Fundido: The Ransom Note Mix

We like Fundido – they’re good fun.

Listen and read the interview below:

How did Duo Fundido come together, and what inspired the name?

Latane : I’ve been close friends with Billy’s cousin Peter since 2009 … and Peter told me about his cousin who was in this cool band that I should check out. We ended up managing his band for awhile and became fast friends. When I moved to NYC in 2015, Billy was living there and deejaying his own parties. He and I had a mutual friend at Baby’s Allright who helped get us a night for the two of us in the front room of the venue. We had never really deejayed together before, but we quickly found some chemistry in playing a mix of international sounds and classic disco, boogie and house.

Billy : Yeah and fundido was just the name of the party at first, not the name of us playing together as dj duo or making music as a production team. The word fundido has a couple of meanings … one is that it’s the name for the melted cheese dish that originated from Northern Mexico (and later became a part of Tex-Mex cuisine – a dish Lat grew up on being from Houston, TX). Another is ‘melted’ or ‘fused’. When we needed to think of a name for our party, fundido felt appropriate given that during our sets we loved to play a melting pot of deep cuts from around the world, while not being afraid to enjoy the well-known vocal centric ‘hits’ as well. And then when we started getting booked as a DJ duo to play other clubs and parties, we just adopted the party name as our artist name.

Based in Brooklyn, what role does New York play in helping to define your sound?

Latane : New York plays a huge role in defining our sound. So many influential movements here… at this point it’s like a bunch of different streams that have all come together into a lake that we are lucky to be swimming around in. To name a couple, there’s the Paradise Garage sound/ethos, the Loft parties, the Latin house/Masters at Work influence, and also just NY basically being the birthplace of disco. More recently the DFA sound which was a big part of our teenage experience … Billy and I both were playing in rock bands before we were deejays … so that label is hugely influential in our interests gradually shifting towards dance music. Being able to release a 12” with them was a serious ‘pinch me’ moment for us. And I think it’s worth shouting out Josh and Dave P (Fixed/Making Time), who helped cultivate a scene in NYC, most recently at Good Room, that celebrates that dark, chuggy, lower tempo sound that has definitely helped define what we play and produce.

Billy : I think one slightly unique influence that NYC has had on fundido is based on the city being so consistently busy with people visiting or moving here from other countries. This meant whenever we would deejay our party and play a Brazilian disco record, or Bollywood edit we made, or an Armenian dance hit… someone who was visiting or had just moved there from another country would come up to the booth and be excited about us playing something that made them feel more at home … and I think that created some extra inclusivity vibes on our dance floors, and also gave us positive reinforcement to keep digging deeper and doing our thing.

What made you decide to work as a duo instead of as solo DJs?

Latane : It wasn’t really a conscious decision, but it is definitely more fun this way. More improv, less neuroticism… because you’re both doing it together. Also allows us to focus on our strengths… which keeps it more enjoyable and makes it not feel like work.

Billy : Yeah exactly. We are very different, and we are like brothers at this point so very much not afraid to disagree with each other. And it makes the end result more unique and interesting.

How do you divide responsibilities when preparing sets or producing music?

Latane : I would say I am slightly more holding the wheel on the DJ side, while Billy is more in charge of driving the production side of things. But it’s not a hard and fast line… both of us are very involved in both sides. Nothing gets done unless we’re both aligned on it.

Billy : Yeah that’s accurate, but it’s definitely not a hard line. For example, Latane comes up with most of the vocal topline ideas for our original music which is an extremely important part of the original music production side… but I also have hundreds of personal DJ edits on my USB stick that I make specifically for DJ sets that we both use. I’m pretty organized which helps keeps the train on the tracks… but Latane also has the energy to communicate and trade ideas with like 1 million other music people per day… so each of us has our strengths and it plays into the overall output and functionality of the project.

How would you describe your sound to someone who’s never heard you before?

Latane : That’s a tough one … and probably every DJ’s least favorite question haha. House, balearic, italo, that whole ‘indie dance’ title which seems to change meanings every 2-3 years … I don’t know. We love playing downtempo and dubby stuff as well though too, so it’s hard to narrow it down. Balearic with some NY grit ? We’ve rolled out that description a few times haha… fine to recycle it here.

Billy : Echoing Latane, a big part of our sound revolves around going on a journey – from both a genre perspective as well as a bpm standpoint. We love to start slow and gradually speed it up, which allows us to explore even more niches and sub genres. Our early success came deejaying in an indie rock venue after the headlining bands would finish and we were trying to keep people around to have a good time, so we like to remind ourselves of that and I think that still shows up in what we do today.

Are there any upcoming projects, collaborations, or releases you’re excited about?

Latane : We have a collaboration with our vocalist friend Nieri coming out this fall on a dream label run by a dreamy British DJ who we have loved for 15+ years… but I am not sure we are permitted to talk about it yet… so you will have to keep your eyes and ears out for it. We have a bunch more original music with Emma Dufaux in the pipeline, who has become like a studio sister to us.

Billy : And this would also be a good time to shout out our studio brother Miles Felix, who is basically the third musketeer in the studio with us … everything we have put out to date he has helped produce and engineer. He is an amazing musician, producer, engineer, and friend.

Latane : Yeah, can’t hype Miles enough. Other than that, we have started making plans with our friends at Universal Cave for a second volume of our vinyl only compilation Paradise Tempo, which sold out pretty quickly on the first volume, so we’re excited to boot that back up again. On the gig front, we have some exciting stuff in the fall… our first time at Studio in the basement of Knockdown Center… a little pre party for Making Time in Philadelphia is in the works… an overdue trip down to Mexico to play with our friends at Boyanza Records … and lots more. This fall should be crazy in a good way. We are excited.