Like Really Quick: DJ DanceAlone on his new album “ACCEPTANCE”
DJ DanceAlone
DJ DanceAlone hops on Like Really Quick to talk about his new album “ACCEPTANCE” dropping on April 20 through the Black Techno Matters label.
Watch the full Like Really Quick episode with DJ DanceAlone here.
Memphis-based producer Darnell Stewart, known as DJ DanceAlone, creates electronic music that challenges conventional boundaries—which is highly evident in his new album, ACCEPTANCE, dropping on April 20 through the Black Techno Matters label.
In this episode of Like Really Quick, he reveals the three elements that define his sonic signature: immersive harmonies that pull you in, textural experimentation that keeps you guessing, and the deliberate infusion of Black cultural elements that honor techno's roots.
"Black Techno matters for representation," DJ DanceAlone explains. "The world fell in love with techno but didn't necessarily fall in love with the people and community it comes from."
The album ACCEPTANCE confronts America's current political climate—a musical meditation on navigating troubled waters. The album artwork tellingly depicts a person in a small boat faced with a massive entity rising from the sea—a metaphor for facing overwhelming adversity while holding onto hope for survival.
His creative process is refreshingly unorthodox: he once started five tracks daily for weeks before selecting favorites to complete. Now armed with algorithmic tools like the Composers Desktop Project, he "morphs sounds together" to create something entirely new. "The best way to stay creative is to constantly have new colors or tools to play with,” he says.
ACCEPTANCE marks DJ DanceAlone’s sophomore release with Black Techno Matters—their 25th digital album—continuing their mission of amplifying authentic voices in electronic music. Listen to the journey when it drops this Sunday.
ACCEPTANCE by DJ DanceAlone drops April 20 through Black Techno Matters
What are three things you like to express through your music?
Three things I like to express to my music would be some form of harmony. For me, the harmony kind of connects me to a lot of music. I like a lot of music that has like—a good bassline is always fantastic, but I really love it when there's like a good pad in a song or good strings or just interesting texture.
That would be the second thing I like to express through my music is interesting textures. I like to try and find ways that how I feel I can put it into either the rhythm pattern or the line itself or the harmony.
I think the last thing I like to do is kind of mix Black cultural elements into my music, so to speak. Just to kind of give that flavor. I try not to let things get to dead or boring or too repetitive. And I kind of try to spice things up with that.
So why does Black Techno really matter?
Black techno matters for a sense of representation of the from the people or the community that spawned the genre in the first place. The world sort of fell in love with techno, but they kind of didn't necessarily fall in love with the people, the community that it comes from.
So it is a very big deal that people hear and people see that that community still exists and is still very much creating. That is why it matters to me specifically.
How do you stay creative?
I stay creative by just trying things. I don't like to do too much of the same thing over and over again. I like to try stuff that maybe didn't work. Or if I tried, it didn't work out. I'll try to write down what I did and then try something like it later.
I used to have a track schedule where I would basically start five songs a day, ad I just wouldn't finish them. And I would do that for about 2 to 3 weeks. And then at the end of the month, I would pick the five songs that I liked the most, and I would just finish those songs. That way I never have to worry about writer's block, because it's always just, what do I want to finish today?
But I'm not really doing that anymore. I'm more just—I write down what I want to create or what I want to get. Like say I want a rhythm that feels like an engine or try to mesh a bass line with a sound effect or key change in a pad style. And I'll try to use an algorithm to kind of make the two things sound the same.
And I'll write that all out. Then I'll try it in the studio and try to make it work. I use a lot of algorithmic tools now that I didn't used to use, I highly recommend the Composers Desktop Project. It's basically like a programing language that can allow you to literally morph two sounds together.
And I use the SoundShaper graphical user interface. But basically, I feel like the best way for anyone to stay creative is to constantly have new colors or new tools to play with.