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iheartf(x)'s Interview with Future Presidents
Future Presidents are a songwriting and producing team from the Netherlands. They wrote a song titled "EleKtriK LightZ," which later became "Electric Shock." Thank you to William Laseroms, Joachim Vermeulen Windsant, and Maarten ten Hove for agreeing to an interview. (http://future-presidents.com/)
1. Could you describe your musical background and experience as writers and composers?
William comes from a very musical family and got a very early start in music working with some major Dutch producers when he was still a kid, Joachim lived in the same street as one of the biggest songwriters/producers in The Netherlands and started working with him, he is also the most musically trained. Me (Maarten) had none of the above, I just started making music around the age of 12 and send my demos everywhere until I met one of the same producers Joachim and William were working with and we three decided to work together on a project that went top 5 in The Netherlands and was released internationally back in 2007. From that moment on labels kept asking us as a team so we haven't looked back since.
2. Who are your influences and do you primarily produce pop music?
Everything we do is pop orientated, we love pop music. But it can be pop dance, pop rock, pop jazz, urban pop etc But we always want to hear a strong chorus line that sticks. Our biggest influence has always been Max Martin, he is the biggest and best hitsongwriter/producer in popmusic of our time. And before that it was Michael Jackson and Abba that inspired us as kids. We get inspired by everything we hear and see, you want to keep your ears and eyes open otherwise you're stuck doing the same thing.
3. According to the liner notes, “Electric Shock” was originally titled “Electrik Lightz.” When did you write “Electrik Lightz” and what was the original meaning of the song?
We wrote EleKtriK LightZ about two years ago, the original lyrics were about a girl breaking up with her boyfriend cause he was no good to her and she was gonna go out clubbing with her friends in EleKtriK LightZ (disco lights).
4. Was "Electrik Lightz" written in Dutch or English?
It was written in English
5. Besides language, are there any major differences between f(x)'s “Electric Shock” and the original?
It's the exact same production, we sent all the files to Korea and they re-recorded the vocals and mixed it over there. So it doesn't sound much different except for the language.
6. How did you first hear about f(x)'s "Electric Shock" and did you know your song would be released in Korea?
We got the request from the label about two months before the release, they were looking for the lead single I guess.. we didn't know at the time that it was gonna be the lead single. But we knew it was gonna be on the album. Than one day we woke up and got tweets from alot of Korean F(x) fans who congratulated us on the track and the video views. That's how we found out the video was online, it already had alot of views that first day so it was a great surprise.
7. The music video for "Electric Shock" has been receiving lots of love on YouTube. In just the first six days, it achieved over 10,000,000 views. What was your reaction when you saw the video and were you surprised by the worldwide popularity?
Like I said we had no idea it was gonna be a single, so yes, we were very pleasantly surprised. The music video looked amazing aswell. We never imagened it would do so well worldwide since it's a Korean song, I think that must have surprised everyone.
8. Were you familiar with Kpop before “Electric Shock” and are there many Kpop fans in the Netherlands?
About two years ago our publisher Universal Music showed us some K-Pop musicvideos and we instantly loved it, the first thing we wrote right after was actually 'Electric Shock', so it's pretty amazing to have it finally come out and be the succes that it is. Plus that we had F(x) in mind for the song from the start, we love their style. So all the pieces came together perfectly. The media here in The Netherlands has picked up on K-Pop some more since our succes with Electric Shock and actually got some airplay on Dutch radio aswell, that's when we noticed how many K-Pop fans there are in The Netherlands, they were really appreciative of all the attention K-Pop was finally getting.
9. Do you have plans to produce Kpop music in the future, either for f(x) or another group?
We are writing several new songs at the moment, so yes, we would love to work with f(x) again or another artist/group.
10. Any funny/interesting stories with f(x)?
No not really, perhaps it's funny that we can't understand most of the things people are saying or writing about Electric Shock, thankfully there are several f(x) fans that keep us updated through twitter. F(x) really has great fans and we want to thank them all for the support of Electric Shock, it has been great to be a part of it.
11. Any other Kpop artist that you'd like to collaborate with?
Yes definitely, all of SM's artists are amazing, but any other Kpop artist would be great to work with as long as a good song comes out of it.
Credit: http://www.iheartfx.com
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