Sound Advice: LB aka LABAT

Join LB aka LABAT on Sound Advice, the weekly interview series covering artists’ journeys and their creative process. In this episode, we discuss the French DJ/producer’s debut album ‘Feel So Good Around U,’ rap-infused club sound, studio tips and more.

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Welcome to Sound Advice, the series spotlighting artists’ creative process and their SoundCloud journey. We’ll get the inside knowledge straight from the source on how musicians, producers and creatives are leaning into everything SoundCloud offers to elevate their sound, get heard and catapult their careers. Sound Advice is now available in audio format on the SoundCloud Stories profile.

On this episode of Sound Advice, we speak to French DJ/producer Baptistin Cabalou, better known as LB aka LABAT. You may have caught him perform at festivals around the world, like at Awakenings, Beyond The Valley or ADE. Or you may have seen him palling around with friends and collaborators like Mall Grab, Skin On Skin and Partiboi69 — who, coincidentally, are all Australians. 

Growing up, LABAT was raised between India and France. He currently lives in Paris, although he doesn’t spend much time there. True to his name LABAT (French for “the bat”), he is usually flying around the globe playing DJ gigs. He grew up making music on an MPC2000 and listening to underground American house and techno, but a couple of years ago, he leaned more into the idea of combining rap swagger and aesthetics with harder house and trance club beats. Since joining SoundCloud in 2011, he’s uploaded hundreds of tracks to the platform: with pumping club cuts on his Poumpet Records label, he caught the attention of Because Music, who signed his forthcoming debut album, ‘Feel So Good Around U,’ which drops in full on February 27. 

We sat down with LB at the Because Music offices in LA to talk about the making of the new record, what inspired the songs and the production tricks he learned. He also shared what it was like transitioning from bedroom production to collaborating with other producers and vocalists in professional studios. LABAT emphasises the importance of not chasing trends, having fun and learning from others. He also shares how SoundCloud has helped him build an audience and prepare for his DJ sets, as well as reveals his favorite plug-ins to help your club tracks bang. 

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LISTEN TO THE AUDIO EPISODE OF SOUND ADVICE FEATURING LB AKA LABAT

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LISTEN TO ‘FEEL SO GOOD AROUND U’ BY LB AKA LABAT ON SOUNDCLOUD

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Things We Talked About In This Episode of Sound Advice

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LB aka LABAT’s Rich Techno Upbringing and His Advice on Connecting With Artists

• We begin the conversation with LB aka LABAT’s history on SoundCloud. As he tells it, the platform “has been there since day one” of his music career,” and is his “number one platform for digging for music.” 
• The French DJ/producer, based in Paris, spends much of his time on the road and searching for potential collaborators. He explains how, on SoundCloud, he sources new music from the demos that fellow producers send him through direct messages. “It’s the best community platform,” he says. After almost 15 years on SoundCloud, he finds the platform integral to his DJing, production and enjoyment of music. 
• LB aka LABAT seemed almost destined to be involved in the electronic music scene. As a child, he watched his eldest brother play vinyl records on a set of turntables, and got involved himself as soon as he could. By the time he was a young teenager, he was gifted those records and turntables, and started on his journey into turntablism and dance music culture. 
• Looking back on his youth in Strasbourg, he remembers the first dance record he ever bought: Josh Wink’s “Higher State of Consciousness,” the 1990s acid house crossover hit that introduced millions to the dancefloor. Here, LB aka LABAT admits that a high bar was set: as he explored dance music further, including cross-border trips to go raving in Germany, he discovered some of his enduring favorites: techno icons like Richie Hawtin, with his Minus and Plus 8 record labels; as well as Detroit legends like Theo Parrish, Moodymann, 3 Chairs, Marcellus Pittman and Rick Wilhite. 
• Going further, LB aka LABAT details how the sample-rich sounds of classic American house and techno allowed him to dig; through sourcing these myriad samples, he discovered soul, funk, jazz, psych rock and R&B records, opening up a world of musical possibilities. Those techno roots have grown branches over the years: LB aka LABAT has gone on to forge friendships and collaborate with contemporary artists such as Mall Grab, Skin On Skin and Partiboi69; all of them walk their own paths in dance music, but it’s all rooted in a love of powerful, sample-rich dancefloor bangers. 

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LABAT’s Tips on Transitioning From Bedroom Producer to Studio Collaborator 

• LB aka LABAT has spent years making incremental, positive changes to his career in dance music. Here, he reflects on the steps he took to make those changes, and how he elevated himself from being a bedroom producer and working on an MPC with samples to today creating in a studio, with live collaborators and vocalists. 
• One of the key factors, he says, is to try and meet fellow artists in person as much as possible. In a world with seemingly endless opportunities to connect digitally, it’s important to make those personal connections and make a memorable, genuine impression on others. 
• And even if you have some language barriers — LB aka LABAT knows this firsthand, as a Frenchman who has English as a second language — it’s still important to do this; connecting through shared musical experiences and ideas is the key, not perfect language skills. Here, he highlights the collaborators and friends who have shone through in those moments, like dance DJ/producer Mall Grab.

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LABAT on How Releasing Music on SoundCloud Helped Build Confidence, Catalog and Collaborator Links

• Growing up with the world of vinyl records, LB aka LABAT loved the ability to share dance music in a dedicated format. As he started making music, and grew older, he says, he often found himself wanting to be able to release more music, faster; to engage with his fans more directly, and not rely entirely on third-party means to bring vinyl into the market. This spurred LB aka LABAT to start his own label, Poumpet Records, which “released a single a month, for a year,” in order to keep the momentum up in his catalog. 
• Through keeping up this momentum, his music got more attention — or as he describes it, “feeding the system with music, so that cool things can happen.” If you’re an artist on SoundCloud and want to press your own vinyl, on demand, then check out our All In One subscription, which includes the ability to press your own vinyl through SoundCloud. 
• As he got more listeners on SoundCloud, he found that his interactions on the platform also gained momentum; where the specificity of the rap-infused club sound that he was uploading allowed likeminded artists to discover him and send their own music to him, creating a positive feedback loop of music-sharing. Here, he reflects on the benefits of this loop and how he finds it freeing as an artist.

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The Creation of LABAT’s Debut Album, ‘Feel So Good Around U,’ and What Inspired Him To Make It 

• In November 2025, LB aka LABAT began teasing his debut album, ‘Feel So Good Around U,’ on French electronic label Because Music. Here, he gets into detail about how the album is proof of his transition from bedroom producer to studio collaborator, as he elevated his sound from being purely sample-based to working with other producers and live vocalists. One of those collaborators is Skin On Skin, an Australian DJ/producer who matches his “drill-techno-dance” sonics and feels like a natural fit with the album. Here, he discusses the energy in the studio, when he and Skin On Skin linked up in Paris to make album tracks. 
• As part of this transition, LB aka LABAT has learned a lot — so what advice would he give fellow producers, who want to go on the same journey? “I want to be the dumbest person in the studio,” he says, with a degree of French wit; that he aims to surround himself with clever, talented people, and absorb their ideas and techniques as they work. By learning through being in the same room as people, you can take on skills and ways of thinking that you otherwise wouldn’t have been exposed to. 
• Alongside that in-person feedback, he took note of the various plug-ins and techniques that others used, and brought those plug-ins into his solo work, at home. Here, he runs through the names and useful elements of various plug-ins — so if you’re a producer, too, listen up and take note, too.
• When he was conceptualizing, writing and producing ‘Feel So Good Around U,’ LB aka LABAT listened to a lot of albums that crossed between his love of rap and club music. Here, he talks about how Playboi Carti’s ‘I AM MUSIC’ in particular speaks to him, and how it made him realize that, in order to make an album, you don’t necessarily have to widen your sonic scope to appeal to as many people as possible. Sometimes, he says it’s better to be “nasty controlled,” and focus on creating a great album designed for dancefloor impact. 
• With his debut album set for release on February 27, 2026, LB aka LABAT also shares some advice to fellow artists, who may want to embark on the journey of making an album for the first time as well, but might be struggling with the first steps to take. “Don’t follow trends,” he insists, “because you don’t have to do what’s hot” at any given moment. 
• By surrounding yourself with better people, keeping your eyes and ears open to new ideas, listening to your intuition and trusting what feels good to you, you’ll create the album you’ve always wanted to create. He’s taking that advice on himself, too — he’s already making his second album, so keep your ears locked on LB aka LABAT’s next moves. 

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Links and Extras

Follow LB aka LABAT’s journey on SoundCloud.
Press play on LB aka LABAT’s 2026 debut album, ‘Feel So Good Around U.’ 
Follow Because Music on SoundCloud. 
Check out the title track of LB aka LABAT’s debut album, a collaboration with Skin On Skin.
Listen to “Double Happiness,” LB aka LABAT’s recent single. You can learn more about the making of the track on his episode of Voice Notes. 
Tap in with Mall Grab, an artist LB aka LABAT first met through SoundCloud.
Explore some of LB aka LABAT’s wide-ranging influences, including Richie Hawtin, Partiboi69 and Moodymann, to name a few.  
Listen to the Club Party Bangers playlist on SoundCloud.
Never miss an episode and follow the official Sound Advice playlist on SoundCloud.

Getting The Most Out of SoundCloud

Learn more about using DMs to connect with fellow artists and potential collaborators.
Learn more about how to make a custom playlist on SoundCloud.
Learn more about unlimited uploads, available with an Artist Pro subscription.
Learn more unlocking access to unlimited distribution, available with Artist Pro.
Learn more about getting heard with SoundCloud’s updated algorithm, available to Artist and Artist Pro subscribers.

To discover additional features a SoundCloud Artist or Artist Pro subscription offers, visit here. To catch up on past installments of Sound Advice and make sure you don’t miss out on future episodes, visit here.

_{CREDITS Host: Vivian Host, Executive Producer: Mike Spinella, Producer: KC Orcutt, Audio Engineer: David “DibS” Shackney, Coordinator: Trevor McGee, Editorial Associate: Lauren Martin}