a good star. [laughs]

DJ Times: You get along well with other artists.

Guetta: It depends on how open you are to people. If you become successful and you don’t speak to anyone anymore and nobody wants to speak to you, don’t complain. I’m always interested to find new people and new artists.

DJ Times: Tell me about the Akon track.

Guetta: It’s a monster! I was in London DJing with Kelly Rowland for a BBC Radio 1 live on-the-radio big outdoor party, and Akon was also performing. We’d met two years before and already we’d spoken and had fun together. It was the morning after the gig and we’re like, “Are we going to a club, or should we go into the studio?” We went to the studio! I finished the track at home in my studio. This track’s going to be on Akon’s album, too. We were just having fun in the studio and making music.

DJ Times: How has the dance music scene in the U.S. changed, in your opinion, from when Guetta Blaster was released ‘til now?

Guetta: All those artists, if they came to me and they wanted me to put tracks for them and they want to work with me…it’s good stars like Timbaland and Justin Timberlake and Kanye West coming to dance culture. My album is, we’re making new music, really. It’s not house, it’s not pop. It’s pop, but in a good way. I’m putting out a track on Toolroom that’s an underground techno track, because I wanna keep my people, also! It’s not that I want to stop making electronic music and go pop, absolutely not. If you listen to the instrumentals themselves, a lot of them are still big, crazy club tracks! It’s just that I come on top of it with songs and chords. If you buy the album, you have access to the DJ versions, like just instrumentals. I play the instrumentals in my DJ sets and people go crazy.

DJ Times: How else did your background as a DJ affect One Love?

Guetta: Well, there’s another song that I did with Julie McKnight, “How Soon Is Now.” This is a really DJ-proper, real house music track. I think that’s gonna be huge in Ibiza. DJing is my life. I’m still a DJ as a priority. Look, the track “When Love Takes Over,” it’s got a huge reaction, but it’s also being played by every other DJ and it’s also being played on the radio. That’s the most difficult thing to achieve and that’s most exciting to me.

DJ Times: But you like having hits…

Guetta: Making tracks to play on the radio only, makes me not happy at all. Making tracks that are only being played by a few DJs is also not enough for me. I wanna take that club culture and make it bigger. I love that. I’m not changing my music. I’m just trying to make that music and make media and people understand that they can be touched by it, even if they’re not proper clubbers. What is pop music? Kanye is pop in an urban way, but it doesn’t mean that it’s not quality or not true. Nobody can doubt that Beyoncé is one of the best R&B artists in the world, but she’s also pop. I’m trying to achieve something similar. Saying that this is similar, I’m trying to bring dance music to people.

DJ Times: I surmise you used a variety of studios to record this album, including your own studio. Correct?

Guetta: Yeah. Some tracks, like the Kid Cudi and Ne-Yo track [the latter not on the album], I did on my laptop on the plane 100-percent. Then I went to the studio with Ne-Yo and recorded it. Kid Cudi was done in a professional studio in L.A.; will.i.am was also recorded in one of the best studios in L.A. It was funny, because I was working with Laidback Luke on a track in his bedroom and, the day after, I was in the biggest studio in L.A. with will.i.am! I love that. Those big artists, they don’t go to bedroom studios.

DJ Times: Which do you prefer?

Guetta: What’s amazing with Kelly Rowland is, we became friends and got that “trust relationship” after a while. I spent a week with Chris Willis in Atlanta and Kelly came to Atlanta and we were working in the home studio of Chris in Atlanta, together. Often, I like it better in smaller studios because there’s no stress and you don’t worry that time is running out and it’s really expensive. Actually, I love it better in a small studio.

DJ Times: How much does your role as a DJ influence your process in the studio?

Guetta: It depends on each track. I always work on the instrumentals and sometimes on the melody, sometimes not. Sometimes a concept is mine. Sometimes I’ll really start as a DJ, with a beat only and the bassline. Sometimes it’s more like traditional composing. I’m a DJ more than anything else. The things I know, I learned from being a DJ, making my own remixes, and making my own music. There’s no rule when it comes to creation. It can start with a beat. It can start with a sample and I get rid of it. A lot of those songs I was already playing just the instrumentals, as a DJ, and getting a really great reaction.

DJ Times: In that respect, would you say this album is already crowd-tested?

Guetta: Yes! This album’s already crowd tested because all these tracks that are on the album are tracks I’m playing in my DJ sets, and they’ve worked. You’ll see me many times with a pen and paper when I DJ, and I’m like, “I need to EQ this track…that break needs to be longer,” and so on.

DJ Times: What DJs are you excited about these days?

Guetta: I’ve done a track with Tocadisco and Laidback Luke, with Seb Ingrosso and Dirty South. If we’re talking about current DJs, I’ve been a big supporter of a new DJ called Chuckie and he’s amazing. This is why the dance music scene is exciting, because there are always new talents. I honestly love to go listen to DJs and go to underground parties—that’s what I do in Ibiza and Miami! It’s exciting. Most of my tracks, I start them with the idea of a DJ track only, just the instrumental. Most of the tracks, I play them and if I see a bigger potential for that track, I’m like, okay, maybe.

DJ Times: Any examples?

Guetta: “When Love Takes Over” was just like this. It was working as an instrumental before I was playing it. For me, as successful as my tracks are now, the most important thing for me is that DJs are playing them. One of my first supporters was Erick Morillo a long time ago with “Just A Little More Love,” and Pete Tong, too. I was always sending them tracks first. I told them, “It doesn’t matter how many radio stations are playing me. If you’re not playing my tracks in clubs, I’m not happy.” It’s great that I’m getting radio support from all over the world, but I see myself first as a DJ. DJing is my life.

DJ Times: How are your “F*** Me I’m Famous!” parties doing in this economic climate?

Guetta: I’m going to Ibiza tomorrow and it’s going to be my “F*** Me I’m Famous” party every Thursday at Pacha Ibiza. The result of the crisis is that club owners and promoters prefer to do fewer bookings, but with bigger names—so actually I’m getting even more bookings now. It’s even busier. When it’s “F*** Me I’m Famous,” it’s my brand, but when I come to DJ, I come to DJ. “F*** Me I’m Famous” is only in Ibiza or in Miami at Winter Music Conference. But the whole year when I’m touring, I’m touring as a DJ only. Right now, people like Sven Väth and Bob Sinclar and myself and Erick Morillo and big names don’t really suffer from this climate because clubs would rather do one big event, instead of four events.

DJ Times: What advice would you give to aspiring DJs trying to break into this industry at this time?

Guetta: Unfortunately, things have changed a lot. When I started, being a DJ was about being a DJ. Now, if you have no productions, it’s very difficult to build a name. The only advice I can give to someone who wants to DJ on an international level is to produce. It shouldn’t be like this, because for me, it’s two different jobs. But it’s the way the market is. There’s one thing to get a reputation as a new DJ. Before being a great producer, you can get a reputation out of great bootlegs. There’s a possibility to get your name out there by making some amazing bootlegs and sending them to big DJs who are gonna listen and maybe play them.

DJ Times: What about your DJ gear setup? Any changes since we last spoke?

Guetta: I’m using three Pioneer CDJ-1000s, a Pioneer DJM-800 mixer, and a Pioneer EFX-1000 effects unit. I do some crazy stuff with the Pioneer EFX that’s really good. I don’t really use computers or stuff like that when it comes to DJing. I’m not a laptop DJ. It’s too much like an office thing. Every time I play a festival, you just have five minutes, and there are so many DJs playing back-to-back. Sometimes I like to be in the dark at the end of the night. Usually, the way I do my sets is, I play my big records—the David Guetta hits—at the beginning of the night, and I play deeper at the end of the night, and the lighting follows.

DJ Times: What’s your main gear for production?

Guetta: When I’m producing, my favorite is Ableton Live and Logic.

DJ Times: What’s next for you?

Guetta: Being a DJ is my life! This whole thing right now around me, I see stadium shows, I do concert halls, and my management and my record company people are like, “David, you need to go live and to come with that huge live show!” But I really don’t like that. What makes me happy is to DJ in clubs. I was touring with my tour manager and my international agent, and I was doing a warehouse party in the U.K., and it was a dirty venue and the lighting system was not good, but the sound system was amazing. I was like, “You don’t understand! This is what makes me happy.” DJing is what I love. For me, DJing is what always makes me happy.

DJ Times: Playing different venues, what’s the difference for you?

Guetta: From a DJ point of view, when you play to 20,000 people, there’s not so much you can do. It has to be a square show and you have to play all your big records. You cannot experiment. Whereas, all the new music I’m trying is always in the smaller clubs. I need that balance. I love the energy when you play a big festival or stadium, but DJ-wise, it’s more interesting to play a gig in a club that’s dark, dirty, and people are really coming to discover new music and are really part of that club culture. When you do a stadium, maybe 50-percent of the people are from DJ culture, but 50-percent are there because they heard your tracks on the radio, and I cannot be happy with only that. I am first and foremost, a DJ. n