Dro Carey's "Dark Zoo" is Darker Than You Might Think

At just 23 years of age, Perth-born, Sydney-based Dro Carey—known to friends, family, and the odd press release as Eugene Ward—has already carved out a remarkable career. Boiler Room sets, monikers that denote numerous bodies of work, and his fair share of hard knocks. Getting stuck into his latest release Dark Zoo, you'd be forgiven for thinking Ward was making a foray into a more commercial kind of UK Garage. But track 2, "Signal Mash," is one for the back corner of a 4am dance party. "Grow Lithe" is darker still, reminding us that Ward's talents are, as they have always been, genre-spanning.

Today we premiere Dark Zoo, listen below. As Ward gears up to play the EP in its entirety for Boiler Room next week, with help from Cassius Select, Cop Envy and Moriarty, we asked him some questions.

Congratulations on the EP, it's so great. What you were listening to in the lead up to its inception? What was inspiring the sound?

I listened to a lot of UK producers' releases circa 2008-2013. This remains a really incredible time in dance music production and since it was also the period I was getting into production, it felt important to go back and do some research about what shaped the Dro Carey idea at its inception, sort of as a way of figuring out where it should go now. Producers like KingThing, early Om Unit, Toasty—basically any records that feel like they fall outside what we might conjure as being the trends or conventions of the time, but not in the sense that they're experimental to the extent of totally eluding pop writing. The exception to this approach is that for the 'Signal Mash' track I was pretty much doing the opposite. Tapping into my own popular memory of UK Funky and channelling an influence without study (kind of romantically I guess).

On "Queensberry Rules", a track that's doing really well, you collaborated with KUČKA. How did that come about?

I had been a fan of Laura's work for a while – apart from her immediately striking voice, I was really impressed with her productions, her versatility with featured performances on other artists' tracks, and the way she realised the project's tracks for live shows in a band with Catlips and Tobacco Rat. Witnessing all of these things it was basically like, this is an extremely talented person and I should definitely reach out! So when I started having discussions with Soothsayer about ideas for the vocal tracks, she instantly came to mind for "Queensberry Rules". I sent her the instrumental and I explained that Marcus Whale would be collaborating on it as well, writing some lines to get it started. To my delight she was into the beat and we went on from there.

Where do you spend most of your writing time? Do you have a favourite place to write?

It's all totally in my bedroom. Occasionally, when I collaborate with someone we will go to a studio, just so it's not so cramped. But yeah the vast majority of writing just happens at home. In the past there's been a couple of things I've written or started on headphones on tour but nothing beats being on my home setup!

Do you think it's getting easier to find success in Australia with electronic music, particularly EDM?

No, not at all. I think it's getting harder and more competitive by the day. More and more people are getting into production and DJing, so the raw numbers are greater, which is not a bad thing but it can make it more challenging to stand out. But what is more significant I think is the way that Facebook and music streaming has changed in the last 5 years; it's made it harder today to break through than it was before. The platforms have transformed, because the large-scale commercial models have changed to include them – this then makes it harder to use them in a community way, or to be a 'start-up' that's competing on them (whether that means artist, label, club night etc).

Finally, have you got a favourite record you're DJing or listening to right now?

My favourite songs at the moment are Fruits by Mei Saraswati, released via Bandcamp on an EP called 'devotions' back in February, and Vapour by Marcus Whale, a just-released single from his forthcoming album Inland Sea. From a DJing perspective, '8th' on the new Cliques EP on Tempa is a verified weapon.

Dark Zoo is out via Soothsayer tomorrow, May 20.

Follow Dro Carey on SoundCloud.