Aero Chord quickly caught my attention in 2014 after I heard his Krewella Remix. His aggressive, unique sounds immediately put him on a lot of radars.

It took a while, but Aero Chord finally made his Chicago debut a few weeks ago at Spring Awakening Music Festival where he treated a much over capacity crowd to one of the craziest sets of the weekend. We were lucky enough to be able to sit down with Aero Chord before his set and chat about Monstercat Records, Darude – Sandstorm, and his first North American tour.

Aero Chord

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Would you like to introduce yourself?

Hey my name is Alex, AeroChord, I’m backstage at SAMF I’m about to play in like an hour. I Can’t wait!

You just kicked off your first North American Tour, how has that been so far?

I’ve seen a lot of new things, it’s very very tiring. No joke, 6 am flights and killing yourself – seriously SO tiring. But the plus side is that you see so much new things. You get to try out a lot of new markets, play a lot of new clubs, try out new songs in different places

SAMF is only your 5th show in the tour, correct? What cities are you most excited for coming up?

L.A. For sure, and definitely The Yost in California because the first EDM show I ever went to in the US was 12th planet playing at the Yost. It was just packed like 2k people just raging. It was crazy. So I really want to play that. I’m also excited for New York City and Canada – I have a Vancouver show- and I’m really excited for that because last time I played there the crowd was insane.

So you mentioned The Yost being your first U.S. Electronic Music Show, and now you’re about to headline it – how does that feel? Is it like a perfect ‘coming full circle’ kind of feeling?

That was actually really weird but SUCH a good feeling. You feel and see the progress and it’s so rare for that to happen, actually.

What a validating feeling, no?

Exactly, I get to see the other side of it now.

How has being a part of the Monstercat family helped you progress and grow as an artist?

It’s the best choice I have when I release originals- because they go so far – they get so much exposure. They get it in so many people’s hands. It’s just crazy how much the label does for me in general. They’ve put me in three label showcases as one of the top artists. They take care of me, if I need help somewhere, if I need connections or advice or tips someone is always going to be there from the team.

Monstercat has such a great online following, have you noticed that?

Oh man, you can’t imagine. It’s all the ‘Darude – Sandstorm’ kids. They’re great. I love them. They love that shit, and I love them.

When someone buys a ticket to see ‘Aero Chord’ what can they expect?

Honestly, Levels, Animals, maybe some Tiesto. *Laughs* But seriously. I play open-format sets. I’ll play everything. I actually freestyle almost every show. Except for today’s set. I planned it out a bit just to be sure I don’t forget to play some tracks. They can expect massive genre-bending, dropping into hardstyle, just whatever feels good

You just said the word open-format, now that you’re touring more do you find it easier or harder to read the crowds across these different cities? Are their reactions different? What do you do with these reactions?

To be honest…and I know a lot of people have said this I’ve seen 3lau say this – when you’re at a level when you’re an artist and you get booked as Aero Chord for example there’s not a huge chance of reading the crowd. You just play whatever you like, and they dig it because they came to see Aero Chord so they rage. But as far as reading the crowd goes I will make slight changes in my sets on the fly. I’ll see they like dubstep I’ll drop a bit more Zomboy in there. Other crowds like really dark trap so I’ll throw some more underground shit.

It’s all about finding that track that makes the crowd scream “OOOHHHH,” right?

Exactly, and to be honest it has gotten to the point where 128 BPM…the fatal 128 isn’t the most popular. Things like trap, dubstep, the offtempo stuff that makes people go crazy

Who do you like that’s making music right now?

Laxx, Zomboy, I’m not going to say the obvious…which is Skrillex. There’s these guys called Command Q who are really underground right now, but they are really fucking awesome….Oh and Habstrakt! I love his shit. we’ve played so many times together that he’s a really good buddy of mine and he sends me all his new stuff, he’s just so awesome at every genre he makes.

Now that we have hit the halfway period of 2015, what are your goals for the next 6 months?

Since this is my first tour, I’d love to work as much so I can secure a second tour like in September or October. I think we have more potential tours in the works which would be so awesome to see happen. Just making new music, maybe try some new genres.





Where would you say you draw most of your inspiration from?

Half of it is just seeing the big guys who are selling out these huge festivals. Seeing them do what they do and them being so inspired doing what they are doing makes me feel inspired, you know? So seeing Skrillex, Diplo, Dillon Francis, DJ SNAKE, all thees guys doing what they do, kind of makes you want to work and get to where they are.

The other part is just seeing the possibility – seeing how far you are able to go. You want to work to get to that point. You don’t want to leave a career hanging because you weren’t putting the effort into it.

Today is going to be your Chicago debut, are you stoked?

It’s going to be awesome. The crowd looks crazy already





Well, good luck at your set, we hope to see you in Chicago again sometime soon.

Thank you so much.

A huge thank you to Aero Chord and the Monstercat team for making this interview happen. We hope to see you again soon!

Check out Aero Chord’s newest song – a collaboration with Razihel – Titans which was released on Monstercat Records.

Aero Chord x Run The Trap Exclusive Interview