Hi all!
Hard to find the words to say how much I love those parties - community’s so important and it’s lovely to be a part of such a lovely world of musical friends - big thanks for coming and being a part of it too :)
Was so nice to listen to the album again in its entirety, James is a composer in the truest sense of the word and absorbing it in one sitting really is the best way to enjoy the music - especially when we can do it together.
Digital still half-price and some CDs still left.
James was kind enough to answer some questions, a fascinating insight into his background and creative process - enjoy!
Please tell us a bit about your background and history in music
I started bass guitar aged eleven in 1990, then Eko XII, piano, drums, synths, whatever I could lay my hands on, all self-taught. I’d stay up at night listening to cassettes of lo-fi and shoegaze, reverse engineering how chord shapes were constructed and arrangements put together, obsessing over production details. I hadn’t yet the means to reproduce those sounds but I soaked them up and dreamt about access to the tools. There was little to do growing up in rural Shropshire as a teenager so I immersed myself in music in a caravan on our floodplain in the Welsh borders, making dual tape deck multi-passes, then 4-track recordings of solo material, building homemade instruments and effects. Electronic music arrived in the mid ‘90s in the form of an Amiga 500 and tracking software, then FruityLoops changed everything a few years later, allowing me to begin what would eventually become Where Edges Meet, the debut that arrived on Ultimae in 2007 after extensive development on em:t records. I’ve been producing, curating and releasing on Slowcraft since 2011, collaborating with artists like Anne Garner, Ian Hawgood and Stijn Hüwels, and working with various ambient labels like Home Normal and most recently quiet details.
Please can you describe a bit about your general philosophy and process as an artist?
I’m looking for synergies, patterns that complement or contrast each another in pleasing, intriguing or unusual ways. These may be melodic, harmonic, rhythmic or textural but don’t necessarily map directly to musical notions, sometimes it more closely relates to process, outlook or attitude. There’s a track on an unreleased album where the main melodic voice derives from audio-to-MIDI software’s radical misinterpretation of random unpitched input from a custom noise generator. I love how the resulting melodies somehow sound like me and no-one else, that’s pure magic as far as I’m concerned. Accessing and nurturing an attitude of openness, alignment and acceptance is as important in creative practice as it is in daily life. I find myself increasingly seeking some kind of flow, whatever that may look like day to day, session to session. I spent months towards the end of last year perfecting a hammered guitar trill that I strongly felt came from somewhere deep within me. It was only after I’d built an entire track around this one little musical fragment that I finally noticed the exact same melody confidently recited to me note-for-note by the little robin who lives outside my studio window. It’s staying on the album for sure, credit where it’s due.
What does quiet details mean to you and how did you use that to approach this album?
It means paying attention and being aware that there’s no real hierarchy among things, everything matters. I released Soundflowers on Slowcraft last year, an album carefully sculpted from studio sessions during the various lockdowns. There was considerable additional material generated alongside, rawer structures sharing similar DNA, and I came to realise that the fact it hadn’t immediately settled into expected, cultured shapes was in fact virtue rather than vice. These undervalued, overlooked forms were granted new life beyond the walls of my studio by your offer of release and a label philosophy recognising just how worthy of celebration quiet details such as these are, and I’m grateful for that.
Big thanks to James for going into so much depth - Part Two coming next week!
Shout-out to the always awesome Electronic Sound mag for the wonderful review of qd22 Veryan, plus a lovely Q&A with the artist herself - highly recommend subscribing to the print edition!
Also to Bepi Crespan for playing a track on citr.ca
Tune in this Sunday 18.00 UK to Reform Radio to hear Mat Smith (Mortality Tables) in the mix, including a Veryan track.
Support the DJs and proper journalism!
Much love, thanks for the support and have a lovely weekend!
Alex
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