Somebody To Lean On Major Lazer Mp3 Download
Barb Magario
ARI SHAPIRO, HOST: If you pull up in your car to a red light this summer and the car in the lane next to you has the windows down, they're blasting music, there's a pretty good chance this is the song you're hearing.(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "WHERE ARE U NOW")JUSTIN BIEBER: (Singing) Where are you now that I need you?SHAPIRO: That's "Where Are U Now," by the DJ duo Jack U, with Justin Bieber on vocals. The song is one of the biggest summer hits of 2015. And another contender for that title...(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "LEAN ON")MAJOR LAZER: (Singing) All we need is somebody to lean on.SHAPIRO: ..."Lean On," by the group Major Lazer. OK, one more inescapable hit this summer...(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "TAKE U THERE")KIESZA: (Singing) I will never dream of your love to take me there, to take me there.SHAPIRO: ..."Take U There," with Kiesza on vocals. So what do all three of these tracks have in common? They were all created by the same producer-DJ music mastermind - Diplo. His real name is Thomas Wesley Pentz. Musically, he kind of owns this summer, and he joins us now from our studio in New York. Welcome.THOMAS WESLEY PENTZ: Hey.SHAPIRO: OK, those tracks that we just played - they are not only different vocalists. They are different albums, collaborative projects. And tell us about - how do these collaborations take shape?PENTZ: Well, I guess people like me - DJs and producers - have a bigger say and a bigger voice than we've ever had before, you know? I'm not a superstar, per se. I'm not, like, on the radio myself. I'm not, like, in the press shots, but I'm, like, a musical creator, a producer, in the same vein as what Quincy Jones or Pharrell and Timbaland were. But this year, people like me are able to go perform the records we play live. And I think that it gives me leverage to bring artists to me to, you know, produce records and kind of be in control of the way it sounds.(SOUNDBITE OF MADONNA SONG, "B**** I'M MADONNA")SHAPIRO: Well, speaking of big artists, you also collaborated with Madonna or her latest album this year.PENTZ: Yeah.SHAPIRO: Let's hear one of the tracks that you produced for her latest album. And because this is public radio, I think we have to call it something else, like, "Ma'am I'm Madonna."PENTZ: Yeah.SHAPIRO: (Laughter). What do we call this?PENTZ: "Ms. Chick I'm Madonna."(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "B***** I'M MADONNA")MADONNA: (Singing) We go hard or we go home. We going to do this all night long. We get freaky if you want. [Expletive], I'm Madonna.SHAPIRO: So how do you take what you bring to the party and make that harmonize with what Madonna has established as her identity over all these years?PENTZ: Well, with Madonna, it was really special for me because I became really close with her and friendly with her that I never would expect. And even when I first got the notion that Madonna wanted to meet and maybe do something, I was like, OK, I'll do this because I want to get an Instagram picture with Madonna at least.SHAPIRO: (Laughter). That was the motivation?PENTZ: Yeah, you know, I didn't expect to even see her more than one afternoon. But with her, she's already getting more comfortable with me. Then this song happened because we were, like, getting a little drunk in the studio, and she's like, well, what's the craziest thing you have on your computer right now? Like, what is it? And literally, it was this crazy noise - this buzzing sound (imitating buzzing sound).But she loved it, and it almost feels like the kind of buzziest record for her album. And it does sound like a Diplo-Madonna song together, you know? The other songs were kind of me trying to find, like, the Madonna from the future or something, you know? And this one was kind of, like, we just threw caution to the wind and made something as obnoxious as possible, which is what - kind of what her career's always been like, you know?SHAPIRO: It's funny that you mention trying to find the Madonna of the future. You told Rolling Stone, when people come to me, they don't know what they want to sound like. They just want to sound like something from the future.PENTZ: Yeah.SHAPIRO: I wonder if you can pinpoint what the future sounds like.PENTZ: You can never figure out what the future sounds like. As soon as you make it, it's the past, so you're just constantly chasing it. You want to find something that just - you haven't heard before. There's a great story of "I Can Feel It Coming In The Air Tonight," Phil Collins, you know? Like, the drums on that are just literally the talkback mic. You know what I'm talking about, right?SHAPIRO: I love that your example of a great musical experimentation is Phil Collins, which I think most people who are, like, of-the-moment trendsetting would be afraid to site as a musical reference.PENTZ: I love any music that makes me feel something, you know? I want music to give me goose bumps. And when I make a song like that, then I know it's good, you know?SHAPIRO: Can we do sort of anatomy of a song? Because "Lean On" is such mega-hit this summer, I'd love it if you could break it down for us and tell us what's going on in there.PENTZ: Well, it started as just a really slow reggae song. And the funny thing is - about it is that MO was fan of ours. I didn't know who she was.SHAPIRO: She's the singer on this track.PENTZ: Yeah. She's a Danish singer who has a very jazzy voice.(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "LEAN ON")MO: (Singing) Do you recall, not long ago, we would walk on the sidewalk?PENTZ: She came to our shown in Amsterdam, and she introduced herself. And she forced me and the other guy in Major Lazer to go to her room to play music for her. Like, she came to this city. I was like, OK, I'll give this girl a chance. And I left her this record - the instrumental - and she wrote like four songs in a week.SHAPIRO: Wow.PENTZ: And we just sat down, and we tried a lot of ideas. And I eventually said, look, we need something fresh, so I turned it into a hip-hop beat. And then, the main thing of the beat is this reggae drumbeat called a dembow. And you hear it underneath the song the whole time right here.(SOUNDBITE OF MAJOR LAZER SONG, "LEAN ON")PENTZ: (Imitating drum beat). It's like a - it's one beat that they used in reggaeton and dancehall records in '90s for, like, 10 years. So we just put that in there and compressed it and made it sound very thick and rich.SHAPIRO: And so when you sent that to her, what was her reaction?PENTZ: She did not like this at all.SHAPIRO: You're like, this is the biggest summer hit of 2015.PENTZ: Yeah. Eventually I convinced her. I was like, this is - trust me, this is going to be big.(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "LEAN ON")MO: (Singing) All we need is somebody to lean on.SHAPIRO: I want to rewind the clock. You were born in Mississippi, grew up in Florida. What's your earliest memory of making music?PENTZ: I would probably say - this is kind of funny because I hope it counts as making music, but I used to just record the radio on cassette tapes and just make little mix tapes, like a pastiche of different things. Like, I would record a lot of - I remember pop music, like, stuff like "Physical Attraction" by Madonna. I used to love that record, and I recorded it and listened to it a lot.SHAPIRO: How old were you when you were making those first mix tapes off the radio?PENTZ: Like 8, 11. I don't know. Something like that.SHAPIRO: It's so funny because, you know, most people start with piano lessons or violin lessons or something, but, like, you were a DJ from day one.PENTZ: But it's funny. In South Florida, DJ culture is so big, you know? Like, in the neighborhood I lived in Fort Lauderdale was, like - there was just so many street parties. I think that that area was, like, the most diverse place I had lived in. It was - my neighborhood was, like - literally, I went to bar mitzvahs. I went to, like, Haitian kids' birthday parties. And, you know, my family - cousins would come down from Orlando. They're all rednecks. It was like...SHAPIRO: So it was like a young Diplo in the making...PENTZ: Yeah.SHAPIRO: ...Where you can hear the sound of it.PENTZ: It was everything. It was every music there. Until I moved to Philly, then I realized how segregated music was, you know? When I went to Philly, we started a party called Holotronics, and we played, like, really crazy music. And that was kind of the inspiration for me to quit my job and go full time. You know, it's crazy because when I was in Philly, I never thought you could make money making music. I was trying to keep any job I had because there wasn't any DJs that had a living doing that, you know? So I had to do it all myself. I'm like an older guy in this DJ world, you know?SHAPIRO: You're 36?PENTZ: Yeah, I'm 36 years old, so, you know, I'm lucky I'm still doing it and still excited by it.(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "TAKE U THERE")KIESZA: (Singing) You show me there's something more to us than the same old thing - no usual affair.SHAPIRO: Well, Wes, in the middle of your crazy-triumphant whirlwind summer, thank you for taking the time to talk with us.PENTZ: I appreciate it. You've been a great interviewer. You knew a lot about my music. I appreciate that.SHAPIRO: Thomas Wesley Pentz is a DJ and producer better known as Diplo.
LULU GARCIA-NAVARRO, HOST: In 2015, one song became not only that year's summer anthem. It generated over 1 billion streams since then. Its name, "Lean On."(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "LEAN ON ")MO: (Singing) Blow a kiss. Fire a gun. We need someone to lean on. Blow a kiss. Fire a gun. All we need is somebody to lean on.GARCIA-NAVARRO: "Lean On," a song by Major Lazer and DJ Snake, featured the singer MO.MO: So my name is Karen Marie Aagaard Orsted Andersen. You probably know me as the singer MO. But in Danish, we actually say (speaking Danish).GARCIA-NAVARRO: MO or (speaking Danish) spent the next couple of years touring, writing and recording new music. We caught up with her as she was in a car driving to her next interview promoting her sophomore album "Forever Neverland." But first, we wanted to know how she got started.MO: I got into music around the age of - I think I was, like, 8 years old. And I think the reason why I got the idea that music was what I wanted to do was because I discovered the Spice Girls. And I fell in love with them. And it was the first time I ever had that music like falling in love with some music. And you felt like the music was just directed directly to me, you know?(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "STOP")GERI HALLIWELL: (Singing) You just walk in. I make you smile. It's cool but...MO: My favorite spice girl was Sporty Spice, Melanie C.(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "STOP")MELANIE CHISHOLM: (Singing) You take an inch. I run a mile - can't win. You're always right behind me.MO: Because I feel like I could really relate to her and her personality, you know? And also, I thought she was the one that sang the best, you know? She was singing so good. And I think the thing for me as a kid, like, in school, you know, I wasn't really very good at school because I was bad at keeping my attention. I'm not very good at things if I'm not feeling passionate about it. And so I think that was really why I started getting into music was because it was something I felt super passionate about. And I really liked doing it. And I felt like I was good at it. And that obviously empowered me to keep doing it, you know?(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "IF IT'S OVER (FEAT. CHARLI XCX)")MO: (Singing) Finally coming down off of all that hurt - got a fresh, new side. Now, I really don't see you.Yeah. I guess I'm the first musician ever in the history of my family. My grandfather - he was a painter. But that's it. My father - he's a psychologist. And my brother is a psychiatrist. My mom was a teacher. And so I kind of come from a brainy family. But, I mean, there's some creative blood running there somewhere. At least, I guess I'm kind of creative (laughter).(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "PURPLE LIKE THE SUMMER RAIN")MO: (Singing) This is what I wanted all my life. No one can take it, no. Pour me all the wine, and let me picture that I made it, oh. This is what a universal fairytale is made of - sugar in my veins, purple like the summer rain.With this album, "Forever Neverland," I started writing songs for it four and a half year ago. But I didn't really know what direction I was going. I was kind of just starting out. And I moved to LA for a couple of months. And I guess just in the hope of finding the sound and, like, my voice I was really happy about my first album. But I really, really wanted the second one to evolve from that.(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "SUN IN OUR EYES")MO: (Singing) I feel the sunlight on my head, the scent of summer in my bed - when we were footprints in the sand, stealing liquor, making plans. I can see your face...It was weird because, you know, you are in this city where all the most exciting music is happening. But I had a moment of just feeling like I didn't know who I was and what my sound was going to be like and what direction I was going. And that was what inspired "Blur."(SOUNDBITE OF MO SONG, "BLUR")MO: It was kind of like the turning point when I wrote that song. That was just around the time where I started to figure out my sound and my voice. And so "Blur" kind of started that. And I think it's quite beautiful that the theme of that song was about being completely lost. But then it started to go better after that, you know?(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "BLUR")MO: (Singing) Under the bad, bad moon tonight - or, baby, is it just me? Or is it something in the air we breathe 'cause I'm feeling dizzy, dizzy, ah.It might sound kind of basic. But I think it was that moment of realizing that, oh, you know, it's OK to actually just be like, no. I love to have a little guitar and to have that kind of rock vibe. But then mix that with, like, a current sound and then also to be vulnerable because I guess after the whole success with "Lean On" and everything kind of - you know, me being introduced into this more mainstream audience, I guess I was a little scared of being my true self and being vulnerable and being ready, you know? And so I was. But it was really nice to get reminded that I should not be afraid.(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "IMAGINARY FRIEND")MO: (Singing) I'm not the type, but I will let you - I will let you in tonight. I'm a little shy, but we could turn down - we could turn down all the lights.GARCIA-NAVARRO: MO's album is called "Forever Neverland."(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "IMAGINARY FRIEND")MO: (Singing) If you can picture it is real - you - you don't need your eyes to feel. Just watch me, watch me, watch me, with your hands.