Interview - David Guetta

David Guetta is one of those people where everyone knows his songs, but not necessarily the name behind them. My, I do like a nice French accent down the phone...

Words - Suzy Sims
Previously published on Native.tv http://www.native.tv in December 2007
(c) Niche News & Publishing Ltd

DAVID GUETTA

David Guetta still sees himself as an amateur. The best-selling, stylish and popular house DJ still sees his job as a hobby, which is nice work if you can get it. He’s a lively Frenchman, full of energy and zest. We soon depress him (not really) when he rings from London, where he’s doing the promotional rounds for his latest single. Guetta is facing 12 interviews this day, and has just finished filming an acoustic performance for Channel 4’s Freshly Squeezed. He's hoping to have music lessons next year so he can play more in this style - is there a new direction coming about, we wonder.

With the release of album 'Poplife' this summer - which includes last year's massive hit 'Love Don't Let Me Go (Walking Away)', a song which managed to get everyone's cars on the dancefloor, as well as recent smash 'Love Is Gone' - Guetta is much in demand to get club nights really going. Recently playing 2020ROCKS in Bournemouth, he's at home in small clubs as well as enormous, spectacular parties. So, let's begin...

‘Baby When The Light’ – that’s your new single with Cozi. Where did you meet her?
In London. I recorded one of the tracks of the album with Tara McDonald who performed on Armand Van Helden ‘My My My’. They were friends and they had the same management. I was looking for this really emotional voice and I was trying lots of different singers, and she proposed to try it and she was perfect. It’s great, I’m really happy with the result.

Is it hard for you to find singers to work with?
Well not really because I’m not like looking so much. It’s always been finding somebody by accident. I met Chris Willis in a bar, JD Davis just came to me because he wanted to work with me. It’s more like a friendship thing for me to hang out with nice people in the studio. I’m not looking everywhere to get some singers. I’m still amateur. No, still! It happens that I’m selling records which is a kind of miracle to me, but I still do this as a hobby really.

You say you’re 'selling records', you won the World’s Best Selling DJ Award at the 2007 World Music Awards.
Yes, and the album is platinum already. It’s great, and it was a huge show so it was really exciting. It was like being at the Oscars, all those big American artists I was like ‘Whoah…’ [laughs] I was impressed. We had dinner and there was Rihanna and Akon, all these huge artists. And me. It’s good. I’m living my dream in the moment, I have to say.

That’s a nice saying.
Yeah it’s great. And the gigs as a DJ, I crave more everywhere I go. It’s magic. You know, all the artistic activities, they’re great when it works. It’s very difficult when it doesn’t work - but when it works, it’s fantastic, it makes you forget everything else.

I read when you first started out in Ibiza people used to laugh at you, especially the English. Why was that?
Yeah, by saying it was a party but French DJs they were like [groans] and I remember actually booking DJs in the early 90s, they would say ‘Really? There’s a scene in France?’ They think that we live in the disco time or something, you know. The island was rammed by all the UK promoters and the American DJs of the time and I came trying to do something different. It was difficult at the beginning, but we’ve done Daft Punk, Laurent Garnier, Cassius and Bob Sinclar and others. It’s a different situation now.

I was reading about your ‘Fuck Me I’m Famous’ CD series, have you got another one coming out soon?
I will have for next summer. Right now I’m really into my album ‘Pop Life’, and this is the most important for me because it took me like 2 ½ years to make it. Actually I produced something like 30 or 40 tracks and then choose only the 12 or 14 best.

It must be quite hard trying to narrow it down.
Oh, that’s the most difficult. The two things I don’t like is choosing because you don’t have enough space on the album, and then choosing the singles. Oh my God, that’s so hard. Because I like all of them, that’s why I put it in the album, but when you have to say okay that’s supposed to be the best, it’s very difficult.

I didn’t know it was you choosing the singles, I thought it was the record company doing that sort of thing.
No because I’m my own producer, so I have my freedom. But they do try, you know. Like they pushed a lot for me to choose ‘Baby When The Light’ as the first single, but I resisted and I’ve done ‘Love Is Gone’ which was a really good move because it was a huge success. But ‘Baby When The Light’ is supposed to be the big one; so, we’ll see.

Good luck with that.
Thank you very much.

Back to your ‘Fuck Me I’m Famous’ club night, you once said your wife brings the glamorous people and you bring the crazies. Is that still true?
Yeah, that’s exactly how it goes, and I like it. I like to meet different people. I think clubs are probably the only place where you can meet people that usually don’t mix, rich, poor, famous, not famous, gay, straight, black, white, it’s great. That’s what we’re doing with ‘Fuck Me I’m Famous’. It’s great, it’s fun. I love to do different things you know, play a big festival for 20,000 people and play for a small underground club of 300.

I was looking at your tour dates coming up and that looks very glamorous, with places like Singapore and Marrakech.
I go everywhere in the world really. There’s Singapore, there’s Marrakech, there’s Germany, there’s America, there’s South America…

…Nottingham. What do you do to relax?
I make music [laughs]

That’s working!
No really, I see it as a way for me to relax and it’s still my hobby.

Do you still go clubbing when you’re not working in one?
Not really. I do this only in Ibiza actually because every weekend I’m playing so I can’t really go. I do this like going out weekdays in Ibiza, so I love to listen to other DJs.

I was reading you were the first DJ to perform a live set on a commercial plane. Was that something you wanted to do or did someone ask you?
I got this mad proposal from this mad plane company. They said play for us, we’ll do the flight on the day of your party, and you can invite anybody you want. So I was like this is great, I can invite all my friends to the party. It was on 14th July which is our independence day and it was crazy, everybody was dancing in the plane. I was not expecting for it to be so good, to be honest. I had two hostesses being my go-go dancers. Perfect.

I was wondering if it was some new craze of extreme Djing, you know, take Djing to these different places.
I’m open to anything! But this one, inviting friends to a party and being there and dancing in the plane, it’s kind of special.

What have been your favourite songs to listen to this year?
I haven’t listened to a lot of music to be honest ‘cause I was really working on my album. I thought the album of Justice was really good, and I love James Blunt also. There’s like a thousand of electronic tracks, I don’t know if you’re interested in that. I’m a big fan of Swedish house like Axwell and those guys, I really love their production.

Are there any other highlights of your year?
The whole year has been a highlight really, I had a baby, I had a new album, I had a really amazing tour, it’s all perfect. I just wish it would never stop.