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EDLX SPOTLIGHT #14 Ambivalent
September 15, 2011
We hooked up with Ambivalent for a chat after he completed his podcast for edlx
EDLX] How did you start producing and when?
I started with Reason in 2002.
[EDLX] What is your approach to putting the tracks together in the studio?
Sometimes I work on an idea from the very beginning, and then other times it is just a matter of playing with some sounds and seeing where they lead.
[EDLX] Can you describe your sound?
Anything I can say about my music right now will hopefully be irrelevant at another time. So I’d prefer to describe it as “evolving.”
[EDLX] Can you reference some of your influences?
I’d have to reference things like Scorn, Studio 1 and Plastikman. That stuff all definitely stays in my mind. I don’t know how much of it comes out in my music these days, but it got me on the road.
[EDLX] What do you listen to when you are not producing music?
I love old Krautrock, I’m a big fan of Terry Riley and Arthur Russell’s more experimental stuff. Obviously you can tell from the podcast that I’m a big fan of old italo-disco and new wave. I’ve always been a big metalhead, and some strange rock.
[EDLX] What have been your gig highlights of the last 6 months?
When we did a party in Tokyo to bring attention to the fact that things were back to normal, we had such an amazing reaction from the crowd. Opening the Plastikman show in Ibiza was totally awesome, and the next day I played in Tarifa. We had such a nightmare getting there, an entire day of flight problems and finally arrived just in time to go to the venue, and when we walked up to the booth, it was on a beach facing the straight of Gibraltar looking out at Africa at sunset. It was so beautiful I forgot the entire trip getting there.
[EDLX] What is your electric deluxe top ten from the back catalogue?
Sculpture.
[EDLX] What is your next release?
There is a recent release that’s a closely guarded secret. I can’t talk about it.
[EDLX] Who surprises you the most when you play with them? Who is pulling out records that you don’t know?
Ryan Elliot is constantly inspiration. He’s always got this ability to play the perfect record for the perfect moment, and it’s always something you didn’t expect, or have never heard before. Every DJ should strive to have that said about them.
[EDLX] At edlx one part of releases is always the tools. Do you make tools for your own dj sets are you playing lots of edits.
Of course. I make tools all the time! Sometimes they’re edits of tracks I always play, or something that’s a new take on a classic hook or something. Or sometimes they’re just a weird effect line for a layer in a mix.
[EDLX] Anything else you want to mention or say?
There are no rules in techno. Anyone who claims to be a “purist” or who tries to act as though there is one path is an ideologue, not an artist. Ideology is the death of creativity.
