Pluie/Noir Studiocast 01 "Erik Sature"
Sound Mixed and Performed by Vadim Svoboda Visual Interpretation by Max Binski
Soundcloud Link: soon
Pluie/Noir teams up with Make Sense's Vadim Svoboda for a new series featuring artists exploring their favourite musical gear through improvisation.
Vadim's session is particularly educational. As a true connoisseur of Elektron's Machinedrum and a lover of classical music, Vadim decided to focus on the ROM feature of Elektron's infamous first drum machine and deconstruct Erik Satie's music on the fly.
Used in the video:
Elektron Machinedrum SPS1UW+ mkII
Strymon Deco
Zoom H6
YouTube (sampling source)
Cleymoore interviews Vadim Svoboda:
Hi Vadim, such a pleasure to have you at P/N finally, especially having you bring a new format to the series. How are you, all things considered, amidst this global chaos?
Hello Bruno! Thank you, the pleasure is mutual! Been a long time we met each other and I’m glad to participate in Pluie/Noir's very subtly sharp universe. Regarding my physical being, I’m safe and sound. Thankfully, isolated in the countryside of France with people I love, so I feel lucky! I guess music producers are somehow trained for social distancing, but this is a serious threat to humanity, so it has to be taken very seriously. I wish we will learn lessons from it.
We’ve met a while ago, back when I was living in Paris. Makesense was on its 3rd release and you were still resident at the Sundae parties in Paris. How did the scene change after all these years?
I guess Paris became a bigger target for booking agents and famous DJs, but those « headliner » performances in big events didn’t necessarily help build our scene further. On the other hand, the reaction it provoked was good, and I see more and more promoters having the guts to do something special, and focusing more on the local talent, with 100% original music. This is, in my opinion, the best way to build a strong french scene. Booking one big name from the ’90s won’t really push our scene further, whereas booking 100 locals actually might.
After a long hiatus period, Makesense returned in 2018 with your own album 'Hasard Ordinaire'. A total shift in style for the label, it presented a side of you a lot of people didn’t know: bold, experimental and tremendously deep. Is this the direction you want to explore?
Yes, I’ve planned to explore different musical styles with Makesense from the start. Makesense has always placed a focus on emerging talents and promoting forward-thinking music. That’s what we pride on, and that’s what drives us. This year will feature at least two new releases. The first one from a very close friend of mine, someone I consider to be one of the most innovative french producers around, and the second one will be the first release of a Japanese Machinedrum master; glitchy, breaky and yet, so romantic. I have goosebumps while typing this, and I can't wait to show it all to you. We are back and for good.
There’s a lot of sound manipulation of Pianos in Hasard Ordinaire. Is Piano is a big part of your creative life?
I’ve been playing the piano since a very young age, so it plays an enormous part in my creative life. Throughout my life, I've used it mainly for advertisements and soundtracks. When I was about 18yo I’ve fallen in love with step sequencers, which lead me to the discovery of Elektron's Machinedrum. Because it's so simple to play, sequence and perform, almost like a piano, I've decided to perform live with it. I’m now trying to mix both of these worlds, and both creation processes: acoustic, grid-free, and synthetic pattern sequences. 'Hasard Ordinaire' is a gathering of several tracks I composed between 2009 and 2018: a compilation of musical drafts, or test tracks, that for some reason I’ve always hesitated to share.
When we met, you already had a deep love for the Elektron machines. I remember seeing you perform live with 2 Machinedrum, and carefully observing you flow with them in a very peculiar way. Is the Machinedrum currently your drum machine of choice?
Yes, even though I've tried to take my distance from it many times. But it became an expansion of my soul, and most certainly a big part of my trademark sound. After 3 years of abstinence, I’m very excited to be back to this machine. I’m now separating outputs, applying external audio processing, reverbs, and compression, in order to improve it's sound while facing new challenges at the same time.
Do you record your samples always through the same mediums?
The samples I use in my regular productions are always transferred to the ROM machine of the Machinedrum, and those can come from anywhere, including internet samples banks, vinyl records, youtube, iPhone recordings, etc. Those sources are converted by the Machinedrum into a 12-bit lo-fi sound that I like and are never left untouched. I like to create the groove from A to Z, so I use the timber of the sample to create texture, and sequence it upside down. I like to put a sample in the centre of special projects, like in "Erik Sature".
This session seems like an educational experiment. What did you intend to reach?
Every couple of days someone asks me something about this machine. I love it. I’ve never met anyone at Elektron but I feel like I'm probably one of their earliest Machinedrum owners. I bought my first SPS1-UW in 2005, and I've spent a minimum of 4 hours per day, every day, for more than a decade, on this machine. It just took me a long time to find the best way I could share my knowledge. I wanted it to be fun to do (hence the improvisation), fun to listen to (like a normal live performance/mix) and yet, still educative (like a tutorial). I’m ultra-passionate about the Machinedrum, and I feel a special connection with the people that feel the same about it.
Why Erik Satie?
In my opinion, the best sample is the one you can't recognize. Satie brings a lot of emotion with very few notes, so it’s somehow easy to grab the texture of a certain piece, or its central mood while transforming it and creating a whole new melody on the fly, with very little effort. I think minimalist piano players are fun and easy to sample. You can quickly appropriate yourself of their sound. Chopin or Rachmaninov, on the other hand, would need more slicing precision, and I guess the podcast wouldn’t have this « easy-listening » touch. I wanted the first one to be simple, and clear.
What can we expect from you in the near (or not so near) future?
I almost finished a piano album that took me 2 years of practice and re-organising of my entire studio. I hope to be able to perform this album in small intimate venues (if we survive this virus!). Playing keys in a concert has nothing to do with playing keys in a recording studio. Then I'll get back to clubs, which I’ve missed very much.
Links:
http://www.makesenserecords.com http://vadimsvoboda.bandcamp.com http://www.maxbinski.com http://pluienoir.tumblr.com https://www.elektron.se/legacy-products/
Web: http://www.ringsofneptune.com / info (at) pluienoir (dot) com
