Exclusive Interview With Bingo Players At Bud Light Sensation 2014

You teased a song on Instagram back in October, is that coming soon?

Bingo Players:  Yes, but you won’t hear it tonight. It doesn’t have a title yet, either. It’s coming in January though.

You’ve said in the past that you’re not a fan of collaborations, why is that?

Bingo Players:  I’m not, not at fan, but for me it’s really hard. Whenever we tried to do a collaboration, it was hard to mesh our vision with the other artist’s vision. We have our own vision and we don’t want to have to compromise that. It’s hard to work together with people who have different visions on music, because then you have to give in. For us, it was useless. We want the track to have the Bingo Players’ vision.

How would you describe the Bingo Players sound?

Bingo Players:  It’s so difficult to answer that. I think, though, that melody is one of the most important things for us. We always start with the chords, never the beat.

Your newest track is Knock You Out, and it’s been very successful. How did that one come about?

Bingo Players:  We got the vocal demo from Sia, because she wrote the lyrics, and we loved it. So we built a track around that. And then it was re-sung by Kim Viera. It took a while to build it from the vocals, and it changed a lot, but the melody and vocals we fell in love with right from the start.

It’s been almost a year since Paul passed away. What’s been the biggest challenge for you moving on as a solo act?

Bingo Players: In the studio, having the chemistry and instant feedback, that I miss. I was more the technical guy and he was more the concept guy, so when I made something he would always give me great feedback, and I don’t have that anymore. So it’s weird. Now when I make something, I don’t have someone giving me an opinion right there in the studio. And with Paul, I always totally trusted his input. So that’s one of the biggest challenges for me, to have confidence in what I’m producing.

Would you ever consider bringing in another partner to help you?

Bingo Players: No. I thought about it, but I only want to do Bingo Players by myself, so that I can continue the legacy and continue what Paul and I were planning to do.

During live sets, Paul was always more the entertainer while you were more of the technical guy. How have you had to adapt now that it’s only you up there?

Bingo Players: It’s difficult because I’m a bit more shy than Paul was. He was always telling me to be more energetic up on stage. I have to adapt though. I can’t just stand there looking down the whole time. I’m growing into it though and I’m more comfortable with it now. I have an MC with me, too, which helps.

Hysteria Records, your label, has some pretty exciting things going on right now. Tell us what you look for in new artists.

Bingo Players: We always try to sign something different, which is risky, but we don’t want to put stuff out there that sounds too similar to what everyone else is releasing. And sometimes I’ll love a track, but it will never get charted because people don’t know the name or don’t know the sound. But I love to expose people to something different. And that’s a key thing about Hysteria. We still have big names, though. We just did a song for Tommy Trash, and MAKJ back when he started. We got a new Laidback Luke one, too. But I love the smaller names. I love playing out their music and seeing the crowd go nuts for these artists that no one knows about yet.

That concludes our interview, but we’d like to thank Maarten very much for his time! Be sure to check out the latest Bingo Players track, Knock You Out, below.