Neumonic grew up in California listening to UK bass music, and he decided to merge all of this together. At the age of 14, he listened to the newest bass music on YouTube, and started growing his record collection. When he did eventually take the plunge to start his DJ career, Neumonic had a very good grasp of the direction he wanted to go in.
At first, people didn’t see his point of view, but in 2026, UK bass music has truly taken off in the US, and Neumonic has a role to play in that. With his organisation “Garage Access” he brings the freshest and biggest UK talent over to San Francisco to play their debut there. So far, he’s managed to bring over Hamdi, Oppidan, Badger, Conducta, Bushbaby, and more. Something tells us that this UK bass movement is only going to get bigger…
Neumonic is not only making waves as an event organiser. He’s just released his debut EP on Deadbeats, filled with quintessential UK sounds. We had a chat with him and talked all about this new EP, some massive events he’ll play in 2026, and what more is to come from him.
Congratulations on the release of your EP! The first song from that EP that you released was “What?” with Mary Droppinz. Such a fun song!
Neumonic: Yeah, it was really fun to work on. The idea behind the song is that we’re clapping back at some Twitter drama. We were on tour in Colorado earlier last year, and we made the track on the road. There’s a lot of dumb little vocal hits, and we slowly added more and more over the last couple months. Mary Droppinz has been a good friend for years so it came pretty naturally. We met at YOON Festival, a very small underground festival out in the Mojave Desert in California. I remember seeing her set and being obsessed. I met her after and we clicked.
You’re saying how you made that track on the road. Is that normally where you get your inspiration?
Neumonic: No, I’m usually really bad at making music on the road but in terms of collaborations, it’s always much better to work in person. A lot of the deep technical production wasn’t done on the road, but the fact that we were spending so much time together on tour made it so much easier to work on tracks. I don’t get to see her that much in person, so this was a nice chance to work on stuff together.
How was it working on the entire EP?
Neumonic: It was fun! There are four tracks on the EP; the first one is “What?”, and the rest of the EP is a little bit of everything. There’s a dubstep track with one of my good college friends, then there’s a really dark demonic two-step track – I hate calling it UKG. The last one is a drum & bass VIP to close it out. UKG is my main genre in terms of production and I’m literally an American in the American scene. What makes me stand out is the fact that I play every genre in my sets. I can’t play just one genre in a whole set. I play UKG, dubstep, breaks, D&B, I play very multigenre. My EP is a bunch of all the UK flavours, and it was really cool to showcase all of this. Working with a label like Deadbeats really gave me the chance to have all of these sounds on the EP.
How was it to work with Deadbeats?
Neumonic: Deadbeats has always been a big dream label for me. It is my first time working with them, and I was able to see how big of a network they have. They’re a machine. We did some really cool artwork and they were on board with that. It’s been really great to work with them. I’ve been a huge Zed’s Dead fan since I was like a little kid, and they were definitely one of the artists that got me into the scene. They’ve done so much for me. I can’t really announce much of it yet, but we have some really cool shows coming up.
Let’s go back in time for a second… In one of your Instagram captions, when talking about a UKF premiere last year, you are talking about how “14-year old Nick would have loved this”. How did you fall in love with the scene?
Neumonic: I love that you saw that caption. At 14, I was just a little kid listening to UKF and all of the other YouTube channels looking for some new music. 2010 was the peak of new dubstep, but because I was only 14 I couldn’t go to shows. The only thing I had were my Skull Candy bass boosted headphones and I was diving into it. I was obsessed with it from a young age. When listening to all of these tracks, I remember thinking, I can start DJing this. I’ve literally been studying this music ever since, and I was downloading tracks to DJ but refused to actually start DJing myself. I became obsessed with the scene, a lot of my friends were DJs and I used to be their +1’s at festivals and club shows. I was living and breathing the whole scene. Eight years ago I then started the Neumonic project, and it was when I came back from a month-long trip in London that I decided to fully dive into the music scene. I wanted to bring that UK sound over to America because I wasn’t really seeing it here.
What about the UK sound makes it so captivating to you?
Neumonic: It’s the sound that I got into when I first started exploring the genre. I feel like a lot of American people get into Skrillex, Excision, the big dubstep and riddim, and then they find the underground. For me it was the opposite. I found this stuff in 2010 when I was a kid. I was listening to Skream & Benga, Doctor P, Flux Pavilion… I was listening to the roots of dubstep in UK sounds at a young age, and did the same with UKG. I didn’t even know what the genre was back then, but I just remember that I liked it. I remember really liking the Gorillaz ‘Clint Eastwood’ refix by Ed Case. What’s cool about bringing this UK sound over here is that it stands out. I really wanted to bring something else to the scene because I think there’s a million people doing the same thing.
When I first started out, no one cared, because no one understood what I was doing. I was making UKG and all the bass heads said it was house music. Even with two-step, everyone kept calling it house music. I tried segmenting myself as a little bit of everything, like I said before, so I also started playing drum & bass, which really paid off. I got to open for Pendulum, Bou, Rudimental… Basically, whenever any of those UK artists came over, I would DJ it. I was carving my own path and then out of nowhere Virji and all of them blew up the UKG genre, and everyone finally figured out what it was. It was lucky timing, but it also doesn’t hurt that I throw events in San Francisco as Garage Access. Pushing my own sound is one thing but I was able to bring out artists for their San Francisco debut, like Hamdi, Badger, SHOSH, Bushbaby, Sammy Virji… I’m trying to bring them all out to San Francisco for their debuts, because I’m both pushing the UK sound myself, and bringing the UK over here.
What’s the scene in California like at the moment?
Neumonic: It’s very commercialized over here. In San Francisco, which is the closest big city to me, electronic music is very big, but the mainstream stuff is what is selling tickets and truly making money. People like John Summit, Fred again.., and Skrillex are drawing huge crowds, but there’s no solid scene in those types of events. The underground in San Francisco is strong, however everyone is struggling to get by and still the UK sound can be hard to come by regularly. Getting to go to London, I just enjoy it more. I also remember going to Outlook Festival in Croatia, and that was the most fun festival I’ve ever been to. There’s just something different about across the pond, it’s more underground, the crowd has more energy, and people are dancing more. The scene is big here as well, but there are a lot of people only showing up for the big names, filming a lot, and not being in the moment as much. It’s a different vibe. In America it’s all about the big visual shows, but I can enjoy some good music in a dark room as well. At some point, when I’m big enough, I would love to do what Fred again.. is doing. I was at his show in San Francisco, and they put stickers over all our phones. That was the best energy I’ve felt from one of those bigger mainstream shows, because the no phones-policy, everyone was really in the moment. That is something I would love to bring. I don’t think I’m at a level yet where I can tell everyone to not have their phone, and also, as an up-and-coming artist you want content, and you want people to be pushing your stuff and tagging you in stories. Unfortunately social media and content is very crucial.
What do you have planned for 2026?
Neumonic: I’m playing Coachella with DoLaB this year, which is huge. Coachella is such a big name at this point but it’s also the first festival I went to in 2015. I’m also really excited about the Untz Festival, which is a festival in California I play every year. This year it’s SHOSH playing before me, then Zero after me, LYNY… That’s going to be a crazy night. That night will actually be me showcasing Garage Access. I also do have a Red Rocks show coming up that is not announced, so I can’t say what show that is, but I will be playing Red Rocks this summer, which is huge. I’ve got a good amount of stuff going on, and there will definitely be more festivals coming as well.
And music-wise?
Neumonic: We’ve got the full EP with Deadbeats now. I also recently released a track on Tabula Rasa Records, which was for a UKG compilation of California artists. That was pretty cool, because it’s really exciting to see other artists here making UKG. I don’t really release tracks like on compilations anymore, but this compilation, as a California kid, I felt dumb to not release on it. And Tabula Rasa is a great label as well. They do a good job of finding niches and making compilations around it. I had a release with Enigma Dubz that got a UKF premiere last year, and we’ll have a vocal version of that coming out with MCs jumping on it. I have another vocal track with MC Elemental who I met in London coming out as well. I’ll have a full vibey future garage release at the end of the year… We’ll be having a lot of other bangers coming out, I just need to figure out the schedules and everything. And then one last thing… I will be announcing my very own record label. I don’t know when exactly, but a lot of people in the scene already know that I’m working on it. We’re currently working on the final artwork, and it’ll be a slow rollout. If you look at my artist pages, I have been releasing tracks under Nawty Records already, so the label already kind of exists, but I want to launch it properly and start bringing on other artists as well.
