Dillon Francis


Dillon Hart Francis is an American electronic musician, record producer and DJ. A native of Los Angeles, he is best known for popularizing the moombahton genre.

Early life

Francis was born in Los Angeles, California to an American father and a Serbian-Croatian mother. Francis has stated that his father, Robert Drew Francis, is an "alternative medicines doctor." He has made a recurring Internet joke about being unable to find his father. Francis has stated that he was very sheltered growing up, claiming that he did not know any swear words until he was 15. He also claims he could not watch TV unless he watched at least two hours of Sesame Street a day.

Career

Platinum-selling DJ and producer, Dillon Francis, has achieved a string of smashes, "Anywhere" featuring Will Heard, "Candy" featuring Snappy Jit, "Coming Over" with Kygo featuring James Hersey, and the RIAA platinum-certified "Get Low" with DJ Snake which surpassed 500 million worldwide streams.

2010–2012

Francis first rose to fame after gaining the attention of American producer Diplo and eventually collaborating on the song "Que Que", with featured Latin-pop artist Maluca. His song "Masta Blasta", originally a 130 BPM house track, was edited after inspiration from Dutch musician Munchi and eventually ended up as the moombahton track that brought him to fame. In 2010, Francis released his Swashbuckler EP on Play Me Records. In 2012, he also released two singles "I.D.G.A.F.O.S." and "Bootleg Fireworks ". Both are known to be fan favorites. He has released works on multiple labels including Dim Mak Records, Mad Decent and OWSLA.
In February 2012, Francis became the first moombahton artist to achieve the number-one spot atop the Beatport releases chart with the release of his extended play Something, Something, Awesome. In late 2012, he embarked on his Wet & Reckless tour across North America, as well as supporting the English electronic-music trio Nero on their Welcome Reality tour and English musician Flux Pavilion on his Standing on a Hill tour.

2013

In 2013, he announced a headlining Wurld Turr across the US and Canada, as well as confirming that his debut album would be released in 2013 before later experiencing various delays. He also gained prominence by being announced as one of MTV Clubland's Artists to watch in 2013, alongside acts such as Kill the Noise and Otto Knows. Francis was labeled by MTV as an "artist to watch" as of September 9, 2013. The uprising artist is on his way to becoming one of the most recognized faces in the EDM scene. Francis has performed at many popular music festivals such as Camp Bisco, Electric Daisy Carnival, Coachella, TomorrowWorld, Ultra and Electric Zoo. Francis is also one half of the comedy production duo Meowski666 alongside Kill the Noise and has been linked to internet funny man The Fat Jew. In October 2013 he was announced as number 73 in the DJ Mag Top 100 poll.

2014

In 2014, his major label debut album, Money Sucks, Friends Rule , landed on Rolling Stone's "Top Electronic Albums of 2014" list and boasted a myriad of diverse collaborators such as Twista, Brendon Urie of Panic! At The Disco, Major Lazer, and more. His single "Get Low" with DJ Snake was released on February 11, 2014. On March 22, 2014, Francis announced via his official Twitter account that his debut album, entitled Money Sucks, Friends Rule, will be released on October 28, 2014, on Mad Decent and Columbia Records. In August, Dillon released his second single off of the album, which was a collaboration with Sultan + Ned Shepard featuring The Chain Gang of 1974. Beginning in February 2014, Francis embarked on the Friends Rule Tour supporting his debut album. Dates for the tour were booked through January 16, 2015 in 18 different cities across the United States.

2015–2016

In 2015, Francis' This Mixtape Is Fire EP bowed at #1 on Billboard's Top Dance/Electronic Albums Chart. The EP's most popular song, "Coming Over," written by Dillon Francis, Kygo, and James Hersey, has reached over 127 million streams on Spotify. On January 1, 2015, Francis revealed to Australian radio station Triple J that he was working on a sketch show pilot for MTV. Francis stated that the show was set to go into production in January 2015. On June 28, 2015, Francis announced his EP This Mixtape Is Fire, which would mark a return to his moombahton roots. The EP features collaborations from Skrillex, Calvin Harris, Chromeo, Bro Safari, and Kygo with James Hersey, along with a remix of 'I Can't Take It' from his album Money Sucks, Friends Rule by Party Favor. He released the first track from the EP 'Bruk Bruk the same day.
In 2016, he released three new singles: "Need You" in collaboration with NGHTMRE, "Candy" in collaboration with GTA and Snappy Jit, and "Anywhere" with vocals by Will Heard.

2017

On April 5, 2017, Francis released another single "Say Less" in a collaboration with rapper G-Eazy. A few days after the release, Francis made it official through a live stream that he had parted ways with Columbia Records mutually and is looking forward to release music as an independent artist. He has also revealed to his fans that he will be releasing an album as an independent artist and also stated that he would return to his moombahton roots.
Francis is known for creating different personalities or alter egos, including "Emo Preston." Francis performed as "Emo Preston" at Emo Nite in Los Angeles in 2017.

2018

In 2018, Dillon returned to his moombahton roots with the release of the Spanish-language studio album, WUT WUT. The album went on to earn Francis a Latin American Music Award nomination and Latin Grammy nomination respectively for the song, "Sexo" with Residente and iLe. On February 21, he released a single "We The Funk" in a collaboration with Fuego. On April 13, he released a single "Sexo" in a collaboration with Residente and iLe. “Sexo” was nominated for Best Short Form Music Video at the Latin Grammys and the Latin American Music Awards for Favorite Video. The song's inclusion in the video category in both awards ceremonies is no doubt due to the widespread popularity of the viral dance that came with it.
On May 9 he released a single "BaBaBa in a collaboration with Young Ash. On July 12 he released a single "Never Let You Go" featuring De La Ghetto. In August, he remixed Martin Solveig's single "My Love". He also was one of the headliners for Hard Summer Music Festival in August 2018. On September 12, he released a single "White Boi" featuring Lao Ra. Wut Wut is the second studio album by Dillon Francis, released on September 28, 2018 through IDGAFOS.
He also appeared in the first season of Taskmaster US alongside Lisa Lampanelli, Freddie Highmore, Ron Funches and Kate Berlant.
Dillon Francis recently released a 7 episode comedy series 'Like and Subscribe' available exclusively on Funny or Die and Amazon Video. The show follows Skyy Goldwynne, Hollywood's biggest manager who locks 4 of his influencer clients in a house with a camera crew.
On December 7, 2018, Francis released "LFGD" featuring Chris Melberger as part of Astralwerks' compilation album with livestreamer Ninja, Ninjawerks Volume 1.

2019

On January 25, 2019 he released the single "Lost My Mind" in collaboration with Alison Wonderland, which is sharing the name with their Lost My Mind Tour in the beginning of the year throughout the United States. Quickly, multiple sold out shows across the United States. The song arose because of a deal between the artists on Twitter, concerning the winner of the FIFA World Cup being Croatia or not, with the reason that both of them have Croatian roots.
Francis also contributed to the soundtrack of with "Catchy Song", featuring rappers T-Pain and That Girl Lay Lay, who became the youngest female rapper to sign a record deal. Following the first film's "Everything Is Awesome", the song principally features the repeated phrase "This song's gonna get stuck inside your head!" According to songwriter Jon Lajoie, he found "Everything Is Awesome" "extremely catchy" and wanted to outdo the song by "dialling the song up to 11".

2020

On May 8, 2020 he performed in the Fortnite Party Royale Premiere with Steve Aoki and Deadmau5.

Discography