Stereofox Mini Mix://34 – Artist [Emzhi]

I first stumbled upon emzhi thx to his awesome collaboration with Oceans titled "breathe". I was quite impressed by the 2 producers and invited both to be part of our mini mix series.

Hope you guys enjoy the interview I did with Matthew and explore the talent of this promising young producer!

TRACKLIST:

Hey Matthew! Very happy to have you as part of our mini mix series. Before anything, could you share some information about yourself?

Thanks for having me. My name is Matthew Gooden, and I’m a 19 year old teenager from Los Angeles, CA, that produces electronic music as a hobby. I’m currently in my second year of study at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, and I am studying Civil Engineering while playing Division 1 college soccer there.

Your mini mix is very bass-heavy. What was the inspiration behind it and how would you describe your mini mix in a sentence?

Yeah I would agree that it is bass heavy. As far as the inspiration behind it, I wanted to curate a list of songs that sum up the creative ideas and feelings that I try to put into my music. My music is a mix of high energy rhythms and slow vibes so I wanted my mix to be able to reflect that aspect of my music.

If I was to describe my mix in a sentence it would be this: If you’re in the mood to feel like you’re being transported to some higher dimension while staying on the ground at the same time, then listen to the mix.

How did you get into producing? Do you have any musical upbringing?

Music production for me started back in my freshman year of high school, when I decided to take an elective called Intro to Music Technology 1. I decided to take it based out of sheer curiosity; I was curious as to how producers like deadmau5, Skrillex, and Feed Me were able to design their synths, and I wanted to learn more about the production process as a whole. Once I had taken the first class, I knew music production was something I liked doing. Once the class finished for the semester, I downloaded FL Studio on my computer and started messing around with it.

As far as a musical upbringing, it stemmed out of being around music a lot when I was younger. My parents would play music throughout the house and in the car all the time, so I was exposed to a very wide range of eclectic music at an early age. As I got older I began to appreciate the music from an artistic/analytical perspective instead of just vibing along with it.

You seem to be quite an avid football fan. I know it's not the most popular sport in the States, so how did you start playing and how professional it is at this point?

I started playing when I was 4 years old, and I have been playing ever since until now. I started playing competitive club soccer when I was around 9 years old, and as I got older, I began to play in more competitive tournaments and leagues. At around 16 years old I began playing in the developmental Academy league, and played for the Chivas USA academy team at 18 years old.

At this point I’m currently in my second year of playing Division 1 college soccer, so it’s not considered professional in the sense of what level I am playing at. Although the time required to devote to it could be considered to be close to a professional amount.

I found your music from the collaboration you did with Oceans. How did you guys meet and what's the story behind the track? Are you real life friends or you rather have an online / soundcloud thing going on.

Well we met through soundcloud initially. He had randomly found my profile and followed me and I followed him back after listening to his music. A couple weeks after that I sent him a message asking him if he was interested in collaborating. He said he was interested and told me to send him a demo to see if he would want to work on it. So I got the idea of sampling Telepopmusik for the track since I wanted the song to have a catchy vibe to it, and Oceans liked it a lot. So we sent ideas back and forth for a couple of weeks before releasing it. Since it’s release it’s gotten over 60,000 plays so the song was a success. We knew each other through soundcloud for about 7-8 months before we met when he came out to LA for a couple days with his girlfriend. So I would consider him to be a real life friend.

You're based in LA - probably the most progressive bass/trap scene nowadays (at least that's how it seems from a European guy's perspective). What's your opinion on that - is there a strong sense of support or the fact that there are many producers out there makes things competitive?

In my opinion the electronic/bass scene in LA is constantly evolving and changing; there are always new genres and musical ideas that are pushing the scene in new directions. Since there are a lot of producers in LA, the competition is definitely there. It’s essentially one big race to see who can put out that new sound that everyone wants to emulate. The competition to be the new trendsetter is what’s driving the evolution of electronic music as a whole, not just in LA. I personally think the scene has hit the wall in the ideas and vibes that are coming out right now. Future Bass is the go to genre right now, and I think that will soon change since there are producers like me who are trying to find ways to push it in a new direction.

A photo posted by Matthew Gooden (@emzhimusic) on Nov 29, 2015 at 3:27pm PST

How does your average day look like?

I usually wake up at around 7:15 am to get ready for my 8:00 am class at school, and I’ll have about 3-4 classes during the day. During the middle of the day, I’ll have soccer practice and weight lifting, and then resume my classes after training. Once my classes are done I’ll start doing my homework which usually takes me 3-4 hours to complete on a daily basis. I’ll usually go to bed at around 11:30-12:00 am, and the next day will have a similar schedule.

If you could choose 2 or 3 artists to collaborate with, who would that be?

Mr. Carmack, Flume, and Rustie. Those three are my biggest influences on my music, so working with them would be crazy.

What's the hardest thing you had to sacrifice in the name of music?

This is an interesting question because I actually have to sacrifice music sometimes to make way for my school and soccer. My studies and soccer both take up a lot of my time, which forces me to have to very little time to work on my music. As a result, I have to treat music as a side hobby instead of something that is full-time. Being a student-athlete requires me to sacrifice a lot things to begin with like going out to parties and such, and music is unfortunately one of those things that can’t do very often because of my other priorities. Although if all I had was music, I would be doing it every day.

Thanks a lot, Matthew! It's been a real pleasure - any last words of wisdom / randomness?

Thanks for having me this has been awesome since this was my first interview about my music. I’d just like to say that if someone or a group of people tell you something you’re trying to accomplish can’t be done, just ignore them. As long as you’re honest with yourself, know your strengths and weaknesses, and surround yourself with positive people, then you can win at anything you firmly set your mind to.

Thanks again for having me!