The Hot 6ix: Zeds Dead and Toronto

Anchored between three legendary music cities – Chicago, Detroit, and New York – Toronto has sometimes been looked upon as a little brother, a tagalong to its neighbours. But beyond headline stars Drake and the Deadmau5, ‘the 6ix’ is teeming with musical and cultural diversity: artists of all different styles with nothing more in common than their passion and the mixed heritage of the city itself. The electronic music community in particular has continued to grow more vibrant every year: it is home to acts like MSTRKRFT, who exploded as part of the blog-haus electro movement in the late 2000s, underground favourites Art Department, and techno mainstays like Carlo Lio. But there is an even younger group of acts who are now pushing their way into the mainstream. Part of that movement is Zeds Dead, a duo that was part of the city’s bass scene for years, and that have since gone on to international stardom.

Beginning around 2009 the group’s underground “Bassmentality” events shuddered and wobbled in the basement of 751, a dive bar in the city’s famous Queen West neighbourhood. The party catered to a burgeoning interest in bass music as dubstep gradually migrated across the Atlantic. Its popularity was a surprise in a city that for many years embraced its identity as a centre for techno, leaving the raucous antics of bass music to the west coast of Canada in British Columbia – but Toronto’s bass history also runs surprisingly deep.

On a warm, windswept street in the Trinity-Bellwoods neighbourhood an ice cream truck is playing a familiar jingle. Someone dashes out of a house and over to the idling vehicle. It’s Dylan Mamid, one half of Zeds Dead. There’s something special about the soft-serve you can get from the trucks in the neighbourhood, he explains, sipping from a freshly blended chocolate milkshake. Inside his home, we connect with his partner Zach Rapp-Rovan, the other half of the duo, over Skype.

Asked whether they ever felt out of place doing bass music in Toronto, they cite the city’s less well-known affinity for the style. “Toronto has a big drum ’n’ bass history,” says Zach. “They say it was the second biggest spot for drum ’n’ bass outside of London, but that was before our time. Dylan actually went to one of the last raves at System Sound Bar, which was an iconic spot. We were way at the tail end of that.”

In the late 90s drum and bass – or jungle, as the style was still often called – found a home in Toronto. The city regularly attracted international talent such as Andy C, Shy FX and DJ Kenny Ken, some of whom still regularly play there to this day. Central to the scene was the System Sound Bar, a 19+ venue that featured weekly drum ’n’ bass parties like FungleJunk on Tuesdays. System Sound Bar also helped to establish local acts like Capital J, Marcus Visionary, and DJ Sniper –although you’d be hard-pressed to recognise many of the names outside Canada today.

The venue closed its doors in 2005, but despite the jungle wave crashing in the early 2000s, the sound was instrumental for Zeds Dead to move away from their initial love of hip hop into the realms of electronic music. “My friend’s older brother went to raves, and through him he started playing me some drum ’n’ bass tracks,” says Dylan. “Some of the first drum ’n’ bass tracks I heard were remixes of hip hop tunes because drum ’n’ bass is double the tempo of a lot of hip hop stuff, so that was an easy way to get into electronic music.”

More than just a breeding ground for hip hop, the city’s mix of immigrant cultures, particularly those from the Caribbean, also played a vital part in fostering a bass community and influencing the unique sound of Zeds Dead. They credit local dub reggae bar Thymeless for really exposing them to dubstep: “That was a big, original influence spot for us,” says Dylan. “Probably one of the first places where we heard dubstep on a decent system – a small dub reggae club and they just had one big fucking wall of speakers. So it was our first time hearing some of those tracks with a proper sub.”

Now Zeds Dead want to play an even bigger role in the city where they started out years ago. This year they launched their record label, DeadBeats, with the very first DeadBeats music festival, an event they hope to put on annually. This year’s DeadBeats show was held on the waterfront, with acts including Lil Dicky and Toronto favourites like Pusher and Memorecks.

“This seems like a logical next step for us that we’ve wanted to take for a while. It gives more of a voice for the electronic realm of things in Toronto,” says Dylan. “There’s a lot of eyes on the hip hop world right now and that’s awesome; everything that comes out of Toronto that makes an impact just brings more energy to the city. I think it’s time for the electronic world to have another lane as well, which hopefully we can help provide.”

The group’s second big announcement this year was that their debut album ‘Northern Lights’ will be released through the label as well. At first listen, the stylistic breadth of the album can be overwhelming. One moment a track lulls you into a hypnotic relaxation with gorgeous vocals and the group’s undeniable pop sensibilities; the next moment you’re staggering back to life from rapid-fire breakbeats. It also showcases talent from all over the musical spectrum: Weezer’s lead singer Rivers Cuomo makes an appearance, as do two-thirds of veteran east-coast rap group The Lox – Styles P and Jadakiss – and even Toronto artist Dragonette, who smashed the pop charts with crossover hit ‘Hello’ with Martin Solveig.

Describing the different facets of the album, Dylan says, “We do all the production, so within that hopefully there’s always an indication of just Zeds Dead. Even though we go all over the place stylistically and genre-wise, I think that there’s
a common thread there.” In contrast, Zach takes a more poetic approach to his vision of ‘Northern Lights’: “I think of our album more of like a ride; it’s a concept album based on the feelings of the Northern Lights, but it’s not one sound throughout, it’s like a dream and it takes different twists and turns.”

As a new Smirnoff Sound Collective documentary demonstrates, those styles also correspond to Toronto itself and its mixture of people and cultures. Just as the effects of dancehall and reggae are leaving a similarly powerful impression on hip hop, Toronto’s Caribbean roots are clear in electronic music, too. “Toronto had that drum ’n’ bass history and the whole dancehall and reggae scene and the hip hop scene,” says Dylan. “All that stuff amalgamates in one way or another to create something new.”

Toronto’s electronic music community has ebbed and flowed since the early 90s. The striations of different movements, whether trance, drum ’n’ bass or techno still continue to shape the current musical landscape. Along with that, the physical landscape of the city itself – its venues, record shops and DIY spots – has continued to change as well. Many of the spaces that launched Zeds Dead years ago have come and gone.

One of the largest of those, The Guvernment Nightclub, locked its doors for good in 2015. A sprawling mega-club, its closing was seen as the end of an era for dance music in Toronto. Zeds Dead in particular had a special relationship with the venue, hosting their annual holiday show at the Kool Haus (the largest venue in the Guvernment complex) for two years before having to move it elsewhere due to the closing.

Despite the changing face of the city’s nightlife, Zeds Dead say that there’s no better time and place for them to begin the next part of their journey than the only place they want to call home. “Toronto has a really cool balance between quality of life and beauty to the city, one where you don’t feel like you’re ever too far from the action,” says Dylan. “It’s a melting pot in the best way.”