Off the back of his successful bop “Bicycle” ft. klei, and vibe-y remix of Alina Baraz’s smash “Floating” ft. Khalid, Austrian producer filous has returned with another earworm. This time around he’s tapped the vocal talents of St. Lucian / half German singer-songwriter from the UK, Louis III – whose RnB-infused pop has been gaining ground, with i-D, Highsnobiety, BBC, and more all hailing him as one to watch. The duo teamed up on a tongue-in-cheek tune entitled “All My Friends Are Rich” which dropped today via Ultra Music. The song of course stays true to filous signature feel-good vibe, with an undeniable flow, spirited instrumentation, and catchy AF hook. Lyrically, it sarcastically plays off the lifestyles of the elite, with Louis III delivering each line with a perfectly playful cadence.
When asked about how the song came together, filous shared, One day I was in LA at a private party and one moment I realized how absurd it was that I, this random kid from Austria was now sitting in a villa in the Hills, kind of pretending to be part of the scene. Right then I opened up my notes and wrote down All My Friends Are Rich. Skip to a year later where I met Louis III through a mutual friend. We got chatting about how fun but also weird and confusing the music world can be and then I brought up the idea of writing a song with an ironic over the top twist about intruding in the rich mans world. Later that day we met with klei and Sebastian Arman, both amazingly talented friends of mine and wrote the song together.
Louis III adds, I was basically a filous fan-girl before I came to Vienna last year to hang out and work on some music together. When I first heard his feel-good, nostalgic sound I had a feeling we could write something cool together, and All My Friends are Rich came off the back of us walking around the city joking about the kind of person you could imagine going to fyre festival and what it must cost to keep up those kind of appearances.
Evolving from a naturally gifted instrumentalist to precocious beatmaker to full-fledged auteur, 22-year old filous has always been something of an enigma, driven by an incessant curiosity and a need for discovery. He’s caught the ears of tastemakers and electronic music fans alike, which has grown his unique global footprint to +500M combined YouTube, SoundCloud, and Spotify streams, thanks to 12+ Hypemachine #1s and his debut EP Dawn topping the iTunes electronic chart in over 9 countries. This earned him a European Border Breaker Award (2017), and 3 Amadeus Austrian Music Award nominations. He’s also been tapped to create official remixes for the likes of Selena Gomez, James Bay, James Hersey, Kiiara and more.
filous is currently in Los Angeles working on new music and will hop over to NYC at the end of March before heading back to Austria to start finalizing his next moves.