Dave, how did you
start playing electronic music, and who influenced you
during your formative years?
Formative years, which ones? My first experiment in
creating music was when I was about nine years old.
My best friend at the time was given a double deck tape
player for Christmas, so I naturally spent hours around
his house recording commercial radio stations. Afterwards
I began recording smaller segments of music and then
randomly over dubbing the tape. The idea was to hear
musical excerpts stop and quickly montage into another
record. Following on from that I began to shorten the
overdubs to the point where the music became responsible
for itself. At the time I wasn’t conscious of
creating a cut/up but was more concerned with goofing
off.
I continued to work on a few cassette experiments and
once I had my own tape machine I started to build cut/ups
more selectively with material from my own tape collection.
By this point I still wasn’t aware of committing
to any musical experiments as such, but was more interested
in drug induced perceptions, exploring possibilities
of uncovering hidden depths that may be found in music,
whilst under the influence.
After reading several articles about subliminal messages
in music I then began to reverse tapes to see if one
could really hear satanic messages contained there in.
Queen’s Another One Bites The Dust does
vaguely say ‘it’s fun to smoke marijuana’
and Led Zeppelins Stairway To Heaven does vaguely
spit out something about Satan. However I remember Judas
Priest reiterating in court that one could also hear
positive messages like ‘time to have a cup of
tea’. This eventually was proved in front of a
jury and ultimately led to the cases being dismissal.
As for influences I pretty much digest whatever comes
my way. Living in Malaysia during my teens I naturally
became accustomed to death metal because at the time
this was one of a few subversive genres of music that
had strong distribution. Also Malaysia has a healthy
death metal scene; so I eventually got to know other
band members via spending every other week at these
jam studios. You’d have your hour booked in advance
and would often have to wait for other bands to finish
their session. Eventually you got to meet musicians,
many of which were involved in death metal. I secretly
hoped for a good death metal band to be in the studios
before us, that way I could use their amp/effects settings
and be inspired by there sound and learn their production.
I also realised that you could do everything yourself,
you could record a demo and have an underground subculture
who would support it and not have to worry about the
commercial industry as such. The other genre that has
shaped me would be hip-hop. I think almost everything
I’ve done could be attributed to this music.
You became known as part of a ‘post-rock’
band, Gwei-Lo, with who you’ve released one album.
You played electronics in the band. Did you want to
work on your own music then? What made you start Ascoltare?
Gwei-lo disbanded due to the unfortunate untimely death
of our dear friend and guitarist Alex Brooker. At the
time I had already been working on some Atari based
electronica and released one record called My Hearts
Diskontent under my Mouse Finding The Key alias.
The record was badly managed so I basically thought
fuck it, I’ll have a go at running my own label.
Ascoltare came about because I wanted to start a fresh
and learn different equipment, styles and approaches.
You are one of the founding members of Tripel
and Dubbel Records, the two others being UM and Andrew
Coleman, and the label is currently only used as a platform
for you three to release music. Are you planning to
open up to other acts in the future?
To answer your question probably not but I guess this
all depends on money. At the moment were severely lacking
in funds and the label is still very music underground,
so priorities lie with looking after our current roster.
Your first album, Visceral Vendor,
was a rather complex and beautiful piece of work, which
combined glitch, acoustic instrumentation and orchestral
moments. What was inspiration behind it?
I’m not particularly sure. The only thing I remember
was being into creating 3-4 minute sketches, and so
the majority of that stuff was designed to sound quick.
The album also seemed quite eclectic in the
way it sounds. Was it conceived over a long period of
time? How did you work on it?
Visceral Vendor was my first experience of
using software, so I worked obsessively on music for
about a year, whilst learning various audio packages.
Eventually I had about thirty tracks to choose from
and compiled roughly fifteen drafts of the album before
settling on something I was vaguely happy with.
The album opens with a snippet of a recording
of John Peel introducing your work as ‘textural
melodic electronica’. What was it like to have
your music played on his show, and did you ever get
the chance to meet him?
Embarrassingly I don’t think I was ever played
on the John Peel show, the sample was taken from Sir
Peel advertising a gig I had coming up.
You have also released a series of EPs, all
coming in rather unusual packaging. These EPs are very
different from each other, and never seem to bear any
resemblance to previous work. Is it a deliberate way
for you to work?
I do my best to listen to many different kinds of music
and the repercussions of this is music gets embedded
in my soul like those magical stones the Goodiepal talks
about, perhaps it’s some kind of sonic stigmata.
It’s definitely not a conscious conceptual decision
to be different with each release, just my love for
many aspects of music, which seep out eventually.
Is the packaging of your releases something
important to you?
I’ll be styling to the bitter end, so packaging
will always be important. In fact just the other day
Strange Lights record boss complimented me by calling
me boutique boy, which is kind of ironic when you consider
how flashy his records look.
Your most recent EP came in two parts, one
published as a seven inch single on Strange Lights,
and the other as an exclusive digital download. How
did the project come up, and why did you choose to release
these tracks as two different supports?
Inspired by v/vm and the amount of quality music they
give away free I felt I should give away some music
and not just shoddy leftovers. I still think Futures
Market is one of the best things I’ve produced.
Download now! http://www.tripelrecords.com/releases/ascoltare-giving.php
What is your view on digital download in general
(free or paid for), and do you think that illegal file
sharing damages artists, or does it encourage people
to be more adventurous with what they listen to, and
eventually with what they buy?
I think it’s cool that people can download any
form of music with a click of a button, in the same
way that it’s liberating to go to a library, borrow
a book then read up on a subject, which we may have
not otherwise been familiar with. The problem is the
responsibility lies with the consumer, how much should
one take? I personally don’t like MP3s so I’m
always going to be out looking for the vinyl and failing
that CDs. However I’m from another generation
and at some point, if not already music will be viewed
as a free commodity and this will be of course damaging
to artists. If you like it and it’s widely available
then you should buy it!
Your latest release is a split album with UM,
which is currently only made available as a vinyl twelve
inch picture disc. What made you decide to work on a
split album, and why such a limited release?
UM’s songs are short and picture disks are expensive,
so we naturally made use of this format. With regards
to the limited availability, all of our records are
released in small numbers as were still relatively unknown.
Hopefully this will improve as years go by.
Due to the nature of the project, did you have
to alter the way you work in any way?
Not particularly but I wanted to do something very special
as both UM and the Goodiepal were involved. I’m
a massive fan of their work.
Where did the idea of using samples take from
various cookery programs, from Fatty Parts For A
Good Match, come from?
I suppose such ideas may have been drawn from listening
to Luc Ferrari and also Dominique Petigand’s record
on Metamkine. Trying to create a British related musique
concrete record but at the same time wanting to sample
French people. Rick at the French fish market was an
ideal source for the beginnings of this project, which
eventually spiralled into some form of deep routed hauntological
fascination for culinary language and cooking programs.
http://www.grapheine.com/bombaytv/playuk.php?id=568777
Will this split LP be followed by other similar
projects, and if yes, can you tell us about what form
these could take?
The only thing I’ve got planned is another new
full-length album, which I plan to release sometime
this year. It’s a record based around my own creative
neuroses and will contain a variety of different styles
of music ranging from breakcore to early electronic
sounding pastiche, primitive / minimal looping, noise
music, lucid sounding ambience juxtaposed alongside
covert field recordings, film and television samples.
I’m quite excited about it, but I shall probably
hate it by the end of the week. LOL
You sometimes take to the stage. How does Ascoltare
live compare to Ascoltare on records?
I try to come up with different combinations of material,
mixed together to create new collages and usually try
to create a show according to the kind of venue and
night that I’ve been booked to play. In some instances
my live sets can end up being the next record. For example
the Gallery release was a live mix I did for
a support show with DJ Rupture. I compiled some of my
boot material to create a different mixes. Also with
the live experience you get to see a nervous, shy, and
livid bloke (nothing new then) behind a computer.
What’s next in your diary?
Learning to play my Hiller pump organ.
Email interview January 2006
Thank you to Dave. |
