You know, usually when we look at the map of
a traditional music career, there is this expectation
of a very linear geographical progression. Right,
like a literal road trip. Exactly. You start
by playing the local bars in your hometown, then
maybe, you know, you conquer your home state.
And if you're really lucky, you get a regional
tour. You just slowly, methodically expand your
borders. Yeah, it's a very sequential climb.
And I think we are deeply conditioned to like
success stories that we can trace with a highlighter
on a map. You know, tracking the artist step
by step, city by city until they finally hit
the coasts. Oh, totally. But then you step into
the world of electronic dance music and suddenly
that traditional map is just completely broken.
It really is. And that's exactly what we're looking
at today. We're looking at a career trajectory
that honestly defies all traditional geography.
It's less like a road trip and more like someone
stood in the American Midwest put on a blindfold,
threw a dart, and somehow that dart landed dead
center in a London nightclub. Which is the absolute
definition of a hyper -connected borderless musical
landscape. I mean, the old rules of physical
proximity just do not apply when your primary
instrument is a laptop and an internet connection.
Completely. Which brings us to our mission for
you today. Welcome to our latest Deep Dives.
I'm your host, and I'm joined as always by our
resident music industry expert. Hey, everyone.
So glad to be here. We are tracing the fascinating
trajectory of an electronic music breakthrough,
and we're using the career of American DJ and
producer Jay Faye, who was born Joshua Fagan,
as our ultimate case study. example to dig into.
It really is. We're going to figure out how an
artist builds a career from releasing tracks
locally in St. Louis, Missouri all the way to
hitting the absolute top of the international
charts. And spoiler alert, it involves the intricate
art of the remix, the rework, and some incredibly
strategic collaboration. And what makes this
specific deep dive so compelling for anyone listening
right now is that we aren't just looking at what
this artist achieved. We are really pulling back
the curtain on the mechanics of how electronic
music actually operates. Right, the nuts and
bolts of it. Yeah, exactly. We're looking at
how a beat gets built, broken down, and rebuilt
to conquer the world. So let's jump right into
the foundation phase. Every artist has one, you
know, that period where you're just trying to
make a dent in the universe. For Jay Faye, we're
looking at the year 2012. Ah, huge year. A massive
year. And I want to set the scene for you, because
this wasn't just a slow trickle of music while
he figured out his sound. This was an explosive
entry characterized by sheer relentless volume.
It was a total blitz. I mean, the output is staggering
when you look at the dates on these source materials.
OK, let's unpack this, because on Valentine's
Day, February 14, 2012, he drops his debut EP,
Bonkers, via the Young Robots label. Right. Then,
less than two months later, on April 3rd, he
releases his second EP titled OPS, but this time
on TNA Records. Yeah. That is two entirely different
EPs on two different labels in under eight weeks.
Which is wild. In the traditional pop or rock
music industry, that schedule would give a PR
team a collective heart attack. Oh, absolutely.
You're supposed to milk one release for an entire
year, touring it, promoting it, you know, really
stretching it out. But wait, because that is
just the original music. In that exact same calendar
year, 2012, he releases eight different official
remixes for a wildly diverse roster of artists.
Eight. It's just, it's a lot. It is. I want to
read this list just to give you a sense of the
spread here. He is remixing Bro Safari, Baraka
Somsistema, Bailey Smalls, Felix Kartal, featuring
Maja Iverson, Craze, Starslinger, Phono, and
The Hood Internet. It is a massive undertaking
for a single producer. It is. And I actually
have a major problem with this strategy. Doesn't
this violate the most basic rules of supply and
demand, and frankly, just human burnout? You
would think so, yeah. I was trying to picture
this work rate. It's basically like a chef deciding
to open two brand new original restaurants. In
the span of two months. Yes. And while he's trying
to run those two new spots, he is simultaneously
doing guest chef takeover spots in eight other
kitchens all around the city. Usually, if you
spread yourself that thin, the food is going
to taste terrible. You burn out and you release
garbage. How did he not just dilute his brand
with all of this? Well, what's fascinating here
is the underlying strategy of that specific work
rate and how digital music production really
differs from traditional bands. Okay, how so?
When you're producing electronically, you aren't
booking expensive studio time or, like, coordinating
five band members to show up on time. You're
working in a software ecosystem where ideas can
be sketched, tested, and exported rapidly. Right,
you just need your laptop. Exactly. But beyond
just the workflow, flow, remixing other artists'
tracks acts as a highly effective, deliberate
form of musical networking. I'm still stuck on
the logistics, though. How does a kid in St.
Louis even get the isolated audio tracks to remix
an artist like Baraka Somsistema? Are they just
cold emailing these global acts? Sometimes it
is a cold email, yeah. Sometimes it's labels
connecting their artists behind the scenes, or
sometimes they're entering official remix competitions.
The logistics of acquiring the audio of the stems
is only half the battle. Think about the cross
-pollination happening here. Braca Sam Sistema,
for example, is a massive Portuguese group famous
for kuduro music. Let's pause there for the listener
for a second. What does kuduro actually sound
like? Oh, Kuduro is this incredibly energetic,
fast -paced electronic dance music that originated
in Angola. It has this frantic, heavy, complex
percussion, usually sitting around like 130 to
140 beats per minute. And it has a very specific,
dedicated global fan base. So when Jay Faye remixes
a Kuduro track, he is effectively... introducing
his signature Midwestern bass heavy production
style to a pre -existing dedicated fan base that
might never have heard of him otherwise. So he's
basically hacking their audience. It is a brilliant
algorithmic hack, but executed manually. You
know, before Spotify playlists and TikTok algorithms
entirely dictated music discovery, the remix
was the algorithm. That makes so much sense.
Right. You take a song people already love, you
inject your unique production DNA into it, and
suddenly... Fans of Starslinger or Craze are
checking the liner notes going, who produced
this remix? I need to hear more from this JFAY
guy. You're building your name across multiple
different geographical and genre scenes simultaneously.
You can only hijack other people's audiences
for so long, though, before your own sound starts
demanding its own spotlight. And I think that
brings us perfectly to 2013, which really feels
like the incubator phase. Yeah, that scattershot
networking in 2012 really pays off. The industry
actually starts paying attention to his solo
work. Right. The groundwork starts yielding tangible
results. When you prove you can deliver high
quality remixes reliably, you level up to bigger
platforms. And we see that shift in the data,
clearly. In January 2013, Jay Faye gets a solo
track called Dibby Dibby featured on a compilation
album released by T &A Records called Moombahton
forever. And simultaneously, his remix game elevates
to much heavier hitters in the UK, right? Oh
yeah. He's remixing Friction, and he does a track
for Scream featuring Scruffyzer, P -Money, and
Reeker Dan called Kingpin. Plus a remix for Amplify
Dot's Track Outlaw. Which is huge. Scream and
Friction are massive foundational pillars in
UK bass and drum and bass music. That is a very
serious evolution from the 2012 roster, but that
compilation album placement is just as crucial.
I want to focus on that compilation, actually,
because I think a lot of us hear a compilation
album and we just think of like a random mixtape
you burn for a road trip. Yeah, a bunch of random
hits. Right. But in this context, I was wondering,
is a curated genre compilation like Mubat and
Forever essentially acting like a tech incubator?
How do you mean? Well, like a startup showcase.
An artist puts their specific product, their
single track on display, in this highly curated
environment alongside other promising startups,
just hoping it catches the eye of a major investor.
That is a perfect analogy. Compilation albums
in dance music aren't just collections of songs.
They plant a flag in the sand. They are definitive
cultural statements. So by releasing a track
on Moombahton Forever, JFAY wasn't dropping a
single into the void. He was explicitly aligning
his sound with a very specific, highly hyped
movement. And for anyone listening who isn't
deep into 2010's electronic sub -genres, what
is Moonbottom? Like, what are we physically hearing
when we play that record? Imagine taking a classic
pounding house music beat, but you slow the tempo
way down to about 108 beats per minute and you
infuse it with the rhythmic groove of reggaeton.
Oh, nice. Yeah, it has this thick tropical swinging
bounce to it. At the time, the entire industry
was watching Moon Button to see if it would become
the next global pop trend. So all the major ladle
A &R scouts, the big festival headliners, they're
monitoring these compilations like a menu for
what to invest in next. Exactly. They use them
for. curatorial validation. If Teen A Records
says J -Face Track is the sound of Moonbottom
Forever, the rest of the industry takes note.
Which perfectly sets up the next domino to full.
Because that showcase track, Dibby Dibby, did
exactly what an incubator product is supposed
to do. It caught the ear of a major player. leading
us straight into the 2014 breakthrough. The alchemy
of the rework. Yes, the rework. Yeah. Because
in February 2014, we get the release of the massive
breakthrough single, Dibby Dibby Sound. But look
at the credits on this. It is credited to DJ
Fresh versus Jay Faye, featuring vocals from
English singer, Mrs. Dynamite. That is a powerhouse
main stage lineup right there. It really is.
But here's where it gets really interesting.
I'm looking at the mechanics of how this song
actually came to exist, and I am genuinely confused.
That's tripping you up. Well... The sources note
that this 2014 hit heavily samples Jay Faye's
original 2013 instrumental track, Dibby Dibby.
How do you sample yourself? Did you just rip
his own audio file and slap DJ Fresh's name on
it to get radio play? Not at all. It is a much
more involved structural process than simply
repackaging an old song. The sources show that
Jay actually reworked the song with DJ Fresh.
Right. And then Mrs. Dynamite's vocals were added
later. To wrap my head around this, I pictured
it like real estate. It's like Jay Faye built
a really great sturdy foundational house in 2013
with that moon batten track. The framing is excellent.
The location is great. Right. But then a wildly
famous architect, DJ Fresh, comes along, tours
the house and says, I love this structure, but
let's renovate it together so we can sell it
for millions. I love that. So they knock down
some walls, add a new roof, reinforce the base,
and finally they bring in a celebrity interior
decorator, Mrs. Dynamite, to finish the rooms
and give it that final, undeniable curb appeal.
This raises an important question for anyone
listening who might be used to rock, pop, or
country music. In those genres, a song is generally
written, recorded, mixed. And then it is considered
a finished, static object. You don't usually
go back and change the drums a year later. Right,
it's done. It's pressed on a CD or vinyl, and
that's it. But in electronic music, a track is
incredibly fluid. It is raw material. It's more
like clay than marble. Exactly that. What we
are seeing here is the collaborative alchemy
unique to the dance music industry. You have
an instrumental club track, J -Phase Original,
Dibby Dibby. It works great for DJs and underground
clubs. But DJ Fresh, here's something bigger.
Yeah. DJ Fresh, who is a veteran at manufacturing
mainstream radio -friendly chart hits in the
UK, here's the potential for a larger audience.
So they take the original stems, the isolated
individual audio tracks of the kick drum, the
synths, the bass line, and they rebuild the entire
beat together. They make it punchier, wider,
and more aggressive. And then the vocals get
layered on top of that new architecture. Right.
In electronic music, we call that the top line.
They lay a vocal top line over this newly renovated
beat. Mrs. Dynamite brings this incredible, energetic
reggae dance hall vocal delivery that acts as
the perfect glue. It completely transforms a
cool underground instrumental into an undeniable
pop dance anthem. And undeniable is the perfect
word because the geography of where this hit
exploded is absolutely fascinating. It really
is. We have a kid from St. Louis, Missouri, creating
a track that gets renovated by a UK drum and
bass legend with vocals from a British MC. So
what does this all mean when we look at the actual
charts? It means we get a front row seat to how
hyper -regional the spread of dance music really
is. Global hits don't actually hit everywhere
globally at the same time. The numbers are wild.
If you were tracking this in 2014... Dibby Dibby
Sound reaches number two on the UK dance chart.
It hits number three on the main UK singles chart.
And it hits number three on the Scottish charts.
Total undeniable domination in the United Kingdom.
Which makes perfect sense given the collaborators
involved and the specific sonic profile of the
track. But then you look across the English Channel
to mainland Europe. specifically Belgium, and
the data gets so incredibly specific and weird.
Oh, Belgium chart data is always a trip. In the
Flanders region of Belgium, the track hits number
40 on their main chart. But in the Wallonia region
of Belgium, it completely misses the main Ultra
Top 50 chart. Instead, it hits number 40 on the
Ultra Tip chart. Ah, the infamous Ultra Tip.
I had to look this up because it sounds made
up. The Ultra Tip is literally a chart. specifically
designed for the top 50 songs that are bubbling
under the main chart. It's the almost made it
chart. It's a very specific metric. I am just
marveling at the weirdness of global music metrics
here. It's like a movie becoming a massive record
breaking blockbuster in New York City, but only
playing at one single indie theater in Los Angeles.
How does a track utterly dominate Scotland, but
hover on a highly specific bubbling under chart
in one half of Belgium? Well, it is a brilliant
illustration of how cultural infrastructure dictates
chart success. You have to look at the history
of these specific regions. The UK has a massive
decades long sound system culture. Right. They
have historically embraced heavy bass, Jamaican
sound clash influences, and high tempo electronic
beats. It is baked into their radio DNA. So when
a track drops featuring Mrs. Dynamite spitting
dancehall style vocals over a heavy rebuilt moon
button beat, it feels like a natural evolution
for a listener in London or Glasgow. It is instantly
recognizable to their musical palette. But mainland
Europe is different. A country like Belgium is
divided into distinct cultural and linguistic
spheres. Dutch speaking Flanders and French speaking
Wallonia. OK. If that makes sense. Pop radio
in Wallonia might be leaning towards entirely
different tempos, perhaps slower, more melodic
styles of house music or French pop at that exact
moment in 2014. So the environment just wasn't
primed for a frantic UK bass track. Exactly.
The club DJs in Wallonia were likely playing
it, which is why it hits the ultra tip, it's
bubbling under, because there is club heat. But
it didn't cross over to their mainstream pop
radio in the frictionless way it did in the UK.
It shatters the illusion that a global hit is
a monolithic event. Music moves through different
cultures at vastly different speeds. So after
you achieve that mainstream chart success, you've
shared a marquee with DJ Fresh. hit with Ms.
Dynamite, you were sitting at the top of the
UK charts looking down. What does the producer
do next? Do they just move to Los Angeles and
chase the next pop star? Some certainly try to
do that, yeah. But the producers who actually
maintain longevity in this industry usually return
to their core identity. Which is exactly what
we see in the final part of our data today. In
2015, the year after the massive pop success,
Jay Faye releases a non -album single called
Trunk. and it is a collaboration with an artist
named Signal .Noise. A very different vibe. I
have to point out the contrast here. Yeah. After
all the glitter and the massive chart placements,
putting out a standalone track with Signal .Noise
feels like a very deliberate, purposeful step
backward. It feels like returning to the underground
collaborative trenches of the dance world. Why
give up the pop spotlight? If we connect this
to the bigger picture. This is the true life
cycle of a working DJ and producer. It's not
a straight line up to the pop charts followed
by a comfortable retirement. You don't just win
the game and stop playing. Never. The massive
chart hit the dibby -dibby sound that is a spectacular
milestone. It raises your international profile,
it brings in significant publishing revenue,
and it introduces your name to millions of casual
listeners. But the career itself... The day -to
-day reality and emotional survival of being
an electronic artist is sustained by a continuous
loop of creating, collaborating with your peers,
and releasing independent tracks. It's like going
back to the gym the morning after you win the
championship. You still have to do the reps.
And you critically need to do the reps because
that peer -to -peer collaboration is where the
new sounds are actually forged. A track like
Trunk with Signal .Noise is how an artist stays
grounded in the scene that birthed them. It keeps
them relevant. It keeps their ear to the ground.
If you only chase the pop charts, you lose the
foundational respect of the clubs. And in dance
music, the club is your actual home. Without
the club, you have no testing ground for your
ideas. That brings everything full circle so
beautifully. When we trace this journey, we start
with Joshua Fagan in a St. Louis bedroom. Then
we move to that absolutely relentless 2012 grind
of putting out two entirely different EPs and
hacking the algorithms by doing eight remixes
in a single calendar year. The Blitz that built
the network. The Blitz, which led directly to
the strategic incubation of his solo track, Dibby
Dibby, on a curated compilation which then triggered
that incredible collaborative explosion with
DJ Fresh and Mrs. Dynamite, taking a Midwestern
kid to the absolute peak of the UK and Scottish
charts. It's a masterclass in how modern music
actually travels, not by touring in a van, but
by sending audio files across oceans. And it
shows how a hit is actually built piece by piece,
stem by stem, collaborator by collaborator. Which
leaves us with a final thought I want you to
chew on today. The next time you are listening
to a massive hit song, especially an electronic
dance track, ask yourself, how many iterations,
how many self samples, and how many different
producers' hands did that exact track pass through
before it finally reached your ears? It's rarely
just one person. Are we ever really listening
to just one finished song? Or are we just tuning
into the final polished stage of a years -long
musical conversation? Think about that map we
started with and how many detours that dart took
before it finally hit the bullseye.