During this year’s magical Dreamstate festival in Long Beach, we got the opportunity to interview Socal’s own Trance force, Dustin Husain. Dustin has emerged onto the scene with an impressive range of releases supported by Armin van Buuren, Paul van Dyke and Ferry Corsten, to name a few. His new track, To the moon, recently came out on Resonation, a sublabel of Flashover Recordings and it has already received support on A State of Trance (ASOT).
His track, “It’s What We Love“ was nominated for tune of the year 2023 on ASOT and he is set to play at Beyond Wonderland 2024. With wins like these, 2024 is looking to be a great year for Dustin. He gave us details on what’s ahead, such as new releases on High Contrast Recordings, and his first release of the year, Midnight Club, which he played during his set. He also hinted at a “Time Out“ dance remix with Ferry. We dove into topics such as his Dreamstate set, how the power of trance helps people, music production, and the importance of working hard to get results in the music industry.
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How do you feel about your set?
“I took a big risk. I kind of steered away from Trance but also still played Trance. As you guys know, Trance is going towards Techno, the harder styles of Trance. So I added some new Eurodance tracks in there, some Tech Trance, sing along, stuff like that. Keep it interesting.”
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You describe your sound as modern trance, can you elaborate on that?
“Well, no disrespect, but you know how everyone is still stuck with the classics? as much as the classics are still classics and still hold, we still need to evolve and give new tracks to listeners so they don’t get stuck in that void. There’s a lot of technology coming out so might as well go out and experiment, don’t be scared, take risks, you know. That’s how you keep a genre alive. You keep the elements, you keep the bass there, but you add your own unique sound and explore different sounds and incorporate it into Trance. And that’s basically what I’m trying to do.”
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What is it about trance that inspired you?
“Trance, just to me it called my name. I grew up with Big Room Trance back in 2009 to 2012. Just the feeling, the adrenaline rush, the vocals. They are like, haunting and captivating where they gave you this feeling you couldn’t describe. But it also pushed me in my personal life. And it just gave me that passion to keep going forward with it.”
Dustin further emphasized the motivating feeling of being able to play for fans to help them navigate life’s hurdles stating:
“ It fills my heart and then just seeing the people out there just dancing, dancing away and no cares in the world, they could be going through hard times. You’re doing this because they’re out here to have fun. ”
Early and current Influences
His early inspirations include Dash Berlin, Cosmic Gate, Ferry Corsten, Armin Van Buuren, Paul Oakenfold which he describes as “the guys that keep doing it, the pioneers, the legends.” Along with these artist, he also enjoys listening to “Tech House, Drum & Bass and the new Skrillex.” As for Trance he’s “getting more drawn into Tech Trance.”
We dove deeper into music production, and some of his Favorite VSTs used to make incredible music.
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You started with Sylenth and Spire, Do you still use those VSTs?
“I still use those VSTs, I’ve been actually diving into Diva as well working with Flashover, Diva is one of their biggest things. Same with a VST called ANA, It’s kind of similar to Sylenth, it’s pretty good. To be honest, it’s just whatever your sound you want to do with production, you kinda want to do background knowledge. For instance, if it’s Armada, you’re gonna have to find Armada sound banks or Armada style VSTs and work from your sound there or even start fresh and kind of just see where your music goes. Like when I first started my first track Tremors, it was an Anjuna EDM style track. I was just playing with Sylenth to be honest, it was all made with Sylenth and I evolved from there.”
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On pushing yourself
Dustin has evolved his sound and put in the work that has attracted labels to reach out to further develop his vision. He elaborated, “If you submit something of quality or something you’re confident in, they kind of see that in you and want to push you to do better, so just keep going. To me it’s like, don’t expect to expect it because that’s what I’ve been doing. I don’t expect anything and just when that time comes, it’s just wow. You got to experiment, you got to tune your ears, mixing, mastering that also plays a big part of it as well. It’s basically just experimental, just trial and error. And once you feel like you’re happy, just go ahead and just push yourself to send it to labels and you’d be surprised a lot of people will go ahead and help you from that.”
Hard work has certainly been done by Dustin through his career and he emphasized that when labels reject your track, it is still considered a win, and mentioned, “they do get a lot of demos, but one thing I do like to add is a lot of people do say, ‘oh, they gave you a generic response.’ It’s not a generic response. They actually listen to that track. It may be a generic response but they actually listen to it. And that’s a big plus. I don’t get discouraged. It actually fuels my fire because they’re actually listening to it and they’re consistently listening to it.”
Dustin gave some encouraging words that I believe all music creators can appreciate:
“ just keep going bro. Like, you gotta have that competitive fuel. You gotta have that fire even though it’s not competition but it’s getting that recognition and that recognition is a big first step, it’s a huge first step. ”
Has your production been more in the box or analog?
“So everything is on my computer. It’s very convenient just doing it on the laptop too. Just also like collaborating with, you know, people who help mix and mastering. They give you insight, you go ahead and exchange ideas. I have actually gone to a couple of producers’ homes before covid happened, before 2020. Shout out to Dave Neven. He was cool, I would always go over to his house after work.”
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If you could pick a dream collab, that hasn’t happened yet. Who would that be?
“Gouryella? To be honest, like in general EDM, would be Calvin Harris with his stuff now, I did play a track from his earlier. It just reminds me of the old school Trance even though it sounds quote on quote old, it’s still refreshing, and for Dreamstate, it’s perfect.”
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What are you most thankful for in this moment here at Dreamstate?
“ To be honest, thankful for all my supporters, girlfriend, best friends, they’ve honestly been there since I started and although it may not seem like I have compassion for them, just know I always do have compassion for them. That’s just, you know, the way I operate and they know that. But you know, sometimes reinforcement is always good. ”
We closed out with some fun questions, where we got to know more about Dustin. We found out he’d want his last meal on earth to be Sushi, specifically shrimp tempura. If he could live anywhere in the world, he feels he’s already there, because he’s, “happy in Los Angeles…you can’t ask for more. You got the beaches, you got museums, you got parks, you got music, it’s a Mecca for everything. Anything you need or want to go for vacation, just go to California, Los Angeles.” He surprised us when he quickly answered “duck” as his favorite animal, simply stating that they’re his favorite.
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Last words for friends, fans, aspiring artists?
“ To my friends, supporters. Thank you. We’re going to keep going and going and going. Husain train all the way. To all aspiring artists just keep grinding. Even if you don’t think anyone’s watching you or paying attention to you. There’s always people paying attention to you, especially the people behind the scenes. I wanna shout out to my mama, shout out to Dreamstate thank you for everything. You know, just we’re gonna keep going choo choo Husain train let’s go. ”
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