Disclosure on the evolution of dance music on both sides of the Atlantic

In late 2012, brothers Guy and Howard Lawrence of U.K. dance music outfit Disclosure leapt across the pond to play a few shows stateside after releasing The Face EP via left field dance label Greco-Roman. The two crept into 2013 for an all-out takeover surrounding their comprehensive blend of house and garage-influenced production laid underneath pop structured vocals on their debut album Settle. As EDM exploded over the past five years, much of the dominating sound has been stale, aggressive, and lacking accessibility, yet these two have taken a page from the likes of Carl Craig, Artful Dodger, and those who carved a more introspective sound to produce a record that has connected listeners, both young and old, on the dance floor. Before the tour, the Lawrence brothers talked about their rise to fame, the history of house music, and where they found that brilliant Eric Thomas sample on "When a Fire Starts to Burn."

Disclosure plays the Tabernacle on Wed., Jan. 22, with Vic Mensa and Samo Sound Boy. $28. 10 p.m. 152 Luckie St. 404-659-9022.

You're coming off an exciting week of shows after dropping the "Grab Her" video, and a performance on Jimmy Fallon, as you roll into the first week of U.S. touring. How's it all going?

Guy Lawrence: Yeah, we just got off of Holy Ship which was absolutely crazy and a few shows in Montreal too. We hopped on a tour bus all night and came to Boston for the American run. Holy Ship was really good and the shows have been class, great crowds, and hospitality. The thing we dropped today was just something fun, a little video for "Grab Her." We got approached with the idea of the video and we loved it so much we thought we had to get it out there somehow, it's not a single or anything. Just a hilarious video.

Holy Ship was an interesting blend of genres. I was happy to see some deeper acts got love on the boat. A lot of your peers like Jacques Greene and Gorgon City, and even label-mates like Julio Bashmore and T. Williams haven't been able to break through yet. Do you feel like Disclosure blew up really quickly?

I'm really comfortable with it, and we still get to play shows with friends like T. Williams. I've got no doubt if we put together a small 300 person show in London it would still kill. We'd kind of rather do the bigger 5,000 person show because it's more fun with more people. Not being underground doesn't mean much, it just means we've got some success. We're still playing with guys like Skream and we've found a really perfect balance. Having options to play to thousands of people and still be able to slide off for a cheeky DJ set is great. We still make a lot of underground tracks and we've got some on the way too, a bit more housey, clubby, in the upcoming months that aren't really targeted at a mainstream crowd at all. We have a really nice balance between underground and pop I could say.

A lot of people appreciate you guys for posting tracks from people like Moodyman and Jimpster on your Facebook page. Any specific reason you're keen on doing so?

That's the music we love. Even though sometimes our songs are in the charts we still think a lot of the stuff there is pretty whack. I think people would agree we don't really sound like other tracks in the charts. We haven't really intended for any of this to happen, we just make the music we want to make with a housey / garagey twist and we've added vocals in a more conventional way with choruses and the verses. It just connected to people. People made the transition with us whereas they may have been listening to Avicii or Calvin Harris, more mainstream chart dance music. Now people can look at our music as chart music too.

We don't really know why we do it, we just do. It's cool to hear people like it. It's quite nice to think some of our fans just 'liked' our page because they heard "White Noise" or "Latch" and they don't really know what came before it - what house tracks paved the way. Like you said I guess it's nice to have the chance to educate people who haven't heard of these artists, people who laid the foundation. It's a great position to be in. Five years ago I didn't know much about house music so I'm taking this journey as well, educating myself on music.

When Disclosure first came to the US, you mentioned how the music that was big here was very loud and bass-driven when compared to the more melodic, house sounds of the U.K., and you were wondering if he U.S. would adopt that music. Have you noticed any changes since then?

We're not really following the charts in the U.S., but we can go off shows and festivals. The majority of the stuff is unfortunately still big room, massive, big bass-line driven stuff. It's fine if that's what people want, but we still get put on lineups with people like Dusky, or Breach, T. Williams even. Seeing that those people are able to come over here and play is a statement in itself for the changes happening. I don't know if that music would have connected two-three years ago, or if we came out two-three years ago it may not have worked even if we were doing great in the U.K. A lot of it here in the US is still quite bass-driven. We'll see how it goes.

There's a soul element behind what you're creating which is lacking in most of the dance music that's released stateside. Does that have something to do with your crossover success?

I think you're right; it's the soul element that's made the big difference. It's the main thing that's wrong with that kind of music. There's a lot of money behind it. A lot of fame that people want to get instead of putting soul into what they're creating. We don't really know a lot of people making that music and I've never asked. But even in that genre there's credit to be given. People like Skrillex, who's one of the nicest guys I've ever met in my life, yeah his music is very heavy and bassy, but technically it's great in terms of production and mixing. I don't know anyone who can make a track as loud and as clear that covers all frequencies. I may not be listening to it in my spare time, but respect that he's seen the dubstep in the U.K. which is much different, much more melodic, and he's made it as big and as loud as he can and he fucking smashed it. As long as its' done in a fresh way which he truly did. Diplo played a new track on Holy Ship, a Major Lazer track he's got with Pharrell and it was awesome. It was sick! It was pretty loud and aggressive, and even I thought it was pretty good.

If you could point out any sonic differences between tunes from people like MJ Cole, Jeremy Sylvester, or Sunship, and music being made today, what would they be? Has technology had an effect on the sound?

The technology available now is the main reason why the music sounds different. The methods and ideas behind the music are very similar; maybe not necessarily with us because we wanted to create a mixture of that stuff, throw vocals on with a pop sensibility, but other production yeah. Technology changes things. The fact that people are now making garage on laptops in Logic or Cubase - that in itself is going to change the sound because now it's clearer, it's better. It's much more high quality. People have huge banks of samples and sounds. It sounded a lot rougher around the edges, more analog. There's a lot of great stuff coming out nowadays, but we do owe it all to people like you said; MJ Cole, Sunship, and many others. There were some great records made back then. I'll say this though when we meet people like Zed Bias and they say they love what we're making that's honestly enough for me. That's what I love. I prefer one of them telling us they love our music than getting nominated for a Grammy or something. That's the main thing that makes me excited. As far as those old sounds we've got a Juno 106 in our studio, which our uncle owned from the '70s, that I've been playing since I was really small, and I would never give it up. It's older than me, but it' such an essential part of the studio.

I have to ask where you guys dug up the Eric Thomas motivational sample for "When A Fire Starts To Burn?"

(Laughs) Just on iTunes, mate. Howard was going through iTunes searching something like motivational speaker New York or America. We just wanted to sample some sort of preacher man and that popped up.

What's your favorite piece of studio gear?

That's probably my favorite because it's the base of so many of our songs chord wise, sound wise. Though I think your favorite bit of gear is always your newest bit of gear because it's exciting. My favorite thing I bought recently was a synthesizer called the Alesis Andromeda, which is actually like a fully analog synth, and quite rare because I think it came out 12 years ago. It had a faulty part and everyone thought they were shit so they had to recall it, but someone started making the parts. Twelve years later someone's helping all these busted synths and people can finally use the Andromeda. I went into the shop, they had a fully working one and I said I've got to have it.

Are there any clubs, DJ's, or specific sets you wish you could travel back to for just one night?

I would have loved to go to the Warehouse in Chicago even though it shut down a few years before I was even born, I think. I would have loved it, seeing what it was like. We met up with Larry Heard the other day, Mr. Fingers, and he was telling us what it was like and I was so jealous. We'll never get to see it. That was the birthplace of everything! Detroit and Chicago kill it.

Atlanta's fortunate enough to have guys like Larry, Theo Parrish, and Moodyman play at the Sound Table thanks to Kai Alce who's been playing with all of them for 20 years. It's great that those cities have had representation here in ATL.

That sounds really good! That's amazing! Apart from that, nights I'd love to go back to, for me: In Brighton, I used to go there five-six years ago, just before I turned 18 when I got my fake ID. I went down there and watched Ben UFO b2b Joy Orbison b2b Jackmaster and that night was probably the most musically educating night of my life. I'd love to go back. Joy dropped "Hyph Mngo" and I just went home and started trying to make tracks like that. Plus it was £1 pound to get in and £1 drinks. Can't ask for more.

So that's the track that started it all for you?

Definitely. "Hyph Mngo" opened up the sound for me in a big way. That was a proper game changer. For me it showed me that dubstep can be nice, it can have melody. It encompassed everything for me. I couldn't even go back and pick a favorite garage track if I wanted to though.

I've always thought it was interesting that house and techno originated here, but once it made it's way to the U.K. it really took off, and in the U.S. quality dance music has remained very underground and esoteric. Do you have any thoughts on that?

We've thought about it a lot as well and I don't really know. You're right that you guys are the pioneers and we caught up, and that we started doing our thing with it, and then you guys did yours again. It's really weird and I'm not really sure. America is obviously much more influential as far as hip-hop. That may be the main reason. Everybody was really into hip-hop and that kind of overtook things. I don't know if that's enough of a reason.

Bringing up hip-hop is a good ending place for us. I know you and your brother are huge hip-hop heads so what ATL track would you pick as your favorite?

We have to go with OutKast, they're one of our favorite hip-hop acts of all time and it's crazy they're headlining Coachella this year as well, which will be amazing. Probably "Vibrate" by OutKast, I love the way the drums are backwards for the entire track.