15 questions with…

As the first Chinese DJ to play Tomorrowland, Chace has already broken ground in the world of EDM. He has also been compared to The Weeknd and Disclosure. Oh and Justin Bieber, but let’s not go there. However, his producer destiny might not have been fulfilled had he not started ‘messing around with a computer’ when he was younger…

> Shanghai producer, DJ, singer and songwriter Chace (Zhu Yihan) was the first Chinese DJ to play Tomorrowland back in 2016. Dutch record production duo Yellow Claw told Mixmag, “for a 17-year-old to compose, write and even sing on all of his records like he does is just mindblowing. He is heading for flashing lights and stadium status, you’ll see”.

And they were right. After recording the track Stranger with Yellow Claw, Chace has now played gigs across the globe including Festival X around Australia, Creamfields in the UK and the EDC Japan Music Festival. He released his debut album, Belated Suffocation, to critical acclaim at the end of last year, and looks set to maintain this momentum well into 2023. He also has some cracking advice on EQ-ing and other processing which has made us completely rethink our kick drums.

1 How did you start out in music production in the first place?

Chace: “My dad is a musician and music has been my passion since I can remember. Drumming was my main thing for years, and my father took me to get lessons that required seven-hour drives every week for seven years. I got into music production when I was 11. To my parents it’s just me messing with computers so it didn’t strike them as a profession at all, plus we were seriously considering applying for Berklee so things were at stake. But I kept trying to prove that it’s a solid way of being creative and I was working on music for years. I eventually got their approval to let me sign to a label in Amsterdam; that’s probably the start of my journey. Imagine if I didn’t get to keep working with computers – I’d be a drumming teacher somewhere in China for sure!”