Chances are that LA based producer Woodys Produce has worked his magic on a song that was once, or is currently, your musical anthem. Over the past several years, Woodys Produce has collected quite an assortment of remixes and productions in his catalog of projects. Never discriminating between genres, he has re-worked gangsta rap classics from Notorious B.I.G. to something a bit more modern-pop like Queen Bey's "Partition".
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Woody had his debut performance at Coachella this year, and it appears that we can expect to see a handful of other firsts from the producer this year. The well connected producer has got his hands in a number of projects and seems to know just the right artists to collaborate with.
After releasing a new remix every week this Summer, Woody is bringing the sunny season to a close with the last remix and the final release of the entire collection, Summer Citrus Remixes. With the intentions of creating your summer soundtrack, Woodys Produce has done just that. From re-visiting Sam Smith's "Latch" to Mos Def's "Ms Fat Booty", and Pharrell's "Aerosol Can", this collection has the power to wrap up the Summer with a sizzle. So have a listen to these stellar remixes, kick your feet up, and enjoy what's left of the sweet Summer with a little bit of citrus.
We got to catch up with Woody to talk about this project and how he may be going in a whole new direction after this. Read the interview below and see what he has else to say about all the projects he has coming up!
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EARMILK: Why don't you tell us how you got started as Woodys Produce?
Woodys Produce: I've always been involved in music in some way or another. Me and a handful of friends that I still make music with, I've known since pre-school. My dad played the guitar growing up. I remember lip syncing to The Beatles in the third grade talent show. I used to be in bands and stuff. I've always been doing music, in one way or another.
I'm originally from Northern California. I was in some bands up there when I just decided that if I wanted to take music seriously, I needed to move to Los Angeles or New York. So I moved to L.A. and pursued the dream.
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EM: If you could work with any three artists right now, who would they be?
WP: I would have to say Riff Raff, Lauryn Hill, and Toro Y Moi.
EM: Alright, I suppose I can respect those choices. If we take a gander at your SoundCloud right now, there is a never ending wealth of rockin' remixes. How do you set out to work on a remix? How do you pick a song? Or what is your process?
WP: The first three projects I did, before I really started remixing stuff, I just wanted to do a collection of music, rather than just a one-off remix. I did three projects; first was Kanye West, then Notorious B.I.G., and then Outkast. They all consisted of ten to twelve tracks that I would remix, so it would be a solid collection of music that could pay homage and give the songs I loved and grew up with a new spin, or a new way of looking at them. You know, a different point of view. I approached them very traditionally. I would take a hip-hop song and put a sort of pop-ish sort of spin on it. I think they meld really well together. One day, I did the Kanye West project, and it caught on. So I decided to keep going with it.
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EM: Do you prefer to work within one specific genre? Or what is your preference?
WP: Not really. The thing with rap music is, most of the time, it's not very melodic. So you have a bit of freedom. You can put whatever you want with it. You don't have to worry about what key it's in or how the person is singing over it. It is easier to put a backdrop on rap music, but I'm a pop person at heart. I grew up listening to gangsta rap, Nirvana, alternative rock, and I've sort of been influenced by everything. I guess my favorite is hipster-pop. I like to work with what's happening now and what I grew up with and a bit of a hip-hop influence.
EM: So we've got your Summer Citrus Remixes premiering here. How did this project come to fruition?
WP: The Summer Citrus thing is a play off of my name, Woodys Produce. A while ago, I put out a few instrumental projects called Lemons and then another one called Limes. I just kept going with the citrus-fruit thing. I just sort of wanted to make a soundtrack for everyone's summer. I thought it would be really cool to put a remix out for the people who follow my stuff on SoundCloud, and I also wanted to challenge myself to make a new remix every week. It was extremely challenging. This can be the soundtrack to your summer.
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I think I'm going to lay off of remixing for a little while and start doing some more original style music. I decided to go out with a bang!
EM: What can we expect from this original stuff? Have you started working on that yet?
WP: Not really. I have a handful of artists who I've worked with in the past that I'm going to continue to work with; Raven Sorvino, Casey Veggies, Mibbs who was originally in Pac Div, Melat who is a singer. So stuff like that. I really enjoy working with artists and collaborating, but I'm also going to work on an instrumental album, which might have a couple features on it, but it's going to be more of stuff that can chilled to or played at shows and festivals.
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EM: Speaking of shows, what has been your favorite show to play?
WP: To play, I had the privilege of playing at Coachella this year. That was one of the craziest experiences of my life and I feel so privileged to have played there. It was like a notch in the belt of bucket lists kinda stuff, you know? That was definitely my favorite show to play.
And then my favorite show to attend was honestly a show this weekend in Los Angeles, called FYF. Most people don't know this, but I've actually worked in the festival industry for about three years now. That's sort of like my side hustle. I haven't done it for about a year, but I worked at Coachella for two years before I actually played it, but on the admin side. I've also worked a bunch of other festivals as well.
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EM: It seems you're connected all around.
WP: Honestly, I'm a bit of a renaissance man in a lot of respects. I'm starting to do photography and video, music videos, and shorts and stuff. I'm actually developing a cartoon. The first episode comes out in like a week actually.
I have my hands in a lot of things, but music is first and foremost for me. It has always been a constant in my life, and I don't think I will ever stop making music. I love it.
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EM: So other than original projects, what else do you have lined up for the rest of this year musically?
WP: I'm going to start playing out a little bit more. I recently played a show in Los Angeles, I played a festival in New York about a month ago. I'm going to gear my focus on playing show a bit more. I'm going to work on this instrumental project, too. Raven Sorvino, who I've been working with has a project coming out that I'm helping to produce. I also mix and master most of her stuff and do a lot of artwork for her and myself too.
It all keeps me really busy. The Melat singer, who I mentioned from Austin, we've been in talks about potentially doing an EP together. But I'm just going to be doing stuff like that, working with songwriters and even trying to get on Wale's album. I got a placement on Iggy Azalea's album The New Classic it's just a whole lot of grinding. I'm going to be grinding 'til I die (Laughs).
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EM: Do you have any last words for EARMILK readers?
WP: I love you guys, everyone that goes to my SoundCloud and messages me positive feedback, or even negative feedback. I don't get too much negative feedback though. Every once in a while I'll get some hate mail saying, "Man, you shouldn't have touched "Machine Gun Funk" from B.I.G. That's a perfect song. I don't know why you tried to remix it!"
I guess that's the beauty of music though, everyone has their opinion and taste. You know the people that message me and tell me how much they love my music is just great. It is crazy what one person can do. I've had zero help in these projects and I've touched so many people in the world just from looking at a computer screen and composing music and putting it on the internet. It is crazy getting messages from Spain and all across the world.
To all my EARMILK peeps, thank you so much. I can't say thank you enough, honestly.
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Woody has made the Summer Citrus Remixes available for free download. You can download them here.
Woodys Produce
Summer Citrus Remixes
