wAFF Slaps that Funk: British dance music artist wAFF got his start performing at arts college, studying dancing and acting.

"I used to be a sick street dancer ha which is quite funny to people when I tell them as I just look like Frodo is trying to take the ring back to Mordor… not a dancer," he says with a laugh. "But my dance teacher would take all the dance class to nights out at house music events which was new to me then. So, after spending every weekend in clubs dancing my tits off to house music, one day I just decided to download fruity loops and try attempt making music. Turned out I became so addicted to it that I quit my college to pursue music. I was about 17 at the time, and by the time I was 18 I was going in the clubs in Hull (UK) the city where I lived back then. My life took a turn to music suddenly, but it just felt right and it seems as though it all worked out ha. But it didn’t really get serious until my very first proper show I played, like my very first official wAFF booking which was Paradise at DC10 in Ibiza, which thinking back is a pretty huge first show ever. It was amazing night, I had all my friends there with me and played before Jamie Jones and I had the place going nuts so I think that moment was the start of everything getting serious as from that point on I was booked up every weekend which was crazy but just really special."

He says that his sound has changed over the years.

"I’ve always been known for big tech. house club tracks, and I still play that style but I definitely have moved more into a housey vibe," he says. "I play a mixture of rolling tech house, minimal and house now where I used to just play big tracks all the time. I really like the deeper moments in sets sometimes now too, so if I have enough hours to play in a set, you’ll be on more of journey with my music rather than me just trying to play constant bombs. But sometimes I will play just house, or just minimal or whatever depending on the event, and place, but I really love that I can now play whatever style I feel is right. I may even play melodic tribal house / techno if I was at the right place so I'm definitely a mixture. But I always aim to impress and stand out with whatever style I play."

wAFF thinks electronic music is generally in a good place right now.

"There’s soooooo many amazing new artists and there’s new styles of house coming out right now which is really exciting," he says. "That’s something that’s really hit the scene and I love it, but my only issue with how things are right now is it feel very oversaturated. Too many artists seem to be making the same sounding tracks, like it’s hard to find music right now that stands out and is fresh. Don’t get me wrong there are really sick tracks being released and fresh music but in-between the odd release here and there I find it difficult finding killer tracks all the time. It takes forever to find a whole load of bomb tunes that is my style, so it’s great but just maybe too much of the same thing. But that will pass, it always does, and new styles come around all the time. There’s nothing negative about any of it but the word oversaturated is what I would say about the music that’s coming out right now. Also, social media is like a race to be the best content creator, in all industries and that’s also fun and I love content creators but now it’s like… who’s got the most followers over who’s the sickest artist, musically or talented. It seems to now come down to how many followers you have on Instagram or whatever. I’m not sure exactly how I feel on that as some people have really worked hard for their following and others not but just maybe they look good or have better content being made so they automatically become huge just from a good video. But I also think fair play on all sides, it is how it is and these are the times were in right now so you may as well take advantage of it all and use everything you can to bring you the most success you can get so I'm not against any of it but yeah there’s definitely sides to it all that I’m unsure how I feel with it."

His latest release is the three-track Slapfunk EP.

"So Slapfunk I made about a year ago," wAFF says. "The name Slapfunk is actually names after one my favorite parties ever, which is called Slapfunk. It’s a record label and event run by two of my favorite DJs, Samuel Deep & Julien Alexander, which is a Netherlands based label and party. It’s one of the best parties I look forward to each year in Amsterdam at a club named Bret. Every time I go to these parties, I leave so inspired and excited for music. So, after last year’s party at Bret at ADE, I went home and made a load of tracks in my hotel. But my track Slapfunk was originally a track I was making to be something I could imagine going down at one of their parties, but very quickly became something else ha. That happens often when making music, you set out to make a certain sound and then next minute its totally different, and that’s a good thing I think as for me personally I just allow myself to be open to any inspiration so if a track your working on stress off into another direction and you allow it, you can end up with something even better than what it was going to be in the first place. ‘Slapfunk’ my tune I can’t actually see being played there now, but I still wanted to keep the name as I do name a lot of my tracks after things I like, or friends or whatever so yeah, that’s it!"

"But the other 2 tracks ‘Questions’ and ‘Next Game’ I made also about a year ago but at a different time," he continues. "‘Questions’ is a track I made after I bought a vocal fx plug in. I wanted to make a vocal like daft punk vibes so I got some software (can’t remember the name off the top of my head) and I just had a mess around with my own vocals which turned out to be pretty cool. So, I kept the vocals in and now that’s what you hear in Questions. The reason it’s called questions is because the vocal is that this voice is basically thoughts of temptations, feeling a certain way about someone but unsure if you could be with them, or if they would be with you and having a second layer of thoughts asking yourself why you feel that way. Just asking too many questions to yourself so the name Questions just seemed right. Finally Next game is just a cool track, and I was probably just playing a PlayStation game then made that track and finished it and went straight onto another game ha. That’s most likely why I it named that."

Looking ahead, wAFF has plenty planned for the remainder of this year.

"So of course, I have my Hot Creations Slapfunk EP coming gout in September," he says. "I have my COMUNA 13 party on the August 27 too, maybe it will have happened already by the time this interview is released [it has]. I’m fully booked right till the end of the year so I’ll be playing none stop it looks like ha. I was gonna go to Burning Man for my 10th time, but I decided to not go this year and go next year instead, I have a holiday with some shows thrown in around Thailand and Bali in November / December! Got Music On closing at Destino with Luciano and Marco Carola towards the end of Ibiza summer which I'm really looking forward to. I’m currently working on a load of sick EP’s to release on the best labels for next year and of course ill be spending the rest of this year building, planning and designing my Nature showcases so I’m ready to go next year! And will mostly be looking forward to having home time, being a geek watching movies playing games, hanging with friends… oh and I’ve just spent the last couple of months learning how to develop games, so I'm currently making my own games which I absolutely love ha so yeah that’s gonna be me this year."

wAFF Slaps that Funk: wAFF's Slapfunk EP is out September 8.


Editor's note: The disclaimer below refers to advertising posts and does not apply to this or any other editorial stories. LA Weekly editorial does not and will not sell content.