Exclusive Interview with Laura Jones

Siam2nite had the opportunity to have an exclusive interview with Laura Jones, shortly before her performance at Glow Nightclub on 21st June.

You have over twelve years of piano training and three years in cello and clarinet. How did you get in touch with electronic dance music in the first place and how did you get into DJing and music production?

I found myself getting in to lots of other music along the way, including indie, trance, progressive house, garage, hip-hop, the list goes on but it wasn’t until I went to Ibiza for the first time in 2004 that I discovered underground electronic house and techno. It was around the time when minimal techno was making it’s mark and when graduating in 2005, I decided to spend the season out there and it literally blew my mind. Every week I’d go to Circo Loco at DC10 and Cocoon at Amnesia and get inspired by all the DJs passing through. I remember being stood on the terrace at DC10 watching the likes of Tania Vulcano, Clive Henry, Richie Hawtin, Ricardo Villalobos, Magda etc and over the course of the summer, I became so obsessed with the sound and the whole experience that I took myself off to a crash course in DJing when arriving back in the UK later that year. I spent a small fortune buying all the equipment like turntables, mixer, CDJs and speakers on a finance deal and became very quickly obsessed with buying vinyl and keeping the local vinyl stores in business. A few years later, around 2008 I decided to buy Logic and taught myself to produce in my spare time. I had a full time job but I’d spend every spare minute I could on my little 13” white macbook and Alesis active speakers. A few years on, here I am.

You play and produce a mix of Deep House, House & Techno. How would you describe your own music in just a few words?

Tough, deep, melodic and hypnotic.

You first emerged to public consciousness in 2011 with the tracks “Live A Little” and your track “Love In Me” became a summer anthem. What other tracks, remixes or mix sets would you recommend as an introduction for someone that is not yet familiar with your sound? 

Further to Leftroom and Visionquest, I’ve released on labels Crosstown Rebels, Glasgow Underground, Dogmatik and Noir and I’d say to check out my Sensoramic EP on Visionquest, I also have an EP about to drop on Leftroom with 4 original tracks and Cassy and Paul Du Lac on remix duties which is a good demonstration of my house and techier side. Remix-wise, the remix I did with Gavin Herlihy of Romanthony’s classic anthem ‘Let Me Show You Love’ and the one we have coming up of Todd Terry’s classic ‘Bounce To The Beat’ on Hard Times demonstrates the same. I aspire to make an array of music over the coming years as I’ve been inspired by the same over the years and don’t like to stick too strictly to one sound in my productions or my DJ sets as you’ll find in either my boiler room set at ADE, the podcast I did for Movement Electronic Festival ahead of playing there last year and also any of my live sets like my ENTER. debut at Space Ibiza last summer or my more recent set at Awakenings in Amsterdam. Check out my SoundCloud if you want to hear more: https://soundcloud.com/laurajones

You have played at the Boiler Room at Amsterdam Dance Event, at Mixmag’s Lab, on Beatport’s stage at Movement Detroit, at Fabric London, at the Circo Loco party series in Ibiza and at festivals such as SW4 (London), Mysteryland, (Amsterdam) Decibel (Seattle) and Piknic Electronik (Montreal). What was the best and the worst gig you ever played and what was the funniest thing ever occurred during any of your performances?

It’s always hard to pick a favorite, there have been so many highlights. One particular favorite was playing my first gig at DC10 in May 2012. I played the opening party and I couldn’t have dreamed for it to go any better. It’s such a special place and has been so instrumental in the journey I’ve taken this past decade that it was a real moment being able to stand up behind the booth and (hopefully) give to the crowd what I had been given all those weeks of going there clubbing. The worst was probably when I played in Tunisia one time. I had played in Edinburgh, Scotland the night before and had to go straight from the gig to the airport. The connection in Paris was delayed by several hours already and when we eventually went to take off, a Tunisian lady jumped up from her seat demanding to be let off the plane believing it was going to crash. I hadn’t had any sleep by this point, was conscious I might miss my set if we were delayed any further; this was relatively early in to my career and I had a pretty serious fear of flying at the time. So as you can imagine, this was the last thing I wanted to hear. In the end, she left the plane and we were so late arriving in Tunisia, my bag didn’t show and I had to go straight to the gig still in the clothes from the night before on no sleep, no food and a total nervous wreck from all the commotion. The funniest would probably be in Paris a few months ago at Le Machine Du Moulin Rouge. The crowd kept jumping up and dancing on stage. The promoter would come and shoo them off stage only to find 5 minutes later they’d be up there again. Halfway through my set I had a tap on my shoulder and turned around to find a topless girl in my face sticking her thumbs up at me. I guess she liked the set… Ha!

On 12th June you will perform live here in Bangkok at Glow Nightclub. Have you visited Thailand before? Will it be your Bangkok debut? What can Bangkok expect of your upcoming performance? 

It will actually be my first time both visiting and performing so I’m really excited. With regards to what Bangkok can expect, now that would be telling. You’ll have to come along and find out for yourself.