What So Not on Returning to Trap Music: “It Felt So Harmonious”

1 month ago 6

**We caught up with What So Not about returning to trap music, his current tour, and the ten-year anniversary of his Divide & Conquer EP.**

After ten years of exploring different genres, What So Not is returning to his trap roots.

Last month, the multi-genre DJ and producer released his EP, I SAW A TRAP DJ AND IT CHANGED MY BIO CHEMISTRY, a celebratory homecoming to his sound from the 2010s. This arrived a month before the ten-year anniversary of his first EP as a solo artist, Divide & Conquer, which propelled the upward trajectory of his career.

To celebrate Divide & Conquer‘s milestone, What So Not is re-releasing the EP as a limited edition vinyl — the first time the EP is being sold in that format. Leading up to the re-release, What So Not swung by to talk about the Divide & Conquer EP, I SAW A TRAP DJ AND IT CHANGED MY BIO CHEMISTRY, and bringing his current tour to more intimate venues.

Give his latest EP a spin, and read on for the conversation!

**Stream What So Not – I SAW A TRAP DJ AND IT CHANGED MY BIO CHEMISTRY on Spotify:**

There’s a really interesting balance on I SAW A TRAP DJ AND IT CHANGED MY BIO CHEMISTRY between nostalgia and experimentation. How did you approach revisiting the sounds that originally shaped your style while still making the music feel fresh and modern?

It felt so harmonious coming back to this genre, near the origins of my music creating life, bringing all the skills I’ve picked up along the way from the different genres and scenes that I’ve ventured into.

Once you knew you wanted to explore this era of your sound again, what did the actual process of building the EP look like?

Being in more rigid and demanding genres like drum and bass, it was quite a breath of fresh air to come back into a genre that has so much room in space for swing, dynamic, and pauses. I think this is the underbelly of the beauty of this genre: the sensual and intuitive body motion of R&B, rap, and hip-hop mixed with the euphoria of dance music and synthesis.

You’ve been on tour for the past month, bringing this project into smaller, more intimate rooms. How has that experience complemented what you’re exploring on the EP, particularly this idea of reconnecting with the sense of community, experimentation, and shared experience that defined that pivotal era of trap music?

I love playing smaller rooms because it allows you to experiment and deviate from common norms so much more. That core audience, that’s deep in the scene and on the level, knows all the unreleased IDs and demands a similar expectation to what we are looking for when we go to write new productions that excite us.

The album and tour both share the name “I SAW A TRAP DJ AND IT CHANGED MY BIO CHEMISTRY.” For anyone seeing you on this tour, what do you hope they take away from the experience, and this new What So Not era?

This tour is an exploration and expansion beyond what this scene started in those nostalgic times. It’s amazing to see people both reconnecting and exploring with me as this scene is flourishing and evolving in 2026.

On September 9, you’re celebrating the tenth anniversary of Divide & Conquer. Can you tell us more about what we can expect from this re-release?

The tenth anniversary of Divide & Conquer is really a celebration of the scene itself. From collaborators on that EP, that were such important parts of the era, to all the music that inspired it and is still being remixed and circulating today.

What does that EP mean to you, and how do you think it’s shaped your career and the musician you’ve become?

The Divide and Conquer EP was a defining moment in my life. Released alongside my RÜFÜS DU SOL “Innerbloom” remix, it was the beginning of the upward acceleration of my career to everything I would do across the next decade until now.

You’ve spent the last decade exploring a variety of different genres and styles. What did that period of experimentation teach you that you brought into these recent releases?

From all these genres I’ve explored, I’ve learnt so much about songwriting, mixing, sound design, and the importance of not only dynamics in your productions, but dynamics in the movement across a record to create these impactful moments that seem to stand the test of time.

This has been a year of rediscovery and reflection for you, but now looking ahead, what are you excited about next?

I’m most excited to see a reinvigoration for the sound and how it can and is being evolved, and the importance it seems to have for young people that never got to experience it in venues and festivals. There are a lot of us right now toying with the evolution of this nostalgic sound and how it cross-pollinates with other genres and fields of modern times to bring forth ideas that haven’t been done yet.