Coming off the release of his latest single “Wild Summer”, we spoke with Flamingosis about his process and what’s next electronic and future funk producer. Flamingosis, aka Aaron Velasquez, embodies the emotion of summer with his track, “Wild Summer”, which features a lively trumpet over groovy percussion melodies and bright guitar riffs. Accompanying the new single, is a music video featuring old footage of Velasquez’s father and uncle, who were professional frisbee players in the 1970s-1980s…and it’s amazing. Here’s what Flamingosis had to say –
BTS: What’s the story behind your name?
Flamingosis: It comes from a freestyle frisbee move that my dad would do during competition. To give more context, freestyle frisbee is where you do a series of trick catches, moves and throws with a frisbee. The “Flamingosis” is a reverse spinning catch on one leg. One leg represents the flamingo and the reverse catch means “osis”. Hence the name “Flamingosis”. My dad and uncle won 5 World Frisbee Freestyle titles together and have been inducted into the frisbee hall of fame. When I started to make music I decided to make that my name to pay tribute to them.
BTS: What’s your process for finding samples for your music?
Flamingosis: I usually look for music on youtube for hours on hours. There’s a lot of rare grooves and soul that you’ll end up stumbling upon on the internet if you search for a while. Also just made an account on discogs as well. So I’ve been shopping online for funk and soul on vinyl to add to my record collection.
BTS: Do you have a time of day or space that you feel you make your best music?
Flamingosis: I don’t really have a time. Looking back, I remember making some great music late at different times of day (late at night, afternoon , early morning etc.). So it just depends if I’m in the mood or inspired to create at the moment. I definitely get into a better workflow when I’m working at home though.
BTS: You were able to work with some really talented musicians to create your upcoming project, how was that?
Flamingosis: It was pretty cool. At first I didn’t really want to do it because I was just so used to creating music on my laptop on my own. Getting into a studio with other musicians intimidated me and I was nervous because I was scared the music may not turn out how I would want it to. But it turns out I was completely wrong and it ended up being really fun. I showed them a lot of different music that I was thinking of sampling, and they used that as inspiration to make an entirely different song in these recording sessions.
Afterward I flipped the recording sessions how I usually would when I flip samples. Many unique tracks came out of this. Much love to Jeff Franca (drums), Borahm Lee (keys), Hunter Roberts (Bass), Recess (Ian Gilley on keys & Drew Birch on guitar), Mike Tallman (guitar, engineer), Loren Dorland (engineer) and Eddie Roberts (Engineer).
BTS: As a follow up to that last question – how do you feel your music differs when working collaboratively? Or does it not differ?
Flamingosis: It works differently. When you collaborate with people it’s a team effort. I’ve collaborated with a lot of producers before in the past, but it was usually sending stems back and forth to one another on our laptops until we finished the track. With the studio sessions, I was kind of directing everyone on how I wanted the recordings to sound, and we did multiple takes until we were all happy with how it sounded. So the biggest difference with working collaboratively in person is that it feels more hands on, in the moment and productive, as opposed to working by yourself or with others digitally on a laptop.
BTS: Any genres you’d like to explore in the future?
Flamingosis: Making some funky, lofi house music would be cool!
BTS: What music/artists have you been digging lately?
Flamingosis: I’ve been listening a lot to Darius and Wayne Snow. They just came out with a new track together called “Equilibrium” and it’s killer! It’s a mix between French House and R&B, which is a cool reflection of both their styles.
What’s next for Flamingosis?
Flamingosis: Stay tuned for some new single releases in the near future!
Stay up to date with Flamingosis!
- Get to Know: Zanski - October 1, 2021
- Get To Know: Arrested Youth - June 25, 2021
- Get To Know: ford. - June 8, 2021
