Stafford Brothers successfully mix party time with hard work
Matt Stafford and I were talking about how pretty the women are at Light nightclub in Mandalay Bay. We weren’t being pigs about it.
“The girls are amazing in Vegas,” he says. “Where do they get them?”
“From a machine,” I say.
“I like that machine.”
Stafford and his brother Chris are the Australian DJ duo the Stafford Brothers, who perform Friday at Light nightclub in Mandalay Bay.
They are the creators of this year’s hit song “Hello,” featuring Lil Wayne and Christina Milian.
At Light, where they have a residency, they are known as fun, easygoing party guys, yet successful and hardworking.
That’s the reputation that also follows their fellow Australians in their field, the Nervo twins and Tommy Trash.
When I tell Stafford what their reputation is, he says it’s an Aussie thing to be “pretty relaxed.”
“We’re definitely not demanding. As long as our drinks are right, we’re happy,” he says.
“One thing about Australia is, there’s no point in having an ego, because everyone will shut you down and give you a hard time. So you just chill. And you’re having so much fun it’s, like, ‘Why worry?’ ”
The brothers moved to Los Angeles a year and a half ago to get closer to the U.S. music industry in an effort to break bigger. The move worked.
“I do love America,” he says. “It’s a blast.
“Everything’s fresh and new. That makes everything exciting. We’re meeting a lot of good people who are helpful and supportive.”
People at Light are certainly supportive.
“I don’t know if you heard about my birthday party, mate. It was a couple of weeks ago, and they put out this massive cake and bottles of Champagne when we were DJing.
“That night, they took us to dinner. And we had a private room. They brought in this ‘fatagram’ stripper.
“Check out my Facebook or Instagram. You’ll see this huge chick. She handcuffed me and said, ‘You aren’t going anywhere.’ It was hilarious.”
The brothers dig Light so much, they took their parents there.
“Our parents are real supportive,” he says. “That’s who we got the partying from.
“I was just back in Australia, and we stayed at their house for a couple of days, and my dad constantly had mates over, and they were playing guitars and they were singing.
“He’s retired now so I guess he can do that. But they’re nonstop. It’s hilarious. I was trying to work. I had to go to a different end of the house to get away from them.”
He laughs.
“That’s where our music came from, too. Our Christmas days are, like, Dad, Grandpa, uncles — playing guitars and ukuleles and singing. Music has just gone along with the partying and drinking beers. It’s been like that my whole life.”
But his parents did work hard before retirement, he says.
“They partied on the weekends. They worked during the week.”
Likewise, the Stafford Brothers have a real work ethic when they record music (their new song is “Wicked Child”), and while they run businesses on the side (clothing, club and software).
“We’re constantly working on all these different things. I like having fingers in pies, mate. But at the end of the day, the main thing’s the music.”
Doug Elfman’s column appears on Page 3A in the main section on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. He also writes for Neon on Fridays. Email him at delfman@reviewjournal.com. He blogs at reviewjournal.com/elfman.
