Music

Locals Shelco Garcia and Teenwolf crash iTunes’ top 10 with new Madonna track

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Las Vegas producer/DJs Shelco Garcia and Teenwolf know what it’s like to watch one of their creations become part of an Internet phenomenon—just search the multiple humorous viral videos for this year’s “That’s My Jam”—but never has any of their productions become its own hashtag.

On December 17, Garcia and Teenwolf (real name: Bryan Orellana) woke up to the news that 13 unmastered tracks from the recording sessions for Madonna’s upcoming album had leaked, including “Unapologetic Bitch”—a co-production between the 24-year-olds and renowned producer (and Wynn/Encore nightlife exclusive DJ) Diplo. They hadn’t heard the whole song yet, and while they were reluctant to indulge in downloading the leak, especially since the song wasn’t finished, they did so anyway—and beamed.

“It blew my mind this morning, listening to the Madonna song for the first time in full...we woke up and got to hear our beat and her vocals over it,” says Teenwolf.”

While Garcia and Teenwolf weren’t entirely happy that an incomplete work of theirs was bouncing around the Internet like an in-play racquetball, they reveled in the song becoming a favorite among tweeting Madonna fans, who often included the hashtag #UnapologeticBitch in their tweets. (The phrase was also rumored to become the album’s title, which has since been announced as Rebel Heart.)

They had even bigger news to celebrate three days later as Madonna, frustrated with the leak but looking to pacify impatient fans, pre-released six completed Rebel Heart tracks onto iTunes. One of them was “Unapologetic Bitch,” which rose to number nine on iTunes’ bestselling songs chart over the weekend.

Though Wikipedia currently lists Diplo and Madonna as the song’s producers—Garcia and Teenwolf’s contracts are pending—the twosome has been reassured by both Diplo and its publishing company that it will receive credit and payment for its efforts. Furthermore, Diplo announced his Las Vegas collaborators to the world this weekend with celebratory tweets linking their Twitter handles.

The duo only found out a few months ago that Madonna would sing over their music. Originally, they thought the reggae-flavored song—their most musically ambitious, they say—was intended for Diplo’s side project, Major Lazer, for which Garcia and Teenwolf had previously produced (and opened during the act’s 1 OAK and Haze DJ sets). But as the two parties traded and tweaked the duo’s recordings, things changed and became suspiciously urgent.

“Diplo said, let’s strip the vocal and do something bigger with it,” says Teenwolf. “And then one day, he’s e-mailing us, saying, hey, I need this really quick! We were already in the studio, we made all these changes—and then we see on Instagram [that day] that he’s in the studio with Madonna. We [e-mailed him back], are you making this song for Madonna? He’s like, just be patient, I’ll show you!

“It was so natural,” he adds. “We made it without the intention of it being something big. And now, hopefully, with the release, it’ll be something big.”

Which is what Garcia and Teenwolf, who have been producing and DJing together for nearly four years, have been working toward since their first release, 2012’s “Fat Man Bass,” was discovered and played by international producer/DJ and Light Group resident Laidback Luke, eventually leading to the local duo releasing music on his Mixmash label. At the end of our December 17 interview, Garcia told me that one of his goals was for a song of theirs to go No. 1 on dance music download site Beatport. “With every release, we’ve come so close,” he says. “Our last one hit No. 18.”

Three days later, "Unapologetic Bitch" crashed the iTunes top 10. That's a lot of people's jam.

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