Intervista Joan Malé

Abbiamo avuto modo di conoscere Joan Malé sia attraverso un disco pubblicato all'incirca due anni orsono per una produzione della stimata etichetta londinese Expanding (When I Was A Child I Wanted to Be An Astronaut sotto il moniker Monoceros) sia per la sua acclamata partecipazione al Sonar, noto festival di nuove e blasonate leve dell'elettronica che si tiene con cadenza annuale a Barcellona, la splendida città dove Gaudi ha lasciato molte delle sue creazioni non molto distante dal paesino in cui lo stesso Joan vive, il minuscolo villaggio di Sant Marti d'Empuries. Dei tanti pseudonimi usati da Joan, Monoceros è probabilmente il piu' noto e in questi giorni è uscito il suo secondo album, questa volta fregiato dei marchi Fueradeserie (una piccola etichetta di Barcellona che ha già prodotto lavori di Apparat, Anders Ilar e Sinf) e Imaginary Nonexistent Records (etichetta fondata dallo stesso Joan per promuovere e produrre i suoi progetti -oltre al citato Monoceros, le denominazioni piu' importanti sono Lumiere e Salad- e per propiziare collaborazioni con altri artisti del suono). Il suo sound è un piacevole intreccio di calde sonorita' leggermente malinconiche, intriganti textures elettroniche con evoluzioni piuttosto variegate: si passa da interessante spruzzate di breaks IDM a timbriche piu' sperimentali, da tracce in cui dominano melodie dolcissime fino a passaggi in cui Joan sembra sposare la formula compositiva propria del glitch. Di questo e di altro abbiamo parlato con lo stesso Joan, che ci ha preannunciato l'imminente pubblicazione di un EP con il suo progetto Salad, sul quale vi terremo informati.

Invitandovi all'ascolto della sua musica (qualche traccia è disponibile gratuitamente sui mini-siti relativi ai singoli progetti), vi auguriamo buona lettura). MONOCEROS Tales for Silent Nights (Fueradeserie/Imaginary Nonexistent) 01.The day we become one 02.<<(The big wave) 03.Warm 04.Depression and vortex at Jan Mayen 05.Background birds 06.Northern lights 07.Off (tales) 08.Tales for silent nights 09.Little pieces 10.Happiness

Hi Joan. First of all, how are you? Fine, thanks. Hard at work.

Your second album "Tales for silent nights" confirms your skills as a sound wizard. Some journalists describe music like yours by using the expression "landscapist music". Do you like this way of labelling your sound? If you mean that this music can open your mind to imaginary places…well.. I do hope so. It's not just a kind of background music, it definitely lets your imagination run wild.

I love your tunes and a lot of thevibes.net readers maybe began loving it, too. Any piece of advice for better appreciating it? Which is your main source of inspiration? It's difficult to say. I believe the place where I live, with its landscapes and the sea, often inspires my music, but I think quietness - especially in wintertime - is essential in composing. I spend many hours a day working, now also with the label, and I run a restaurant, which is what I do for a living. It's open only six months a year, which leaves me time to work on music, but, unfortunately, not enough for the live events I'd like to do. I think the best setting for "Tales for silent nights" is home, at night, probably after a day of hard work. You can even appreciate this kind of music when you are asleep, in the middle of consciousness in sleep or lucid dreaming, when the images that music creates in your brain are halfway between dreams and reality.

You live in a small village near Girona, don't you? Yes, 40 km from Girona, near the sea. It's a medieval town with stone walls, still resist the building fever thanks to the Roman and Greek ruins nearby.

Any influence from what is surrounding you in Sant Marti d'Empuries? I think I've already taken a picture of every single coin of St Marti. Landscapes are very important to me. The album "Tales for silent nights" should have come out with a photo book with the series of the pictures of full moon I took - and this is something I'm still working on (as usual $$...) - since I think that this album is closing the night full moon pics series.

What do you think about the massive recurring to field recordings in electronic composition? I think that some people are tired of pure electronic sounds, after all these years. On the one hand, I think it is a general tendency, people try to make something new or simply recycle of electronic sounds. On the other hand, people are waiting for another Hendrix, Beatles or Aphex Twin to change the scene, I think that the idea of "market" and "new" has also some part in it. But if you live in a little village like me, all these things are more far away and you follow your own rhythm, it's a very simple question, you like it or you don't like it, and the wrapper has nothing to do with it.

Could you reveal to us what kind of tricks/instruments you use for treaten sounds by giving that deepness which marks bass tones and drum sounds as well as electric piano (like that in Warm)? I usually work with samples and I make cut and paste. The origin of them can be from virtual or real synths, field or acoustic instruments (drums, guitars, toys), after they have been recorded I tend to cut and paste them, I use softs from 7 years ago, and a lot of freeware synths. I never use midi, and when I make a loop in a sequencer, I cut it again and again, maybe to use the last part of a snare, kick etc...Then I use ableton live 4 for live sets, and I usually visit kvr site to find more new instruments. The compression in bass and kicks as well as the use of reverb / echo is essential. But my next album will probably be simpler with less fx.

Your first record was issued by the excellent Expanding. Are you going to publish any other bijou by Paul Merritt's label? Any work in progress? I'm working that out, but Paul probably will answer better than me. At the moment all my projects are focused on my label, not only Monoceros, I have other alias for other genres, but just like you and other people, I'm waiting to hear Expanding's next release! It's of course one of my favourite labels, and I feel very close to them and their artists.

You recently performed in Finland! Did you manage to see Aurora Borealis? I will play on 24th, together with an artist from Girona (Lluis Sabadell) at the Ice and Fire Festival, which will take place in a town called Savitaipale. We have been working on the music, and after that, there will be a Monoceros live - if I don't get frozen! as I heard that there could be -20º... Anyway, I think that Aurora occurs from September to October, doesn't it?

Could we hope to see you perform in Italy? I have been in Italy on holiday for the last two years and I'd love to.

Do you still want to become an astronaut? :) No, but I follow the astronomy news, I have been looking pics of Mars with that 3d glasses on the NASA site, am I a freak?

The main differences between that record and "tales for silent nights"? Well, that record was sort of childish and naive, this one is darker and deeper, and all the tracks have been done to work as one. Every album contains an embryo of the following one. For example, the track "the astronaut" on the previous album paved the way to this one, and the track "my lego enterprise" laid the ground for "funny toys" of my forthcoming Salad project.

Someone -maybe The Black Dog or Paul Van Dyk- talked about an instrument which could produce sounds coming into mind, recording it immediately on a support, while answering to a journalist asking for a music instrument still to be invented. What about yours? Some people say that the next step in human evolution will be fusion with machines. I believe one day plugins will be able to decide rhythms autonomously, but they will never been able to emulate humans. The same goes for Random-based instruments, which can follow the laws of harmony and music, but not like a "human feeling emulator". But surely that the most simple thing will be the next, like Hendrix used distortion and changed the music of 20th century. But I also have to say that the technology development will probably come to a halt in the next few centuries.

Even if it's still a small label, could you anticipate anything about projects related to Imaginary Nonexistent Records? I will release 3 eps at the same time, Salad "[º_O]" inr002cdr , "Over mini-pop" inr003cdr , and "Electro Faith" inr004cdr, 100 copies of each in a very nice CDR collection and in mp3/Flac at digital stores. One of these tracks will be on a 12" since some of them are dance-oriented. I'd like to release some .Exe on vinyl, I have a remixes project from "Tales for silent nights", and I'm thinking of moving my studio to make the new Monoceros album. At the moment there are many lines in progress, maybe some electric guitars too... who knows.