Dillon Francis

Attacking the dancefloor with speaker-ripping electro and a snarky sense of humor, Los Angeles-based DJ and producer Dillon Francis helped popularize the moombahton electronic genre in addition to embracing trap and dance-pop. Early releases such as 2011′s Westside! explored the fusion of Dutch house and reggaeton known as moombahton, and Francis pushed the style in a harder direction, dubbed moombahcore, with efforts like 2012′s Something, Something, Awesome. He delved into a wide variety of genres with the guest-heavy 2014 full-length Money Sucks, Friends Rule, a number two Billboard dance album, then focused entirely on Latin styles with the Spanish-language Wut Wut in 2018, which earned him back-to-back Latin American Music Award and Latin Grammy nominations for the song “Sexo” featuring Residente and iLe. Happy Machine, released in 2021, consisted of upbeat, vocal-driven house songs, and 2022′s Cake and Cognac EP saw him collaborating with rapper Yung Gravy.
Born in 1987, Francis grew up Los Angeles the son of an alternative medicines doctor. By his teens, he was listening to a mix of punk and electronic music. However, he was initially focused on the visual arts, including photography, printmaking, and graphic design. After high school, he attended art school, during which time he also began experimenting with music production, learning Ableton from producer Cory Nitta, aka Cory Enemy, in Atlanta. He eventually decided to leave school and turn his attention full-time to making music. As a DJ, Francis debuted in 2010, going willingly “dumb” from the beginning with his collaboration with rapper Dirty Nasty and the duo’s cover of “Sandwiches” by the Detroit Grand Pubahs. He released the solo Swashbuckler EP on the Play Me label before joining Diplo’s Mad Decent with the Westside! EP. The single “Que Que,” with Diplo and Maluca, was a huge hit in the moombahton scene. Building on the momentum of the moombahton trend that was popular the time, he pioneered a fiercer variation called moombahcore, with releases like the single “I.D.G.A.F.O.S.” (later the name of his label) and the 2012 EP Something, Something, Awesome. His 2012 single “Masta Blasta (The Rebirth)” found him working with another stuttering genre in dance music: trap.
Working alongside A-Trak and DJ Snake, Francis ventured into EDM and other popular genres with his 2014 album Money Sucks, Friends Rule reaping the varied results. The debut LP featured a parade of guest appearances, and nearly all those tracks became dance hits. First was “Get Low” with DJ Snake (which also hit the main singles chart), then “When We Were Young” with the Chain Gang of 1974, “We Make It Bounce” with Major Lazer, “Set Me Free” with Martin Garrix, and “Love in the Middle of a Firefight” featuring Brendon Urie. The seven-song release This Mixtape Is Fire. followed in 2015 and featured tracks with Skrillex, Calvin Harris, and Chromeo. A bevy of collaborative singles arrived in 2016, including “Need You” featuring NGHTMRE, “Candy” featuring Snappy Jit, and “Anywhere” featuring Will Heard.
In addition to releasing singles like “Say Less” and “Hello There” in 2017, Francis made his acting debut in the comedy television series What Would Diplo Do? Beginning with the funky “Ven,” a barrage of singles preceded the 2018 release of his sophomore full-length, Wut Wut. Featuring contributions from Lao Ra, Residente, De La Ghetto, Fuego, Arcángel, and more, the set placed at number 22 on the Billboard Latin Albums chart. It also garnered Francis a Latin American Music Award nomination and Latin Grammy nomination for the song “Sexo.” Keeping busy in 2019, he released “LFGD” with Chris Melberger, “Lost My Mind” with tourmate Alison Wonderland, “Change Your Mind” with lovelytheband, and “Catchy Song,” a group collaboration with T-Pain and That Girl Lay Lay for the soundtrack to The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part. His mixtape Magic Is Real arrived in November 2019 and included collaborations with Nitti Gritti, Vera Hotsauce, Bunji Garlin, TV Noise, and Big Freedia.
Festival Bangers for When Festivals Start Again Because There Are No Festivals, an EP with TV Noise, appeared at the end of 2020. The EP Very Important Music and full-length Happy Machine, both focusing on joyous dance pop tunes, were released in 2021. The following year saw Francis team up with Minnesota rapper and longtime friend Yung Gravy on the EP Cake and Cognac. ~ David Jeffries & Paul Simpson