LE BAIN: Last time we talked was in winter of 2014. Looking back at those last two years, how did you mature?
GAVIN ROYCE: We have sort of found our stride as producers and have developed a sound that is unique to us. This has helped us better set goals to work toward. When we first started touring and getting a lot of attention, we didn't know what to do with it or how best to capitalize on it. Also, we've started to think about W&R more as a business—not in how we make music, but how we handle everything else. We love what we do and want to do it for years, so we have made it a point to be more serious about it.
Gavin Royce and Sam Walker
SAM WALKER: Also our popularity in the US has gone way up! so we're really happy about that. I think we look back on the past two years and see ourselves on the one hand finding our own path, and on the other, starting to sink into the fabric of the culture.
Gavin, could you tell us more about your first contact with ‘rave culture’? You said it happened when you were 11, through your family in England.
Gavin: I would be driven around by my older cousins in the UK and they would just have tapes playing. I had never heard anything like it. To me, this sort of 'rave music' was the most popular music there—it's all I would hear. One song that stood out to me was Smart E's Sesame's Treet which samples the Sesame Street theme song. It may seem so ridiculous now, but that was the first time I knew i was hearing a sample. I was listening to some hip hop at the time, as well, but didn't know they were sampling. Hearing this song I knew from my childhood transformed really blew my mind and changed the way I listened to music!
Walker & Royce in the mix
Sam, if you had to define that same moment of childhood, when something has a big impact on your future, what would that be?
Sam: As a kid, it was probably the first time I got my own computer. I put music software on it and tried to write my own things. There has always been a part of me that wants to do it all myself, I think mainly to avoid letting anyone know how totally ignorant I was, at any given moment (laughs).
Sam: I am absolutely loving the resurgence of the dance culture in general—however, nowadays I've been cooped up in my studio trying to get as much work done as humanly possible and have less time to go out! But when I do, it's really special.
Gavin: Like Sam, I don't go out as much as I use to, but when I do it's always a lot of fun...NYC is red hot!
