Duane Harden: How to Make a Club Classic… in 15 Minutes.
Singer-songwriter Duane Harden recalls the late-night creative burst that resulted in 1999 house anthem (and UK No.1 hit) ‘You Don’t Know Me’ with Armand Van Helden.
DUANE HARDEN: When I went to college in Boston — Boston University — that’s when I met house music. And that’s when I met Armand Van Helden. He was a DJ then, but he wasn’t famous yet. We started hanging out all the time, going to clubs all the time. I don’t know how I graduated.
When Armand started blowing up with his remixes and original productions, he moved from Boston to New York. And after I graduated, I got a job as a computer engineer with UPS in New York. Armand was always saying, we should make a song. I said no, no, no, no, no, no, I’m not doing that, music is not my thing. I’m a computer guy. But finally I was like, alright, you want to make a record? Let’s make a record.
I worked at UPS in Times Square and Armand lived nearby. One day after work I went over to his house, and he plays me one disco loop. I say no, that’s not it. He plays a second. He’s going through his crate, you know, his records. He pulls out another record, plays the break, and I say no, that’s not it. He pulls out the third record. And it’s Carrie Lucas, ‘Dance With You’. And when I heard those strings, I said that’s it, I like that. Armand was like, okay — he sampled the record, put on a loop and went to dinner with his girlfriend.
I wrote the song in fifteen minutes.
Before he left, Armand gave me these fuckin’ rules. He said, you know, I don't want it about love, I don’t want it about romance, rules like that. So I wrote what I wrote — in fifteen minutes the song was written. Then I had to wait for him to come back from dinner. When he did, he said, okay, what you wrote? I showed him the song and he said like, okay now we’re going to record.
Now, I come from a musical family, but I’m not a music guy. Like, my aunts and uncles, they can sing — my grandfather was a Southern Baptist preacher, he had 14 kids, they would go around to all the different churches and sing. They could really sing. Three of my aunts played piano by ear, never went to school, it’s just natural, God-given talent. I have a lot of people in my family with natural talent. Maybe that was intimidating, I don’t know. But I was just a computer guy.
So when Armand says I need to record the song, well, I’d never really sang before, besides in the church choir, because we had to with my grandfather, and then I sung in the gospel choir at Boston University. But I never really sung, you know? I’d never recorded, so I was anxious.
I said to Armand, just leave me alone, I’m too nervous to do this with you sitting here. And he showed me how to use the Mac he had back then and the ADAT and all this stuff. Then he went into the bedroom with his girlfriend, and I stood there and his living room in Times Square, and I recorded ‘You Don't Know Me’. It was like 2.30, 3.30am or whatever time, early in the morning, I had finished but he's in bed with his girlfriend with the door closed and I didn't want to disturb him, you know what I’m saying?
Anyway, finally I just went and I knocked on the door. I was like, yo, some of us got jobs — I gotta, I gotta go to work in the morning. And so he came out. And he listened.
Then he said: Yeah, cool.
So unemotional!
I said, it’s late. Whatever you don't like, I'll come back another time to fix. The next day he calls me: I just need something for the break. And I came over, and that's when I sung this high note, at the end of the break before the last chorus, there’s this high note that I hold. I sung that note. Armand said, That's it. I got everything now.
Soon after that, I went to Miami; it was my first Winter Music Conference. I’m doing all the stuff, going to the panels. And at night, I'm going to the clubs and I'm hearing this track — and I’m like, that's me! I had never heard the finished song up until we were in Miami. And suddenly, everybody is talking about this new Armand Van Helden record…