Sonic Seducer - Musik Magazin Interview

Before talking about Rapoon please tell about how you came in contact with experimental music and why you chose to leave :zoviet*france: in the 90s.

I first got interested in recording sounds and manipulating them when I swapped some records for an old quarter track reel to reel tape recorder. I was about 14 or 15 years old and someone I knew had this big old suitcase sized tape recorder that weighed a ton and he also had fifty or so reels of quarter inch tape. He mentioned he was going to sell it so I offered him a swap and I got to carry this thing home.

You were supposed to record four tracks of mono (records were mostly mono in those days!) and get four times the amount of time from one tape. Everything about the machine was oversized and the huge knob that switched between tracks was really cumbersome. I discovered pretty quickly that if you held it between track positions it played back two tracks. Another friend who was into electronics made a new switch for me that allowed me to record on one track and play back all the others. This machine had a built in amp and speakers (also a built in microphone, although the mic didn't work at the time). So it was my first all in one four track studio. From this I got interested in taking sounds and changing them, cutting them up, re-recording, all the usual stuff. Somewhere about this time I first heard the German experimental bands like Can, and especially Faust, who influenced early work. I took all this with me to art college and eventually pursued music more seriously, studying electronic and experimental composition and occasionally performing Stockhausen pieces with other artists/musicians.

After art college I continued working, mostly on my own, until I met up with a couple of other musicians who were the remnants of a punk band who didn't want to do punk music anymore but who had a one record deal left over from the break-up, with no band and no direction.

We got together and things clicked and :z*f: was born. (Originally :z*f: were playing guitars, drums and synths.) The first album untitled was completely improvised in the studio, six hours I think, with the clock ticking.... I think the best you can say about it is that it was full of enthusiasm and had a sense of humour.

As to leaving :z*f: in the 90s, this wasn't exactly a case of choosing to leave. It was with great reluctance that I finally decided I couldn't stay anymore. I have seen it said that I left in order to further my own ambitions, but that just isn't true. I put 12 years of my life into :z*f: and always considered it to be a lifelong project. Leaving was a bit like a divorce - putting things behind you and starting again. I still feel pain when I think about it but I don't regret leaving.

How strong is the connection between your visual art and you music? Do you see you music and visual art as equivalents of each other?

Yes I think there is a strong connection between the two disciplines but they are not exact equivalents of each other although there are many similarities in approach and execution. The reason I say they are not exact equivalents is because I think music and painting occupy different sets of attention and mindset. Also they physically exist in different dimensions. Music MUST travel in time. A painting unfolds in a different way, an initial response, and then, if it's any good, rediscovery over time.

I think maybe my music has more to do with art, painting, than it has to do with contemporary music in the sense that it is about juxtaposition of elements regardless of what the elements are. I just use whatever interests me at the time. In my visual art I am just as interested in landscape and life drawing as I am in abstract painting. It has taken me a long time to begin to feel that each discipline has an equal importance to me. Art was my first love but somewhere along the line music became the main activity - lately art has become more and more important to me. I feel better for the shifts in importance because I think each discipline has become stronger through the other.

To go back, for a moment, to why I left :z*f:: one reason was, quite simply, that I wasn't enjoying it anymore.

One of my favorite Rapoon releases is Tin Of Drum which cover artwork is related to Drum tobacco. Do you ever get any response from the tobacco company?

I'm glad you liked this one, it was a bit of a departure in a way. I never got any response from the tobacco company but figured that using their product was legitimate anyway. After all, Jasper Johns used Guinness cans and David Hockney painted packets of tea, and of course Warhol used many fine products as images to transform.

Drum used to be my favourite tobacco - I gave up smoking a little over a year ago.

I think you use a Coil sample in Beneath the Sky - do you ever get any feedback from Coil because of the use of this sample?

Other people said this. Actually I never knew what they meant, then someone sent me a copy of the track. How it got there was that I used a cassette tape someone sent me of a DJ demo, it had some cheesy dancey kind of stuff on it, I cut up a couple of beats and reconstructed them into something else. The Coil voice must have been in among them, although I did contact this person who told me that all the material was off sample CDs.

What about live events?

Live events are very difficult at the moment. I have two children to look after - my wife has the job that pays the mortgage. We had a second child just over a year ago (hence the quitting smoking) so I spend all day chasing after a baby that's just about to become a toddler. My other child, Jacob, is seven now and I take him to school and pick him up. We walk, we don't have a car. My days are full and it's hard to get away, but just occasionally I do. I'm off to Barcelona next month which will be great. I haven't been there before.

The latest release was the 3CD set by Soleilmoon. What can you tell about this release and the concept behind it? Do you like to collaborate with other musicians.

I've known Nigel and Randy for a long time and this whole project just came about by chance really. Someone wrote a letter to me and a letter to Nigel saying, why don't you do a project together? Next time we spoke to one another, we mentioned the idea and though, yeah, why not? Coincidentally, Randy contacted me, we've been friends for years, and said How about working together on something?

Both projects were going along independently for a while, then I mentioned them to Charles at Soleilmoon. It was his idea to get Randy and Nigel together to complete a triptych. It just made a lot of sense and also gave the project a different focus. This was the first time I had worked with other people in ages, and it was good to have different ideas and input. I also enjoyed doing it, mainly I think because Nigel and Randy are friends and it was good to share ideas and give music to each other. It was also very much a case of treating each other as equals and with respect - a recent experience reminded me that not everyone is capable of doing this, which is another reason I'm not so bothered about playing live.

Do you think that there will be a collaboration between :zoviet*france: and Rapoon someday?

I really wouldn't know. I doubt it but anything is possible.

What we can expect from Rapoon in the future?

I have just completed an album which will come with an edition of large postcards of recent artwork. The whole thing, CD and postcards, will be in a custom made folder. The project is called Navigating by Colour, and will be released through Soleilmoon/Staalplaat. After that I am currently working on a new album which includes dialogue about the existence of aliens, it should be ready by early summer and is called What do you suppose....? (The alien question!)

After that I have got several albums worth of material already recorded and waiting for mixing, editing, manipulation on a recent purchase of a PC based system. I am also currently working on finishing a loop library CD ROM for Sonic Foundry to go with their software programme Acid.

So all in all I am pretty busy!

interview by Sascha Bertoncin

Sonic Seducer - Musik Magazin

P.O. Box 10 14 65

46014 Oberhausen

Germany

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