Meet 420tiesto, an LA Producer Climbing the Ranks of the Underground
420tiesto is a producer we really rock with here @ SLAP. His beats are always thumping and are characterized by intricate drum patterns, usually mixing a bunch of different drum sounds into his work.
He's worked with a number of artists we've featured like Lil House Phone, BagTy, Nolanberollin (listen below) and other notable names in the underground like Lil Tracy and CHXPO.Â
We caught up with him to learn about what's gotten him here:
To get the basics out of the way:Â What part of LA are you from/in? How long have you been producing?
I've been producing for ten years. I'm originally from Cerritos, then moved to Yorba Linda, then to La Crescenta, then Chico for school, then Tujunga, K-Town, Silver Lake... I've stayed all over LA.Â
Gotta ask... where’d the inspiration for the name 420tiesto come from?
Zaytoven is my favorite producer, so it's kinda like the Tiesto version of his name.Â
You do a lot of production for Lil House Phone. Is that a personal friend or just someone you mesh well with musically?
That's the bro, one of my only friends in this music shit.
What program do you use to produce? and are you self taught or have a mentor of some kind?
Fl studio, and no they didn't even have tutorial videos for this shit back in the day.
Do you have any other musical background such as instruments or engineering?
No I started producing hella late too, when I was 18/19. I used to go to a lot of raves, and I wanted to be a DJ but I didn't have enough money for turntables. One of my homies in college was like dude you should just download fruity loops. At first I didn't even know where to put the first kick, drum, claps or anything.
Is there any producer or combination of producers that you would say has inspired your own sound?
Zaytoven , Timbaland, The Asian dude in the Neptunes
You have a lot of collab beats with different producers/rappers, including one with Odd Future’s Left Brain (listen below.) How did that one come about? And what is it that you like about doing beat collaborations?
One of the homies introduced me to him, and I like working with people... It's cool.Â
You have another collab with Captain Crunch (listen below) for a song by Yung Mojo… are there any more of those floating around? Will there be more in the future?
I'm not sure my desktop is hella messy I should look into it though.
If you could collab on a beat w/ anyone who would it be?
If I could collab with anyone else it would probably be Zaytoven.
Are there any  artists dropping music on your beats for the first time in the near future?
I hope so honestly... I don't want to say too much though.
We recently heard from Bag Ty that you helped direct his most recent video (see below.) Do you want to do more directing going forward?
 Yea I got hella movie ideas and a cartoon I want to make.
We hear a lot of bongo drums in your beats... Where did you get inspired to incorporate that specific drum sound into your own music? What about that sound do you like so much?
I'm not really sure. I just like the sounds... they just sound hella  dope so I use em.Â
Are there any other specific sounds  that you would say characterize your beats?
I'm going to start putting the Fruity Loops sound in the beginning of all my beats. Like when fl opens up it has this like bloop sound, yeah that's my shit.
Any plans for personal music in the future? (and I don’t mean putting your own vocals on them... more like production that isn't made for people to rap over.)
Yeah, fasho gonna happen soon.
When someone hears a 420tiesto beat, what do you hope they’re feeling?
I hope they feel good inside.
Follow 420tiesto on Twitter and SoundCloud for updates and new music.Â
