Meet Toucán… Since bustling on to the scene with their debut track ‘Get up’ on Food Music, the House & Bass duo from Kent have been causing quite a stir. Their follow up release ‘Prana’ got snapped up by the massive Subsoul imprint and has been supported by many of the big names. The girls are currently working on follow up releases and have been nominated in this years Bass Music Awards for Best Breakthrough Act. Gigging constantly across the UK and Europe, expect to see a lot more from the girls in the future.

Ladies welcome. Having played alongside you two numerous of times and have seen the progression you two are making, I thought it was about time we got down on an interview, so… Lets start with telling the readers the reason for you two naming yourselves ‘Toucan’?

Hey! Thanks for having us. Well to cut a long story short, we pretty much searched exotic birds, found Toucán, both liked it but decided to add an accent to make it more interesting (although it can cause problems with promoters who can’t find the á on their keyboards! Haha) and it just stuck ever since, we’ve never been anything other than Toucán from the get go.

How did you two meet?

We actually met at college in Canterbury

And how did you two decided you were going to perform and produce music together?

Well we were always around the club scene since leaving college & we used to do promo for a local club where we are from in Maidstone called ‘The Source Bar’ . We both had the same interest in music and one day decided to buy some decks, learn to DJ & in our spare time we would just chill & make tunes. We later both realised we wanted to seriously make music and decided to do a production course together at Point Blank Music College in London, it taught us a lot. 

From when you first started, did you think you’d be where you are today?

No, you can never judge those things! People would always tell us that we could go far & we always talked about it like ‘imagine if..’ but we were definitely surprised at how quickly we managed to get noticed when we really started to push ourselves.

How long have you been performing together now?

Well actually playing in clubs I’d say 3 years maybe, at home together would be longer.

Ive seen your bookings have started to get further and further away, even travelling out of the country. But where has been your favourite location to play at?

We recently just got back from a gig in France which was really lovely to play at, the promoters were amazing. Its great to play in other countries because the hospitality is always so great and the parties are decent. Not sure of a favourite venue but when we play in Nottingham its always a good night! 

Whilst entering the scene, you released your debut track ‘Get Up’ on Food Music. Had you two ever considered that this track was to get signed?

No not really! We sent a bunch of tracks out hoping that one of them would get picked up & we were really lucky to get a response from Food Music, obviously a massive first step! We’ve always been a fan of the label so feel really lucky to be a part of it.

How long did this track take to complete, being your first release…

Well it was made a while ago now but as we were under no pressure to get anything out in a certain time frame, it wouldn’t have been a quick job. We send things back and forth to each other when we are not together in the studio and are both perfectionists so finalised tracks can take a while when we are both making adjustments, nothing ever feels truly finished!

More recent to this, you released a track titled ‘prank’. This was released on the might ‘Subsoul’ label. How did all this come about?

Our management had been talking with Subsoul about a track before we made it so it was kinda earmarked for them and fortunately for us they liked it.

Anymore releases on this label to follow?

Nothing confirmed we’re just making as much music as we can at the moment and we will just go from there

This year you made you’re debut at Bestival, which is probably the wildest festivals in the country. So tell us 5 of the strangest things you saw at the festival…

Yeah we were so excited to get to play at one of the best festivals in the UK. 5 strange things ok… 

1. They had a campervan area with old pimped out VW’s … we found our future ride and named it Toucánmobile haha, we spent a lot of the festival in it actually.. 

2. There was a huge robot in the middle of the festival which isn’t something you see everyday

3. A photo booth that takes a photo of your shoes (not a great sight at a festival) 

4. A food stall that had the biggest paella I’ve ever seen

5. One of the stages was a giant ship coming out of the ground.. which was pretty cool

Two girls performing together isn’t something you see everyday, but what do you two girls bring to that table that other DJs don’t?

Well, each other! We can vibe & bounce off each other and if we are having a good time its always a good thing for the crowd, we always have fun.

You play between a mix of house & bass music. Some bass DJs these days have started incorporating MCs into their sets. Is this something you two have ever considered?

No its not something thats ever occurred for us. When we used to play the heavy bass stuff we had just started to play in clubs, we were not at a level to have MC’s & we didn’t have the big crowds either! As we’ve progressed our music has taken us down some different routes and I don’t think an MC would suit the type of sets we play today.

In your spare time, what do you two get up to and how do you see each other?

Well we love to travel, we’ve travelled around Thailand together for a few months before and we have been to a lot of countries. We share the same friends so we spend time with friends & Jasmine her boyfriend. We do spend a lot of time with each other which does make us want to kill each other sometimes but we both consider each other a sister, we’re very close.

Is there an artist who has inspired you both to this day?

That would be Mr Chris Lorenzo, we think very highly of him and his productions.

In the next two years, what do you hope to happen for your music?

We are hoping to get some more releases out to some good labels. We are working on an EP which is coming along slowly but surely, we just want to make sure its right and not rush it. We have nearly finished a Bootleg of something which we may put out as a free download.. so watch this space!

Do you have any plans for Ibiza next year?

Nothing in the diary as of yet but I’m sure we will be back there again next year, we got to play Sankey’s, Ibiza Rocks and on a boat party this year which was awesome!

December 8, 2015