Interview Andrew Duke

Pubblichiamo di seguito una chiacchierata con Andrew Duke, noto giornalista, elettromanipolatore sonoro, nonchè produttore tra i più incontinenti (dal momento in cui fu eseguita questa intervista al momento della pubblicazione sono stati pubblicati altri due titoli) attualmente residente ad Halifax, cogliendo l'opportunità di parlare di uno dei suoi più recenti workouts "Take Nothing for Granted", pubblicato dalla sua stessa etichetta, la Cognition Audioworks. Registrato nel 2003, tra quelli più recenti riteniamo sia il più interessante. Il legame con temi socio-politici (notate l'essenzialità dell'immagine di copertina che ricorda una nota rappresentazione della libertà di alcuni artisti anarchici che su campo bianco scrivevano provocatoriamente "Image Freedom") traspare dal nome delle tracce. Ma assicura Andrew. L'album non può essere considerato "bombastical". Interessante del repertorio di Mr.Duke, anche Sprung, capolavoro techno pubblicato nel 2002 dalla francese Bip-Hop.

What's the weather like in Halifax? We just had a record snowfall last month here in Halifax-95.5 cm of snow fell in a 21 hour period. This is very unusual weather, though, and it usually doesn't snow like that. In fact, this was the biggest nonstop snowfall in the last 100 years or so here. Schools, stores, and the transit system were shut down for days because it was so hard to get around.

You're a critical acclaimed techno musician and a journalist. Have you ever tried to write a review for your own record? :) I write the press releases for my albums on Cognition Audioworks and help write the press releases for the albums released on other labels, so that is similar to writing a review, I guess.

The Canadian scene seems to be re-rising. I've experienced that the best electronic music is coming from cold areas of the planet: Canada, Germany, Scandinavia. What's the relation between weather and music? Is your music a weather report? Some of the reviews of Take Nothing For Granted (the review in The Wire, for example) --and reviews of some of my other albums as well--have referenced the weather and/or my location on the east coast of Canada, but I don't think the weather or my geographical location really has an influence on my music. But maybe it is a factor and I just don't notice. I remember in the past when I recorded using strictly analog gear that weather was indeed a factor in the wintertime-at one point my studio was located in a really cold part of the house that didn't have a heater and on really cold days in the winter I couldn't do any recording because my EMAX II (my main piece of equipment at the time) wouldn't always boot due to the cold affecting its circuitry. But it doesn't get very cold in Halifax compared to the cold experienced in other places. The same goes for the heat; sometimes in the summer my laptop might crash a bit more often in the heat during really long recording sessions (so I've got to be careful to keep it cool and ventilated with a fan on nearby), but again it is not that hot here in the summer compared to other places and I'm sure this is a really big problem elsewhere. Sometime you worry that the laptop might crash during a live performance, but I think the only time I ever had a laptop crash during a live performance was when I played at Montreal's Mutek dans la rue (a week long street festival the Mutek organization puts on every summer in Montreal); luckily the crash happened just as I was planning to finish my set anyway.

Some years ago Bip-Hop published Sprung. This album was differently described (someone said "troubled Acme's instruments used by Wile Coyote"!). It looks to me that you wanted to integrate a series of broken cycles with matters that in a way are broken cycles in scientific matters ("Chromosome 20", "RSVP", "Ut Ut"), a sort of swan dive into a very cold ocean... does it? Some albums sound like just a collection of tracks; a compilation of material from one single artist. My goal on Sprung was to record an album that had a real flow to it and that held together as a whole. I wanted it to have a variety as well, so there is a bit of electro, some tracks with an industrial feel, some techno material, some experimental material, and so on. All of the tracks are rhythmic, but I didn't want to make the arrangements too "easy"-I wanted them to be challenging, so you can DJ with them and dance to them, but they're not predictable arrangements. I was really happy to see all the positive reviews of Sprung from around the world. The album was nominated for Album Of The Year (Electronica) at the 2003 Canadian Independent Music Awards. Also, many of the tracks on Sprung were licensed to numerous compilations. "Pharmakoi" was actually licensed to be used in a new Canadian television show called Snakes & Ladders that just aired nationally across the country in mid-March.

We share the same way of composing. Some time ago, an Italian label published some pieces of mine--later I produced for my own without published anything--mainly created by overloading electronic circuits and let sound the results by plugging them to drum machines and synths. It's funny to read how critics try to describe them. How do you create those saturized sounds (in particular that "gummy" bass in "Knot Rocket")? "Knot Rocket", like a lot of the other songs on Sprung, was the result of jamming with Native Instruments' Reaktor and then cutting and pasting the results. Some of the reviews said "Knot Rocket" reminded them of the sounds of frogs and other amphibians, but I didn't use those types of sounds to make that track. But, yes, it is interesting to read things like that and see what images and ideas the music brings to the minds of other people.

If a newbie should ask you the start-up records for electronic music, what would you recommend? Morton Subotnick, Tangerine Dream, Brian Eno, Kraftwerk (I was happy to see their live performance in Montreal in April), Depeche Mode, Skinny Puppy (I got to see them perform in Halifax in 1985), and Mantronix are some of my early favorites.

How many pages of the Encyclopedia do you read a day? :) I am usually so busy with my music these days that I don't do as much reading as I would like. When I do get a chance to read, I usually read non-fiction: music, politics, environment, and health-related magazines, books, and websites.

How's Cognition Audioworks' research going? My Just Because You Can Doesn't Mean You Should album is the current release on Cognition Audioworks; it will be released in June 2004 and is getting lots of positive reviews and leading to a lot of tour requests, which is great. The next album on Cognition Audioworks will be from the Canadian artist Foal (Chad Munson) who is from Saskatoon, in the Canadian Praries. I played a show with him when I was on my Canadian tour last summer and was really impressed with his music. His album is called Foliage and will be out later this year. Also out later this year is an album from Clinker (Gary Joynes) called Unloading 550 Volts. Like Foal, Clinker is Canadian (he is from Edmonton) and I signed him to the label after seeing a really impressive performance from him at Mutek this past year. He shared a bill with Christof Migone, Thomas Koner, and Asmus Tiechens. Out later this year (or maybe early next year) is an album from Granny'Ark (Michelle Irving) from Vancouver, on the west coast of Canada. Like Clinker and Foal, I signed her after seeing/hearing an excellent live performance from her when I played with her, Jimmy Edgar (Warp), and Loscil (Kranky). She has just released an EP on Zora Lanson/Kompakt that is getting excellent reviews.

Wittgenstein wrote: "The work of the philosopher consists in assembling reminders for a particular purpose". But I'm not sure he was really speaking about philosophers, having listened to Take Nothing For Granted. Do your sound-structures come near to Douglas Crimp's idea of recorded present? I know of Crimp's works, but not of his idea of recorded present. As Wittgenstein said: "What I cannot speak about, I must pass over in silence."

Did you create any visual related to caw020 (Take Nothing For Granted) tracks? The graphic design for Take Nothing For Granted is intentionally brutally minimal-just black text on a white background. I wanted it to completely free of pictures so that listeners would focus on the music and come up with their own visuals for it in their minds.

Could you write a track-by-track commentary of Take Nothing For Granted? As John Cage said: "I compose music. Yes, but how?" It is hard to break down an album an examine it so intimately in words (I would rather people listened to it and then formed their own opinions), so I'll just say that my goal was to record an album of parallels and juxtapositions. So "Shuffle" and "Mortal" are almost two parts of one song, and yet different. "Or" and "Warning" pack a powerful punch, and yet they too differ-one is upfront and tough, the other more subtle and disorienting. "Suture" is almost glacial dub material, while "2fwd1bwd" is like the essence of a dance song made from just one sound. I made sure there was a mixture of songs with beats and without, shorter interludes of sound design (like "Cement" and "Progress") for deep listening, as well as many layers. "Britlur" is made from a single string sample; the full version will appear on my forthcoming album on Phthalo. There are also some unlikely sample sources: "Slip", for example, is a super-reduced remix of The Doors' "The Crystal Ship" that I did for my wife-"JLA" is titled as a tribute to her; those are the initials of her maiden name; "Shuffle" and "Mortal" are derived from one of my favorite Stevie Wonder songs, and the vocals from Depeche Mode's "Enjoy The Silence" are used on one of the tracks (can you guess which one)? I don't want to tell readers/listeners too much because I want each listener to form their own story when they listen to my music, so I don't want to say too much.

What do you think about John Cage? I think his ideas were very innovative, especially his famous track that was totally silent (4'33").

Any work in progress? I'm always busy doing something. The best way to keep track of my ongoing activities is to check out my website (http://cognitionaudioworks.com) often. My Consumer Vs. User album will be out on California's Phthalo label soon. The project that I currently working on is a new album for Bip-Hop to be entitled Remembering Jason Trenholm. It is dedicated to my best friend, Jason Trenholm, who died on January 1 of this year as a result of injuries he received after being hit by a car while he was out walking. We met when we were just 5 years old and were best friends for the next 29 years, so there will definitely be a lot of memories infused into the recordings on that album. The album will also include a bonus CD with remixes of some of the tracks on Sprung. I am also doing a lot of scoring and sound design for web installations, documentaries, theatre, film, and television, so if anyone needs scoring or sound design done, they can reach me on andrewduke@cognitionaudioworks.com