Sofi Tukker are back & taking 2022 by storm with new & exciting music to grace our ears and the highly anticipated announcement of their incoming full studio album WET TENNIS dropping April 29th. The first releases to the WET TENNIS album include the super danceable and highly catchy, ‘Original Sin’ and now their most recent collaboration with Mahmut Orhan, ‘Forgive Me’ featuring emotional violin melodies & dark mysterious tones. With a sonically diverse and colour exploding album on the horizon and a massive US/European tour taking place this summer, we had a moment to catch up with these two super talented musicians. A unique opportunity to hear what they’ve been up to and dive into the deeper details for this next exciting chapter into their blossoming musical catalogue.
First tell us a little backstory behind the latest track ‘Original Sin’ and its inspiration and creation?
We wrote original sin in the middle of the pandemic. We realized that for us and for a lot of people who were stuck inside during quarantine, we often took out our frustration and anxiety about the world on the people we love the most. We were making all sorts of mistakes, not because there’s anything inherently wrong with us but because we were living through a troubled time. It’s a song about having grace with ourselves. Remembering that we aren’t born sinners. We don’t have to repent. And we don’t have to apologize for our desires. We are simply a bunch of freaks trying our best.
Original sin features an incredible music video featuring lush nature, fluorescent tennis gear and powerful colour schemes, where do you guys draw creative ideas for your music videos and how does this process go about? Do you have certain creative friends which direct and help with these videos? How much creative collaboration with other artists takes place in your videos?
We had an incredible crew of creative collaborators and friends for this video. We first came up with the concept together in a room with our creative director for the project, Amber Park, and our stylist, designer Johnny Wujek. We then brought on the genius Aerin Moreno, who is the director for the video. We knew we wanted the video to be like the garden of eden of the Wet Tennis world. And we knew we wanted to be wearing super colorful bright tennis outfits. It came about from a lot of conversations, and images and ideas bouncing back and forth between us all. It took us a while to nail the video, actually. The video took us a while to perfect because we wanted to find the perfect balance between the Wet Tennis world and aesthetic and also staying true to the lyrics and vibe of Original Sin.
We love the WET TENNIS acronym for the LP: When Everyone Tries to Evolve, Nothing Negative Is Safe. This sounds like it has a deeply conscious meaning behind it, can you guys tell more about the personal spiritual, emotional or conscious journey that has inspired such a powerful message?
During the pandemic, every day we were faced with a choice: either we can let this cripple us, let this make us sad and depressed and anxious… or we can make the most of it. We can dance it out in community. We can pour ourselves into DJing and building the freak fam. While negative things are bound to happen, we have a choice to not get stuck in it. We were so inspired by the freak fam, the community of people that joined us every single day for our livestream sets, and their capacity for positivity and optimism. A lot of the music comes from this place, too. We wanted the album to feel and sound fun and bright, but underneath that is a lot of conscious choice and intention.
What kinds of sound design, production and types of tracks can we expect for the rest of the WET TENNIS Album?
We wrote a LOT of music during the pandemic but we intentionally put the songs on the album that overall felt really optimistic and hopeful. If we have a more introspective moody track on the album, then it’s always followed by a bright dance party track. We have some more acoustic style tracks on it and a lot of house music. We were inspired by DJing every day and there’s a bunch of nods to the freak fam throughout. There are a couple collaborations but mostly it’s just the venn diagram of both of our brains bouncing ideas and sounds back and forth.
It’s so exciting to see the WET TENNIS live show hitting the US, Europe Canada and Australia, what advice would you have to stay so fresh on tour, keeping your personal energy high and to thriving with tour life demands?
We work really hard to thrive on tour. We treat ourselves like professional athletes. Before each show, we spend an hour and a half warming up and working out — and we always cool down, stretch and ice after the shows. We make sure to sleep and nap as much as we can, Soph is sober, and we stay eating healthy. Our rider is basically fruits and vegetables and this tour we are gonna bring an air fryer on the tour bus :). Gotta stay fresh to put on the best possible show every night!
We absolutely loved ‘The Freak Farm’ livestream experience which has continued to be such an amazing experience throughout lockdown and beyond connecting people for the love of your music and creating deeper connection during such a difficult time, what have been your greatest personal takeaways from this experience? How did this change you guys as people? Did it change your conceptions of how you can connect with fans differently?
The freak fam feels like a miracle. We went through what could have been the worst and loneliest time of our lives, and instead it was filled with community. We had never felt so connected to people all around the world. Everyone really became like family. We were there for each other, and continue to be now, through so much hardship and life changes. Whereas before the pandemic, people would gather at our shows, and maybe make a friend or two, people connected day after day, really getting to know each other–and not just in specific cities. It really became a global community. We now really understand the power of consistency, and the power of a collective in lifting each other up.
We are just still at the beginning of 2022 which is hopefully going to be a new year and a break from the pandemic narrative, would you guys share with us some personal goals you have for this year or maybe even some new resolutions and whether you are keeping to them?
We have so many goals for this year! We are going to be touring the world and being with people in person, but we want to make sure to maintain the online connection with the freak fam. We want to put on the best possible show every night, and really put on the most unique show, unlike any we’ve ever seen or heard of. It’s part live show–part game. It’s super participatory and we want everyone to leave that night saying, wow that was one of the best nights of my life. I felt so connected and joyful and alive.
With the music landscape changing so drastically since the pandemic what advice would you guys have for producers, artists or duos out there now that are pushing to break their music to a bigger audience?
This advice has remained the same throughout our whole career and we always try and take our own advice: make music you love. Don’t make music for some imaginary listener or some imaginary idea of what you think people might like. Make music that you genuinely want to listen to and would be thrilled to play on stage night after night for the rest of time.
What would be your message of inspiration for the freak fam and music lovers for 2022?
The acronym for our album: When everyone tries to evolve nothing negative is safe. Know that you always have a choice. Shit is gonna happen. You can either grow and evolve from it–or not. There are people out there who are here to support you and believe in you. There are other freaks here to make you feel less alone in that process, who will inspire you and hold you accountable to making all of life feel like a growth opportunity.