Category: Vintage Synth Trumps (Page 3 of 3)

Vintage Synth Trumps with FICTION STUDIOS

18 August 2017 /

Fiction Studios is a boutique recording studio located right in the heart of London, fully equipped for recording, mixing and mastering while also available to hire for Voiceover and ADR recording.

The studio was set up by brothers Dominic and Nathan Cooper in 2016; Cooper is best known for his role in the film adaptation of ‘Mamma Mia’ while Nathan was a member of THE MODERN and today performs as KID KASIO.

Combining Dominic’s experience in the acting field and Nathan’s background in music production, the air conditioned studio caters for bands, musicians and voiceover artists. The studio also features an array of classic analogue gear which ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK decided would be a good reason to visit and challenge Nathan Cooper to a round of Vintage Synth Trumps…

First card today and it’s a Korg Mono/Poly…

I’ve got the plug-in! My friend’s got a Mono/Poly and he swears by it, we were in a band together when we were young…

…I thought you were young? 😉

Yeah! *coughs*

His name’s Gabriel Prokofiev, we both got into synths at primary school and we’ve both built up a collection over the years. I’m quite jealous of his collection, there’s a few he’s got that I haven’t and the Mono/Poly is one of them.

What was the first synth you owned?

It depends if you want the first good one or the first keyboard? My first keyboard was a Yamaha PSS-110, I found one again recently on eBay and thought I’d buy it on a whim… it’s awful! It’s got these samples of a dog bark and cat meow and what’s supposed to be a cuckoo! *laughs*

So it was more like a toy?

Yes, so I followed that up with a Casio SK1 when I was about 10-11 which had a sampling thing in it, so that you could burp into it and play ‘Happy Birthday’ out of burps! *laughs*

But my first proper synth was when I was 14, I begged my mum to buy me what I wanted, which was a Roland Juno 60. In those days, you went to ‘Loot’ magazine… this was at a time when they were really cheap because everyone wanted a Roland D50 or Korg M1.

I would say it’s the same one I own now, but it isn’t… sadly in the early 90s, I was recording in Ezee Studios with Toyah and MARILLION’s producer Nick Tauber. He told me to leave the synth there as we’d be back in a couple of weeks. But the session got put back and put back and we didn’t go back for nearly a year, so when I finally returned it was gone! I was heartbroken! A lot of people just stared blankly when I asked where it was, we couldn’t trace where it had gone. The one I replaced it with, I’ve had now for a fair amount of time.

The Juno 60 is a robust old thing isn’t it?

Every synth I have at Fiction Studios has at some point, needed to be completely refurbished, apart from the Juno. It never goes out of tune! The only thing that ever happened to it, was when I was touring with THE MODERN and I snapped one of the keys while I was loading it back onto the van. It was after a horrific gig at an indie venue called ‘Filthy McNasty’s’ which was where THE LIBERTINES were signed, so God knows what we were doing there! *laughs*

What I really wanted was an Oberheim or a Jupiter 8, but that was out of my range, so the Juno fitted in the budget for a birthday present. I know Howard Jones used one and it was analogue so that was it.

OK, next card!! What are the chances, it’s a Juno 60!!! *laughs*

When I set up Fiction Studios, I was lucky to be loaned some of my dream synths like the Oberheim OBXa. I also have the Prophet 5 which I saved up for ages for, but having said that, the go-to synth is still the Juno 60, it’s still used in my KID KASIO stuff more than anything else.

Maybe it’s because I know it so well and all the patches on it were programmed by me, but there’s something about the interface on it, it’s just so easy to manipulate, it does what you want it to do, to fit into the track. Having said that, you get less happy mistakes with it though. I guess because I know all the sounds on it so well, so it rarely does anything that truly surprises.

Now, here’s a monster on the next card, a Yamaha CS80!!

That’s the dream isn’t it? I’d love one! I have the Arturia softsynth version. I always think of VANGELIS, the ‘Blade Runner’ soundtrack and Stevie Wonder who used it a lot. It’s one of those synths that’s got a ‘sound’ to it with that ribbon controller.

The ribbon controller is an interesting point as the Polymoog had one too and I’m assuming that kind of controllability is very difficult to simulate using software?

Yeah, totally! It’s why I use as much hardware stuff as I can because when I’m using mod wheels, pitch bends and stuff, I’ll programme the part in MIDI and then have the part playing through the synth while tweaking it and then I’ll record the sound onto the computer, adding any kind of modulation manually. Because you’ve got that tiny bit of human touch to it, that is what people kind of connect to. Although it’s still synths, it’s got some human authenticity to it. You can use pitch bend and stuff with softsynths but you don’t get that same interaction. And I think that can make or break a sound sometimes.

I remember on one of my KID KASIO tracks ‘Full Moon Blue’, I was using a harmonica sound from a Yamaha DX7 but it wasn’t quite sounding right, and everyone said I needed to use a breath control; so you put this thing in your mouth and plug it into the back of the synth and it will change the sound as you blow. I love things being electronic and mechanical but sometimes if you add something like that, it adds that human element to it. There’s something about humans AND machines.

So why set up a studio when today, someone can grab hold of a laptop, get GarageBand and do everything there? Why does anyone out there need somewhere like Fiction Studios?

Good question… because many softsynths are now based on old analogue ones, it’s got people hankering after the authentic sound, even though softsynths do a really great job.

I think most people are aware the original sounds are better, but people can’t get their hands on them and they are expensive these days; a lot of people don’t have the room for them as well.

So in the current environment where synthpop is popular, there is a market for people coming in and wanting to play around with the old synths and run their ideas through some classic analogue flagship gear. It’s nice in that sense that people can do that. Some people often just want another pair of ears so if people want me to produce something, I can listen to what they’ve done and steer it in a certain direction.

Modern music has become very inward because of home recording…

Yes, it’s become very introspective. You can get something sounding good on GarageBand and get it up to a professional level but you always need someone else, that’s why all KID KASIO albums are mixed by Adrian Hall because I need that extra pair of ears, he can hear stuff that’s clogging up the track that I’ve been too entrenched in to notice.

So that’s why a studio with an in-house engineer or producer is great to make professional sounding tracks, or they can use the synths to produce their own stuff.

How did your most recent single ‘Drive (Some Kind Of Love)’ come about?

It was inspired by the film ‘Drive’ which came out in 2011; I’d just finished doing the ‘Tamara Drew’ soundtrack with Ben Todd and ‘Drive’ really blew us both away. We thought it would be great to write a song that could stylistically fit into the film. We performed it live and realised it went down pretty well. So that’s why I decided to release it.

When it was being mixed, I gave Adrian some reference points which were ‘The Boys Of Summer’ by Don Henley and ‘You’re The Voice’ by John Farnham. The track had this American vibe to it which a lot of my stuff doesn’t have, my sound is very Synth Britannia but for some reason, ‘Drive (Some Kind Of Love)’ just had this MISTER MISTER element to it!

I envisaged the video being filmed on an American highway in an open top car, but it ended up being done in London with me driving around in my Reliant Scimitar classic car and the video came out ok *laughs*

Looking at Fiction Studios, I’m amazed how spacious it is… what did you have in mind when you chose this location?

It is right in the heart of London, very few studios are now, normally you have to go to the East of London or the trendier parts, this is slap bang central. I was looking for a space with my brother and his accountants have got a firm on the fifth floor of this building. He mentioned to them he was looking for a location to set up a studio and they suggested their store room in the basement.

We came down to have a look and it was not what you would expect an accountancy firm’s store room to look… there were boxes of files but because this firm looked after actors, models and people in the entertainment industry, there was all this weird stuff there.

I was looking around and there were MTV and Nickelodean Awards for ONE DIRECTION!! The firm represented them! So there was a pile of their tour clothes and what was really sad was all their stuff that fans had given them was here! So there was this huge great portrait of Harry Styles staring at me that some fan had spent ages drawing! And it was down there gathering dust! *laughs*

Anyway, I noticed a library area that looked something out of Hogwarts from ‘Harry Potter’ and it was set up originally as a film set but never got round to being used. They offered to move it but I said not to as I could imagine bands hanging out in this bit because it had a really nice vibe.

The brickwork and features are all fake, but the 6000 old books are real! Occasionally you’ll pick a book out and it’ll be from the 1850s. So it’s great for inspiration, and what I’ve found I’ve done recently is I’ve been tidying up, looked up at the shelves and see the spine of a book that has the title of a song I’ve just written! It’s very weird!

And there’s no curfew or restrictions on the time of day an act can use the studio?

No, people have booked Fiction Studios until very late at night and it has 24 hour concierge so you can come and go when you please.

You have your synths but you are equipped to record acoustically as well, was this important in the viability of the studio?

Yes, the drum kit has been put near the library area. I would happily just set it up as a synth studio but I was looking into this as a business, so I didn’t want to close it off and make it accessible to everyone. And it’s worked the other way, I haven’t really had enough synth acts in here! I’ve had indie bands, opera singers and everything here so it’s been really interesting *laughs*

So, time for another card, an Oberheim 2 Voice…

I haven’t got a 2 Voice but I’ve been really lucky recently to accquire an OBXa, which was one of my dream wants because I’m a big fan of Richard Barbieri from JAPAN, where they used the similar OBX and Prophet 5. There’s just a sound about the OB series; since getting one I’ve actually come to really respect Richard Barbieri’s work because it’s not as easy as turning it on and having those sounds.

You can find them when you tweak but it’s hard, and makes me realise he was a bit of a genius when it came to that stuff. How I came to acquire it is one of those funny things, I was at a party and I got chatting to a guy called Ian Merrylees who is a TV Editor.

He said “I’ve got a few synths at home”. Now nine times out of ten with these types of conversations, it turns out the synth is a Casiotone… so I asked him what they were and he said “one’s an Oberheim” and I’m like “WHAT?”

It had been in his loft for fifteen years… so I went round to his house to have a look, and not only did he have an OBXa, but he had a Prophet T8 as well! He wanted to see them used, and he very kindly loaned them to Fiction Studios, although they needed loads of servicing… I needed about four people to carry the T8 into the car, it’s a real monster! *laughs*

What other synths do you have here at Fiction Studios?

As well at the Oberheim OBXa, Prophet 5 and Prophet T8, there’s a Crumar Performer which after the Juno 60 is my most used synth, the SH101, Yamaha DX7, Korg MS2000, Korg DS8 and a Korg Poly 800 which my band mate Chi in THE MODERN found in a skip!

My most recent addition to the synth armoury was from when Roland came down to the studio and were impressed with the look. So the deal is they will lend us anything if they can film in here every now and then, so I have been lent a Roland JDXa which Nick Rhodes of DURAN DURAN spearheads the campaign for. It has a really nice interface, it looks amazing.

It’s great for live because unlike the old analogues where you need a torch because you can’t see the controls, this has everything lit up really nicely and there are in-built effects so everything sounds nice straight out of the box.

You have two mixing desks here?

One is for bands to use when they rehearse in the live area, it’s an old Datum series made by Hill Audio who provided the desks for Live Aid.

I was keen on having an old analogue desk, so I got this Soundtracs IL36 32 channel mixer from a friend of mine who was downsizing. That’s the thing about these desks nowadays, no-one wants them, my friend just wanted it taken away, it took five people to lift it! But I love it because it’s got a great sound to the EQs, I run all my synths through it. I have a nice Focusrite pre-amp so that it sounds like those old Neve desks, it’s got a beautiful analogue sound.

I use Logic to record but if people want to use Pro-Tools, they can. I have a nice Neumann U87 microphone and an Avalon pre-amp so you can get a good vocal chain. The monitoring uses Genelec speakers so it’s all here for people if they want it.

Another card, an ARP Odyssey…

I was this close to getting the Korg remake last year and then the studio came up. So when there was the offer of these other synths and I was getting the studio set-up, I had to spend my money on other things. I’d like to get one because ULTRAVOX used it…

…you know Billy Currie’s just sold his?

Did he? Why would you sell it?

He did sell it for £8500!

Ah! That’s why you’d sell it! *laughs*

How much is the remake by Korg?

Don’t quote me on this, but I think it’s about £700 so it’s a lot cheaper than buying an old one and it’s got MIDI.

Now I see here you have a tape recorder AND a drum machine… *laughs*

The tape recorder is all rigged up and came into use recently. Dave Ball from SOFT CELL came in with some old ¼ inch tapes of demos recorded when he and Marc Almond were at Leeds Polytechnic. He wanted to find out what was on them in case there was any other stuff that hadn’t been heard before, and there was!

That was a great experience, he’s such a nice guy and one of my idols, so to sit there and go through this stuff first hand was amazing, This early stuff was almost punk and really out there lyrically, it was amazing how simplistic some of the synth lines were, that’s the beauty of them. The Oberheim DMX was kindly donated by a friend, I must give it back to him soon as I’ve had it for about ten years *laughs*

It’s got a brilliant kick drum, snare and clap sound which I use in almost everything I do but I tend to sample it rather than use it as a drum machine.

There are modern drum machines like the Roland TR8, but most people just use software, so is there a place for drum machines in recording today?

I think there probably is, but I still use loops quite a lot. Most people will use a programme in Logic for drum sounds called Battery where you can load up whatever vintage drum machine you want and play it on the keys of a synth, layering up the percussion framework into the computer.

I like the inspiration you can get from loops, I use a company that supplies them and you can pick one out by year. When you buy a particular year like say 1982, they send you a pack of a hundred loops played on the popular drum machines of that year in various tempos and stuff. So what I invariably do is use that as a basis and layer the sounds up with real ones from the DMX or a sample from a 12 inch single. The great thing about the DMX is that you can open it up and tune up each drum to the song via the dials inside.

When it comes to using a drum machine to programme, it’s quite fiddly and you end up recording it back into the computer anyway, so it’s a bit pointless. But it is nice to have it hands on.

Final card, it’s the Polymoog…

People say I haven’t got any Moogs in the studio but they’re one of those makes that I never got into. I want one, partly because Howard Jones had a Moog Prodigy but when I was young, I always associated Moog with the more proggy end of music and it sort of put me off *laughs*

It’s funny because Rodney Cromwell admits he’s “a Moog Snob”…

I guess it’s the difference between 1977-1980 which is more the lo-fi era of electronics where he comes from musically, while my stuff fits more into the more later end of synthpop 1982-1983…

Ah, the digitally stabilised analogue period…

Yeah, exactly *laughs*

Having said that, if anyone wants to donate a Moog synth? I do have all the Moog plug-ins but it’s just been one of those things.

So what are you up to at the moment musically?

Apart from producing an array of acts here at Fiction, I’m planning the video to the final release from my KID KASIO ‘Sit & Wait’ album. It’s going to be made up of old footage of me in bands from the 90s.

Also I’m putting the final touches to an EP of cover versions I’m releasing next year. And busy writing and recording for my third KID KASIO album.

ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its warmest thanks to Nathan Cooper and Fiction Studios

Fiction Studios is based at 22-24 Ely Place, London EC1N 6TE United Kingdom – for further information, please phone +44(0) 207 831 8177 or visit their website at http://www.fictionstudioslondon.com/

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Vintage Synth Trumps is a card game by GForce that features 52 classic synthesizers

Text and Interview by Chi Ming Lai
18th August 2017, updated 11th February 2021

Vintage Synth Trumps with RODNEY CROMWELL

30 January 2016 /

The name of RODNEY CROMWELL is comparatively new to electronic pop music.

But the man behind the persona, Adam Cresswell is a seasoned hand, having previously released an album ‘Navigation’ as part of oddball synth duo ARTHUR & MARTHA with Alice Hubley in 2009.

But a number of personal circumstances led to ARTHUR & MARTHA disbanding. While Hubley went on to form cult indie band COSINES, Cresswell laid low, at least until 2015. He re-emerged as RODNEY CROMWELL with ‘Age Of Anxiety’, a concept album of sorts chronicling his problems with depression and anxiety that had affected his life and creative muse.

The honesty apparent in Cresswell’s dissonant vocal styling, alongside crisp electronics and acoustic instrumentation, has made ‘Age Of Anxiety’ an unexpected favourite of both critics and online radio outlets. Echoing the spectre of acts such as SECTION 25 and NEW ORDER, songs like ‘Black Dog’ and ‘You Will Struggle’ embody the album’s concept perfectly.

Ever the synth enthusiast, he accepted ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK’s invitation to a round of Vintage Synth Trumps.

Your first card is the Yamaha CS60, does that mean anything to you?

Absolutely not… I always regarded Yamaha as people who made motorbikes! I’ve never owned a motorbike, I’ve only ever been on one once and it scared the sh*t out of me! I bought a Yamaha 4-track… when I got my student loan, I went out and spent it all on a Yamaha MTX4. And that is where I learnt to be a producer, by recording to tape.

4 tracks, it’s very limiting so you learn to be disciplined. I used to record 3 tracks and then bounce them all down to the fourth, and then start again. You’d be making a record using the same process they made ‘Sgt Pepper’ with, but you’re doing it in your own bedroom! *laughs*

Are you one who relishes equipment restrictions to provide the artistic drive?

Yes! To be honest, whenever I see a photo of people in a roomful of analogue synthesizers and loads of gear, I’m thinking “are you throwing in gear to fill a hole in your creativity!?”.

I have got 4 synths… 5 if you count the MicroKorg, which I don’t! And I’ve used them on the last three albums I’ve made, not because I’m a cheapskate but those 4 synths have become my sound. I like working within the limitations of what they can do. I say limitations, but the possibilities of just one half-decent analogue synth are almost limitless anyway! I love the fact you can plug it in, turn it on and it’s never quite the same as last time! It makes it interesting playing live with them.

Have you ever seen one of these, a Jen SX1000?

I saw one of those in the music shop at the end of my road last summer. I went in to buy a cable and there was a Jen SX1000… I was going to buy it, but my wife said “no, you’ve got enough synths in the house!” *laughs*

Next card, it’s a Moog Prodigy…

It’s a good synth, I always liked the white buttons on it but I don’t have a Prodigy, I have a Moog Rogue. They’re a bit similar in that they’re in the entry level bracket… all my synths are in the entry level bracket!

Were they like the Casiotones of their day?

That’s a bit too demeaning… my synths are a Moog Rogue, a Moog Opus3, a Korg MS-10 which is my stage synth and an ARP Quartet which has the string sound on it. I bought them all within 2 years. They all get the job done and they are my sound.

Why did you get a Rogue instead of a Prodigy?

Oh, this was in the days before the internet, and you would buy whatever you saw in a shop or the small ads. My mum phoned me up one day after looking in catalogue and said “Oh, I know you’re looking for a Moog Prodigy, but this shop in Croydon says it has got a Moog”. I drove over and there on the top shelf above rows of horribly plastic digital synths was this Rogue with a chip on one key, so it looks like it’s got a broken tooth! *laughs*

They got it down and dusted it off… it was like when GARY NUMAN discovered synths, it made this massive great noise and I thought “I’ve got to have that!” – it took a month’s wages to buy the thing and that’s really where it all started for me.

So was that in your early indie phase?

Yes, I was in a band called SALOON and I took this Moog through to ARTHUR & MARTHA as well. In fact I haven’t done a gig without the Rogue since 1998 and I can’t imagine getting onstage without it, it’s part of the family. We’ve been through an awful lot together from leaving it in the road and almost losing it the first day I took it to a recording studio, to climbing down a mountain in Spain in the dead of night with it.

What’s its main characteristic?

It’s got a dirty sub-bass all the way up to glass shattering whistles and pops. But what I most like about it is you can throw it about and bring a bit of drama to the stage performance; you can’t get out of little plastic digital synths… you know, twisting the filters, throwing the switches in an overly dramatic way.

Live though, you are a good mix of analogue and digital sequences via the laptop…

The reason we use a laptop on stage is I won’t ever work with a drummer again! Not because I have anything against drummers personally, but that whole lifting drum kits into the backs of vans… I’m too old for all that! *laughs*

Using sequencers can be a little restricting but equally, life is too short for too much freeform synth jamming, I just want to be playing pop music. I like the live thing to be controlled in terms of sequenced songs, but with the opportunity for some level of improvisation which the analogue synths bring, because they never sound the same… sometimes, I wish they were more the same, but you go with it.

A good example of your analogue / digital live mix is on ‘Black Dog’. How did the track musically come together in the studio?

I was playing with my brother’s Korg Prophecy, I hit a key and it made this pulsing sequencey noise and when I played another key, it sounded like a sequenced pattern. The song was made up by playing those sequences live… it sounded just about in time!

It reminds me of NEW ORDER and SECTION 25…

Funny you should say that! When you hit those notes and they sound a little bit like ‘Temptation’, you’re going to go with it aren’t you? *laughs*

What’s very characteristic about your sound is although you love synths, acoustic textures such as glockenspiel and melodica have always been part of your world, as well as the more traditional guitar and bass… what was your ethos behind this?

That’s a very good question… I think they just suit the mood. It’s nothing more than that, it just sounds right. I love electronics, but I like things that bring something else to it. One of the bands that switched me on back in the day was STEREOLAB, they had electronics but also glockenspiel and horns or whatever. I literally play what’s knocking about in the house. We have a glockenspiel that sounds pretty good so I use that, and I have a decent a bass guitar. I just use whatever, although there’s not much guitar on ‘Age Of Anxiety’ because I’m a terrible guitar player…

You prefer the bass?

Yes, I was a bass player for 6 years; I used to play in a Peter Hooky kind of style because I wanted people to know I was a songwriter too. So much of the time I would add a melodic counterpoint on the bass to go with the vocal lines. When it came to ‘Age Of Anxiety’, I was just enjoying myself playing the bass for the first time in years… I cranked the tone knob up, whacked on a bit of chorus and it sounds like Peter Hook! I thought “Sod it! Why not?”

Considering the album is called ‘Age Of Anxiety’ and about your experiences, fronting RODNEY CROMWELL must have been a challenge. What were your coping strategies?

To be honest with you, it has been a way of me showing to myself that I am able to cope. I can stand up in front of people and perform, I’ve always been quite good at that. It’s the other things… just don’t ask me to travel to a gig through The Blackwall Tunnel. I don’t like flying either!

But I have to do it, especially if people are listening to the record and coming up to me saying “I love what you’re doing, I suffer from anxiety and it’s really helped me”; I can’t then say “don’t talk to me” and huddle up in the corner, that’s not going to help them!

It’s been a very weird year becoming a front person in a musical act. I’m a middle-aged bald guy, I’m supposed to be at the back where nobody looks at you, not at the front with people throwing their underwear! *laughs*

How would describe the music environment from the time with ARTHUR & MARTHA in 2009 to today as RODNEY CROMWELL?

2009 was a very difficult period in terms of musical promotion because of the financial crash; for one people were very reticent about investing. We had ‘Navigation’ in the can for a least a year before it came out, with labels saying they would put it out and then not committing, and we missed the boat when things like LA ROUX and LITTLE BOOTS were happening.

People didn’t know what the right model was at all, they didn’t know whether to put out vinyl, CD or downloads. They didn’t know how to promote things, whether it should be blogs or newspapers and stuff like that. Distribution companies didn’t know what they were doing… we had two distribution companies, one doing the CD and one doing the digital! It was a very funny period! So that’s why we started our own record label Happy Robots because we got so fed up and thought we could do a better job ourselves.

Now it seems to be a bit different, in that blogs and websites are very much a big part of the model. You’re going to get a lot more traction on a specialist outlet like ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK, than a bigger general music platform or the Daily Express. 

In terms of distribution, people realise there’s no money in it anymore, so let’s not be deluded about it, you don’t press 1000 copies if you’re a new artist, you press 300 and hope for the best! Do I think it’s better or worse? I don’t know! I think things are more straightforward now in that it’s more clear cut. It’s easier to get a handle on the right thing to be doing and what isn’t. I mean, I never thought I’d play another gig again after ARTHUR & MARTHA ended, but if I want to sell CDs, I’ve got to go out and do some gigs.

Another card? A Roland SH-2… have you ever wanted a Roland?

No, not really! I think I’m a Moog snob *sniggers*

Me and my guitarist do have Boss pedals, which are built by Roland of course… I have five of them and one Moog guitar pedal and of all those, which is the one that plays up and doesn’t work? It’s not the blooming Boss is it! Hahahahaha! So maybe Roland is the way forward for me!

‘Cassiopeia’ is a great title, did you have a Casio? How do you see them in the pantheon of accessible technology and how it changed the landscape?

I think Casios are great, I love the Casiotones. The very first RODNEY CROMWELL track which I wrote in 2002 for a ‘Lord Of The Rings’ compilation was just the MS-10 and a Casiotone. They’re great for kids as well. My kids have got a Casio, but they just hit the Autosong thing and thump it a bit…

…I think a few bands do that! *laughs*

Casiotones are really cheap in boot fairs!

You have been a strong advocate of the instrumental with tracks like ‘Baby Robot’ and ‘One Two Seven’, there’s not enough of them on albums today… discuss?

I would have loved to have done a whole instrumental album to be honest, because of that whole not putting yourself forward as the singer, but I can’t help but gravitate towards vocals, lyrics and being pop, although there’s nothing better than a really good instrumental. With ARTHUR & MARTHA when that started, I thought we were mostly going to be instrumental, doing that ADD (N) TO X thing, sort of noisy and experimental, throwing synthesizers around all over the place.

Although your vocals are quite sombre, your synth melodies are quite bright and pretty like on ‘Baby Robot’?

Yes, ‘Baby Robot’ is the one track on the album that’s 100% upbeat as it is about the experience of being a father.

Some of the synth sounds even on ‘Black Dog’ are quite bright?

Yeah… the thing is, if you’re making a song about anxiety, if you’re not going to make the melodies hummable and the synths sound bright and happy, you’re just going to make a Goth record! And I don’t want to make a Goth record! *laughs*

Yes, you end up sounding like THE WAKE!

Exactly… although I like THE WAKE! *laughs*

It’s only recently since I’ve remixed other people that I’ve consciously realised that I have a formula, which is major key with an upbeat disco tempo.

The most favourite synth you’ve owned and why?

The Rogue is my favourite, but the ARP Quartet gets used more these days because it does great piano melody lines as well as the big string sound. This album is probably more MS-10 than it is Rogue. The Rogue is great for live or whatever… but this question is a bit like asking “what do you like about your Black & Decker Workmate?”… the MS-10 is a really good tool, to me it’s a workhorse, and it gets the job done.

But with the Rogue, there is more of an emotional connection there… we’re special buddies who is like your best mate who you see every couple of months, you don’t need to talk to each other but you know what each other are thinking.

The synth you’ve most wanted but never had, that use could use musically as opposed to having ornamentally?

I’d love to have one of those British Synthis like the AKS, they look and sound stunning., I remember Barry 7 from ADD (N) TO X throwing one about on stage. The VCS3 is cool too, I remember SONIC BOOM playing a gig with his EXPERIMENTAL AUDIO RESEARCH project with two of those on stage, going up and down the filters, it was just noise! I used to have a T-shirt with ‘Putney’ written on it, nobody got it… apart from me. The EMS Synthi 100, DELIA DERBYSHIRE and the BBC RADIOPHONIC WORKSHOP… it’s the daddy of synths, one of the greatest bits of British Engineering. I also like the Wasp and the Gnat in their black and yellow.

How was it to reunite with Alice Hubley again playing live? I understand ‘Autovia’ is now part of the set?

It was brilliant, we’ve realised what good mates we are and she’s a really good synthesist, it’s great because she hasn’t been really using analogues in the COSINES live set. A few weeks ago we thought we’d dig out ‘Autovia’. When we hit the droney groove at the end, I felt like I was in NEU! It was just the best moment, it’s great to be working with somebody who is on the same wavelength, even though she loves TAYLOR SWIFT! *laughs*

How do you see the future of synthpop?

I hope it doesn’t become a retro thing… what I was trying to do with this record was to use retro gear, but use it in a forward looking way, in the same way that ‘I Feel Love’ did, it was about making records that sounded like the future. I think with that sort of instrumentation, you can still do that. But nobody has quite cracked it yet. I like the stuff that’s uplifting like CHVRCHES, but it’s about bringing enough new to the party, to bring the sound forward.

My thought is, it’s the people who are getting into CHVRCHES now, who will be inspired to make a synthesized form of music in the future…

I agree, and they’re the only band really who are at the right level to be inspiring a new generation. I really hope that happens. I think there’s a lot of good stuff going on, but we need young blood coming up and showing us old timers how it’s really done.

ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its warmest thanks to Adam Cresswell

RODNEY CROMWELL ‘Age Of Anxiety’ and ARTHUR & MARTHA ‘Navigation’ are both available in CD or download formats direct from Happy Robots at
https://happyrobotsrecords.bandcamp.com/

https://www.facebook.com/rodneycromwellartist/

http://www.happyrobots.co.uk/

https://www.facebook.com/happyrobotsrecords

Vintage Synth Trumps is a card game by GForce that features 52 classic synthesizers

Text and Interview by Chi Ming Lai
30th January 2016

Vintage Synth Trumps with MAISON VAGUE

28 December 2011 /

Living In A Dream Since 1983, MAISON VAGUE’s ‘Synthpop’s Alive’ was one of the surprise albums of 2011 and is possibly the best wholly independent release of the year.

It is the creation of Clark Stiefel, a German domiciled American with a passion and love for all things ‘Synth Britannia’.

A classically trained virtuoso who studied piano and electronic music at a conservatoire, his working knowledge of vintage synthesizers and modern technology has affectionately revived The GARY NUMAN Principle.

One of the few active musicians to have handled both the original Moog and Buchla modular synthesizers, he adds musicianship and a wry sense of humour to the quirkily authentic proceedings. The title track with its battlecry of ‘Synthpop’s Alive’! could be the result of an unlikely sexual liaison between DEVO and PLACEBO. Unbelievably catchy, its statement of intent is so profound that if you are a sceptic, you really will become a believer.

Chunky riff laden tracks such as ‘Pixelated Lover’, ‘My Situation’ and ‘Give Them Away’ allow the listener to have fun with their air synths and smile with a wonderful air of irony. Album closer ‘Living On Ice Cream’ apes ‘Replicas’ outtake ‘We Have A Technical’ but if that doesn’t appeal, there’s always the appropriately titled ‘No Show’ which is a fine example of BETTE MIDLER gone electro and the reggae inflected ‘Tunnel Vision’.

Meanwhile, ‘Colored Glasses’ explores more cerebral depths via some terrific classical interludes as befitting Clark Stiefel’s eccentric FRANZ LISZT demeanor. In a genre where pretension can often rear its head in an over grandiose fashion, MAISON VAGUE are a bright light in modern synthpop.

ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK challenged Clark Stiefel to a game of Vintage Synth Trumps over Dim Sum and a few glasses of Altbier on a lovely evening in downtown Düsseldorf…

First card? It’s the Roland Jupiter 4

The Roland Jupiter 4, my favourite synth. But that’s a very difficult thing to say…

What inspired you to get one?

It was an accident. Around 2002, I purchased a TR606 drum machine on eBay and after I made the deal, the guy I was buying it from said he had other things for sale, one of them being a Jupiter 4.

I had never played one before but I knew it from GARY NUMAN as I’m a big fan. There’s lots on the ‘Telekon’ and ‘Dance’ albums.

I was always fascinated by that sound. There’s something so distinct about that sound. Up until then, it was not a synth I pursued. But the Jupiter 4, in a strange way, came to me. So I bought it on instinct and it was like fate. For the last nine years, it’s been a major part of my life.

Which songs have you used it for on the ‘Synthpop’s Alive’album?

It’s used all over but most notably on Colored Glasses. It’s pretty much 90% multi-tracked Jupiter 4. It’s best at making electronic sounds. You can literally feel the electrons. It’s got such a living, vibrant sound. It’s also very good at odd, other worldly sounds. I find it has an almost organic quality to it. On ‘Colored Glasses’, I’m playing it almost like I would a piano, in a Beethovien style, like an acoustic instrument. I plan to experiment more with the arpegiator and the CV trigger-in on the Jupiter 4 on the next album. One of the things I actually like about my Jupiter is that it has no MIDI or CV GATE interface, so basically, I have to play it.

Why do you think the Jupiter 4 isn’t as well renowned as the Jupiter 8?

I think one of the reasons is the styling and aesthetic. I’ve noticed people talking on the internet about the home organ styling of the Jupiter 4. Personally I really like it. I also have a Roland Promars which is like a monophonic version of the Jupiter. The sound is almost identical. They have the same styling: the same coloured buttons and everything. I love it. Very vintage. I guess people weren’t impressed by it at the time and with competition like the Prophet 5 and Oberheim OBXa, it didn’t stand a chance. It had only one programmable oscillator per voice and limited four-voice polyphony. Those would be some of the reasons.

The next card is coincidentally, the Jupiter 8! Have you got one?

No. For one thing, they’re too expensive now. You’d be lucky to find one for $8000. The Jupiter 8 is a legend. When I think of it, I think that’s a synth that I don’t have and probably never will! *laughs*

I’ve played one, though. It’s brilliant. No question about it. But it’s not a synth that I covet.

You know, I don’t think GARY NUMAN ever had one…

There you go, maybe that explains it. I have other synths that I think are very good and I’m happy with them. I just don’t have a relationship with the Jupiter 8. But still, it’s an amazing instrument.

The next card is a Sequential Circuits Prophet 10. Legend has it that GARY NUMAN bought one but never used it. JAPAN’s Richard Barbieri used one live though.

That’s funny about GARY NUMAN because I have this guilt complex; I own a Prophet 10 which I’m very happy to have but the problem is, it’s so incredibly huge! I live in Germany now but I’m originally from the United States where I had quite a big synth collection.

One-by-one, I’ve been bringing them over (it’s much easier that way, especially getting them through customs). The Prophet 10 is the one synth that has not yet made it because the damn thing weighs 70 kilos! I like to joke that the Prophet 10’s flight case is going to be my coffin someday! *laughs*

I bought it in 1996 and have been intending to bring it over to Germany ever since but it’s 2011 and it’s still not here! But I will get it here!!

The Prophet 10 is basically two Prophet 5s on a double keyboard. Now I can see the point that you could get two separate Prophet sounds when you need them but it’s packing it all into a small space. Isn’t it likely to be more unreliable or the sound quality is lower, like an old tape-to-tape cassette machine?

Good question. I would say in theory that’s not true… but in practice, it’s absolutely true which is the reason why I have a Prophet 5! If I need a Prophet sound, I use my Prophet 5. I won’’t give up on the Prophet 10 though because it is such a monster, so legendary.

Is this where your classical thing comes in; that its a bit pompous and slightly over-the-top? *laughs*

I think it is. It’s the Quasimodo, the mad organist in me. You know, I’m a keyboard player: I like to play with both hands so I am happiest when I can use all ten fingers.

And with the Prophet 10 having ten voices all ten fingers can be occupied, just like playing an organ. On the Prophet 5, I’m constantly running out of voices!

You said that the Jupiter 4 was your favourite synth, but some would argue that the Prophet 5 possibly was the greatest polysynth of its time. Would you agree with that?

Absolutely, without question. Even in this era, I still think its a fantastic instrument. I didn’t use it though on ‘Synthpop’s Alive’. The Oberheim OBXa unintentionally stole the show. In some ways they’re very similar instruments, though the Prophet 5 is a lot more capable. Still, they can cover similar ground… but given the sort of ground that need to be covered on the album, the OBXa got the nod.

GARY NUMAN used the OBXa as his main synth on ‘Warriors’

I didn’t know that. That’s good to know. Maybe it was subconscious?

Is the OBXa the one you use for the blistering solo on ‘Synthpop’s Alive’? Is it better for soloing than perhaps the Jupiter 4?

Yes, you can solo on the Jupiter 4. It has a mono mode to engage all four VCOs and it sounds pretty good. But it’s not as aggressive as the OBXa. The OBXa has more of a rock ‘n’ roll tone to it. I like that!

That’s funny because I always heard that the OBXa is a very American instrument and much favoured by rock bands whereas the Rolands and to a lesser extent, the Prophets weren’t. Any explanation for that?

There’s no question that the Roland and the Prophet are more sophisticated, finer instruments.

The OBXa has an earthy, bluesy quality to it. It’s limited compared to a Prophet 5 but its very straightforward.

So you would try to construct atmospheres with the OBXa?

It’s not what I would reach for although it certainly can be done. In fact I recently pushed the limits of my OBXa by hooking up a Moog CP251 Control Processor to it just to try out some weird funky things. I was surprised just how weird and funky I could get it to sound. Still, its simplicity is what I like best. It’s a rocker’s synth.

Let’s draw your next trump card; it’s a Korg PS3300. KARL BARTOS used it as part of his live set-up when he was in KRAFTWERK…

All I can say about Korg is: I like Korg. I respect Korg instruments. But for some reason I own very little of their gear!

Is it because Korg were the ones who cracked the budget synth market in the mid 70s and therefore weren’t seen as musical because synths like the Korg 770 and Micro-Preset were so competitively priced that people didnt see them as real instruments in the same way as when Casio opened up the market later on? Saying that though, the Korg PS3300 is pretty expensive!

I would admit to that about Casio but I wouldn’t say that about Korg because they’ve made some really nice instruments like the Mono/Poly and MS20. I’m not put off by Korg for any reason.

The MS20 in particular is really great. I would love to have one. But somehow Korgs have never really come my way.

Maybe it’s because you’re American, because Korg was very popular with British synthpop artists?

That could be…

Acts like THE HUMAN LEAGUE, THE NORMAL, OMD and SIMPLE MINDS all started with Korg as their first instruments but then again, GARY NUMAN never used Korg! *laughs*

Really? Then there you go! Another unconscious decision, I guess I’m just not a Korg guy *laughs*

Next card; the ARP Odyssey, as used by ULTRAVOX and KRAFTWERK…

I’ve never played an ARP Odyssey but I have played an ARP 2600. I don’t actually own one but it’s still a special instrument to me because it’s one of the first synthesizers I ever worked on. It was one of the synths I used to learn synthesis. In the music conservatory where I studied, in the beginners’ studio, they had an ARP 2600 and a couple of VCS3s. From these you got to move up – we were not allowed at first in the big studio with the Moog Modular and Buchla! The ARP 2600 is a fantastic beginner’s instrument. It was essentially our text book so I have a special fondness for it as I ‘learned the ropes’ so to speak on that synth.

As a classical musician, how did you find originally the concept of sequencing with a piece of music playing all by itself almost like ‘Sparky’s Magic Piano’?

Interesting question. I think there was a certain reservation at first. There was a part of me that wanted to feel this abandonment in sequencing and aleatory music… music that has a life of its own.

But there was also this feeling that sequencers were somehow cheating. I’ve long since gotten over it! *laughs*

Final one…

Ah! The Minimoog! Another classic which unfortunately I don’t have. It’s so legendary. I do have a Moog Little Phatty though. It’s not a Minimoog by any means but it’s satisfied my cravings for the time being. It’s a brilliant instrument because it’s so deceptively simple. It’s actually got a lot of power behind it. Its simplicity is one of its strong points because you can make sounds immediately.

It’s very accessible and it’s a very practical performing instrument. You can just pack up and play it anywhere. You’re not going to freak out about it being on stage. Granted it’s not cheap but it’s also not the most expensive instrument in the world. The Little Phatty is a synth that I could play on stage and not worry about it. If I had a more expensive Moog Voyager, it imagine it would just stay in the studio and never leave.

So was it the Little Phatty that you used for your NUMAN-esque buzzy bass monophonic sounds?

Actually, I bought the Little Phatty after I recorded the album. But I did want a Moog sound for the ‘Synthpop’s Alive’ title track. So I cheated and used the Arturia Virtual Minimoog — one of the most brilliant pieces of software ever. I’m not a huge fan of softsynths and virtual instruments but I’m thankful for the Arturia Virtual Minimoog because I needed that Moog sound and it delivered.

Any plans for MAISON VAGUE to play live?

There’s a chance, yes. The only hold up at the moment is that I haven’t got a band! It’s just me — and I don’t fancy the idea of cloning myself *laughs*

I’m working on it, though. I love to perform. Recording is a very different art from performing. I would like as much to be live as possible. I’m not a big fan of going out on stage with backing tracks or too much pre-sequenced stuff. A little bit is OK… but to substitute a musician by having a backing track, that I don’t really like so much. So I either need to find more players or simplify and re-arrange.

Where do you think you might take MAISON VAGUE in the future?

I definitely feel musically I’m heading in a more minimal and transparent direction. This is an extreme example, but if you could imagine LEONARD COHEN playing synths. When one thinks of singer/songwriters the first thing that comes to people’s heads is a guitar. You don’t really think of a singer/songwriter with a synth. But if the song is strong enough, then maybe you could just have a minimal accompaniment — perhaps only a Jupiter 4 and TR606 drum machine? It’s only a dream at this point but this is definitely brewing in the back of my head.

Favourite electronic artists at the moment?

One act that I’m really happy about is LA ROUX. For one, I’m happy they exist. I first heard about them on an electronic music website where someone had posted a video of LA ROUX in actually what was a negative context. But what they’re doing is precisely what I would like to on stage as well. Watching their performance, it was electronic music, it was synthpop, but you could see what everyone was doing just like in a traditional band. I like electronic music that’s played like a band and not just a lot of knob twiddling. There’s a certain ridiculousness to all that knob twiddling I feel!

Remember that famous performance of GARY NUMAN doing ‘Are ‘Friends’ Electric?’ on ‘Old Grey Whistle Test’ in 1979? What is so striking about that performance is that it’s a band: you know precisely who is playing what and where it’s coming from. And I think that’s something very important in performing electronic music — even more important than people realise because even 20-30 years on, there’s something about electronic music that still puts people off, you know? There’s inherently something unnatural about it. But when you approach performance like a traditional musician, it just comes to life…

So synthpop really is alive?

Synthpop’s Alive!

‘Synthpop’s Alive’ uses the following synthesizers and drum machines: Oberheim OBXa, Roland Jupiter 4, Roland Promars CompuPhonic (MRS 2), Roland MKS 50, Roland JP8000, Roland XP60, Arturia MinimoogV, Digidesign Xpand, Roland CR8000 CompuRhythm, Roland TR606 Drumatix, Native Instruments Battery and Submersible Kitcore Deluxe

ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its thanks to Clark Stiefel

‘Synthpop’s Alive’ is available as a download album

http://www.maisonvague.com

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Maison-Vague/43000159265

http://www.gforcesoftware.com/cards.php

Vintage Synth Trumps is a card game by GForce that features 52 classic synthesizers

Text by Chi Ming Lai
28th December 2011

Vintage Synth Trumps with MIRRORS

30 April 2011 /

“Meine Tasche voll mit kleinen Geheimnissen. Du nennst diesen Platz mein Schloss. Aber ich zeige all mein Verlangen. Du sagst mir, du hast nichts. Aber ich, ich bin ein Wahnsinniger…”

MIRRORS capture the intelligent aesthetics and aspirations of KRAFTWERK, JOY DIVISION and OMD. Bringing them forward into the 21st Century, they have a denser, grittier approach for an element of aural claustrophobia that reflects their pop-noir aura.

As well as releasing one of the best albums of the year so far in ‘Lights and Offerings’, they have also been impressing new audiences via prestigious support slots with Gary Numan, John Foxx and OMD.

Now they are embarking on their first headlining tour in Germany, the spiritual homeland of electronic music. This expanded show to sees the welcome return of their debut single ‘Look At Me’ to the live set, as well as premieres for B-Side ‘Toe The Line’ and the monumental album closer ‘Secrets’.

The latter in particular showcases the ambition of the MIRRORS audio/visual experience; grainy impressionistic film projections and stark lighting soundtracked by the sharp, dynamic cacophonies of synthetic sound. Effectively creating their own ‘Spiegelsaal’, instrumentalists Ally Young, James ‘Tate’ Arguile and Josef Page are fronted by the intense, energetic persona of vocalist James New.

With their confidence growing throughout the tour, James even performed the song’s final reprise monologue in Deutsch at Frankfurt’s Yellowstage, much to the delight of the home crowd.

Just prior to their first show at Cologne’s Gebaude9, ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK were invited by James New and Ally Young to a round of Vintage Synth Trumps in a variation of the classic card game that has kept many a child happy in the school playground.

While Tate sat nearby compiling MIRRORS latest tour blog, James and Ally also talked about ‘Lights and Offerings’ reception, how they are not synthpop by numbers and their use of guitars…

So what’s your first trump card?

Ally: Well how about that? A Juno 60! *big cheers from all*

James: What are the chances?

And James has one for a Sequential Circuits Prophet 5… let’s talk about the Roland Juno 60 first because that’s one of the mainstays of your set-up isn’t it?

Ally: It is. James plays the Juno and I play not a Sequential, but a Dave Smith Prophet. It’s fully analogue with digital interfaces.

What you’ve got there is a classic synthesizer with the Juno 60 and the most up-to-date polyphonic analogue synth in the Prophet 08. When you decided to go for synthesizers as your main instrumentation, how important was it for you to use a combination of vintage and new equipment?

Ally: The reason we like all the old synthesizers is that they don’t go in tune properly, one wrong move of a button and the sound is lost forever, they’re noisy and they’re slightly unreliable… but that’s what we like, that analogue warmth.

James: The Juno for us particularly was just because for warm padded sounds like FEVER RAY-type drones, it sounds incredible; an almost ‘organy’ synth sound and for things like ‘Write Through The Night’…

Ally: The chord at the beginning of that is Juno.

James: What we tend to use the Juno for is padding out. If you think of us almost as a traditional band, Ally plays the lead parts, Tate plays the bass parts on the Moog, Josef obviously does drums and I’m sort of rhythm in all the rest of the noise *laughs*

Where did you get the Juno 60 from?

Ally: That was covered in dust in the basement of our record label’s office.

James: We asked “Can we borrow that?”

Ally: Two years later and we’ve still got it and we’re still touring it.

With the Dave Smith Prophet 08 then, what made you choose that one?

James: It does a bit of everything.

Ally: It does sound amazing. I didn’t what to buy it at first; I’m not a big fan of the digital modelling synths… if you want an analogue synthesizer sound, you’ve got to buy one. It’s part digital but the way the sound is created in the DS is totally analogue and the pretext of the Prophet is that it’s not a homage to the Prophet 5 which Dave Smith and Sequential Circuits obviously made… it’s if he never made the Prophet 5 and was going to make one now, this is what it would be.

For me, it does everything. It’s the best of both worlds, the functionality of it is amazing, the extra envelope generator etc. I used it on pretty much everything for recording and live. It’s just so versatile. A lot of the pulse sounds that we use a lot on the record are actually a Minimoog but the Prophet does them pretty closely for live.

You do get some quite amazing sounds on your solos, I’m thinking particularly of the screeching one in ‘Searching In The Wilderness’..

Ally: I knew you were going to say that, that was the Juno. A lot of them are a combination of sounds, two or three parts put through a holy amount of reverb!

‘Searching In The Wilderness’ is also the song that changed the most from its original demo to the final recording.

James: It became more MIRRORS.

Ally: I think it was maybe a bit too twee, a bit too light…

James: It was a bit too light and it did remind us a lot of ‘Speak and Spell’. On the original production, it was very empty and it needed to sound like the rest of the record.

Ally: I think it’s moved away from ‘Speak and Spell’ and more into that saturated sound…

James: Melodically, maybe not…

Ally: But the actual production has much more of a darkness. In its original guise, it didn’t sit right.

James: It’s the lightest thing on the record.

Ally: But we wanted it on there, it’s a nice little mood change.

Photo by David Ellis

OK, let’s pull out another card…

Ally: Ah, the Minimoog.

James: Actually, when we did our very first recordings where we pooled all our money to go into a studio, there was a Minimoog there. I’d personally never heard one before…we were using plug-ins because we were flat broke. And when we heard it, it was just amazing!

Ally: It’s that moment isn’t it?

James: From that moment on, we just thought “we have to use this” as the driving force for some of our tracks.

Ally: Those sort of “dum-dum-dum-dum” pulsing parts… amazing!

James: So yeah, that was the start of it, my first memory. And there’s some great pictures of us looking very excited!

What made those pulsing sounds on the beginning of ‘Fear Of Drowning’?

James: That’s actually Garageband…

Ally: It was originally, but we replaced it with the Prophet although we’re not snobs in any sense. Some of the sounds you hear on the record were from plug-ins and Garageband but it’s more about the post-production really. We’re not going to sit here and say we only use analogue gear and we only use sequencers… we don’t. If something sounds good, then it really doesn’t matter.

So can I ask, is there any guitar on the album?

Ally: There are loads!

James: It’s really distorted and low, it adds density.

Ally: I would say it’s on every track without exception, perhaps ‘Something On Your Mind’ doesn’t have any guitar.

James: It would be about the only one. We use it in a particular way; it isn’t guitar live…

Ally: It’s not Jimmy Page wiggling all over it! It’s more in an almost MY BLOODY VALENTINE sense because there are layers and layers of guitar all over the place. But we just maybe sidechain it off something strange so it’s sucking in and out a bit…

James: Exactly! And it gives it some rhythmic element as well so if you have layers and layers of guitar, you just sidechain it to a snare or vocal. Then you end up with this kind of sickly, heaving in and out which you can’t pinpoint.

Ally: That’s one of the things that is quite MIRRORS, we have a lot of these synth sounds but we have things like guitars on there to add that extra dimension.

James: The thing about it is also, having acoustic instruments gives it a live feel and that was important. It had to be visceral and real, having a couple of drums that were a bit out.

Do you think having musical backgrounds in more conventional roots actually helps your songwriting because synthesizers are still comparatively new to you as instruments; that you approach them like excited boys?

Ally: I think so. The other thing you have to bear in mind with a synthesizer is you can play a melody or a chord with one sound and it could be completely wrong.

Manipulate that sound and then suddenly, it becomes something else which you don’t really get when you’re sat round a piano or writing a song on an acoustic guitar… it is what it is. Electronic instruments, good or bad, give you that freedom to be able to play the same thing but change the sound and manipulate it so that it becomes something completely different.

James: It’s two different challenges for us in that one half of it is very much important that we get the songs right to start with. I tend to take more of a role in that initial melody and then Ally certainly has vast interest in the geeky side of recording.

Ally: Most of our songs start with the core of a song, then we just pull them apart and put them back together using electronic instruments.

Are you quite prolific with your writing?

James: It weird actually, I think I used to write much more but particularly since being in MIRRORS, I’d rather write fewer ideas and work on them for longer to make sure they’re the best versions of the song.

Ally: For the ten songs that made the album, we have ditched I’d say twenty…

James: Yeah, that’s probably quite standard.

But resulting from that, you’re becoming known as a good B-sides band…

Ally and James: YEAH!

James: We’re really pleased about that…

B-sides are a great traditional to be part of. How do these tracks emerge? Are they experiments in new directions?

Ally: They are tracks that, for whatever reason, didn’t make the record, be it for mood or that there was already a song of a similar nature on there.

James: We didn’t in a lot of cases think they were worse. Every single B-side could happily have had a place. We didn’t want it to be too self-indulgent and long. If you’ve got fifteen brilliant songs, it’s going to be an hour and forty five minutes!

Ally: No-one going to have time for that, we’re not RADIOHEAD! *laughs*

James: It’s nice that people really appreciate that we do put as much of an effort into the B-sides because it means they’ll come back to the singles.

Any particular favourite B-sides?

Ally: I think ‘Toe The Line’ probably for me personally. That was a song we didn’t really consider for the album until the very last minute and we thought “What about this? It’s actually quite good!”

James: ‘Lights And Offerings’ for me.

Ally: Yeah, I forgot about that! ‘Lights And Offerings’ was so close to making the album…

James: The reason it didn’t make it was because ‘Secrets’ did, it’s as simple as that. They come from a similar place and we didn’t want to have too many epics. With ‘Somewhere Strange’, ‘Fear Of Drowning’ and ‘Secrets’, you’ve got three lynchpin moments; we didn’t need another one of those.

Ally: We’ve always played it live, it goes down excellently.

James: It’s one of my favourite tracks of ours! ‘Broken By Silence’ as well, I like that one.

Can I ask you about ‘Falls By Another Name’ as that’s an interesting one, in that there are elements of early DEPECHE MODE?

Ally: It’s a bit of a guilty pleasure…

…was that one definitely recorded as a B-side one-off to get a certain thing out of your system?

James and Ally: MAYBE!

Ally: Perhaps subconsciously.

James: We do have a habit of writing quite big melodies and choruses, we come from a poppy sort of place.

Ally: James and I normally do that, it’s Tate that reins us in! *laughs*

James: And Tate will tell you right now that he’s not a big fan of ‘Falls By Another Name’…

Tate: It’s alright… *everyone laughs*

The German bonus track ‘Visions Of You’ probably falls into that category too. I think it sounds like CHINA CRISIS if they had fully adopted synthesizers.

Ally: Yeah, people have said that before.

James: That’s another of the ones we looked at when we were making the record.

The label really wanted it to be on the album and we had to put our foot down and say…

Ally: …this doesn’t feel right to do this on our first record. It didn’t make it in the UK but we’re happy to release it in Germany and I think we’ve come back to it a bit.

James: It’s a very big pop song but there’s part of me that thinks it might be a little too big.

Ally: It sort of scares us almost!

Another card then? A Korg MS10…

James: Korg MS10… I know about this one don’t I? *laughs*

Ally: Yeah! I’ve been looking for an MS20 for a while but they’re all quite expensive.

James: I might be right in thinking they’re quite good at making those muted guitar sounds.

Ally: There’s a track we’re working on at the moment where we’ve made an almost pizzicato string sound. It does that and it’s really lovely. I think I’d potentially invest in an MS20 for the second record mainly because I like the idea of something that’s semi-modular plus also the bass and the filter on it are amazing. It’s got the external input audio input so you can feed other audio into it and use the filter on it…

That’s how GOLDFRAPP got those synthetically treated screaming sounds on the ‘Felt Mountain’ album…

James: Oh, that’s interesting…

Maybe that’s something you could do?

James: Yeah, will definitely try *chuckles*

Ally, you’ve got a Moog Source card there but your Moog is the Little Phatty, what’s that like?

Ally: It’s good but it’s not as easy to make good sounds as the Prophet, it takes a little bit more work.

James: It’s good at what it does for live work because it basically does the bass for us.

Ally: It’s got that nice effect because it’s monophonic and it’s limiting in a good way I think. Again, some good modern features like you can connect it up to your computer and look at the sound. It’s also got a tempo synch, an arpegiator and little things like that.

Was there any reason why you got the Little Phatty rather than the Voyager?

Ally: Price mostly! The Little Phatty is £500 cheaper and if we were going to spend that much money on a synth, I think we’d probably get another Prophet to be honest, or something older.

The most unusual synth I saw your list was the Siel Cruise, where did you get that from?

Ally: eBay of course!

James: It’s good for strings, like those kind of slightly cheap NEW ORDER-like sounds… “aahh-ah-aaaah!”

Ally: Mellotrony! It’s a layer of the strings on ‘Look At Me’. But it’s not very good at doing most things! *laughs*

James: It’s just a one-trick pony and only cost a couple of hundred quid so it’s good for that particular trick.

So how do feel the overall response to the ‘Lights and Offerings’ album has been?

James: It’s been really, really good. It obviously hasn’t been world beating but what we feel like we’ve achieved is a small, really loyal fanbase which is such a great place to start from.

It gives us a place to go. I’ve been in bands where fans have been incredibly fickle and they move on. I really feel with MIRRORS, we’ve got something.

Ally: Yeah, not all the reviews have been positive as I’m sure you can imagine… the NME didn’t like it, but we knew they wouldn’t! But people like Artrocker, Q and Mojo, the magazines that we would read and respect gave it very positive reviews. In that sense, we were really pleased.

James: In a people sense, it’s been really lovely as well. So many nice messages from loads of old friends of mine as well, ringing up and saying “I just wanted to say it’s absolutely brilliant”.

Ally: It’s really sweet that.

Photo by David Ellis

How do you respond to criticism in some quarters that MIRRORS are merely “synthpop by numbers”, that you are just only recreating a specific sound from a specific era?

Ally: I’d like to quote Andy McCluskey from OMD who said in the ‘Synth Britannia’ documentary if they had been a button on a synthesizer that said hit single, he’d have pressed it more than anyone else… that button doesn’t exist! *laughs*

James: It starts with the songs and I’m very proud of them. It’s ten excellent tracks and I think it’s very diverse. But the thing is, this is our first record, people have to realise that as well. They are things that we aren’t pleased with… I think we’ve made without realising it, maybe a record that was slightly more derivative than we hoped to make. We can be honest about that!

Ally: Yes, absolutely! But I think the live show is a very different beast to the record, it has a lot more energy perhaps than can be conveyed on the album. And it’s a lot more raw and much more like a live band.

James: I’ve heard lots of people say “I wasn’t that sure about the album but with the live show, I’ve done a total 180” which is nice.

You played at Back To The Phuture supporting Gary Numan and John Foxx, how was it for you?

Ally: We really enjoyed it. It was really nice for us to be asked to play alongside Gary Numan and John Foxx.

James: We saw people’s responses at the end of the show.

Ally: People were very keen to buy the album and we sold out, we didn’t have enough to go round.

James: It was great; a perfect audience for us really isn’t it?

Did you chat to either Gary Numan or John Foxx?

James: I had a good conversation with John Foxx. Since then, I think we might be playing with him again so that’s really good. I didn’t meet GARY NUMAN but I think I wandered into his dressing room accidentally! *laughs*

Photo by Largs Diegmann

What inspired you to cover ‘Something On Your Mind’, a comparatively obscure country song?

Ally: Tate and I had a couple of Karen Dalton LPs and it was on an Optimo mixtape. The song is beautiful, she was something of a tortured soul and her voice is incredible. We wanted to do it and it initially wasn’t going to be on the album but the label heard it and really liked it.

James: And I wanted to sing it basically *laughs*

Ally: We were quite happy for it to go on there because our version is so different. It was very nice for us to be able to apply our aesthetic to someone else’s song.

James: I think the thing for us as well is, bearing in mind that we make electronic music all day, we get back and we won’t listen to that kind of music.

Ally: Yeah, I don’t come home and put on ‘Messages’! *laughs*

James: I think we came home, put that record on and thought it would be quite interesting to try and do something that’s entirely different to MIRRORS but bring it into that world.

So did the Laura Cantrell cover of ‘Look At Me’ come before or after that?

James: Before, we had it for a couple of years. Basically she did a cover of NEW ORDER’s ‘Love Vigilantes’ and we heard that. It was really nice so we asked her.

Ally: We got a really sweet message from her saying “Thank you for asking me to do it”. Her and her band locked themselves in a studio over Christmas 2009 in Nashville. She thought the song was lovely and really enjoyed the experience.

James: And again, it goes to show that they’re really good pop songs for me because it works perfectly like that and it sounds like it could be one of her singles. It shows that we write universal music…

Ally: We just present it in a slightly off-kilter manner.

Photo by David Ellis

How did ‘Secrets’ end up being an eleven minute, three movement epic?

James: It was fourteen to start with! The label nearly had a panic attack! *laughs*

Ally: Yeah, “we’re not putting the two big singles on there… we’re putting this on it!” *laughs*

James: I wrote the song five years ago, we wanted to make a mood change on the record didn’t we?

Ally: Yeah, we wanted to do something bombastic with it. We had the initial idea of the first groove and Tate had written this piece of music that seemed to fit it so well.

We wanted to make a bold statement…like it’s our debut record, you only get to do that once and we didn’t want to look back and think “we should have put that on!”. So we thought, why not? It’s got that ENO-esque bit in the middle.

It starts very big and is quite rocky in places before the mood descends into that abstract middle and the reprise just comes in, in a different version of itself.

The ambient interlude made a refreshing change from the silence before a hidden track. It was like you decided to do an Eno instead of everyone else accidentally doing John Cage after all these years…

Ally: I’m glad you think so

James: You might see a live version of that idea live *laughs*

It will be interesting to see how you do it because that’s the one the fans have been waiting for…

Ally: That’s part of the reason we’re doing it. It was always going to be a bit of a challenge to do live, it’s just such a beast.

So what next for MIRRORS? What direction are you possibly going to take?

James: It won’t be that long ’til the next album, we said a year from releasing the first. So we’ve written quite a few songs already. We’re writing as a live band now, that will be the big change. It will be a more contemporary record.

Ally: Maybe a bit less busy, more stripped. To be honest we don’t know ourselves yet.

This has been such a long process for us because we had a lot of the songs written before we were signed, then we re-did them and now we’re touring them again which is very enjoyable but at the same time in the back of our minds, we have new ideas that we want to put down and the way things can move forward… it’s very exciting.

James: With the live show as well, we are talking quite excitedly about a more interactive show for the second album which we haven’t had time to do where we actually incorporate the sounds from the crowd so they become actually involved in it.

MIRRORS ‘Lights and Offerings’ uses the following equipment: ARP 2600, Akai MPC1000 Production Station, Dave Smith Instruments Prophet 08, Doepfer MAQ16/3 Sequencer, Kawai R50 Drum Machine, Korg MicroPreset, Moog Little Phatty, Minimoog, Memorymoog, Nord Lead 2X, Octave Cat, Roland Juno 60, Roland SH101, Roland TR808 Rhythm Composer, Roland MC202 MicroComposer, Roland SPD-S Electronic Percussion Sampling Pad, Siel Cruise.

ELECTRICITYCLUB.CO.UK gives its warmest thanks to MIRRORS

Special thanks to Debbie Ball at Create Spark and Skint Records

‘Lights and Offerings’ is released as a CD, double vinyl LP and download by Skint Records.

MIRRORS’ suits by Gresham Blake Ltd, Brighton

Vintage Synth Trumps is a card game by GForce that features 52 classic synthesizers

https://www.facebook.com/theworldofmirrors/

Text and Interview by Chi Ming Lai
30th April 2011, updated 17th March 2018

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