And when you hear jazz, you really hear a commune of people expressing themselves together. Rose diplo and Kamasi Washington when we continue. Rose funding for charlie rose has been provided by and by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and Information Services worldwide. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications rose welcome to cuba. Thank you. Rose why did you want to come . Well, i guess the main reason is we were able to come. Rose right. The idea opened up to do a concert here. Weve done a lot of concerts, my group, all through the caribbean. Ive always been fond of cuba. I have been here once before to see another person perform and i thought when i had the opportunity, we had to do it. We had to be the first to try to come here and do it and do some outreach with the kids here. Rose this is an interesting month in cuba. You, president obama, and the Rolling Stones. Rolling stones are coming later, yeah. Rose yeah. We beat both of them. That was the goal. Rose you were kicking it off. We were the preparty before president obama and the Rolling Stones. Rose the opening act. Yeah. Rose youve said this is the most important show youve ever done. I think the pressure is on us to do something you know, its kind of an amazing opportunity. I think right nowive done so many concerts, i know we have fans all through the world. This is a show were doing free for the people. We are invited in cooperation with the government. Its a very diplomatic opportunity, i feel like, something very important, especially right now in the relationship between cuba and america so unique for the first time in 50 years that were able to come do something cultural as a bridge because everybody thinks everything is about politics here and its a lot deeper. Rose its more about culture. Yeah. Rose and youve met young people today. Where was that curiosity . Today we spent an hour doing a press conference with Young Musicians and i was amazed at how specific their questions were about distribution, about sound cloud, releasing music, record labels, about mastering the music, about the sounds i use. You know, it wasnt just these kids were spefnlgt theyre trying to do this for a living and i feel like whats amazing is that having this access to me is sort of like having access to the internet or something which they dont have easily here, so having me there to give them simple information, simple answers is huge for them. Rose youre a way for them to find out what they wanted to know about how music works. I was surprised how much they knew, how culturally aware the kids are, considering there is a sort of blockade of culture reaching cuba, these kids are finding ways to find things themselves. Rose how much recognition is there . Not much. The kids today were deejays, they study electronic music, they were aware of who i was. But a lot of the kids, the songs playing are distributed through the channels which is through usb keys and packages, but they dont know who we are, just the sounds, the music. Tomorrow they will see the whole show and get the whole experience. Rose is that what makes electronic dance music so universal and global. That its anonymous . Rose well, that there is a sound. Yeah. Rose its not a song, its a sound. While pop relies on the people, the culture around that artist, electronic music can be made by anybody. You dont need a huge team to build you up, to build your album, your marketing plan. Electronic music can be made on one computer and one hour. You can upload it to the internet. Like i told you before, it goes to the world instantly. Thats whats great. Its in the hands of anybody. Thats whats beautiful about electronic music. Its the sound, not who the person is. Rose weve talked about this also. How good a musician do you have to be . Im a pretty bad musician. I think that speaks volumes. I can put things into key. I can play an instrument simply. I can find chords. Im by no means an aficionado or great musician. I think i just find ideas first and execute them. Rose what is it you do . Definitely coming up with the concepts and ideas. I can make music, im just not a great player. There are so many great guitar players, keyboard players, and im just a person thats able to kind of take those sounds and build something out of it. Its a whole other level to the music. Rose how do you define electronic dance music for people watching this conversation who dont likely know . Well, i think the three words are pretty simple. Its made electronically. Made with the computer. You dont always have to dance. But its created very simply. All you need to do is have one sound. You can use your iphone to record the voices, import that to your computer and create a whole keyboard and spectrum of sound with one noise. Its the most simple music. You can make it archaic. You can also make a whole symphony. You can have some of the great guys who did music concrete in france that build entire symphonies out of keyboards. Herbie hancock, the symphonics of electronics. Rose the symphonics of electronics. Yeah. Because back in the 70s when the first synthesizers were coming into play, you heard it everywhere, prog rock, jazz, fusion, all the way to 80ssynth. The way synthesizers sound pushed music forward and people take bits and create more. Rose do you think electronic dance miewct will move forward. I think so because the people make it are young. Theyre the ones with the ideas that are fast. They will take chances quick than anybody else. An older man its very hard to steer a big ship, but a small one you can paddle quickly and move Different Directions. So i think its going to change because the people making it are very young and very excited, very literate at that music. Rose its extraordinary. You think about lean on. Spotify says it was the most streamed song. Rose streamed song ever. Of all time. I think that particular song, it speaks volumes because its very worldwide. You know, even in america, were not a huge act by any means, but everywhere else in the world, from turkey, china, india, that song hit people everywhere. Rose south america, jamaica. Trinidad, mexico, brazil, wherever we go, its a huge hit. It has a sound. It incorporates reggae, pop. The singer was danish. She came from jazz. The song is everything. It speaks to the world because it hats a caribbean influence at the same time. I think thats one important thing about our project is we have caribbean influences and rhythms that translate to the rest of the world very simple. I dont know why its able to go everywhere like that. Rose yeah, but beyond the number of people that downloaded, beyond all the things happening on spotify, there is a sense that youre playing to huge crowds. Yeah, we have i mean, i think weve played festivals between 20 to 100,000 people in germany, belgium, arenas. Its crazy how big the fan base is. India. Rose 200,000. Weve headlined festivals for that many people in germany and holland. Rose does that mean its more popular outside of the united states. Yeah, 100 . Europe is the biggest market for our music. Im not sure why that is. We just always i think even with our labels we always start in europe and build a brand to america. Lean on was playing in four or five countries in the europe before it stard to chart top 40 in america. America hasnt had an american artist on the billboard number one chart in Something Like five months or something because its been, like, adele, rihanna, Justin Bieber, drake. These are all people from canada and europe. Americas had a drought as far as pop musics going. Rose why do you think that is . I think it has something to do with the worldwide aspect of music now. We used to be the cultural ambassadors for popular culture. We used to be the people who created it and it came into the world. Now its coming back. The world halls had a piece of it and theyre creating something more extraordinary. Were digesting that now as americans. Rose you record with Justin Bieber. I did. Hes a great kid. Hes had a great kid since he met you and had an album out and scored three number one records in america. Rose when youre here diewrks work with the cuban musicians . Yesterday is one of the first times i met somebody who was a friend of mine, a rap group called the ishas who are big and had to come back. Were planning on doing music. Their story is amazing. I would love to introduce you to them later on. Rose that would be great. Your schedule is amazing. You leave here on monday morning. Rose monday morning at 5 00. 5 00 a. M. Head back to americat got a show in las vegas tuesday. Then we head for a south american tour friday. Before i came here, it would be the strangest routing ever. I went from islam bad to l. A. To atlanta. I dont know if anybodys ever done that. Rose a performance at islam bad . Yeah, we did a show last saturday. Rose in pakistan. In pakistan. How much music, if people dont understand it, how would you tell them the difference between good in electronic music and great . I mean, its hard. Everybody has their own opinion. Music affects you how it affects you. Great pukes great music, timl tell when it lasts. I think great electronic music, people might not give it a fair chance because some people dont understand what goes into creating electronic music, what the musicianship actually is. Some people think its just, you know, a bunch of keyboards and p button pressing. Rose and some people say it wont last. But its been going around since the first synthesizer from ray kriswiel to donna sommers. It will be hard to go away. Rose for you, what do you hope to do with it . I feel like, you know, were here in havana. We came from isla islamabad to e shows. These are the guys who are changing it, pakistan, india, so im hoping to be an ambassador for them. Rose there is a sense somehow its an important time for these young cubans to feel connected to the world. Its the first time theyre getting connected, i feel like. Earlier in the interview, they talked about the Rolling Stones coming. There have been a few artists that are no, si nostalgic that e here like the Rolling Stones. Whats cool about our shows tomorrow is were at the top of our game, Young Musicians, and were coming with music popular all over the world now to cuba which doesnt happen a lot of times. They might get artists that come for nostalgic reasons. I feel its important to bridge the gap and whats happening in cuba now, cuba can make the music as well. Were helping them create at the same time. Rose whos coming with you, when you come . I have a team. To come here was pretty complex. People helped me in my management. Fabian puts together music havana which is a festival thats being put together. The cuban government, we had to work with some of the ambassador here. Its pretty complex and i appreciate the huge team to make it happen and they work tirelessly. Rose who will be on stage. Major laser. Rose major laser. Three of us on stage. Deejay, three of our dancers, and the production, the lights, videos, everything that comes into electronic music. Its very sensory. Rose they say what they love about electronic dance music is the concerts can go on for four hours. It has no physical limitation. There is also no set list. You can do whatever you want. We play some of our records, mix with some of the records we work on, remixes. Rose is there a play list or spontaneous . Sometimes it depends. Our show when we have the lighting cues, we have to keep it formatted to a set list but lots of times we just go off on a tangent and if the crowd wants this, ill go that way. Ill try to push it as far as i can. Thats the job of a deejay. Rose you have to feel where the crowd is. Exactly. You have to guess. Rose does it differ when you go from country to country. 100 . Rose islam bad is islam islamabad is different than jamaica. I play different sounds. Rose do you have to know their music . I do research every time. Today i will get records and try to edit them to fit our list and throw salsa samples in there and give people little surprises. Rose the interesting thing about cuba, and its true in other countries, in america, but they really celebrate artists here. They do. Rose the artists are put up on a pedestal. I think culture in general, cuba is a place where education is free, your healthcare is free, everything a lot of cuba is for the greater good of the cuban people but i think a lot of emphasis is on the individual as well and creativity. I visit add film school here, one of the most film schools in the world is in cuba. People travel from everywhere, germany, america, to go to this film school in cuba. So i think culture is taken very seriously. Its strange, the actual stream of information that leaves and comes here is so weird what things are given to people and taken away, but theyre still creators everywhere making media in cuba. Rose is this a long way from Daytona Beach . Growing up between daytona and south florida, we have such a cuban influence in florida. The food in florida feels more cuban than in cuba. I never thought i would be here with you. Thats amazing. Rose i didnt know i would be here with you either. When you called and said, im going to cuba, i thought, man, thats great. But you were the last person i thought who might call me and say im going to cuba. I think, you know, its strange, but even when i was in islamabad, i had to do a couple of interviews with the embassy there because thats one of the most important outlets for media, the American Embassy in islam ma dad is the second most popular Facebook Page in all of pakistan. So i went there to interview and their job was to market america. Thats what embassies do, they have a media center to help market what america does, the relationship with pakistan. Its important for me to do a couple of interviews, talk to people and share my experiences there and also bring music to kids. Thats the most important thing we can do in america is to bridge the cultural gap because thats the only thing we do have a lot of capital in, what were doing as creative people. I think that is important to have that conversation with different countries. Thats whats happening in cuba and i think its important obama is coming in i think two more weeks. Thats huge. First time in 70 years. Rose 59 or 60. And its important for People Like Us to come and to share our music and stories to the kids because those are the ones going to change the relationship. Rose do you have any political conversations when you come to places like this . A lot. I dont understand whats happening. Im diving into peoples lives. I dont understand how kids have an opportunity to make music. Can they do that for a living . Whats the difference in what they choose to be . Rose what about the rest to have the world . Theyre really aware. A lot of kids are getting bits and pieces to the internet. They find ways to access instagram and facebook. You would be surprised how much theyre aware. When the information comes, you cant stop the flow. Do you understand . Rose back to Daytona Beach youhead a certain counter cultural life, didnt you . You knew people from all cultures. I think growing up in florida. Daytona is one area, you grew up in florida, in south fort lauderdale, thats when i got interested in electronic music. We had the same similar interests, as music changed and became more a global culture, you know, ten years ago, 15 years ago we had the opportunity to make music, major laser, and it became possible. 15 years ago, the genres were very distinct. The if you were a kid, grew up a certain way and made a certain kind of music. These kids play metallica on the radio, doing metal, still doing all kinds of music. Rose youre in philadelphia . Right. Rose as a deejay playing a lot of events . I think i was a lucky guy to be at a certain time. When i first started doing music i was selling my own mixed tapes hand to hand. You can still make a living doing that. Rose you would mix the tames. I would make edits and mix the music. Id go to the record shop like kims video in new york, closed down, but i used to love that. I used to sell them 100 c. D. S at a time. Id make 6 hundred dollars. Print them, 45 cents each. That was my living. I started to develop that way. I could sell the c. D. S out of my car. Then people moved to the interfled. People said, hes making these albums on his own, we should try to invest in him. So people invested in what i did, other artists. It was like working a business. Rose what was the breakthrough . M. I. A. I made one mixed tape and sold it on my own and we made her a mixed tape. It exploded for her. Her deal with interscope happened from that. People gave her money to make records and thats all you want as a musician is to have access to capital to make your music. Rose but arent glow a place where people real lewant to collaborate with you . Enes, like with somebody like Justin Bieber or chris brown. Rose which do you prefer . Both, im glad i can do both. If one slows down, im still Getting Better as a producer, im still learning every day. As deejay, i get to go places like havana and build something brand new. Rose how did you come up with that. Major laser . Rose yes. I had an excess of music. At one point i was making a lot of music and no one was taking it. I was starting to go a certain direction and no one was getting what i was making. I said, hearings this is a great record for you. So and so artist, lte try. This no one was taking it. I said lets do our own project and thats what major laser was. Rose you do have a certain reputation as a bad boy. I think thats funny to hear you say that. For me, when it comes to media, for a while, any publicity is good. Just making noise. But ive grown up a lot over the last couple of years and ive started to let the music speak as much as i can. Rose let the music speak and yeah. Rose because an argument was made at some point that those kinds of controversies hit social media and fuels interest in you. Kit never hurt. Rose a battle with taylor swift . That was indirectly. That was probably before i understood. I didnt even know who taylor swift was back then. I thought i would never meet her. Since then, ive become a friend with her. Very strange. Rose you think you might one day collaborate with taylor swift . Its funny, i see her around and we talk sometimes but four years ago i would have never expected to meet her. Rose are you at a place now youve won grammys. Youre accepted by all the Music Industry and youre a part of every aspect of it. I dont take that too seriously. Im only here to make music. If i