Nobody Beats The Drum Return, Leaner and Meaner

And yet, just as they were enjoying the fruits of their big break into America, the group quietly parted ways, leaving the original member Sjam Sjamsoedin as the last person beating the, uh, drums. So what happened? "Last year was definitely the best year we ever had, "Sjam tells THUMP. "It was like a boy's dream come true. We had a label that really wanted us to sign with them, offering a multi-album deal. It was very, very serious. The negotiations for the deal were long, and in the end, Jori and Rogier kind of chickened out. It's not that I blame them, I wouldn't want them to sign anything that they couldn't commit to. But this all came at a time where I was really ready to go. It was hard, but we are still all great friends. But now it's back to me, myself and I just like in the very beginning!"

"Jori and Rogier decided to split right after I broke up with my girlfriend," Sjam explains. It was a rough moment. But, like any good artist, he turned sadtimes into symphony: "I just locked myself in the studio. "Let It GO!" is really about forcing myself to let it go. Bad things can happen and changes will come in your life and you have to just let it go." The track is a straight-up electro heater and you'd never guess there was any angst simmering behind it's hyped-up vibes.

Now, the onus is all on Sjam. "There is no one else to blame when shit goes bad!" he laughs. "I think over the years we limited ourselves to a specific sound, but now that it's all me I've been in the studio a lot working on my sound. Some of it is hip-hop, some of it is early rave, and some of it is house or techno. The same influences that we had before, but now I am giving it more space to not be defined by a single genre. The big visual show we had was a huge part of NBTD, so now that it's a solo act, I am coming up with something that will be equally impressive."

Photo credits: Maeve Stam

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