Who are BLU J? And how are they absolutely killing tracks on such a regular basis? Looking these 2 up on Google does not merit a lot of info - that's where we come in. We sat down (in different countries) and asked the boys a few questions about their latest release, and life in general.
BLU J. Congrats on all the recent success. Much deserved. First question is always - how'd you come up with the name?
Much appreciated :) BLU J came easy, it's a marriage of our actual names.
So even your actual names are cool... Not a whole lot of info out there on BLU J. Are you taking the ZHU approach? Or is the world just sleeping on you for the time being? How long you been producing?
The BLU tribe is still growing, but we don't feel slept on. We're feeling the love for sure. Regarding our image we've been playing it low key, and that's because we want to keep the focus on the music. We may let up on the secrecy as we move forward, we'll see (this interview is a start)... We've both been musicians since youth, and have double digits + years producing combined. BLU J was born at the end of 2012.
Your SC plays alone show that you're feeling the love! Closing in on a million with a few tracks. Ok, your Soundcloud says vancouver / San Francisco. What's the story there? Can't decide between 2 of the most beautiful cities in the world?
Haha yeah we've got the beautiful West Coast locked down between the two of us. We hail from Los Angeles and Edmonton, and actually met in San Francisco. Due to 'complications' one of us had to dip back north of the border.
We'll assume those are badass crime related 'complications' that add to your credibility... Now your latest track
'Gdbye' (stream above)
premiered on Wednesday with Zane Lowe - BBC Radio 1. That's HUGE! How did the premiere come about?
Yeah thank you, that one was massive - felt good to have the man himself pull back and premiere one of our originals / collaborations on air with some heavy hitters. We have to give shots out to our people at ALT:VISION for that play.
In the past year you've remixed Twista, Rihanna, Deadmau5 + Kaskade, Alina Baraz + Galamatias, to name a few. Quite the eclectic mix - what makes you want to remix a certain track?
Ultimately, if we're feeling a track, it meets the criteria for a flip (and we may respect any number of compositional aspects of a track). That said, we'd be lying if we denied a love for straight up evoking nostalgia, and reinventing or paying homage to memorable tracks (if the time feels right for it).
Download tracks - HERE -
Man, that Twista remix brought back some feels! And the drop in UMBRLA, my goodness. Any remixes we should be excited about in the near future?
We're playing with a few ideas right now, OGs and flips ranging from 90s throwbacks to late and great soul singers. If you're excited, we're excited (real talk).
Now we're excited that you're excited that we're excited. So what's in store for BLU J in 2016? Album? Touring?
We're throwing our energy into putting out tracks, and growing that BLU J fam. While we're really looking forward to building out the live set further and dancing with everyone in person, we want to deliver more music to everyone before we shift focus.
Respect, that's wise. Well, we are already officially pumped for your first show in Van - whenever that ends up happening.
BLU J thank you so much for taking the time to chat with us. Best of luck in 2016! Keep these bangers comin'.
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