Lao Discusses the Electronic Scene in Mexico City and Taking His Labels Naafi and Extasis Global

Upon listening to the music of 28-year-old Lao, one might think that he grew up in or near London, and that his music was made after an adolescence fu

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Upon listening to the music of 28-year-old Lao, one might think that he grew up in or near London, and that his music was made after an adolescence full of raving and studying grime and jungle. However, Lao grew up in Mexico City and discovered grime (and all of UK dance music) via television and the Internet, some of it within the last year. While some of the dark, gritty aspects of his music may be coincidentally linked to traditions that came before him, it's clear that he deliberately makes music to circumvent the stereotypes surrounding Latin electronic producers who mostly expand on cumbia, baile funk, kuduro, and so on.

Lao is not only a producer and DJ, he's a vital facilitator in Mexico City's club nights and operates two labels, Naafi and Extasis. Naafi encompasses the wider scope of dance music, while Extasis is more experimental and art-driven. In having his hands on the marketing and presentation of so many other artists, Lao has learned the best way to create his own music and promote it.

Lao came to Red Bull Music Academy Tokyo as a participant, where he got to play at Unit for DBS alongside fellow participant Ekali and headliners Mala & Coki and GOTH-TRAD. We caught up with him in Tokyo to learn about how he got access to various types of music from Mexico City and why he quit his job to come to RBMA and begin a new chapter in his career.

How would you describe the electronic music scene in Mexico City right now? How is it different from the way it was when you were growing up?

I didn’t get into electronic music or the scene in Mexico City until I was 15-years-old. For some people, that's considered late. That was when I first saw a turntable and someone actually DJing with vinyl for the first time. No one was really using vinyl, because in Mexico it's way too expensive to get, and not just the turntables. The clubs just don't have the infrastructure.

In the mid-2000s, I was in high school, and I got involved with a group of friends. It was the beginning of the "laptop era" of making music, and it was mostly for geeks and nerds and all that. I was introduced to ambient, dub, techno, and generally digital styles of dub-influenced music. I got hooked up with Basic Channel Sound, these guys from Berlin...

Was this all online I’m assuming?

Well, it was the early 2000s, so it was way different. I remember the first time I went to see a DJ—a real DJ set—they were playing this acid jazz/drum & bass thing. After that I erased almost everything from my computer that wasn’t electronic.

Before that, I wasn’t part of the MTV generation. So after my favorite shows, which my mother didn’t want me to see, like Beavis and Butt-head, there was this late night show called 120 Minutes. That show introduced me to music by LFO and Aphex Twin. When I first listened to Aphex Twin, it was life-changing. That’s why I have this. [Points to tattoo on arm] I’m such a fanboy, and Japan’s crazy about him, too. They have the symbol everywhere, so it’s cool.

Yeah, the logo is on almost every single locker in every club in Tokyo!

People ask me if I just got it. I’m like, “No man! I got this years ago.” I was so into that music. I wasn't into punk music, but I was a rebellious kid. I don’t know why I hated rock or music that came from the blues. I just wanted to be into strictly electronic music. So, I started working with some friends who were teaching me how to produce music. We were doing more experimental, minimal techno with dub and soundscapes. At the time people were into field recordings.

It was the beginning of the "laptop era," so everybody was experimenting in so many ways, yet everything was so limited. I remember having RAM and hard drive issues, all that. I got involved in the scene, which wasn't that alternative, but there was a small forum for us. We started this net label called Filtro in 2004, and then by 2007, there were like 16 or 17 releases. It was only friends, and we were getting a good response on the Internet. It was the pre-blog era, so even building the whole website was so difficult. Then, it was definitely just for nerds!

DJ culture arrived in Mexico in a strong way around 2005 - 2007. It came with tons of branded parties and was more electro and electro-clash. I didn’t like it that much. I was rebellious, so anti-dance floor; I don’t know why.

I realized that I was good at making dance patterns and grooves and all that. I was 18, and I established myself in making what I think is forward-thinking music, but always with an alternative, punk attitude. Nowadays I’m so happy. I’m running two labels—one with my friends called Naafi, and we’ve been supporting many people. We have almost 12 artists, and they're almost all from Mexico. We stand for something that we call “Peripherical rhythms,” which pushes the boundaries of the dance floor in Mexico. Nowadays, almost all the clubs interested in some kind of electronic music consider alternative to be disco and nu-disco, which is not my thing. I respect that, I have many friends who are doing that, and they are doing a great job and touring, but I’m interested in new forms of risky club music, emerging patterns, and rhythms from all over the world.

My struggle now is to get away from the kind of label you get being a guy from Mexico, like a "Latin guy." I want to work within my identity, but not directly like playing Cumbia and stuff. I even said no to my first gig in New York, because I didn’t think it was a good move. I’ve never been there, and they would have paid me, but they wanted me to play at this Cinco de Mayo party, which I wasn't comfortable with. This is a really good moment in the scene, and many people have high expectations, because Mexico is so huge.

Now, there are platforms for making new stuff. Kids who are like 16, 17, 18-years-old, are making grime and other music that's far away from the most common stuff.

Just judging from Twitter, it definitely seems like Mexico City's underground electronic scene is growing quickly. It seems like a lot of your music is inspired by music that originated elsewhere, particularly in England. Have you been there? How did you discover grime and jungle and just darker, grittier sounds in general?

I was and I am still such a nerd. Back in the day, like six or seven years ago, I would spend all day on Discogs, learning where the release was coming from and who the producers were. I think that making a song is only 50% of the job. Like I said, I was into Aphex Twin and LFO and all the old-school intelligent dance music, even though I have never seen those guys live. I've just never had the chance. Even Squarepusher, he was going to play in Mexico, but he cancelled. I'm glad he did, because it was an awful event and an awful festival.

I like reading. I’ve been watching all the documentaries I can get. While I'm here at RBMA Tokyo, I’m glad that I’m meeting dBridge. I’m not really into drum & bass, but I really like learning the roots of it. Even though it’s music, you should download and read about it.

I used to write about music, too. I had this blog in 2009 or 2010. My intention was to write about the artists I like from all over the world. I was writing reviews and putting everyone on the same level: people I was meeting on SoundCloud, people from Mexico and Latin America, and people who were bigger, too. I’m still doing it everyday. I write a comment or just get in touch with people. That’s how I get into knowing the roots of some sounds.

For example, Zebra Katz, who's a participant here—I met him four years ago on SoundCloud. We just met in-person here for the first time, and I was his DJ for the performance he did at Harlem before Just Blaze and Marley Marl. Everyone was asking me, “You knew Zebra from before? Are you his regular DJ?” And I just said, “No I met him Saturday, same as you!”

The social part of music is so important to me, and it’s one of the things I wrote in my RBMA application. What I want to take back home is that experience, getting to know other people and the environment, and how they manage to be here, because most of the guys here are into risky or more alternative music. I'm not a passive fan. I'm a guy who writes to people to get in touch, and I'm such a nerd. I don’t go to parties that much. Getting to know how people came up with their sound, like jungle or grime, is important to me.

I just got into grime last year, and I don’t know it well. I know I don’t want to stick with the genre by itself, but I want to know the roots, and how, technically, they were doing it back in the day so that it will make sense to me.

Yeah, I can hear the grime influence in some of your recent stuff on Soundcloud. Instrumental grime is having a moment right now, but I don’t know if that’s just wishful thinking. Tell me about your label Extasis and also your involvement with the label Naafi.

Yeah, this one? [Points to Naafi T-shirt]

I started Naafi with Fausto Bahia, Mexican Jihad, and Paul Marmota. We wanted to make an Internet-based label with no geography—more of a global thing—and the output is more abstract electronic music. There are dancing tracks there, but they are alternative in many ways.

I started Extasis with a friend, and it's more about reflection. I don’t know how to put in words. I mostly do the A&R and production stuff—getting the graphic designer, making the video, and uploading everything. I do the mastering myself, even though I’m not the mastering guy.

I like to establish a dialogue with people. We’ve done 16 releases with people from all over the world, and the 15th release was a compilation. Generally the people who love Extasis' records are more into the art stuff. Even the few interviews that we've put out as Extasis records are in like weird art magazines from other countries.

I think the artists' approach is more complex—music that’s not straight to the dancefloor but has something to say. It’s alternative, and it’s Internet-based, and we want it to be that way—working in micro-genres and small markets and more niche sounds.

It sounds like Extasis is more about creating for expression than anything else. For your solo career, do you aspire to work with more vocalists? Have you been working with vocalists here at the Academy?

Even though I’m into electronic music, I'm such a fan of the most pop songs, like Top 40 songs. There’s a whole science behind them that I’m always fascinated by. Have you seen the Lady Gaga "Judas" Wikipedia page? There are three pages of information. It’s amazing to know that the strings were recorded in L.A., the voices were engineered in New York, and so on. Even if you don’t like the song, you can listen to it for 30 seconds, and then you have the tune in your head for the next month. There’s a science behind that.

In the future one of my goals is to be a record producer for really pop songs, and it’s weird. Many people don’t believe it. Since I don’t know vocalists, I usually put songs on my SoundCloud as bootlegs, because I’ve been using vocals or acapellas that I’ve found, just to learn the structures of mainstream of pop music. I think that the more I get to work with vocalists, the less I'll want to make things that are abstract. I’ll do some really straight-forward pop.

Yeah, I can respect a lot of bad pop music in its ability to simply reach people. I think producers can exist on both sides if they want. Richie Hawtin was definitely talking about growing at your own pace when he talked about Grimes going from an indie label in Montreal to 4AD and now Roc Nation. You've been at the front row of almost every lecture here.

Yeah, these are people who I’m not really sure if I will ever see again. I don’t want to miss the opportunity. I'm getting the answers now, and I think this is the best place to get them. Because I’m in Naafi, I’m responsible for most of the alternative dance parties that happen in Mexico, and at some point, even though we’re not producing all of the things we do, we are the connection point to these friends or to people who have connections and want to have a party. At some point, they contact us to do a better negotiation, because everybody has an agent. We’ve established personal relationships with many artists, especially with people from the Fade to Mind crew and GHE20G0TH1K, which we were just fans of before. There's mutual support. We’re selling way more merch in Korea and other parts of the world than in Mexico or in L.A. We realized that we can fill a club with people and make a party there and they know our stuff and it’s really interesting. Here in Tokyo, I have fans coming up to me for the first time in my life saying, “Can I take a picture with you?” The first day I was here, someone said, “You're from Mexico? You’re Lao right?” Traveling helps you realize how you influence people or at least if people like what you’re doing.

I've loved working with Dorian Concept. He’s here all day, and he’s such a nice guy. Everyone here knows that it’s the mentors' job to be critical in their arguments or opinions about our music, and I find that it’s a really good, professional way to work. Seeing Dorian Concept's show and then working with him in the studio right after is an amazing thing.

Has Japan or Japanese music had an influence on you even before RBMA? I thought it was really sick that you were on the bill for the DBS night with Mala & Coki and GOTH-TRAD.

Yeah, at some point, I wanted to start making more melodic stuff but also drum tracks. I found traditional music from Japan, like from the Noh Theater, it’s a very specific drama theater, which involves music and drums, like Samurai music. Before coming here this year, I was definitely into Japanese drums. They have a really flashing or bright sound, and it reminds me of the cartoons I used to watch as a kid like Dragon Ball Z or something with swords crashing a lot. There’s music for sword-fighting here, and that's really interesting.

What are you going to do after the experience here at RBMA? It seems like you’re someone who’s really savoring it and understands the opportunity you have here.

I quit my job before I came here. I made a commitment to myself to get a job related to music when I go back. I’ve been starting to give lessons to kids, not in full production but in remixing. I want to work on an album. I have labels that have asked me for EPs, and I’ve been working on that, but I want to do a full album because I think the process is different. I studied film and cinema, so I would love to tell a story that way. I want to do a live show, continue DJing, and play more outside of Mexico City.

I'm just going to go full-time into music, which wasn't the case until I got here.

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