Drew Taggart hasn’t been back to Midcoast Maine in a while, but he has a good reason: his electronic dance music duo, The Chainsmokers, are the hottest thing in popular music these days.
The duo, consisting of DJs Taggart and Alex Pall, have had three top-10 hits in 2016, and their current single, “Closer,” just spent 12 weeks at number one on the Billboard Hot 100. They just released a five-track EP titled “Collage” that is flying off shelves, they sell out shows all over the world and have played to festival crowds of up to 50,000 people. But Taggart, who grew up in Freeport, hasn’t forgotten where he came from.
Though he played on the soccer team and could often be found snowboarding on the slopes of Sugarloaf, Taggart’s chief passion has always been music, starting with the drums when he was a young boy. Though he played the drums traditionally into his adolescence, electronic dance music — more commonly known as EDM — caught his eye once he reached high school.
“What was cool about dance music is I could produce the entire song,” said Taggart. “I liked having control over the whole thing.”
A study abroad trip to Argentina during Taggart’s junior year furthered his interest in EDM. David Smail, a science teacher at Freeport High who had Taggart in class, noticed a change in his student after the trip.
“Not only did he come back with good soccer moves, but he came back with a vision of what he wanted to do with music,” said Smail. “I think going abroad helps students realize that they can do anything they want.”
Taggart created an EDM presentation on his computer for his high school capstone project, and continued studying and refining his sound at Syracuse.
“I was into dance music before the majority of the U.S. knew what it was,” said Taggart, who noted the music scene was slowly transitioning from hip hop to EDM over the course of his four years at college. “Then dance became the biggest genre.”
He began to DJ for small crowds, and then during a senior year internship at Interscope Records, he sold his first piece of music.
“I remixed one of their apps and they bought it,” said Taggart, who did all of the work on his Apple laptop. “When I was paid I realized I’d made something from scratch that people were willing to pay money for.”
Through the remainder of his senior year, the gigs kept coming. They paid little but reinforced to Taggart that he could actually create a product that would sell.
“All of these little things that would be small now were huge reinforcers back then,” Taggart said.
Taggart met Pall in New York City shortly after graduating from Syracuse in 2012, and the two immediately hit it off. Pall was already an established DJ in the Big Apple, playing gigs in clubs with his then-partner under the name The Chainsmokers. But his partner quit to follow his own ventures, and Pall was looking for a replacement. After sharing a few drinks with Taggart, a new version of The Chainsmokers was born.
“I moved to New York and we started grinding five nights a week,” said Taggart. “We were always confident that we were doing something right, but always determined to do something bigger.”
Taggart said that he and Pall were making enough money to live on, and before long he paid off his student loans. The Chainsmokers had a viral hit in 2014 with “#Selfie,” but really broke loose in 2016 with top 10 Billboard hits “Roses” and “Don’t Let Me Down.”
But as it turned out, the boys were just getting warmed up.
“It’s been interesting the visibility that ‘Closer’ has given us,” said Taggart of the tune that catapulted The Chainsmokers into the mainstream. “Our first hit, ‘Roses,’ felt like such a big moment, but it was nothing like this.”
Taggart sings lead vocals for the first time in his career on “Closer,” and he agreed that singing opened the door for a whole new legion of fans. The track was also an avenue to get more personal with his music.
“My challenge when I sit down in the studio is to write something about myself and my friends that also relates to other people,” said Taggart. “Almost every line in that song is about my friends from high school who went to Boulder, and my experiences in college. Freeport isn’t a wealthy place, but when I went to Syracuse all my friends drove big, expensive Range Rovers. The Range Rover line in ‘Closer’ is from that.”
Taggart said the success of “Closer” hasn’t gone to his or Pall’s head, and that they are always looking ahead to their next venture.
“We’re very proud and grateful, but we’re already looking at what’s to come in 2017,” said Taggart. “We love music and love making music, and we’re pushing ourselves to progress as artists. That drive comes from a passionate place, not a place to want or need to succeed.”
Taggart said his parents always encouraged him to succeed on his own terms.
“They were super supportive of my music,” said Taggart. “They were never like ‘don’t do this.’ They said I just had to figure out how to afford it.”
And growing up in Maine, Taggart confessed, was the perfect catalyst for his creative process.
“I’m really grateful to be from there,” said Taggart. “Kids have their own space to go explore and be outdoors and make their own little world for themselves. That’s something that’s hard to come by for today’s kids.”
The Chainsmokers don’t have any scheduled shows in Maine at the moment, but will be performing at the House of Blues in Boston on Dec. 5.
bgoodridge@timesrecord.com
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