Zedd searches for timeless art in the kaleidoscopic “Telos”

LOS ANGELES (AP) — It’s been nearly a decade since Zedd, the Grammy-winning producer and DJ, released his second album, “True Colors.” The German maverick was looking for an album that would stand out, one that would tell a story beyond the success of his debut LP, “Clarity,” or “True Colors.”

Zedd didn’t want to be put into “this EDM box of making 128 BPM club hits, because I have more to say,” he noted.

This is how “Telos”, their long-awaited third full-length album, came about.

“It’s an album that for many years I doubted I could create,” he told The Associated Press. “I wanted something timeless, something I would be proud of forever, and something that was very detailed and not just about songs put together on a record, but where each song led to the next.”

The project is highly collaborative, featuring songs with Muse and John Mayer and new pop voices like Remi Wolf and Bea Miller.

In an interview, ZEDD spoke about “Telos,” an album inspired by Jeff Buckley. The answers have been edited for clarity and brevity.

AP: It’s been nine years since your last album. Why?

ZEDD: I’ve enjoyed not putting pressure on myself and just putting out singles. And of course, always, in the back of my mind, I was like, I’ll make another album. But what am I trying to do and what am I trying to say? And I came up with these concepts before I started working on an album. I wanted it to be meaningful and have some kind of concept behind it, not just, “Hey, I’ve got a deal, I need to make an album.”

Then the pandemic hit and I was like, “Well, this is a perfect time. Now everyone is out. I can finally sit down and make an album.” And I was aimlessly trying to make an album that just didn’t feel genuine to me, and I scrapped everything except for one song, “Dream Brother,” which became a cornerstone of my album.

AP: “Dream Brother” is a surprise.

ZEDD: The whole inspiration behind “Dream Brother” was this artist, Jeff Buckley, who was so inspiring to me in my life, and that song that was really meaningful to me and it felt like, “Okay, this is a concept: to do things that are genuinely meaningful to me, that have some kind of connection to my musical upbringing or my life.” And I started remaking my album off of “Dream Brother,” and all of a sudden, it felt like, “Oh, there’s a concept there.” And there was a moment where I cracked the code saying, “This is going to be an album that’s purely for me, whatever that means musically.”

So that just clicked and I realized, “Okay, whatever comes from the heart is going to go on this album.” And whatever emotion I can capture, of what inspired me back in the day, I want to try to recreate it, so that other people feel what I felt back in the day when I was deeply inspired by those albums.

AP: You’d always wanted to work with Matt Bellamy, and Muse appears on the closing track, “1685,” which references Bach’s “The Well-Tempered Clavier.”

ZEDD: They’re among the most influential people for me. So for me to work with Matt Bellamy was a dream, and for the whole band, really. And we’ve tried it a few times in the past… We both tried it twice with two different songs. And they felt amazing, but not perfect and not forever. So, luckily, he’s very similar to me, musically, in the sense that we’re not going to force anything.

I had this vision[for“1685”)andIsaidtomymanager“ThisisgoingtobetheinstrumentaltrackorwithMusebutwithnooneelse”There’snooneIwouldconsiderbecauseMuseisabandthatworksmusicthiswayTheyoftentakeclassicalpiecesandreinterpretthemandmakethemtheirownAndformeitwaslike“WellifI’mgoingtoreinterpretmyfavoriteclassicalpieceofalltimeI’monlygoingtodoitwithsomeonewhoalsodoesitandwhoinspiredmetodothattobeginwith”

AP: “Telos” comes from ancient Greek; it can mean “end” or “goal.” What does that mean to you?

ZEDD: “Telos” has multiple meanings. One of them is the realization and achievement of your goal, celebrating human art. And that was what I was feeling for most of the recording of the album. I felt like I had accomplished something I didn’t know I could accomplish, creating an album on a level I wasn’t sure I could do yet.

And then, towards the end of recording “Telos,” I started to feel the other emotion, which was just that I had exhausted myself so much to the point of losing almost 20 pounds. I couldn’t sleep at night. I would wake up at four in the morning with the song stuck in my head that I was working on. It was really kind of traumatizing in a way for me, and I really resonated with the meaning, the ending, of “Telos.”

AP: What do you think about the state of EDM music? It’s a roller coaster ride, with ups and downs, in terms of popularity.

ZEDD: I have to admit, I’m not even aware of the state of EDM, and I think, I don’t know if it’s subconsciously, but ever since I started working on my album, for me, I started working on a body of work that to me was completely separate from what the trend is in EDM. I don’t even know how EDM my album really is. It’s half organic, half orchestral, half electronic. And I’m also not really interested in following trends, and I haven’t been a big fan of a lot of the trends that get picked up. And I feel like trends last for a shorter period of time than ever, so chasing that, I feel like it’s never going to fulfill you. Because by the time you get there, there’s already something else that’s trending.

I made a decision early on in my career that I’m going to create my own path, and I’m going to walk my path the way I want to and whoever wants to join me is welcome to join me. But I’m not for everybody. And my goal has never been to cater to everybody’s opinions. And that’s an unattainable goal to begin with. And I think that if you’re genuine about what you do, if you love the music that you create, then there are going to be people who feel the same way.

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Associated Press writer Maria Sherman contributed to this report from New York.