Child Of Explores Memory, Mood and Movement on New EP ‘Remover/At The Heart Level’
- Undrtone Blog
- Jul 22
- 3 min read
Child Of doesn’t make tracks to tick boxes. His music feels lived-in. Honest. Full of texture, tension and unexpected feeling.
His new EP ‘Remover / At The Heart Level’, out now on California’s SOL Records, builds on that. A two-tracker that balances club weight with emotional pull, it feels both personal and open to interpretation.
Lead track ‘Remover’ is driven by the unmistakable “yeah” vocal sample, a familiar sound from early 90s rave culture. Think Quadrophonia, 2 Unlimited, the era when that one syllable could move a room. But this time, it hits differently.
“I was messing around with this Rave Generator plug-in,” says Child Of, aka Todd Weinstock. “That sample popped up and immediately felt good in the track, so I built a little melody out of it. Normally, that ‘yeah’ is used in the context of peak-time energy, but in ‘Remover’ it felt more like a memory of the rave, not the actual rave. Like a bittersweet trace of something that already happened.”
It’s that emotional framing that gives the track its weight. A slow burn with a rising pulse, it feels like reaching back to something half-remembered and deeply felt.
‘At The Heart Level’, the second cut, strips things back but keeps the atmosphere thick. Anchored by arpeggios and subtle modulation, it simmers with quiet intensity.
“This one’s really carried by the arp and the chord progression,” he says. “Once that core clicks, even small shifts, some gentle modulation and a few bells and whistles coming in and out can create a surprising sense of movement and emotion.”
Todd’s background plays a significant role in how he perceives music. Before all this, he was touring the world with post-hardcore bands like Glassjaw, opening for acts such as Deftones and Gang of Four. That raw, live energy never left him.
“Punk taught me that energy outranks perfection,” he says. “Playing in bands taught me to treat production like a form of performance. That mindset definitely slowed me down when I first started making dance music, but I’m learning to find the right balance. When I notice the teenager jamming in the garage version of me taking the wheel, I let him. Just with a bit more intention now.”
That mindset has also shaped his DJ sets. He has played at House of Yes, Elsewhere, and Musica in NYC, opened for acts like Le Youth and Gabriel & Dresden, and co-founded the warehouse series Pixelated. Each show shifts his perspective on what to create next.
“Every time I play a show, small or big, it recalibrates my studio perspective,” he says. “Hearing other tracks I admire or my own on a club system really gives a new perspective of what works and what doesn’t. I can watch how they influence the crowd and how they make me feel in real time.”
Pixelated, in particular, left its mark.
“Running Pixelated taught me that genre and aesthetic are almost secondary. Trust is number one,” he says. “If people feel fully supported and free to be themselves, the party becomes something greater than its parts. At its peak it was pure connection. A love fest of artists backing each other without reservation.”
That same spirit runs through his work with SOL Records. This is his third release with the Orange County label, who focus on deep and emotionally driven club music.
“I sent some demos to Brayden, the label owner, and we ended up talking on the phone for a few hours,” he says. “It was immediately clear our values aligned. SOL has a real sense of community and a kind of simplicity to it. Just solid humans wanting to put out solid music.”
His remix for the final Lee “Scratch” Perry release also showed another side of his process.
“I was so intimidated when I started working on it,” he says. “There are so many versions that sounded nothing like where it eventually landed. It turned out better than I ever expected. It’s one of my favourite pieces I’ve ever been a part of. Being involved in that project is still a pinnacle in my musical life.”
As for this EP, it wasn’t built around a concept. It just grew that way.
“I almost never set out with a clear concept,” he says. “Even when I try to, it doesn’t usually work. I try not to overthink, and when I succeed at that, the tracks evolve organically. With these two, I wasn’t even sure they’d belong together. But over time, they started to feel like complementary facets of the same story.”
It’s a story worth sitting with. Or dancing through. However it hits, ‘Remover / At The Heart Level’ is Child Of at his most open, and his most essential.
Child Of