- Words Isabelle Cassidy
- Photographer Amy Peskett
- Fashion Aga Dziedzic
- Grooming Venner-James at The Only Agency
- Production Studio Notion
- Photo Assistant Ryan Ashley James
- Photo Assistant Robyn Dillon
- Fashion Assistant Daisy McDonald
- Fashion Assistant Georgia Petrou
- Location Wolf & Badger Studios
After a whole decade together, it’s still So Far So Good for The Chainsmokers.
Since forming The Chainsmokers in 2012, Alex Pall and Drew Taggart have collected accolades and experiences most artists only dream of.
Best known for making EDM pop music for the masses, the duo has racked up billions of streams whilst building fan bases on every continent. Alongside their international reach, you’d be hard pressed to find a young Brit who wouldn’t identify songs like “Closer” and “Roses” as soundtracks to their youth, tracks whose anthemic hooks still hold the power to whirl us back to nostalgic summers of the mid-2010s.
Moving through a multitude of musical evolutions over the past decade, the title of their new album, So Far So Good, epitomises their career trajectory and consistent chart successes. Opening a new chapter after a two-year hiatus taking time to rest, reflect and recuperate, the album speaks to a new era for The Chainsmokers.
Talking to the pair via Zoom, their excitement for the new project carries across, as well as a genuine, earnest appreciation for their experiences so far. They playfully sum up their approach to their life and work with a quote: “That water looks deep, let’s jump in it, and hopefully, we can figure out how to swim.” If the last 10 years are anything to go by, in this metaphor I’d compare Alex and Drew to Olympians. Thinking about their past successes whilst looking to the future, we discuss how they’ve shaped EDM, the struggles of adapting to a TikTok era, and why this album feels like starting from scratch.
- Drew:
- Vest JADED LDN
- Trousers Song For The Mute
- Boots Bottega Veneta
- Alex:
- Jacket & Trousers Prada
- Shoes Converse
So Far So Good marks the return from a two year hiatus. Did it feel a long time coming?
Drew: We did a big reset with this album. We felt like we needed to go away and refocus on our most exciting sounds, and we rediscovered that over the past two years. It’s what our fans want most from Chainsmokers and it feels very elevated, very much us.
It sounds like the break gave you much needed time to reflect. How does it feel being back?
Alex: The gap was essential on so many levels. At the end of 2019 we were burned out, physically and mentally exhausted from eight hardcore years of playing over 180 shows and putting a song out what felt like every six weeks. I think there’s a reason why artists take some time to pull back and rediscover what their magic is. We didn’t expect it to take two years, but we needed every minute of it. The project is infinitely stronger as a result of having that extra time. It feels like we’re a new band in some ways, starting from scratch.
You do feel guilty. You never really want to dip out; you worry that the world’s gonna move past you. But we’re excited. It feels like we have an opportunity to reconnect with our core fans, hopefully reach some new ones, and continue this momentum.
- Drew:
- Jumper Axel Arigato
- Trousers Badlands Studio
- Alex:
- Shirt Bryder
- Trousers Berluti
- Drew:
- Jumper AGR
- Jean Levis
- Alex:
- Jacket Song For The Mute
- Knit Jumper Paul Smith
In what ways has the music evolved?
Drew: This was the first album that we’ve put out in the traditional album sense – every other album came out single by single. There are a lot more exciting little bits that are for just us and our fans. Every time you put music song by song, you think about it being received as a single, so we had a more creatively free process this time because of the album context.
It’s been almost a decade of The Chainsmokers. When you first started, you were doing what many EDM artists weren’t: mixing indie music. Do you feel like in the last decade you’ve had a part in shaping EDM considering the genre’s mainstream status now?
Alex: It’s hard to take credit for that. We admire people like Calvin Harris and Avicii, and Swedish House Mafia, Daft Punk, David Guetta, Tiësto. Those guys are legends to us. I think what we did was bridge a gap between two different genres that had a big impact on us as we were growing up.
Indie music had such an influence on us growing up; the songwriting and the authenticity of it. We thought, ‘What if we bridge that gap between that type of songwriting, and this amazing, global dance music with melodic texture that you got from these gigantic dance artists?’ Doing those remixes was really exciting. Hopefully we’ve influenced some producers; we’ve gotten nice emails from people over the years. Who knows, ultimately, when it’s said and done, what our mark will be.
- Drew:
- Jumper JADED LDN
- Trousers Song For The Mute
- Alex:
- Jacket & Trousers Prada
Thinking about singles and virality, when “#SELFIE” went viral in 2014, that was before the days of TikTok and was during the early days of Instagram. Now the idea of reaching the charts by going viral on social media is almost commonplace – have you felt those shifts within the music industry as a whole?
Drew: Absolutely. The phase Alex was talking about, when we were remixing indie artists off this website called Hype Machine – which was like the first viral charter of the internet – that was before playlist culture. Even since we took time off at the beginning of 2020, the influence TikTok has had on the music industry is astounding. You’re getting way more hits and viral moments, but since we started, you’re getting fewer hits that last a really long time. There’s so much content, so there’s very low barriers of entry to making music and getting it out there. The artists that we look up to are the ones that don’t really follow trends. You can only be yourself and make sure that you’re speaking authentically to yourself and your fan base
Do you feel like your fans have come with you on your musical journey?
Alex: That was one of the better surprises: seeing fans be like, ‘Where are you, we miss you guys’. Going deeper, we want to connect with these people, and we’re blessed to have had this opportunity. The music gets so big you forget exactly who you’re speaking to and who’s with you. There’s a big difference between the casual fan that likes your song or is familiar with it, and a fan that knows what we’re playing every day, or what we wore yesterday. Every artist wants their music to be heard by everyone on the planet. But deepening our connection with those fans is the goal as we move forward in time.
- Alex:
- Jacket Song For The Mute
- Jumper Paul Smith
- Drew:
- Jacket Song For The Mute
- Jumper Diesel
- Trousers Samsøe Samsøe
What drives you to keep making new tracks and find new collaborators? Do you feel like have the drive to keep evolving and moving forward?
Drew: Creating a good song is one of the best highs that exists. For purely selfish reasons, we’ll do that. It’s an insanely cathartic process. It’s the most sincere form of therapy. We’re huge music fans, and being able to take all the things that inspire us and make our own collage with it, we’ll do that for the love of it forever
What do you feel like you’ve learned from each other? Is the fact that you’ve had the opportunity to work together for so many years something you cherish?
Drew: We always say the luckiest thing that ever happened to us was meeting each other. We met one day and then the next day just started The Chainsmokers. To do that on a whim and then grow together over 10 years…
Over 10 years, you grow a lot as a person. We’ve done things together that you just can’t explain to anybody else. We’re really lucky to be at that space 10 years later, and still be better friends than ever.
- Drew:
- Vest JADED LDN
- Trousers Song For The Mute
- Alex:
- Jacket & Trousers Prada
- Jumper Axel Arigato
- Trousers Badlands Studio
Is there anything you’d like to think of as your legacy, both musically or otherwise?
Drew: One of the things I’m most proud of is that we’ve never left anything on the table. We were killing ourselves doing shows because we wanted to play for as many fans as possible, so we were doing 150-200 shows a year for the past five years. We went everywhere; we never said no to anything. If we could get there and make it work, we wanted to do it. We’ve gotten to go around the world a dozen times now and really built fan bases on every continent. Being able to bring a really fun show experience to every part of the world is something that I’m most proud of. It’s something that I’ll be proud of forever.
Alex: It’s just been such an honour to do the things I love. Being able to not only do what we love with music, but get into other areas that are exciting to us. If you want to do it, throw yourself into it and figure it out. I think that’s been the spirit of The Chainsmokers.