MUTEK Mag

Slow Pitching

info@mutek.org (Cheldon Paterson) — Mon, 13 May 2013 17:31:54 -0000

Toronto based Cheldon Patterson (SlowPitch), was asked about the general affection for slowness in his art. This year, he presents Emoralis, a new AV offering starring snails, during PLAY 4, on Saturday June 1st.

MUTEK.ES Previews: Interview with Raime

info@mutek.org (Beto Vidal) — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 16:57:52 -0000

RAIME will perform on Thursday February 7th for A/Visions 1 at The Station, Estación Francia.

MUTEK.ES Previews: Vessel Interview

info@mutek.org (Carles Novellas) — Mon, 28 Jan 2013 00:24:32 -0000

Considered one of the best albums of 2012 for its new twists and turns in techno, Vessel’s debut full length, “Order of Noise”, will see its Barcelona premiere at the Nitsa Club on Friday February 8th. Pushing the fledgling Tri Angle label’s sound in a new direction, Vessel constantly unnerves the ear with his haunted, bustling productions.

MUTEK.ES Previews: CLIP! Interview

info@mutek.org (Carles Novellas) — Wed, 23 Jan 2013 17:00:00 -0000

Clip! is presented by the Red Bull Music Academy and performs on Saturday February 9th in the Nocturne 3 event held at Nitsa Club.

MUTEK.ES Previews: Interview with Jon Hopkins

info@mutek.org (Chris Mann) — Mon, 21 Jan 2013 15:37:19 -0000

After several months in the studio, English producer and composer Jon Hopkins is just about ready to release his next album on Domino. Jon talks us through the creative process and his recent experiences ahead of his live presentation of the new album at Barcelona's MicroMUTEK Festival in February.

MUTEK.ES Previews: Interview with Deadbeat and Danuel Tate

info@mutek.org (Chris Mann) — Thu, 22 Nov 2012 03:34:57 -0000

Since Deadmau5 confessed back in June that he, and some other electronic artists, just press play on stage, the debate over authenticity and what artists are really doing behind the laptop has become one of the defining themes of the year. Before their show at the Soiree MUTEK in Barcelona, to launch the new Micro MUTEK program, we caught up with two Canadian artists, Deadbeat and Danuel Tate, both of whom have spent the majority of their careers playing live, and who have developed some informed and experienced opinions on the current 'state of play'. Danuel Tate, a keyboardist and vocalist, has dazzled MUTEK audiences in several of their incarnations (Montreal, Mexico, Barcelona) many times, in the context of live performance, as a member of Cobblestone Jazz, but also with his recent solo sets. Scott Monteith, aka Deadbeat, has also continuously challenged the live format, through his own command of software and hardware, but also by working with visual collaborators such as Lillevan, and by constantly updating his set courtesy of the new material derived from his prolific studio output. Danuel and Scott mused on man versus machine, the stigma of devices, the nature of jamming, and being Canadian.

Q: Let’s talk about the show tonight. What are you going to be playing? DJing or playing live?

SM: We’re both going to be playing live, I think?

DT: Yep!

Q: Are you going to play together as you obviously just collaborated on the single “Lazy Jane”?

DT: Maybe at the end.

SM: Yeah, maybe at the end.

Q: How are you going to do it? Is Danuel going to sing and play keyboards?

SM: We’re just going to go for it. Just jam.

Q: How much of your recording is jamming and how much is pre-meditated?

SM: The recorded stuff is all jamming really. A case in point is when Dan was in Berlin last year. I sent him a rhythm, an idea for a tune that became “Lazy Jane.” Two weeks before that I was thinking “Hey, I´ve been hearing you on this. Here it is.” We were like four hours in the studio and it became three mixes.

Q: So what did you hear about Danuel in the track then? The voice particularly. But were you also playing keyboards?

DT: Yes. We had a piano there, and The Mole was there too.

SM: And the organ, what was that? The Farfisa! The Farfisa Compact was on that tune as well.

DT: Didn’t we layer some keyboards?

SM: Not so much of it ended up in the final mix. Those mixes are mostly my beats and Dan’s voice. That’s the bottom line. That’s one of the good things about jamming. You get a whole big mess and then you just start deleting.

DT: Pretty nice for me really! [Laughs] It’s pretty easy!

Q: Scott didn’t you used to play in a band before you started doing electronics?

SM: I used to play bass in a band called Lucidity when I was 16 years old.

Q: So how do you find the jamming on the electronic gear compared to the band?

SM: I’m a terrible musician. I don’t play bass, piano, guitar or drums or anything very well, so electronic gear is fucking great for me because I can actually contribute something of substance that doesn’t involve dexterity.

Q: What about you Danuel, you are obviously very good with the piano. How much jamming are you doing live now?

DT: I think it’s like sharing [the creative experience] with the gear. So it’s like a simulation or whatever, where the line between… you can feel really exposed if you are just playing a piano in a club, but if you are playing a piano that’s gated and this and that it’s… a lot of criticism is out there where people are saying music is going downhill because of these ways that you can use gear to enhance the way you sound and feel. It’s as if you were giving the robot, or whatever you want to call it, the technology, some of the artistry, so it’s more of a sharing between the human and the technology. I think, in my opinion, music is getting better.

SM: I can also say that I think Dan is a great example of a mind blowingly talented musician, like an example of when the human choice aspect of it [music making] is really prevalent. The first time Cobblestone Jazz played MUTEK at Metropolis, Mat [Mathew Jonson] and Tyger Dhula going for it for probably a good 40 minutes or so before Dan touched any keys, you know. And then they played “Dumptruck” and destroyed the place. It was that human notion of wait, wait, wait…waiting for that moment to actually come and be ready: “Ok, this is my time!” and bang! And then going for it. That’s something that not even the smartest robot in the world is going to be able to figure out.

DT: Intuition, right. So we get to think on a higher level a little bit, instead of being right down the bottom playing everything note for note, every chord that goes by in the track. You get to think about it on, not a higher level, but a different level.

This is an edited transcript of the full interview which can be found in audio form at http://www.scannerfm.com/ or via www.facebook.com/Cabezadevacaradio

Nouveau Palais' New Royalty

info@mutek.org (Michael-Oliver Harding) — Mon, 28 May 2012 17:42:08 -0000

We caught up with the three Canadian tastemakers last month for a wide-ranging chat in advance of their North American premiere this week at MUTEK.

Roll the Dice's Cinematic Visions

info@mutek.org (Dimitri Nasrallah) — Fri, 25 May 2012 09:55:26 -0000

In advance of the duo’s MUTEK 2012 performance at Nocturne 4, we caught up with Peder Mannerfelt earlier this year to find out more about Roll the Dice’s working habits and their distinct visions.

Sendai Skips the Beat

info@mutek.org (Michael-Oliver Harding ) — Tue, 15 May 2012 11:33:48 -0000

Yves De Mey and Peter Van Hoesen’s latest record, Geotope, is awash in glitchy ambience and eerie static. MUTEK caught up with two of Belgium’s finest creatures of clicks to discuss the design of their experimentation

Danuel Tate's Solo Hotbox

info@mutek.org (Dimitri Nasrallah) — Mon, 07 May 2012 14:00:16 -0000

A longtime member of West Coast electronic-impov groups Cobblestone Jazz and The Modern Deep Left Quartet, Danuel Tate has played an important (if occasionally overshadowed) role in the evolution of the musical community around the Wagon Repair label. In 2010, after years of collaborating with Mathew Jonson, The Mole and Tyger Dhula, he finally stepped out on his own with his solo debut album, Mexican Hotbox.