After Kaytranada’s recent release on HW&W Recordings I was interested to find out what other gems this Los Angeles label was hiding. This search brought me to the SoundCloud of Ontario producer, Elaquent. I was immediately hooked on his sound after listening to his remix of Huron River Drive, and the tracks kept getting better as I progressed through his catalog. A few words with his manager, William Cole, later and I was sitting in the California sun with a blue Gatorade in one hand and my phone connected to Skype in the other. Enjoying that track up above? Well, read on, there’s plenty more where that came from.
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Tell us a bit about yourself.
My name is Elaquent. Beat-maker, producer, hip-hop, a little electronic. I’m from Guelph, Ontario. I’ve been doing this for a few years now.
What do you produce with?
I’m all software. I use Fruity Loops with a bunch of midi interfaces and I have an SP-404 that I rock with for live sets.
How did you get started making music?
For me, always being a hip-hop fan as a kid my older brother briefly got into rapping and we always had this ‘whatever you can do, I can do better’ sort of mentality. I wasn’t a very good rapper, haha, but I liked production so I got curious in the 8th grade and I’ve kept doing it since then.
Really? That’s pretty young.
Yeah, well I mean I wasn’t good back then… I was just clicking boxes and I didn’t really care, haha. It wasn’t until university really that I tried to be somewhat serious with it.
How would you describe your style?
That’s tough to say. I always throw hip-hop as the main foundation, but I think I’m more well known for my laidback, vibing, almost neo-soul type stuff. But I guess I go through phases. Like I went through this video game phase where I did nothing but 8-bit Nintendo kinda stuff. Ultimately though I guess I’d describe my style as… I dunno! I don’t really trip out too much on labels, I just make what I like.
Do you think that where you live has an impact on your sound?
Well, Guelph…
…Does it have a good music scene for what you make?
As far as specific stuff that I do… no, haha. At least, if there is a good scene I’ve clearly been living under a rock. That doesn’t really bother me though, I don’t want to be defined so much by where I come from. Some people don’t even know that I’m Canadian at all and that’s fine, all that matters is that I keep making stuff that I enjoy making.
Who would your biggest influences be then? If it’s not the city that you’re from then you have to have some artists that play a large role in shaping your sound.
I guess it depends on my mind-frame and when you listen to my songs you can make some pretty educated guesses as to who I grew up idolizing. Guys like Dilla and Mad Lib, that’s not really a surprise to anyone. Some of my biggest influences come from my friends, to be honest. Guys that are doing good music too.
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I hope you all enjoyed learning about our Introducing artist this week. Be sure to check out the links down below for more from Elaquent!
Elaquent on:
SoundCloud | Facebook | Twitter
About the Contributor
