&friends weaves deep narratives through a global approach to Afro-House music

&friends is a concept created by storyteller and artist Sean Thomas, and is based on the inspiration and the merge of global cultures through the pure spirit of music - crafting an intimate landscape where human beings can experience healing moments, love, unity, and self-empowerment on the dance floor.

The fascinating project finds its inspiration in the musical footprint from the traditional diasporic genres of African culture, gathering an expansive variety of sonic shapes that involves uplifting voicework, and impeccable percussion that ignites sonic creativity. As a crucial part of this musical project, we can find the noble art of Nigerian songwriters and recording artists like Phina Asa, Oluwadamvic, eL Jay, and Dotun Oladesemola.

Having a deep conversation with the mastermind of &friends, Sean Thomas, we discovered a brand-new perspective that we seldom see in today’s dance scene. As a free spirit, he taught us that authenticity, rhythm, and lyrics are another way to provide light to those who are still in the darkness, his form of reminding us that we are one, no matter where we come from, what language we speak, or what we believe in.

In 2022 when the project launched, the path of &friends garnered unprecedented momentum following the success of the track ‘Ode Ireti’ ft. El-Jay and Oluwadamvic. The Nitefreak Remix of the seminal &friends track sent shockwaves to audiences worldwide, starting its sensation at the iconic Playa at Burning Man, as played by Keinemusik. Continuing throughout the world across 2023 to present day, &friends has made their mark on places like Beirut, Dubai, Egypt, Madrid, Marrakesh, Mexico City, New York, and most recently our home country of Brazil during Carnival.

2023 saw the project accumulate further accolades, marking &friends’ first official releases on distinguished labels like Armada Music, MoBlack Records and Tomorrowland Music. Late-summer, Sean brought all of &friends core collaborators to one stage in Egypt, with the electrifying debut performance being the pinnacle of the live experience &friends seeks to create. The collective has plans for additional live performances this year.

Prior to year-end, &friends teamed up with Label Radar and Beatport in celebration of one year of ‘Ode Ireti’. The three teams opened a global contest to invite producers and emerging artists to submit their own interpretations of the unifying anthem, and after 378 submissions and a meticulous selection Sean Thomas decided to showcase 13 remixes on ‘Ode Ireti Pt. II, The Album’, including contributions from passionate young talent like Brazil’s own VXSION, Reminder, and Zani.

This year, &friends has most recently seen the release of an official remix with iconic duo Sofi Tukker, and has forthcoming collaborations and remixes with Brazilian artists like Zerb. He and the crew have much more original live music in store as they prepare for a late-summer live tour, as they craft innovative experiences to share on the horizon.

&friends is not your typical Afro-House collective; it is more than that…It’s global, it’s family, it’s friendship, it’s us.

Hey Sean, catching up with you is an immense pleasure, and welcome to our Mixmag cover story!

I am super excited, too! First of all, I have been following Mixmag since the mid 2000’s. I have always been a massive fan of the magazine. You have covered the most incredible artists in the last 40 years; it is humbling. I’m feeling good! I have been traveling a lot for the last couple of months. I think it’s always a challenge to stay grounded when you are touring so much, and you are managing so many pieces.

It can be a lot of pressure to not only make music, but create new things or shows. Ultimately, when you are doing what you love and are the most passionate about, you always find a way to make sure that you continue to innovate and stay grounded. My most significant things are heart, physical health, and mental health, which always come first. Everything else is a lot easier from there.

Would like to start by knowing more about you and the crew that makes up &friends. What draws your attention specifically to Nigeria?

What people don’t know is that I started my journey in music in 2005, when I used to produce hip-hop just for fun. I have also always been a writer, writing is another very important way that I express myself.

Back then, when I initially became inspired by African culture, I loved artists like Dr. Dre, 2Pac, N.W.A, Common, and Biggie. They were poets that were telling real stories and the hardships of what it was like to be African American in the United States during the 80s and 90s. I always had a deep curiosity, especially being white and privileged, to learn about how my own lived experience differs from that of others.

In 2007, I went with a group of friends to San Bernardino and had my first experience raving under the sounds of Carl Cox and Erick Morillo. I bought my first turntable just for fun back then, a CDJ400, when we had to put CDs in and were just throwing our own house parties with our friends.

Eventually, I got into production on the house music side; I started a DJ Mix podcast, and one day, I got a DM from a promoter in San Diego, asking me if I wanted to play a show. I remember that first show playing in front of a crowd in an actual venue. I felt addicted to this deep feeling of being able to create a space and energy through the gift of sound. From there, I started to play a few times a month in San Diego and it really grew from 2009 until 2013.

I was doing small tours on the West Coast and México, and the project was rising - but I’m sure, as you know, the music industry can be hard. I was bartending during the week and playing shows on the weekend, up until everything changed - my brother passed away. Since then, everything seemed to shift in my life. Music didn’t sound the same, and I didn’t have the same drive. I just didn’t want to be living a life trying to make it as an artist, so, I left everything behind and went into the digital marketing sector. I had lost that drive to make it and wanted to build something with more security.

Years later, I built a company, working hundreds of hours weekly, and being “successful”. Then COVID hit, and everything changed. So, I figured out a way to return to my passion: music. I wanted to start a project not only for myself but also for other people and get back to the roots… I wanted to work with artists that could create something in people, with soul and a sense of awakening, and for me, that had always been the arts of African culture and their heritage.

My love for Afro-House developed around 2018, I was a huge fan of Black Coffee, De Capo, and Black Motion. So, when I was thinking about starting a project, I knew I wanted to work with African vocalists and find somebody nobody knew.

It all started when I reconnected with an old best friend who is my partner-in-crime, co-producer and business partner in everything we do at &friends, Michael Scheinker.

We went on this site called “SoundBetter”, where you can find session players, vocalists, mixing and mastering engineers, everything. I remember coming across this guy and I listened to the tone of his voice - immediately, he just shocked me. I never heard something like that before. I felt something profound in my soul - it gave me goosebumps, I simply wanted to work with him.

His name was Oluwadamvic. I sent him a message, and then we spoke for two hours. When we spoke, I felt a lot of my brother’s energy inside of him, and I knew then and there that there was something special. We started to work on a record that turned into four records, then he told me about Phina Asa, his cousin Dotun, and his best friend, eL-Jay. So, we all started working on more records together, which became very special.

We started a family. I knew we had something beautiful - so before we released music, I told them I wanted to go to Nigeria. They didn’t believe it initially… Visiting Nigeria was a beautiful, powerful, and magical experience; I will never forget when we first met in person after two years of working together. It was more than I could ever dream of, and from there, I simply knew we had something that could create a new genre in the Afro-House world and dance music.

Working with them has inspired me more than I’ve ever been inspired in my life.

How do you find the balance between paying homage to African musical roots, and exploring contemporary sounds?

For us, it’s pretty easy! Especially with the relationship and the bond that we all have; it is about expressing ourselves. How Oluwadamvic, Phina, eL-Jay, and Dotun express themselves through the lyrics, their stories, and their rhythms, and you combine all of this with myself and Mikey’s production style… it simply fits. When you know, you know!

It’s been seamless for us, and it all goes back to collaboration. When you show up authentically, vulnerably, and fully express yourself, you will likely find the right people to collaborate with.

For us, I think it’s been pretty seamless, which is why for the last two years, we’ve been sitting on around 30 plus records that are unreleased; that’s why I play three-hour sets of our own original, unreleased music.

It’s a journey through spirit and soul, from highs and lows - from deep dives, up to immense energy. It’s been pretty wonderful how we’ve found that balance, and that we’ve created our own lane in the Afro-House world.

Somebody said we’ve created a new genre, like Afro-Pop-House - and I like that because we strive to find that balance and thread the needle between being novel, and familiar.

One of the core values of &friends is to convey melodies and lyrics to embrace the inner power of every human being, correct? Why is this more important than before? How do you feel about current culture in dance music industry?

It’s getting worse! Capitalism has never been higher, the world has never been more sensitive. In the music industry, it can often feel like it’s all about competition versus collaboration.

For &friends, it’s all about awakening emotions, the soul of certain things that you didn’t know you needed to feel, that you want to feel; that once you feel that it’s something familiar, it’s comforting like a warm embrace.

The biggest part about music and the most significant part about any type of creation isn’t about being anything. It’s about creating what you want to develop and what feels suitable for your desires; that’s what we try to do. We’ll always push the boundaries of creativity. At the end of the day, we must remember where we come from.

In general, dance music is about a cathartic release. It’s all about expressing emotions, and that’s what we are trying to do. Tell stories that allow people to express every form of emotion through our music. That’s the only thing that I’m trying to do when creating, is create an emotion, and a feeling that maybe people didn’t know that they needed to feel.

As an avid writer, could this feeling of empowerment and healing be reasons to write a book?

I’ve been journaling and writing since 2018; it’s a daily practice, and since then, I have written about 27 journals, over 10,000 pages. It has always been my form of expression. I do it with gratitude. It’s self-therapy, especially since I grew up in a challenging home with a lot of physical and mental abuse from a stepdad. Writing for me was my outlet. When I reach 30,000 written pages, maybe I’ll give it to an editor.

For me, the world is now rewarding things for attention, versus intention. We’ve gone away from vulnerability and authenticity; we have gone into a very filtered world.

I want to help people express their forms of creativity and break away from societal programming and norms. If we did, we as humans would be freed from the invisible chains of expectations. I definitely want to write a book at some point, but I prefer focusing on music first.

‘Ode Ireti’ has had a tremendous impact on dance floors around the world, with many great artists like Keinemuziek playing it, and crowds going wild. What can you tell us about the creation of this epic anthem?

First of all, seeing the response to this record has been insanely humbling.

To me, it’s almost not even a surprise because ‘Ode Ireti’, in Yoruba, means “Hunters of Hope’. The whole story of this track is about a boy that was stuck in his village, and was told that this was his only path in life and he needs to abide by what he’s been given. Still, the boy knew something bigger was out there for him. There was a significant calling, and it’s all about mustering up the courage to leave what people are telling you to do in order to find, and relentlessly pursue, what’s in your heart.

I will never forget when eL-Jay and Oluwadamvic sent us the vocals, and I was like, guys, “What are these vocals”? I need to know precisely what it’s saying because it gave me goose bumps immediately. When they shared the story of the meaning behind it, it was the story of themselves and their own experiences. Having this story being sung across the world is fantastic. Hearing “Olélé” chants out in crowds when the record was not even played is an experience. There is nothing better as an artist than to have that, especially with the story behind this record - and the most beautiful part of all to me was hearing Oluwadamvic and eL-Jay’s voices traveling the world.

I’m just so excited about the platform we have created to share the voices and the gifts of artists who may have never gotten a chance. That’s what &friends is about, and people’s reaction worldwide is a dream.

What can you tell us about your partnership with Beatport and Label Radar to facilitate your recent remix contest? How did you select the artists, and what criteria did you consider?

It was funny how the remix contest came about because, honestly, a few bigger artists had reached out to me saying that they really wanted to remix the record. But there was something that just didn’t feel right. Going back to the ethos of &friends, which is to give more opportunities to people who rarely have them, or don’t have the resources to get them, I decided to do a remix contest and select young producers who may not have even released a record yet.

We had gotten a couple of good friends who worked at Beatport and they gave us so much support, with the guys at Label Radar also being so great to work with. I’ll never forget once we released the contest the response was crazy, and at the end of it we had over 300 submissions. There were at least 25 submissions that could have easily been released, but obviously we couldn’t do that. We were looking for creativity and differentiation. There were 4 or 5 artists who had never released a record. So, it goes back to the ethos of &friends, which is providing a platform for underserved artists to give them a voice.

It is amazing to see artists supporting artists, and some of these guys collaborating with each other on different records. It all goes back to collaboration and connection. What a wonderful way this was to find and give them another platform to share their sounds and gifts.

Talk to us about the importance of your label Hidden Hands - where will it head in the next few years?

Hidden Hands was founded by every single label telling us no when we wanted to start releasing music. Some labels even said no to “Ode Ireti”! So we decided to do it all over again, all ourselves, and that’s what we did. I don’t think there’s been a more rewarding thing, to hear “NO” and then having a track go viral while doing it all by yourself - from music production, to distribution, to promotion. Hidden Hands is all about perseverance and removing doubts from the naysayers; it’s about how we can achieve everything on our own without relying on anybody else.

Right now the label is only for releasing music of our own with remixes from artists that we support. Maybe in the future, once there’s more time, I want to start having more bi-weekly releases and continue to find underserved talent... Everything we do is a platform for supporting emerging artists and unknown talent - that is the ethos behind the name. We just want to be the people operating the background, helping push artists who deserve to be in the front.

It’s been both unique and challenging to dial in every single piece of a label and release music - the distribution, and marketing - but in the end, there is never a bigger reward than doing it all on your own.

What is the biggest misconception that people may have about African culture?

Living in Western culture, people may hear many generalizations and stereotypes that do not reflect the truth about African culture - However, one of the most incredible things about Nigeria is that I have never seen people have so much life in their eyes. Going there was one of the most eye-opening experiences I’ve ever had; it completely shifted my perspective of my own life. Their smiles and laughs were so pure, which was the most beautiful thing for me.

People in Nigeria know what living is and how much of a gift it is, while often living with much less resources than we do in America. It’s a massive testament to going back to how we can live on less; we’ve overcomplicated everything, especially with technology.

How do you foster community and solidarity among DJs and artists in Africa? Given the effort you and your team have invested, are you satisfied with the level of response you received?

It starts with our core group, Oluwadamvic, Phina, eL-Jay, and Dotun. It’s been amazing to create a family. It is not just a business relationship, it goes deeper than that.

Mikey and I are currently producing Oluwadamvic and Phina’s solo albums, as we will also be pushing their solo projects this year. We are working on the full crew’s visas, because they are going to be joining me on our live tour this year. They are planning to move out of Nigeria this year to Dubai, where I moved myself earlier this year, so we can work more closely together and help create generational wealth outside of our core family.

We have collaborated with incredible artists like Atmos Black and Dr. Feel. We’ve brought Atmos Black to one of my incredible summer shows in Egypt. For us, it’s how we can continue providing more opportunities for artists who deserve them, but don’t necessarily get the platforms they deserve.

Our first live show in Egypt with the whole crew was an incredible experience. It was the first time they had been outside of their home country, the first time they took an airplane, and the first time they jumped into the ocean; that is what &friends is about: creating firsts. I want to create so many firsts for so many artists, and for so many people all around the world.

Moving into the current world, Will emerging technologies like AI affect artists in our industry shortly, or will they open up new capabilities?

It’s funny because I just wrote a journal entry about this today! AI can definitely enhance, but it definitely can detach from the creative experience. You will still know who is creating from the soul with intention, and who is using robots. I can already hear it! I get specific demos from people, and I can already tell people are making music with AI.

Creating brings back life and soul to our increasingly strange and disconnected world. With AI evolving nonstop, it’s more crucial than ever to connect deeply with our true selves, to our innermost dreams and desires - to create real purpose, vulnerability, and authenticity. I think that artists who continue to create in this way are the ones that are going to win.

There’s a growing curiosity that admits to all the weirdness; what’s beyond this world of digital disconnect? How do we balance the allure of virtual worlds with the richness of real-life experience? How do we take back our stories using creative hearts and brains from the clutches of AI and algorithms?

Creating becomes our way back to what’s real, and that’s the absolute defiance against digital disruption. Creating holds the key - it’s the hopeful path forward.

Can you share any insight into upcoming projects or milestones you’re working towards for the rest of the year? We saw some terrific releases coming in the time ahead.

The beginning of 2024 has been something that doesn’t feel real, and at the same time, it feels like precisely what’s supposed to be happening.

Our most recent release was an official remix for Sofi Tukker, who are two of my favorite artists of the last decade. I really love what they build and create, and how they show up in the world - they are so authentic. We recently had a very highly anticipated ID from all of our sets premiere on BBC Radio 1 with Pete Tong called ‘Day 5’ which will be released in late-April.

We have a couple of massive collaborations coming with some of my favorite artists like XINOBI, an official remix coming out for Nelly on Casablanca Records, which is pretty surreal seeing as this was a track that was a staple when I was in high school - as well as a remix of Brazilian artist Zerb’s “Mwaki” making its way out on TH3RD BRAIN. We are also wrapping up a collaboration to remake the legendary record, “Love Generation,” with Bob Sinclar and Zakes Bantwini.

One of the things that I’m most excited about is starting the live tour with our full crew at the end of the summer. This is only the beginning: I’m excited to push the boundaries of creativity while always leading with a pure, open, authentic, and vulnerable heart.

Find more about &friends on: Instagram | Soundcloud | YouTube | Spotify

Visit &friends on www.andfriendsworld.com