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winnetkacurrent.com LIFE & ARTS
the winnetka current | December 6, 2018 | 25
North Shore-made Louis the Child tours internationally
Group stops
in Chicago for
Friendsgiving show
Megan Bernard, Editor
The last couple of times
The Winnetka Current
checked in with Louis the
Child, it had released its
first EP and then made the
Coachella lineup.
Now two years later, the
EDM group is touring internationally
and is on its
heels of releasing a debut
album. Its hit song “Better
Not” featuring Wafia even
became the Minnesota
Wild's victory song this
season.
Robby Hauldren, of
Northfield, and Freddy
Kennett, both New Trier
graduates, together comprise
Louis the Child, a DJgroup
mixing the sounds of
pop and dance. The duo’s
“Dear Sense” tour is wrapping
up Saturday, Dec. 8.
The tour wouldn’t have
been complete, however,
without a stop home in
Chicago.
On Nov. 23, Louis the
Child played to a sold-out
show called Friendsgiving
at the Aragon Ballroom.
It was the second time the
group had performed there,
but it was the show they
were most looking forward
to this year, seeing how
their new set would look
inside the space.
“The tour is really cool,”
Hauldren told The Current
before the Chicago
show. “Freddy and I and
our whole crew think it’s
a step up from every other
tour that we’ve ever done.
We’ve been a lot more involved
than ever before.”
The duo made decisions
on major parts of the show
down to the lighting, lasers
and visuals.
“We had enough time
to put together a show
that we are really proud
of,” Hauldren added. “We
have a whole new set up
where we are facing each
other instead of facing the
crowd. We have a couple
more little toys to play with
on stage. … It’s a lot more
fun and (there is) a lot more
to do up there.”
“This show is just a huge
step up for us and it feels
really, really good,” Kennett
added.
As for the set list itself:
Hauldren said there have
been a lot of new edits on
old Louis the Child songs.
“There’s also a lot of
new things that we made
to play live,” he said. “It’s
a lot of fun to be playing a
lot of new things and to be
playing a fresh set.
“It’s more Louis the
Child music than we’ve
ever played at a show.
There are maybe three
songs in the entire show
that aren’t Louis the Child
songs. … It’s a lot of our
own music, which feels fun
to play out.”
After touring for a couple
of years and several
festival circuits, Hauldren
and Kennett said they are
starting to recognize fans
and the fans are starting to
recognize their music.
“It seems like people
know every song that we
play,” Kennett said. “Definitely
people are screaming
‘Better Not’ at the top
of their lungs. It’s not that
way for every single song,
but those moments, like
with ‘Better Not,’ it’s really
special and makes us
feel very grateful for doing
all this.”
“We’re seeing a lot more
familiar faces in the crowd,
Louis the Child’s Robby Hauldren (left), of Northfield, and Freddy Kennett perform at the Aragon Ballroom Nov. 23
in Chicago for a Friendsgiving show. Photos by @itsColinMiller
too,” Hauldren said. “We’ll
hop up on stage and look
down at the front row and
we recognize people, the
fans that have been to multiple
shows. … It’s cool to
have fans that are coming
up to us and tell us it’s their
fifth or 10th time they’re
seeing us. We really have
formed awesome relationships
with our fans.”
After the tour wraps, the
duo will head to Europe in
February to play a handful
of overseas shows. This is
their second time touring
Europe, after a headliner
tour with Whethan, another
New Trier grad-turned-artist,
last year.
“We go from playing a
room as big as the Aragon
in the United States, and
then you go back across
the pond and you go back
to playing 200-400 people
rooms that are as big as
Lincoln Hall [in Chicago],”
Kennett said.
Although their shows
The Chicago Friendsgiving show on the “Dear Sense” tour was sold out.
are smaller in Europe,
Hauldren and Kennett said
their true fans show up.
While on tour, the duo
is “always making things
on the road,” they said, to
possibly put it into a future
album.
“We want to get an album
out before the summer
hopefully next year,”
Kennett said. “I have no
doubt that we’ll be able to
do that. We have so many
ideas already that feel like
they should be on the album.
I think we are going
to be working pretty hard
the next few months to get
that album together and
done and finished.
“I just really want to
make a really cool debut
album. … We want to hit
a lot of different sides of
Louis the Child and keep
exploring to capture new
feelings.”
If the wait till next summer
is too long, catch Louis
the Child on their own
radio show “Playground
Radio” on Sirus XM’s Diplo
Revolution.
On their show every other
Monday, the duo “picks
out a bunch of songs that
we’ve been listening to all
week and we get to show
them to the world on the
radio station.”
“It’s wild,” Hauldren
said, “because there are
so many little things like
this radio show that have
happened in our career
that you never would have
thought would happen.”