To anyone new to your music, name 3 words that best describe your sound.
LD: 80s infused electropop
Introduce yourself (yourselves) and your hidden talent!
LD: My name is Laura Dre and I’m a singer/songerwriter and music producer. I studied music production at BIMM / University of West London and produce everything myself. I feel that my music is different of what’s out there, because I have a rare contralto voice and because I have quite an eclectic taste in music, you will hear that my music offers a lot of diversity. I can sound anywhere from pop to dark, depending on my mood.
What made you decide that music is the right path for you?
LD: I knew since I was a 4 year old child that this is what I wanted to do! Make music. But back in the early 2000s there was no option to study music production in Germany, so after graduating with my “Abitur” I left right away to tour with a metal and pop/rock band in Los Angeles, USA. After 2.5 years I relocated to the UK mainly to form my own band and being in a city that is full of opportunities. London offered a large music scene, fresh sounds compared to L.A. and my ticket to become an independent artist. I always wanted to be able to produce my own music professionally as you know, hiring a producer is super expensive! Plus it’s never the true ‘YOU’, especially when those producers never have the same vision as you. During my time there I met many incredible people that I’m still in contact with and ended up staying in London for more than 12 years
If you could change about the music industry, what would it be?
LD: Feature more females in music production positions as there are currently only 2% music producers out there that are women! According to PRS. I would also like to see an increase of female stage performers at festivals, the statistics for female artists are 21% and for songwriters 12%. Currently as it stands, the music industry is heavily male dominated so I’m hoping for a more balanced change in the near future.
Tell MoggBlog viewers about your latest release! What’s the inspiration behind that?
LD: In a nutshell: Matching with someone on Tinder, having an instagram crush and unrequited love. The long story: Up until April 2020 I found myself composing techno and cyberpunk style
Instrumentals under the name JadziaDX. I was inspired and influenced by a game called Mass Effect. I was heading in that direction until I met this girl online on Tinder. We matched, I saw her instagram and was immediately smitten by her. Yes it was love at first sight on instagram! It was the first time I had an instant crush on someone, and she’s probably the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen walk the earth. Mesmerising eyes, a smile to die for and also gay. She’s a Japanese stewardess and introduced me to “Japanese City Pop” (a genre popular in Japan during the 80s) that opened up a whole new horizon of musical enjoyment to me. Anyway, she’s a big 80s music lover and that’s how I started composing 80s style music, I wanted to impress her. I composed my first song “I wanna be your only one” and showed it to her, she loved it. After her saying this, I started seriously considering going that direction, I had my reservations because it was 80s, I thought it might be a little outdated because of the retro sounds, but boy was I wrong! To my surprise and thanks to my best friend’s girlfriend, there is actually a whole scene out here that love 80s retro music. My best friend’s girlfriend introduced me to synthwave by giving me a playlist to listen to and I thought “this is really cool! How have I not discovered this genre before?!
And that was the start of “Laura Dre”. I continued going that path of making those 80s
influenced synth-pop tunes. I created one track after another. Me and my insta crush kept chatting, I discovered enough about her personality and what her type is. I knew I wasn’t her type but in May I told her that I like her (not just like that of course). She said “How can you like me, you don’t know me, pictures lie”. Perhaps she’s right, but how can I or anyone not like someone smart, with excellent English, open minded, who has traveled the world, cultural education, good taste in music and she seems to be very appreciative of it, but most importantly she’s openly gay. I’ve been and done that before: dating people in the closet and it’s not a great experience, so I will refrain from making that mistake ever again. It’s just too much hassle and not worth wasting my energy on this. So, can you blame me? I’m probably one of those 0.001% people that have a “global head” why look for someone local when you have the whole world available, right? Why settle for low quality when you know that the real deal exists somewhere 10.000 miles away? I never get why some people have narrowed, restrictive thinking. Take for example Michael Caine who discovered his future wife on a coffee advert.
The deal
Despite this being currently a one-way road, I have made a deal with her. In May I said “let’s go out on a date when I have my musical breakthrough (signed to a record label), but until then let’s keep things professional” and she said “deal”. I saved a screenshot of this conversation. This was the one motivation that kept me going and I slowly discovered things about myself. The things that I was able to do musically speaking. I sent the next two demo songs I produced to her “Loving you is a beautiful sin” (which is about being addicted to something or someone you could die for, if you can’t have them) and “If looks could kill” (which is about unattainable love). Communication slowly died down, as she was too busy with her new girlfriend, which I’ve found out later and so I stopped sending her my demos. I moved on and let it be.
Time passed and I composed new songs, in August I had composed 5 tracks. During that time my instagram crush went on a beach holiday and we started chatting again. She had broken up with her dream wife material and was going through an emotional phase I’m guessing. Needless to say whilst she dealt with her broken heart, it was good news for me. My energy refuelled. I felt invigorated and started composing “I open my eyes”, which is about not knowing whether something is real or not. She listened to this demo and totally loved it, asking if I’m going to release this beautiful song on Spotify soon. I said definitely. Shortly after that I came up with “Moving Spaces” which is about moving forwards and backwards in love / relationships and she loved this one as well. The lyrics refer to an “oasis” which is her beach holiday. On the chorus part where it says “‘cause we are in love”, the way I thought about this, is not referring to us being in love with each other. For me this is still one-way, and her being in love with someone else. Of course, this phrase is multi-dimensional and can be interpreted to whatever the listeners prefer. Particularly this song she said: “I can guarantee that this song will be a smash hit”. That made my day! I then got signed with one of the worlds leading synthwave record labels “Outland Recordings” and now I’m on this amazing journey of slowly taking over the world with my 80s infused electropop sounds.
The rollercoaster
Conversation slowly died down again, it’s like a rollercoaster with her. She never actively asked me anything, she only responds when asked with one-liners or not at all, which comes across as cold and disinterested. This has led me to creating “Ice Maiden”. This one is also about unattainable love, like a beautiful stripper dancing in front of you that you’re hypnotised with but can’t touch.
Probably not good timing but I thanked my insta crush for giving me tons of inspiration to create this album and journey and I asked her if she would still fulfil her part on the agreement we made. She said she would be honoured to go on a date with me, which was fantastic progress, because earlier in the year it didn’t sound like she would. So the story is still open until we meet after the pandemic. In the meantime I will continue to write more music and finish my 2nd album, hopefully go on an Asia tour soon as well.
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