Electronic Producer Diplo Going Country, Has All-Star Collaborations Planned
Diplo will use his birth name, Thomas Wesley Pentz, to release country music. The first taste of an album called Thomas Wesley arrived Wednesday (April 24) in the form of a collaboration with Cam entitled "So Long."
Expect that several more collaborations with country artists are on the way. This week, Diplo will play Stagecoach, at the first-ever Stagecoach Late Night at the festival’s Palomino stage on Sunday (April 28).
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Along with the Cam collaboration, Diplo tells Variety that he has been in talks with Zac Brown, Thomas Rhett and Sam Hunt. He also made friends with Sturgill Simpson and hopes to create country music with the same energy he has.
"There’s all these kids who are doing country in a really new way. There’s new energy in the sort of outlaw, outsider country that hasn’t been around in years. I’ve always felt that way, and it’s fun to push myself and see what I can come up with getting in with these artists," he explains, not offering much in the way of details.
Though he's a platinum-selling and Grammy award-winning producer, it was still hard for the DJ to get into the genre's inner-circle, he admits. "It’s actually a hard thing to get some of these guys to take a chance, because country’s such an insular community, but I’m trying to do something a little bit different with the songwriting just trying to experiment, y’know?" he says.
Diplo credits his want to create country music to his upbringing in Southern states like Florida, Mississippi and South Carolina.
"I feel like I had to do a bunch of other stuff first, but now I’m coming back to it," he insists.
Aside from being a successful DJ, he is a member of Major Lazer, LSD (with Sia and Labrinth) and Silk City (with Mark Ronson). Diplo is also an in-demand producer, working with big names from all genres such as Beyonce, Bad Bunny and Turnstile.
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