Dance Loud are an electronic duo that specialize in – you guessed it – dance music. Composed of Kristin Sanchez (DJ, producer, engineer) and Desereé Fawn Zimmerman (drums, guitar, vocals), the real-life couple bring completely different aspects to the table in creating Dance Loud’s sound. Today we’re premiering their latest single and the accompanying video for “Hollow,” a track that shows off the balance between Sanchez’s electronic production and Fawn’s live instrumentation.
Over a pulsating dance beat, the duo ask the listener, “Are you hollow inside?” The stripped down quality of the song allows for a lot of room for the electronics and live instrumentation to shift and morph over its nearly five minute run-time.
Based in Chicago, the duo used a real estate business to build the capital to finance this DIY electronic project. They had built a strong following and even built their own touring bus, when tragedy struck. That tragedy is a large part of the inspiration behind this new song “Hollow.”
“This song was made during Halloween time hence the title Hollow along with deep dark vibes,” the duo said in a statement. “We truly feel art is a reflection of reality and ‘Hollow” is just that. After going through a life-changing experience and nearly dying by being rear-ended by a semi-truck on a highway and ripping apart our hand-built tour bus, the month in the hospital gave us a lot of time to think about all the shitty things and shitty people we have dealt with. We started to truly understand intention, justification and perception. The song is exactly about that. We justify every action we make and seen through others eyes can be seen as bad or good. In the end, there is no bad and good, there just is.”
Everything we do has a reason for doing so,” they said. “Seeing our nation fight over politics, race, gender, sexual preference, everything.. Every person that is good can have a bad side to them and every bad person can have a good side. Life is not like movies where there is the perfect hero and a terrible villain, life is full of the grey area. This song became a therapeutic revelation for us with the need to forgive folks that have wronged us. We have been bombarded with every kind of wrong doing and have seen the worst in people throughout life. This song has frustrated feelings and a lot of anger all spilling slowly from our nerves into words and distorted sounding synths. Every person can be seen as good or bad, it’s all about perception because we as humans are not half good and half bad, we just are..Humans. As one world, treat everyone as though they are in your shoes because in the end, we are as one. Don’t be hollow and heartless inside. Walk in their shoes. Don’t judge a book by it’s cover. Don’t hurt someone…you may only hurt yourself in the end.”
After the accident, the duo immediately began work on The Moment, which will be their first album since the horrific accident. It’s out June 5. “Hollow” is the first single from the new album.
Once you are thrown into a situation of possibly dying tomorrow, it starts invoking your bucket list of goals,” said Sanchez. “You start immediately doing exactly what you would do if there was no tomorrow. Even with all the little voices in your head telling you to stay practical, your soul’s desires come screaming out. As the lyrics say in ‘Dimes:’ ‘I’ll work on my soul, to be a better being. To live out all my feelings. Do or die…’ Prior to the accident, musically we were just giving a part of ourselves, being a DJ and drummer duo. We knew if we wanted a life in music, we had to give it everything we had to give including Deseree fighting her fear of singing. We’ve learned that when you are terrified of what could happen, only the best comes from it. Risks come with fear but that fear fuels the fire.
On a technical level, Kristin was trained to work in a traditional recording studio, studying audio engineering in college,” said Zimmerman. “It was limiting at first knowing you won’t have the funds to run out and buy 30k minimum of equipment to build your own studio. The fear of not sounding our best, prevented us from releasing the 10 songs we were working on when our computer and hard drives were destroyed in the accident. This ‘do or die’ attitude gave us the fire to continue our education as mix engineers and use unconventional recording techniques to create a hi fidelity sound with a limited budget. Higher creativity comes from financial limitations.”
“‘The Moment’ is symbolic for a few things: 1. Precious, our DIY tour bus had “Precious Moments Child Care” decals on the exterior from its previous owner. This album is a dedication to her, RIP Precious. 2. The moment is literally talking about that moment that changed our lives and derailed us on a detour we didn’t know we were going to go on. 3. Every moment is precious. ‘Stop and Appreciate’ lyrics from ‘Hollow.’
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