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Image via salute on Facebook/Luma
The young producer salute has been impressing us with his vivid, colorful original tracks and remixes for a while now, and he got a lot more attention last year when he dropped his monster remix of Sam Smith’s “Money On My Mind.” With his music lying somewhere between the sharp edged synth madness of Rustie and the smoother, R&B-influenced sounds of Cashmere Cat, salute added another achievement to his list when he made a track with a vocalist—”Real Cool” with Vanessa Elisha.
With the “Silver Tides” / “Real Cool” release out now (buy here), and with the promise of an exciting year ahead of him, we caught up with salute over email. Check that out below while you get into the mix he put together for us, featuring “some of [his] all time favorites as well as new tracks [he’s] loving at the moment.”
Can you introduce yourself…
I’m Felix or salute—I’m originally from Austria but I moved to the UK last year.
Tell me about Dime Club and why you decided to star your own imprint?
Dime Club is pretty much a product of me being fed up with other labels. I wanted to be in total control of everything to do with releases as I think involving other people can often distort plans.. that’s the last thing I wanted to happen. Big labels will often push releases back for ages—and I mean ages—it is absolutely frustrating and I wanted to avoid sitting on the music for too long. As for the name, “student” is basically a synonym for “broke,” hence me picking the word “dime.” Clever, huh? Not really, but still.
What can we expect from salute this year? Are you working on an album?
I’m working on a lot of music right now, including production for singers. I’ve never really done that sort of stuff before, it’s so much fun. I’ve been getting into songwriting too, it’s like an entirely new world to me, adding a sort of poetic layer to my music. As for an album.. I don’t know. I’m not going to sit down and say, “Right, let’s make an album.” If I did that, I’d probably end up trashing my laptop. I’ll write a few songs, do a couple of instrumentals, play around with it all for a bit. Then I’ll probably be eating a bowl of crisps in bed and realise that I’ve made an album. That’s always how these things work out for me. I can imagine releasing an album sometime next year.
You worked with a vocalist on “Real Cool,” but who would be your dream vocal collaborator?
That is such a hard question to answer… I’ve been sitting here for about 20 minutes thinking about what to write. I’ll go ahead and say Jill Scott. She is a goddess.
Who is inspiring you musically at the moment?
Right now, I’m really enjoying what SOPHIE and A.G. Cook are putting out, as well as Cashmere Cat, Rustie.. all of them are next level. All of them have got their artistic personas on point, so impressive.
Take us through this mix—how did you choose who to include, what feel were you going for etc.?
These are just some of my all time favorites as well as new tracks I’m loving at the moment. I know all of these tunes inside out, they mean a lot to me. A mix between relaxation and energy I guess. The sort of music I aim to make myself.
