JapaRoLL, is the only Japanese DJ/Producer who receives support from the Dutch Lions Hardwell who’s ranked 3rd in 2016 DJ Mag Top 100 DJs and 29th Nicky Romero in the market. In 2014, he signs a contract with JUMPP Records supervised by a Ukrainian DJ/Producer Juicy M and kicks off his international career. First dropped a single “Guitar Freaks and later releasing a remix of Juicy M’s “Show Me Love ft. ENDEMIX” and shows his talent to the world. Not to mention this year, he signed a release contract with Armada Music supervised by another Dutch Lion Armin Van Buuren and with Kid Coconut supported by Steve Angello. Let us share the interview with this Japanese talent confidently entering the world’s EDM scene going up the stairs.
Q1. How would you describe your release on November 4th, “Japanfunk (Original Mix)”?
If I describe it in a few words, it will have to be “up tempo Tribal House”. I wanted to create a difference between the Tribal House already in the market and this song is what I came up with. At ULTRA JAPAN 2016, Fedde Le Grand and Knife played my song showing some support and also Nicky Romero’s Protocol Radio 220 played the song for me.
Q2. What was the final decider to release your song at Armada?
Last year was a year for me to release a lot of songs and to earn the experience but this year, it’s different and I wanted to put more effort and time into songs to seek for quality and not quantity. So, it’s important for me now to release songs from the Labels I want and it had to be the world’s top Armada Music. I’ve started working on this track beginning of 2016 and couldn’t really decide on from which label I should release this track from as my next step in the career. I have great connections with some DJs abroad and have asked them for feedback for improvement. I’ve been in contact with ex Armada’s A&R Manager and artists at Armada, asking me for demos so that was my final decider. To be honest, during the couple of weeks signing the release contract with Armada, I’ve been contacted by other labels wanting to release and as a Producer that’s a compliment and an honour.
Q3. How did you end up doing a collaboration with Funk Machine for the track?
I met Funk Machine at some International project I was involved in. We got close and started sharing the techniques and know-how as a DJ/Producer and ended up making a track together, the first one being “Lee Carter vs JapaRoLL & Funk Machine- Move That Body (Michael Brun Mix)”. After that, we got even more closer and were like “let’s make a few more songs together”, which was great and ended up making this release together.
Q4. You are recognised as one of the Japanese Producers doing collabs with international artists and is there anything you pay attention to or focus on when choosing who to work with?
I try to understand them as a human being so that eventually it will be expressed as a track. Also, I tend to consider about the time difference because I usually work with people who lives in the opposite time zone so if we don’t consider that we can’t move forward hahah.
Q5. In your career, who or which track has been the most influential for you?
It will have to be Steve Angello and Axwell Λ Ingrosso, the former Swedish House Mafia. I’ve been influenced by them since SHM era and they all have their stories and they’re really good at expressing that through the songs or the stage designs, atmosphere they create. They constantly producer songs that can’t be made by others and it’s just pure talent and sense. Their live show is simply AMAZING, it feels like I’m watching a Premium Rock Band for the first time. Whenever I hear or watch them perform, it reminds me and motivates me to work harder because that’s where I should be aiming for and want to be.
Q6. We heard that you’re still making songs back in your home town and not in Tokyo, why is that?
I simply don’t want to change my routine. I believe that the place where I make the tracks are not important but the environment as a whole. I prefer to be locked up back home and come out to Tokyo for work. Also, the only time I can become truly relaxed is during the ride on the way to Tokyo and that moment is great because sometimes great ideas pop up and lead to another track.
Q7. How did you come up with the name JapaRoLL?
There’s no deep meaning behind my name but since I started I wanted to become Internationally famous so tried to think of something representing Japan. It means starting from Japan and RoLLing into the world travelling with my music doing gigs, shows and festivals. In the logo, you can see that the “o” is a globe so that’s what it implies. People from abroad always calls me “Japa!” so it’s easy for them to remember me and also it doesn’t match with anything else so when you Google it, you’ll only find me hahha.
Q8. What do you think is important and need to be considered as a Japanese Producer to release their tracks from Big International Labels?
I believe it’s the sense of creativity. To be honest, I believe that anyone can make a track if they put the time into it. But there will be no originality to that song and when you make a song it’s important to leave an impression in listener’s mind. That’s one of the mission of producers and if they lack in creativity, that’s going to be very difficult to stand out in the international market.
Q9. What is DJ Mag to you?
DJ Mag is interesting because they evaluate you on your performance and effort in the past year and show it in a ranking format. Even as a fan of DJs, it’s interesting to see. If they can tell us more about how the rating/voting system works, then DJs can focus more on how to improve and reflect for the future.
Q10. Shout out to your fans out there supporting you!
Thank you always for supporting me and for voting on me for the DJ ranking and I’ve got interesting releases coming up so stay tuned and hope to see you all soon.
It’s great to see a Japanese DJ/Producer receiving support from world’s top DJ/Producers out there and climbing up the EDM scene. JapaRoLL participated in “Burn WORLD DJ CONTEST 2014” run by the Energy Drink Burn and was chosen as the finalist and in 2015, his song was aired on “Hardwell On Air” as the first Japanese DJ/Producer. He’s definitely one of the hot ones coming up the scene and proudly from Japan. Everyone stay tuned and he’s going to be releasing more tracks with big labels.