Back in 2014, The Chainsmokers had a viral hit with #SELFIE, a cheeky electro-house novelty song about a woman taking selfies.
The EDM duo moved past SELFIE and established themselves as serious hit-makers when they released tracks like Roses and New York City.
The Chainsmokers is consist of 27-year old Andrew Taggart and 35-year old Alex Pall both from New York City. They formed as a duo in 2012 starting out by making remixes of indie bands like Two Door Cinema Club and Phoenix.
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They then started collaborating with Indian actress and recording artist Priyanka Chopra on the single Erase with the follow-up The Rookie coming later. Due to their success on those projects, Dim Mak Records picked them up especially after they heard the track SELFIE they just made. Taggart and Pall noticed how the word selfie had become a trend and they wanted to take advantage of it. They made a demo of a song containing monologue from a female clubber about taking good selfies. Inspiration came from the regular club goin women that the Chainsmokers saw on their nights out in New York City. So when they were composing the track, they wanted to incorporate the "let me take a selfie" line in it somehow. The Chainsmokers described in an interview with The Phoenix New Times,...
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“Honestly, "#Selfie" is kind of a phenomenon for us. We made it and thought it was funny and put it out as an edit. Then Dim Mak wanted to buy it, and they bought it from us and put it out officially and we made a video for it. This was all just because we thought it was fun. And then the song just kind of took on a life of its own. Which is honestly really great because it's brought in a new audience of people that listen to music that we've made that we're more passionate about.”
True enough, thankfully projects like SELFIE was just a one-off thing with them, because they followed it up with a better less-annoying single (despite the song’s subject matter) with Kanye that features the vocals of sirenXX. Kanye was a genuine hopeful follow-up to SELFIE . The Kanye track was shockingly heartfelt, with sirenXX desperately pleading to have the confidence and pure finesse of the song’s muse Kanye West.
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SELFIE might have put The Chainsmokers on the proverbial music map, but it was with Kanye that their credibility strengthened. The followed up the track with hits soon after which later became part of their extended play Bouquet. With singles like New York City, Roses, Waterbed, and recently Don’t Let Me Down, The Chainsmokers success would go for a long time.
Here’s their new single (follow-up to Don’t Let Me Down) called Inside Out featuring vocals from Charlee.
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