David Guetta doesn’t have to think very hard about the moment he did the seemingly impossible and went from not only being dance music’s number one DJ to one of the most exciting and prolific pop producers on the planet. It was May 2009 and the release of ‘I Gotta Feeling’ by Black Eyed Peas. It got to Number 1 in both the US and UK, not to mention numerous other countries around the world, and went on to became the best selling digital single in history, shifting millions units. Guetta, who co-wrote the track, was suddenly the most in demand hit maker in hip hop and R’n’B. He’s gone on to write hits for Flo Rida, Akon, Kelly Rowland and several more hits for the Black Eyed Peas.
But, perhaps more importantly, ‘I Gotta Feeling’ also laid the groundwork for the Frenchmen’s fourth album, ‘One Love’, released in August 2009. If ‘I Gotta Feeling’ heralded his arrival as a pop producer, ‘One Love’ established him as one of the most successful musicians on the plant in his own right. Featuring the singles ‘When Love Takes Over’, with guest vocals by Kelly Rowland, and ‘Sexy Bitch’ starring Akon, it topped the French and European charts. Guetta has now sold 4.2 million albums, 17 million singles and has scored five Number 1s in the UK. He simultaneously changed the sound of pop music worldwide and his beloved gave dance music a new status and credibility; without compromise.
Which makes Guetta’s new album, ‘Nothing But The Beat’, one of the hotly anticipated releases of the year. To gauge exactly how big it is, look no further than the rush release of ‘Where Dem Girls At’ featuring Flo Rida and Nicki Minaj. In April, the acapella was leaked and an unknown producer used it to make a bootleg version of the track. It forced an early release of the track at the start of May, with none of the usual promotion - no radio, no video, no advertising, no marketing, no nothing. But even so it topped iTunes charts around the world on word of mouth and social networking alone. Guetta is proud to have one of the biggest on-line communities in history with over 20 million FB fans and over half a billion views on Youtube.
No surprise, then, that the rest of ‘Nothing But The Beat’ is being kept a closely guarded secret. It features tracks with, Flo-Rida, Nicki Minaj, Taio Cruz, Ludacris, will.i.am, Usher, 50 Cent, Snoop Dogg, Akon, Jennifer Hudson, Sia, Timbaland, Dev and more while the second single ‘Little Bad Girl’ features Taio Cruz and Ludacris. Like ‘One Love’ the new album is a fusion of dance beats and urban vocals, but Guetta has honed his craft and this time it’s even better, more polished, with bigger hooks and more punch. “I wanted to push the hybrid of European dance music and American urban culture even more,” he explains. ‘Where Dem Girls At’ is very much in the same vein as ‘Sexy Bitch’. But that’s it, I’m moving on to something different. That’s closing the story for me for that sound.” ‘Nothing But The Beat” is Guetta pushing the envelope.
The huge success of ‘I Gotta Feeling’ and ‘One Love’ meant that everyone tried to copy his sound, fusing dance beats and R’n’B/hip hop vocals. He could be forgiven for feeling aggrieved. But no: he finds it flattering. “I’m happy because it’s the music I love. For 20 years I felt frustrated that dance music was not respected in the same way that hip hop, pop or rock was. Now it feels like it is.” Plus he sees moving things on as a challenge. “When I listen to the radio in the US, every song sounds like ‘Sexy Bitch’. The urban dance thing has become huge. Now I have to push it more because my sound has become the standard sound. It’s a challenge, but I like that.”
When Guetta started working on “Nothing But The Beat” 18 months ago, his hectic schedule meant that he had to write on the move, planes, hotel rooms, even taxis. “You have to understand that the way I live I’m always travelling,” he says. “I use a computer to make my records. That’s what I do all day. When I DJ, I play for two-and-a-half hours. The rest of the time I make beats. When I come back home to Paris I have a studio and I work with musicians for bigger arrangements. When I’m on the move I have this small keyboard. It looks like a toy, but it’s really useful when I’m looking for melodies. The best things come on the plane because it’s somewhere I can work undisturbed. ”For example, I wrote the track that became ‘Sexy Bitch’ while I was flying to Budapest.” Having written most of the album in transit, Guetta spent two months working in studios in Los Angeles in January and February of this year applying the finishing touches and making the last crucial connections with the urban world. “No phone. In the studio 15 hours a day,” he says.
He’s always been a hard worker. Guetta’s DJing career began when he was 13. He started mixing vinyl in the basement of his parents’ house in Paris. He says he was “a little bit of a bad teenager”, that he “had a lot of negative energy”. Music was a positive influence. Indeed, Guetta says that “music saved my life”. When he was 17, he got a job DJing at a gay club called The Broad. “It was the luckiest thing that ever happened to me,” he says. “The owner told me I had to play bands like Depeche Mode, New Order and Prince. So I was playing a mix of funk and synth pop. It’s not that far way from what I’m producing today, that mix of dark electronic sounds with something sad and melancholy and really happy vocals full of hope.”
In 1988, he travelled to London. He went to landmark acid house club Shoom, where he experienced the same epiphany as everyone else on that legendary dancefloor. Inspired, he imported acid house back to Paris. Guetta went on to DJ in Parisian clubs Les Bains-Douche and Le Palace. During the ’90s he became one of the key figures on the French dance music scene, promoting and playing groundbreaking nights around the city.
In 2001, Guetta scored a hit in France with ‘Just A Little More Love’, which was also the title of his debut album the following year. It featured ‘Love, Don’t Let Me Go’, another French hit that also reached Number 1 in the UK. Album two, ‘Guetta Blaster’, was released in 2004, then ‘Pop Life’ in 2007, the latter a prescient title if ever there was one.
It’s hugely important to Guetta that he stays in touch with his roots, which is why ‘Nothing But The Beat’ includes a second disc of electronic instrumentals alongside the main disc of his trademark electro-pop. “The first part is more emotional, more songs, more human,” he says. “The second disc is synthesizer-based, it’s more technical and mechanical; pure club music. I know how to make those big pop records now. But I needed to feel true to myself, so I took the decision to make it a double album with one electronic disc. I didn’t want people who’ve been following me for years to feel left out. I feel like if I lose my original fans it’s over. Without those people that inspire me I’m just another pop producer. And I also wanted to use the success I’m having to introduce the urban community to more underground dance music. There’s a lot of people in America who don’t know anything about it.”
Staying in touch with his roots is also why Guetta hasn’t put together a live show with a band, as his record company wanted him to in the wake of ‘One Love’s success. “I asked myself, Why? I’ve been a DJ all my life, that’s what I do. It doesn’t make sense to change that. I didn’t want to go 100% pop. I want to take the club experience to new limits, but not lose its essence. I prefer to play two gigs at Brixton Academy than the O2 Arena in London, even though I could fill the O2.” Guetta challenged the traditional “live” show format and has taken DJing as an art form to another level. His show is a live mix of his music and more underground electronic tracks, a mind-blinding light-show; a true sensory, euphoric experience for his legions of loyal fans who follow his every energetic move. To see him perform is like watching a puppet-master. A true heavy hitter, regularly headlining festivals in front of 80,000 strong crowds at pure electronic and multi-genre festivals alike. He’s played to a million people at Berlin’s Love Parade and last year he bettered that when he played to two million people at the Salvador de Bahia carnival in Brazil. He is, by a long chalk, the biggest DJ in the world. But like with his productions, he will never leave his roots behind and still plays in intimate clubs til 7am. His residency at F*** Me I’m Famous in Ibiza is one of the most celebrated club-nights in the world.
World class pop producer and superstar DJ, either one would be enough for most other people, but Guetta doesn’t see why he has to pick one or the other. “One of the hardest things about being an artist is knowing who you are. It took me 15 years to find out. What I realised is that I can refuse to choose one camp,” he says. “People want to put me in a box, but I refused to allow that to happen. But I’ve always been like that. I’m not trying to be credible, I’m trying to be incredible.”
Mission accomplished.
'NOTHING BUT THE BEAT' - the tracklisting is now revealed!
This outstanding masterpiece is a double album with a vocal side featuring the world’s greatest talents and a pure electronic side of futuristic, instrumental tracks, where he shows he may be the biggest pop producer on the planet right now but why he is still the No1 beat-meister and DJ in club culture.
Album featuring list
Afrojack, Akon, Avicii, Chris Brown, Dev, Flo Rida, Jennifer Hudson, Jessie J, Lil Wayne, Ludacris, Nicki Minaj, Sia, Snoop Dogg, Taio Cruz, Timbaland, Usher, will.i.am…
Vocal Side
1. Where Them Girls At Feat. Flo Rida & Nicki Minaj
2. Little Bad Girl Feat. Taio Cruz & Ludacris
3. Turn Me On Feat. Nicki Minaj
4. Sweat – Snoop Dogg vs David Guetta
5. Without U Feat. Usher
6. Nothing Really Matters Feat. will.i.am
7. I Can Only Imagine Feat. Chris Brown & Lil Wayne
8. Crank It Up Feat Akon
9. I Just Wanna F Feat. Timbaland & Dev
10. Night Your Life Feat. Jennifer Hudson
11. Repeat Feat Jessie J
12. Titanium Feat. Sia
Electronic side
1. The Alphabeat
2. Lunar (David Guetta & Afrojack)
3. Sunshine (David Guetta & Avicii)
4. Little Bad Girl - Club Instrumental
5. Metro Music
6. Toy Story
7. The Future (David Guetta & Afrojack)
8. Dreams
9. Paris
10. Glasgow
I'm A Machine Feat. Cri$tyle (iTunes Exclusive)
Album international release date 29th August 2011
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This biography was provided by the artist or their representative.
