If you’re enjoying drum & bass’ recent stateside resurgence, you have WORSHIP to thank for it.
The UK-hailing supergroup of genre titans Sub Focus (Nick Douwma), Dimension (Rob Etheridge), Culture Shock (James Pountney), and 1991 (Fred Webb) has been the driving force behind the high-BPM sound’s growth in the U.S. since live events roared back after the pandemic.
After conquering their home scene, the four producer-DJs made a concerted effort to bring the sound back to prominence with the youngest generation of American ravers, touring across the continent as a B4B and climbing the venue ladder to headline historic venues and events like Red Rocks, Los Angeles’ Palladium, Denver’s Mission Ballroom, Ultra Miami, and Electric Forest. But before they could be fully crowned the U.S. dance scene’s presiding D&B dons, there was one more mountain to summit: Coachella‘s famous Sahara stage.
After taking on Justin Bieber in a set conflict clash for the ages on the festival’s first weekend, the collective caught up with EDM Maniac before their weekend two performance to discuss making history as the first drum & bass artists to close the Sahara, how the show unveiled eight new tracks releasing under their collaborative moniker soon, and their mission to spread the genre globally by working together. This summer, they’re set for another big slot at Lollapalooza.
EDM Maniac: After a historic weekend one performance at the Sahara, you’re running it back again tonight. What did it feel like to step onto that stage on weekend one? What has stayed with you?
Dimension: It was amazing. It’s so nice to be back at Coachella. I played here years ago, so it’s amazing to be back as a group, and we were so happy with the response we got. We had a bit of a brutal set time, being on the same time as Bieber, but we’re really proud that we pulled a good crowd. It was an amazing show. The Sahara is just an insane stage to play on for dance music. It’s been one of our goals to play as a group, so it was amazing to finally make that happen.
EDM Maniac: What was it like going in knowing you were up against the Biebs? Any nerves?
Dimension: Definitely. When you’re walking up to the stage, all of the walk-up area is completely underneath the stage, so you have no view of what the crowd is. So literally the first time we saw who we were playing to was when we stepped out there.
EDM Maniac: It was a huge performance for you as artists, but also a huge performance for drum & bass, headlining that stage for the first time. What does it mean to you to represent the sound you’ve so proudly repped for your careers on arguably the biggest stage in music?
Sub Focus: We’ve all dedicated our lives to drum & bass. When you add up all our solo careers, it’s literally like 60 years of combined experience, and for us to all be here together as friends, and having that wealth of talent by your side, it just means so much for us. It’s been our life’s work, really, to come together and bring the genre that we love to this sort of stage. We’re really proud of our achievement, and we kind of feel like we’re only just getting started. It’s really exciting.
Culture Shock: It does feel like the beginning over here. We’ve actually been doing it for quite a while. We’ve been touring in the U.S. for a while, and it wasn’t connecting, but now it’s really starting to kind of surge.
1991: It’s quite interesting that the last time we were all together in this area was when we were doing our first WORSHIP tour, and we were kind of taking a break off in Joshua Tree. But that tour was just way smaller than anything we’ve done since. That’s when it kind of all started, was that first WORSHIP tour in 2020, and now we’re doing Coachella. It’s a really crazy full-circle moment.
EDM Maniac: Not that there aren’t others, but what does it mean to you to be the foremost figures pushing the genre here in the U.S. and globally?
Sub Focus: I definitely feel like we have a responsibility, as we’re representing our whole genre on these sort of stages. We want to be showing people the full breadth of the genre and spreading the gospel of D&B to people, showing what we feel is the best the genre has to offer.
EDM Maniac: From the Ultra Miami main stage to Red Rocks, it’s not the first time you’ve played massive stages. What’s it like to share those moments on and off stage with each other?
Dimension: We’ve all had our own solo careers, and touring by yourself can be really hard sometimes. The lack of sleep, the traveling. I think just having people who you respect and people you look up to by your side to bounce ideas off, not only touring, but also in the studio together, making music together, it’s just really inspiring.
I kind of get why bands exist now, and I get why people produce as duos, because sometimes someone will come up with an idea that you would have never thought of, and then you have that idea, and then your brain works differently. It’s just this constant snowballing of ideas, and I think together it’s a really powerful force.
Sub Focus: I think we just have a lot of fun on the road as well. We were joking about some of the vlogs with DJs; they’re basically talking about being jetlagged all the time. And when we started doing buddy tours together, I was like, ‘Hang on a second. This is really, really fun, just being all friends as a group.’
I think you also roll with the punches a little bit more. When you clash against Bieber on your own, you’re like, ‘This is a nightmare.’ But when you’re with friends, it allows you to sort of take the rough with the smooth a little bit more, because you’re in it together.
Culture Shock: Speaking of Bieber, I think it was quite a bold decision on our part to sort of go up against him. We thought we’d take that better set time in the darkness. And then he changed our time, got scared, so they moved us [laughing]. We may not have individually chosen to do that, but together, we’re more than the sum of our parts, and that comes across in the studio as well.
Sub Focus: I think it’s emboldening us. We’re being a bit more bold with some of the music we’re making together now.
Courtesy: WORSHIP. Credit: Sam Neill (@samneill.photo).
EDM Maniac: How did you all initially come together as friends?
Sub Focus: Me and James have known each other for the longest. We were signed to RAM Records in the noughties, Andy C’s label, so we were both mentored by Andy early on. We have quite a lot of overlapping friends, and that kind of started happening with all of the guys. I started finding myself hanging out more with Seb [WORSHIP manager Sebastian Weingartshofer] and Rob. Me and Rob wrote “Desire” together. Me and Freddie did a remix together. And so we were just weirdly finding ourselves doing the same things together, same shows. It just kind of evolved gradually from that.
Culture Shock: The whole thing is kind of an accidental process, really. The three of us, before Nick joined, we were on a tour in the U.S. and we were loving touring together, but the shows just weren’t connecting. And then when Nick joined, we decided to really go for it in the U.S. and kind of package our music in a way that was much more exciting for younger fans.
Sub Focus: We didn’t really feel like the genre was reaching its true potential out here. And we felt by showing it in a certain light, doing our own events, we could show it in a way that we felt was cooler than what was being done in the U.S. at the time.
Dimension: Yeah, we never actually sort of intended to play together. We got booked for a festival, because traditionally we’d play for an hour each night. Then they’re like, “We want you all to play.” When we did that, we realized the power of us all together.
EDM Maniac: What went into the creative direction of your Coachella show?
Dimension: It’s a huge amount of planning that goes into it. We’re hilariously using the same production company as Justin Bieber, so they’re having a crazy weekend. We considered to do something fresh and original. There’s four of us, so we decided to have four large monolith pillars, that kind of represent all four of us. We started that idea at Red Rocks, then transferred that to our own headline shows in New Zealand, and now we’re kind of doing that in Sahara. It’s a huge wide screen, so we had to think quite hard about how we could translate that. But we’re really happy with how the show worked.
Sub Focus: The way Human Person, the production company we work with, approached it was creating these 3D environments for the monoliths to be in. Almost like set design, but within the screens. I was really excited by that idea. Sometimes they’re static, but we’re lighting these, rather than crazy visuals that are moving around all the time. We’re kind of creating a set that we sit within.
Courtesy: WORSHIP. Credit: Sam Neill (@samneill.photo).
EDM Maniac: You also debuted eight new collaborative tunes, the first as WORSHIP, coming soon. How did you incorporate those moments into the set?
1991: We wanted to create bespoke moments for those songs, so there’s certain bits where there’s lyrics popping up, or certain visuals for certain songs, which feels really exciting. We’re really showcasing the stuff that we’ve been working on for the past few months.
Culture Shock: It’s quite funny, when there’s four of us, we’re often on our laptops, kind of competing with each other to make a sound that will fit at that moment. And there’s a lot of time pressure, so if you get on the controls and you want to express an idea, you kind of have a very short window in which to convince three other producers that this is the right direction to go in. It doesn’t give you much time. But the amazing thing is, there’s this thing you have when you get in the zone as a producer. You kind of have this magic moment where you’re not really overthinking anything, and the music just flows through. If there’s four of you in that period in the zone together, it’s quite an incredible feeling.
Dimension: A lot of people are quite curious, ‘Who does what? Who does the bass? Who does drums?’ But it’s easy to forget that we’ve literally all been doing everything ourselves forever. So we’re all really skilled in basically every sphere of making music. We kind of all just jump in together, and the best ideas win.
EDM Maniac: After all of these milestones, where is drum & bass headed next?
Dimension: I think Asia is a really exciting market. I’ve been going there quite a lot, doing lots of big festivals there. We’re going to be hopefully playing there really, really soon. Potentially playing South America, which is a new territory for us.
We kind of started from the bottom in America, and now we’re at Coachella, which is kind of like the Super Bowl of music, so we kind of want to do that again in Asia, because going there, tasting the food, meeting the people, smelling the smells, it’s just such an exciting place. And for me, that kind of just gives me a new lease of energy and something we can get our teeth stuck into.
Sub Focus: I think we want to take it to new places if we can, and spread the word as much as possible. South America is exciting me, Asia is exciting me, and I really want to see some U.S. drum & bass artists really cut through as well. There’s a lot of talent here, and I really want somebody to really break out. I think that’d be amazing for the scene here.
EDM Maniac: What other artists have you been most excited to see perform at Coachella?
Sub Focus: Nine Inch Noize. I saw a bit of that show last weekend, and it absolutely blew me away. I thought it was one of the best shows I’ve ever seen, to be honest. Today, I think we’re kind of in show mode.
Culture Shock: I’m gonna go check out Nine Inch Noize again because I didn’t have my earplugs at the time last weekend. But it’s the most incredible production I’ve ever seen. We saw a bit of Anyma last night, which was visually spectacular.
1991: I saw Turnstile yesterday, who I’ve been really excited to see for such a long time. That’s by far my favorite thing I’ve seen at the festival so far. It was so good. I love how they have a constant camera feed of the crowd, and it’s just constantly giving energy to the crowd, because you’re just seeing people go crazy on the screens. So much fun.
Dimension: My girlfriend is half South Korean, so I saw BIGBANG, and it was absolutely fire. Loved it. So much fun.
Featured image courtesy: Coachella. Credit: Brandon Densley (@dnz_media).