sillygirlcarmen on ‘Wait For You’, Detroit Roots and Building Sun & Sound Detroit

Music begins with feeling for Detroit-born DJ, singer and producer sillygirlcarmen. It’s an instinct that runs through her approach to DJing, songwriting and production.

This kind of openness to following an idea wherever it leads rather than deciding in advance exactly where a piece of music belongs is key to her workflow. “I always jump into music based on my initial resonance to the feeling,” she says. “Not everything I make will translate to the settings I most often play but I never feel pigeonholed by that. I am an artist first, if a song moves me, I’m running with it.”

That philosophy sits naturally at the heart of Wait For You, her new collaboration with fellow Detroit artist Ryan Sadorus, which is out now on her own Sun & Sound Detroit label. The track is built around a warm rolling groove, playful bass and Carmen’s vocal, balancing the immediacy of the dancefloor with an emotional undercurrent of longing, patience and connection.

The collaboration unfolded differently from Carmen’s usual creative process. Ryan Sadorus, a Detroit-based DJ and producer whose own musical history encompasses the city’s underground alongside influences gathered while living in Tokyo, arrived with a particularly clear idea of where he wanted the track to go. “Ryan came with a strong leading vision in mind,” Carmen explains. “This was a unique collaboration because I often like to sit with the track and flesh out melodies, but he sent me the track and lyrical content all at once. It resonated right away and was a fun process adding my voice and emotion.” 

The result carries characteristics deeply associated with Detroit dance music while resisting any need to recreate its past. Its connection to the city lies as much in spirit as in sound. “There is defiantly soul and warmth within this record, that I think resonates with the roots of Detroit,” she says. “The innovation comes in when considering the collaboration and the new age approach to a record that feels so carefree and fun.” 

That relationship between history and possibility has accompanied Carmen throughout her development as an artist. Born into Detroit’s dance music culture, she grew up with unusually close access to the people and sounds that helped shape it. Her father, Todd Johnson, was an early DJ and promoter within Detroit dance music culture and a principal behind the Charivari Detroit Music Festival, while figures including Delano Smith, Terrence Parker and Eddie Fowlkes were part of the musical environment surrounding her childhood.

Rather than leaving her feeling constrained by that history, Carmen sees it as encouragement to take creative risks. “Detroit’s pioneers and history influence my courage to try something new and put it into the world every time,” she says. “Simply leaning into who I truly am and being unafraid to give it my all comes from all I have observed of Detroit culture.” 

Carrying that legacy forward, then, is not simply about reproducing a recognisable Detroit sound. It is also about remembering the places, communities and experiences through which an artist develops. “Staying true to my roots, the music that truly moves me, the scene that has supported my growth, the venues and spaces that have allowed me to get stronger at my craft time and time again,” she says. “These stories, these moments will forever be told in my story.” 

Carmen’s creative identity has expanded beyond the DJ booth. Having played from Detroit to New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Montreal and Paris, she has built a reputation around sets that respond instinctively to the people in front of her. At the same time, her work as a singer, songwriter and producer has become an increasingly important means of expression, with releases connected to labels including Nervous Records, Popgang Records and Soul Clap Records alongside her own Sun & Sound Detroit.

Asked which part of her creative life feels most fulfilling, she finds herself moving between two worlds. “I bounce back and forth between DJing and singing being the most fulfilling,” she says. “Songwriting and singing, really allows me to stay grounded in my spirits itch to create and express, while DJing allows me to connect in the world and share my wide taste in music.” 

In an era when technology is rapidly changing how electronic music can be made, Carmen also sees something fundamentally human at the centre of her work. “I think the main thing that will always be the common thread in my work, is the fact that I’m using my voice,” she says. “That is a part of me, literally, that cannot be replicated.”

Her creative process reflects that same emphasis on instinct rather than formula. “When I’m working on new music ideas, that thread of inspiration is coming from something beyond me,” she explains. “It surely is spontaneous and spiritual. Whatever I am feeling or trying to inspire in the world comes through.” Yet creation does not always need a destination or grand plan. “But most often, the process is simply cathartic,” she continues. “I crave the opportunity to sing new melodies and play with new ideas.” 

For an artist whose philosophy as a DJ has long centred the audience rather than the person behind the decks, releasing original music creates another dimension to that relationship. Carmen sees recorded music as a way for the connection established in a club to continue long after the night itself has ended. “Definitely, people connect with you differently when you are also an artist,” she says. “They get to revisit your work or essence through your music while away from the dancefloor.”

That continuing exchange matters to her. “I like hearing feedback from people and see what parts of my artistry resonate with them most,” she adds. “It feels like an extended conversation knowing people can listen to your music over and over again.” 

One of Carmen’s first opportunities to experience that relationship with Wait For You happened almost by accident and before she had even begun regularly playing the track herself. “My Collaborator, Ryan Sadorus, played the record out long before I had added it into my rotation,” she recalls. “That is when I first got to witness the magic.”

The moment could hardly have been better timed. “The funny thing about that moment was I had just walked into the nightclub while Ryan Sadorus was in the middle of a DJ set. He had no clue I had just arrived, and as I’m walking to the bathroom, I hear the song.” The coincidence carried its own significance, “synchronistic moments like that really tickle me,” she says. “I love how the universe works.” 

Wait For You also represents another chapter in Carmen’s development as a label head. Starting Sun & Sound Detroit was not, she admits, something she had mapped out as an inevitable career move. “That was the last thing I had on my mind, honestly,” she says. “But I’m so happy I did. I’m learning so much from a business perspective and feeling a new type of empowerment as an independent artist.” 

That independence is now opening possibilities beyond her own releases. Rather than viewing the label purely as a vehicle for her individual work, Carmen is thinking about how it can expand into a broader creative network. “The potential!” she says when considering what excites her about its future. “I have so many ideas I would love to bloom under the Sun & Sound Detroit label. I am constantly plotting and planning on fun ways to make the next move,” she continues. “I am very hopeful and eager to see how many artists we will have the pleasure to have releases with in the future. Making a wider net with other creatives is a huge goal.” 

That desire to collaborate also offers perhaps the clearest indication of where sillygirlcarmen might head next. Rather than treating Wait For You as a definitive statement of a fixed sound, she sees it as one point within something deliberately open-ended. “I’d say one piece of a bigger musical direction I’m building,” she says. “I feel limitless in my interest to create. I think my sound will be forever expanding.”

Collaboration is central to that expansion, not as a way of losing her own identity, but as an opportunity to discover how that identity changes in different musical environments. “I really love collaborations, because with each new artist I work with, I get to envision myself in a sonic world from a different perspective but still find my own root.” 

It is an idea that connects many of the threads running through Carmen’s story: a deep awareness of where she comes from without being confined by it; a relationship with the dancefloor built around communication rather than ego; and an appetite for collaboration, experimentation and continual creative expansion.

With Wait For You, those threads meet in a record rooted in Detroit but looking outward, a collaboration built around groove, voice and feeling. And for Carmen, there is no suggestion that the process of defining her sound needs to arrive at a final destination. “I feel limitless in my interest to create,” she says. “I think my sound will be forever expanding.”

Ryan Sadorus & sillygirlcarmen - Wait For You is out now on Sun & Sound Detroit. Grab it on Beatport HERE.

Read the full interview with sillygirlcarmen on The Night Bazaar website HERE.