Shaking It Across The Dance Floor: Disco House All Year Round
It has been just over a year since Treasure Fingers aka Ashley Jones graced our shores for numerous festival and club dates, including Field Day and Summadayze and there’s a tingle of excitement in his voice when he recalls the Australian summer and outrageously energetic crowds. At the time of this interview, the Disco house phenomenon has just listened to Britney Spears’ new single and is preparing for his show in Las Vegas – surprisingly – a gig which is set to be more relaxed than others on the tour. “There are a few extremes,” Jones says of American audiences’ response to his work. “I’d say Las Vegas is one of the exceptions. It’s totally different everywhere. LA’s the really alternatively young crowd and then there’s Southern California and then even when you play out in the Midwest – like smaller towns, I feel like they actually go a little crazier because maybe they don’t have the same parties or something.”
Jones has always been influenced by Electronic music but during his early teens, listening to Prince, Michael Jackson and old ‘80s Funk was of higher priority. Today, these early influences can be heard in his work, along with Drum and Bass, a genre Jones began exploring when he joined Drum’ and Bass group, Evol Intent. “I got into electronic music – really experimental kind of stuff,” Jones says. “Then I started making Drum and Bass on my own and I started getting reasonable crowds to play in at a lot of big parties throughout the south east and because of that I hooked up with these two other guys who are in Evol Intent. We were all making producers’ kind of stuff and that’s when I kind of moved to Atlanta and I kind of officially formed Evol Intent.”
But, it seems Evol Intent doesn’t have too much of an influence on prime project, Treasure Fingers. “I guess production techniques and that sort of thing I really learnt from doing Evol Intent but creatively there’s not much,” Jones reveals. “I was making funk and disco-tech type stuff ever since I learnt how to produce but it was always something to do as a hobby I guess on the side, and then when we came up with the name Treasure Fingers, that’s when I started doing some more stuff on it.” Jones was initially playing live bass, keys and guitar, with the thought of creating a band but when a friend came up with ‘Treasure Fingers’, it remained a one man game. “We all thought it worked really well, easy to find out about if you look it up online,” Jones chuckles.
Following the naming however, there would’ve been no need to indulge your curiosity online as Jones’ track Cross The Dance Floor moved Treasure Fingers into the spotlight. “That was completely unexpected,” Jones laughs. “I started that track without any vocals or anything. It was just a filtered disco kind of track. I came up with that line and then recorded it that same night. And I played it to some people and just got a lot of good response from it. We gave it out to blogs, just because I didn’t have the labels or anything at that point and then the blogs reached out and then Fools Gold reached out and found it and it went crazy from there.” Cross The Dance Floor hasn’t been the only track which has seen Jones’ popularity jump to ridiculous heights. His remix of Tensnake’s famous Coma Cat caught the attention of all hipsters, chin strokers, lolly-pop lovers and party kids and Jones is adamant about one prediction for this year; “I think Tensnake is going to keep killing it,” he offers. “I don’t know what he’s coming out with next but I’m sure it’s going to be big. “
With his mad touring schedule, Jones has hopes of releasing his debut LP in 2012 and comes across quite vague when the topic arises. Either that; or he’s keeping some serious surprises under wraps. Fingers crossed for some treasure.
Treasure Fingers [US] plays Any Excuse at the Prince Bandroom Friday January 28.
