EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: Maddy O’Neal at The Electric Forest
Maddy O’Neal has played Electric Forest many times but it’s been a couple years so she came back to EF this year in a big way, playing multiple sets, including her renown “Madhaus” set. She also spoke at the Femme House panel and found a little bit of time to talk with SFTS.
SFTS: You played around Detroit just a few months ago.Tell me about your Detroit connections.
Maddy O’Neal : I did! I think the last time I played it was Elecktricity, which is Pontiac but near Detroit. It was awesome! I didn't know what to expect from that place. I know it has a lot of history. I had a blast. It was my first headline there and then I've played Tangent Gallery and El Club. I hope to be back at the new venue, Big Pink. I try to be there (Detroit) once a year. I have a bunch of friends that live in Detroit, like my buddy Chester Pink, who opened Big Pink and to see people building new things in Detroit is awesome.
SFTS: Tell me a little bit about your lifestyle. I see it as two different modes, the “at home recording mode” and the “touring/festivals mode.” It’s almost like living two different lives.
Maddy O’Neal: It is! It's wild because I sit in the studio and work by myself and really deep dive into all of that. Then, polar opposite is being around people nonstop and being in an environment like this and honestly, it's a good balance. When I have to recharge and I think the best way to do that is to just sit in my studio and create, bringing all the live inspirations back into that.
SFTS: After all that studio time is a festival a shock to the system?
Maddy O’Neal: No, because I've been doing them a lot! But, I think at the beginning of festival season, I took January and February off to work on my album which I don't normally take big chunks of time off but when I went back on the road from that it was a little bit of a shock. Because I was in an introverted writing mode and I was just like I don't remember how to talk to people!
SFTS: Yesterday was a shock to the system for me because of the heat. How do you deal with that kind of heat?
Maddy O’Neal: Luckily the stage was facing indirect sunlight but I was dripping when I got off. I always try to drink a lot of water and I conserve all of my energy until that moment. So you gotta save it.
SFTS: You have long days here too. You had the Femme House Panel early afternoon, now interviews, then you are playing again tonight…
Maddy O’Neal: Yeah, I’m thinking of taking a nap soon! Or, just going to chill. My friend said something to me at one point, he said “rest counts”. Even if I’m just laying down working on my set. You can recharge your batteries even if you don't take a real nap. I think I'm playing at 3 AM tonight so that's the move.
SFTS: Explain to me what your “Madhaus” set is?
Maddy O’Neal: The set I did yesterday is what I normally do. It's mostly my own music, like 85% is my own music and I have drum pads and it's an ableton set. That’s a showcase of my production and then the Madhaus sets started over the pandemic when I was doing a lot of live streams and I just fell in love with house music and started DJing it. You know my catalog is only so big so I couldn’t just play my own stuff over and over again for people on the internet. So, yeah I'm really stoked that I get to do multiple things. I didn't wanna create a new alias but if I could do a DJ set and also my regular thing it's pretty cool.
SFTS: You have a new record coming out soon…
Maddy O’Neal: Yes, it is coming out in September. It's almost done. I'm gonna put out the first single next month. I'm really excited about it. It's definitely an evolution of my sound for sure. It's a little bit more bass heavy. I took it back to my roots a little bit in the way that I was sampling. The first single is kind of like an old-school dubstep sound, which is cool for me because that’s what I came up on.
SFTS: What I find interesting is when you make music that goes out on, I'll use the old term, an “album” you have a song or track but then that takes on a different form when a DJ uses it. Do you keep that in mind when making music?
Maddy O’Neal: I do, I make edits now to play live. The special thing about the album is some of the songs might not ever be played live.You know they're listening songs and you can expand a little bit more. It's easy to get into a live mode when you’re constantly playing shows. But I think a lot of the best music is when it may not even be danceable, it's an intellectual experience. So it's fun to explore those territories when I’m making a record.
You can follow Maddy O’Neal at her website Maddyoneal.com
