An Odd Fit The Haxan Cloak

Yes, loads.

As far as I am aware, quite well. I haven’t heard any negative feedback, which is more than I could have hoped for, especially with an album like Excavation. I don’t think it’s the easiest music to digest. It’s not terribly accessible and it’s not comprised of a familiar or comforting sound palette. I don’t think it’s music that comforts, necessarily, so I’m surprised by the fact that people are willing to engage with it. It is, however, also very, very encouraging and very humbling.

It’s funny—I was discussing that the other day with some other musicians. We were talking about playing live. Because I have been playing so much, I still am tweaking the performance and making it bigger and better. Although I reproduce songs from the record, the performance results in a kind of amplified version of the original; it is the most intense version of the music possible. Sometimes when I go back and listen to the record, I’m like, “Oh, this sounds really quiet.”

Sometimes the prospect of playing a show is laborious, but the minute I get on stage there is this exchange between the crowd and myself. When I am actually performing, it never gets boring. I have probably done this show over a hundred times. It’s not boring—every night is different.

It was good. It is so funny how things just come full circle: something like eight years ago I was writing my dissertation at university and one of the main things I wrote about was The Disintegration Loops by William Basinski. And then to be playing a show with him years later is just incredible. If someone had told me eight years ago that I would play at Berghain with William, I wouldn’t have believed it. It was a really good show. William’s performance was great. It was kind of two extremes: I was maxing out all frequencies and was really loud. Then he came on and made everyone sit down. He did this really quiet, really personal performance. It was brave. Really bold…

I just did a UK tour with Fuck Buttons, which was really good. Ben, who plays in the band, is one of my best friends. It was a really nice tour to do. They obviously attract very big audiences. Maybe only ten per cent of those people knew who I was, so most of them hadn’t come to see me. However, it was the kind of audience that understands what I do. They were very receptive to my music. People came up afterwards and said, “I’d never heard about you but I am going to get your record.” It was a good opportunity. And it’s good to see your friends play every night.

Sure.

I saw Endon, the guys that are playing now, in the sound check. They were fucking brutal—really brutal. Unfortunately I didn’t really get to see any of the bands that played before me. But I’m really looking forward to seeing Emptyset. I know them as people and I know their music but I have never actually seen them play, aside from in the sound check earlier as well—and I thought I was loud! They have this intense bass level, man. I love their music. And it is nice to see proper live electronic music—they are actually doing stuff.

So everybody was putting bags on their heads?

There are a few reasons why I am into the fog and the strobe. With live performance, especially when you are in the mode of doing it so often, you constantly play in different places. Yet it is always the same thing that you are doing, no matter where you are in the world. It becomes this weird kind of ritual, almost. In the ten minutes before the performance you get yourself into the right mindset. Then you go on stage and you get all those feelings—feelings you only get at this particular point in time. You can’t really get them in any other way. The fog and the lights, etcetera, echo this ritualistic thing that I am going through as a performer. Further, I am very aware that from an observer’s point of view it’s not a very visually engaging show. At the end of the day, Excavation is an electronic record. To perform that, there’s nothing I can do aside from moving my arms wildly, but you know… In using smoke and strobe I was seeking to create an aesthetic extension of the sound without using classic visuals, cause I don’t like that.

That is ok. I don’t mind if people leave the room. I was even speaking to James from Emptyset after my show. He said it was too much for him. He had to leave.

The first time he saw me in Austria a couple of months ago he had to leave too. And that is fine. The only reactions I wouldn’t want the show to cause are boredom or apathy. If somebody really hates it, like venomously hates it, at least they’ve had a reaction, rather than just being like, “Well, you know…”

[Points to his head] It’s in here. At the moment it is fairly abstract. It is definitely not going to be similar to the last record. I am thinking of including more live instruments—more of an ensemble approach.

Yeah… but at the same time, not really. It will be more intense than the first album. I am thinking about lots of live drums. It would be more of a traditional band sound, I guess. At some point it would be nice to have a band around me—it really depends on how the next record goes. One thing I know, though, is that I wouldn’t like to take existing songs and include other people in the live versions. I think that as a listener, when you hear a piece of music knowing that it is crafted by one person you can kind of imagine how intense the personal involvement is. Sometimes if you see the same music performed by more people than just the one who wrote it, the music loses a kind of… Well, it can’t be romanticised anymore. The purpose, the concept, the feeling are all diluted. I mean, how can you expect another performer to understand something that you can’t even articulate? In general, though, I am definitely interested in collaborating with other people. You know, for the next record there are people in mind that I’d like to get to contribute.

No, not at the moment. We are all very good friends, though. And, for example, Josh [Leary, a.k.a. Evian Christ] sometimes samples bits of my songs to make tracks that he then sends to me. He does that just for fun—it’s nothing official. Tri Angle is like a little family—it is really cool. We all keep in touch. Weekly. I just spent two weeks in America with Josh and Robin [Carolan, founder of Tri Angle].

Just hanging out… I was in New York doing a record and then I was in Los Angeles for some meetings and stuff, and Josh was there as well. Off the back, cause he did that Kanye [West] stuff.

Actually, I am producing Wife’s new record. Compared to my stuff, Wife is definitely poppier. And then the record I did in New York was with this band called The Body. It’s a two-piece sludge metal band. That album will be coming out on RVNG.

Yeah, it is kind of an odd fit. But it’s cool for them to be releasing that. “Pop”—Jesus, man, I mean what does “pop” even mean these days? You know, when I say “pop,” I don’t think of Kylie Minogue. In reference to what I do there are many things that could be deemed “pop.” I just mean that I am interested in taking my aesthetics and applying them to other projects and seeing how that works out.

Yeah—I enjoyed that. I’d liked that record to begin with, and then they just got in touch. And I was like, “Right…” [Smiles mischievously]

Yes.

James [who does Wife] and I are friends. The record had been partly produced by Roly Porter. When the label got it back I guess they felt it needed something extra to help it sound a bit more visceral and intense. We’ve spent the last few months just going through the album. So in this context I had more of a kind of executive producer role…

It is. Hopefully there will be a single released before Christmas. And the album should be out in March or so.

Some more shows, and then the other guys on Tri Angle and I will be going on a Christmas holiday together. We got a cottage in Wales. It’ll be a countryside retreat.

Yeah, should be good.