RufusRüfüs were signed by electro DJ and Bang Gang co-founder Ajax (aka Adrian Thomas) to his five-year-old label Sweat It Out!, which enjoyed an international hit with Yolanda Be Cool and DCup's We No Speak Americano.
Tragically, Thomas died in a traffic incident in February. Rüfüs have dedicated Atlas to him. “He definitely made it all happen,” Jon George (synths, keys and pads) says.
Though Rüfüs have a loyal following, and many know their tunes, the outfit's background is shadowy. As George tells it, Rüfüs had its genesis up north in 2010. It was here he bonded with Tyrone Lindqvist (vocals, guitar and keys).
“I was finishing my sound engineering degree up in Byron Bay a few years ago now. Tyrone is best mates with my little brother and he came up to visit us right towards the end of my degree. I was helping him record some of his acoustic stuff, and he was helping me with some of my dancier productions. We spent one night in together – everyone else in the house had money to go out and we didn't – so we ended up writing the first track together as Rüfüs.”
On George's return to Sydney, the pair took the project “a little bit more seriously”. And they recruited James Hunt. “We poached him from another band as our drummer,” George reveals. “Tyrone and James went to the same school together.”
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Rüfüs – so DIY as to construct their own studios – premiered with a self-titled EP, home to the popular Paris Collides, on their Monekeleon imprint. Rüfüs generated interest overseas, with Talk To Me finding its way onto 2012's Gildas & Jerry Kitsuné Soleil Mix.
Having aired EPs, Rüfüs set about hustling for an album deal and this brought them into the orbit of Sweat It Out!.
“We were looking for some people who were on the same page as us, that were after the same things, and that could help us go in a direction that we wanted to.” George had long admired Thomas. “He was such a big influence on me in particular. Like, when I first started going out, I was going to Bang Gang and that's what got me into dance music.”
They'd meet with the DJ, who became “a huge believer”.
“Unfortunately, just after we'd signed the deal, and we'd spoken so much about what we were all gonna achieve together, Ajax passed away – which was pretty massive emotion-wise for us right in the middle of writing this album, [but] inspired us to actually make it better and really push what we were doing, because of how much he believed in us and because of a lot of feedback that he'd given us on tracks already.”
