CS Exclusive | Shmallen
Connecticut based up-and-coming producer Allen Hansrisuk, aka Shmallen, has been consistently impressing with a string of excellent remixes and originals, most recently taking the blog world by storm with Tell Me, an alluring track sampling Destiny's Child's Independent Woman. Last week he took the time to answer a few quick questions for us, in addition to putting together a great exclusive mix, full of choice tunes from the likes of Route 94, Karma Kid, Motez and more. Read the results below, and enjoy kicking off your week with an hours worth of deep house and disco beats!
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Caveman Sound: Tell us a bit about yourself, who is Shmallen? How did you get started producing?
Allen Hansrisuk: Well, there's nothing particularly extraordinary about my life haha. I grew up in suburbia, I go to college and I make music! Fun fact: I spent the majority of my adolescence playing golf and got pretty decent at it, might I add. Anyway, I got into DJing first. Without sounding too full of myself, I basically thought I could do a better job than the guys playing the parties that I was going to. I started learning the basics of DJing and eventually wanted to make tunes of my own. I started with mashups which moved on to hip hop beats, then I went through a progressive house phase, and now I think I've finally found my niche in the sort of disco and deep house crowd.
CS: Who are some of your favorite artists right now?
AH: I literally listen to everything. Lately, I've really been into deep house tracks with real soulful R&B vocals over them. People at the top of my list include: Karma Kid, Disclosure, Tourist, Dusky, Amtrac, Kaytranada, Goldroom, Motez, Kastle the list goes on! Apart from the dance genres, I've been digging King Krule. These days, I don't listen to much hip hop but I'm keeping up with Rich Homie Quan. Guilty pleasure, I guess.
CS: Dance music is constantly evolving – what trends, or lack thereof, do you see happening in 2014?
AH: Deep and disco seem to be really closely related these days. There seems to be a revival of all things dance music from like 1970-2000 with the influx of disco, acid, garage, techno, and jack tracks coming onto my Soundcloud stream. Or maybe I've just been oblivious to it all and I'm just learning about the music now. I think this trend will continue on throughout 2014. I'm pretty excited, it'll be like a modern take on the music that exploded onto the scene back then. I think a lot of artists now are trying to do just that.
CS: Your music is the soundtrack to what city?
AH: Shmallentown. Located on a beautiful island in the Pacific somewhere, where there are daily pool parties and hot babes galore. Being completely isolated from the rest of the world there are no problems, just parties.
CS: What are you looking forward to this year?
AH: Graduating school, definitely. A lot of my producer friends have been doing some big things and I'm really excited to see where they will go in the coming year. I'm also working on an EP to be released soon, loaded with soulful deep house tunes with a tinge of disco. I just want to release a bunch of new tunes, travel around, and play shows!
We want to say a big thank you to Allen for chatting with us. Keep your ears perked for his forthcoming EP, and everything else Shmallen, via the social links below!
Connect with Shmallen — FACEBOOK | TWITTER | SOUNDCLOUD