beats, breaks & big smiles 2.0: April 2013

Make Your Ears Bleed

It's very easy to think that all good producers come from places such as the US, Europe and Japan. There are tons of interesting names all over the place doing great music and new interesting sounds. DOS4GW is one of those. I listened to him a bit a few years ago, but after meeting the guy down in Melbourne last year got me really into his stuff. So it's with pleasure that I present one of my current favourite beatmakers. He's not just an great Australian artist, he's a great artist period.

First off, please tell us a little bit about yourself. Who's DOS4GW and why shouldn't we miss out on what you got going on?

DOS4GW is a few things - a roguelike hiphop producer and post-rave terror, progressive crunk-noise and skweeeelectronica artist, mainly. Basically it’s samples flipped from anywhere and everywhere from SNES roms to MegaDrive roms to GBA roms to NEOGEO roms, big drums, heavy bass synths and sleigh bells. Airhorns.

Why shouldn’t you miss out? well. It’d be presumptive for me to say ‘cos i’m a bad ass’ or something but you should definitely take a listen because I’ve been working hard on my sound for years now and feel like a) I’m super happy with everything I’m doing now and b) I’m still improving. also c) I like offending people with loud, digital abrasion combined with analog synths and drum machines and seriously if you don’t like that i) you can fuck off and ii) you’re probably reading the wrong fucking interview amirite?

Seriously though your mate Dave likes me so check it out.

How did you get into music making and can you tell us about your musical history?

My mother is a very musical person and she took me to Suzuki Method classes before I could consistently shit in the correct domestic appliance. To give you an idea of ‘very musical’ she has a severe degenerative brain condition and is in residential care but can still play a bunch of Beethoven. Anyway, piano and trumpet lessons all throughout primary school, then tuba in high school, and a stint at the University of Western Australia studying classical music performance. I didn’t last long there though. Took up guitar when I was a spotty teenager as well, and spent about ten years playing with rock and funk bands.

However I was always much more interested in computer generated music and synthesizers, from the age of about 13. I worked a whole summer at a petrol station for $6 an hour to buy a sampler when I was that age, and I’ve been obsessed with collecting gear for longer than I can remember.

The other piece of the puzzle is my obsession with technology and computers. When I was growing up, my Dad got on board with the newish personal computing trend. We had a bangin’ old XT which he wrote a thesis on. I mostly used it to play pinball and King’s Quest. My older brother was also into computers and we used to spend our pocket money at computer trash-or-treasure markets. We’d buy a shitload of old motherboards, CPUs, RAM etc and try to cobble them together into working units. I think the first one that I managed to get working by myself was a 286. To say that I was stoked would be an understatement. I had set off the surge protector more than a few times before that but it was a small price to pay. It was the start of a lifelong obsession with being hands on with technology.

I think being an electronic music artist was somewhat inevitable, right from the start. It scratches a lot of my itches. Plus I enjoy doing it and enjoy meeting other people who do it too. Plus sometimes people give you free drugs!

How would you describe your music and would you mind sharing your creative process with us? Don't hesitate to get geeky for the readers out there.

I find describing my music difficult. Here goes though: it’s 60-170bpm electronic music, more on the head nod type tip rather than the dancefloor vibe, but with rave and tech influences. I produce lots of doom electronica hiphop beats for rappers also.

My process can start in one of two places:

1. Digging at the trash and treasure market or

2. Generating a weird/cool noise/riff with a synth or sampler on hand.

I have a few spots I hit regularly, and I try to only buy a few records at a time to sample. Too much choice = no creative pressure. There’s always a few crates with unusual stuff spread over the markets. And if not, buy some banging percussive techno riddims or a cheesy soundtrack. Get home, play through, flip anything that sounds good. Sometimes it jumps straight out, other times it’s a long wait or a miss, but there’s usually something to try. Once I’ve got the sample, I find that I can hear what it needs (to my ears, anyway) pretty quickly, be it breaks, drum machine hits, bassline, synth melody/harmony, whatever really. I have a massive collection of sounds that I’ve been collecting over the years, but nowhere near as big as some of the libraries I’ve seen. I’m probably somewhere in the middle on that one, e.g. more than 100 breaks but less than 10,000,000,000. Again, too much choice is a bad thing for me.

I’ve got a few favourite synths and samplers too. I used to be a big hardware sampler junkie but downsized recently. Favourite keyboard sampler? Ensoniq Mirage, or possibly the Korg MicroSampler, which is fucking massively underrated, buy one now. Favourite rack sampler? Akai S612, if you’ve played with one you know what I mean. Favourite desktop sampler? MPC1000, only because it’s the only MPC I’ve had and it’s a lot better than my ES-1! haha. Favourite synth? Hands down, my Roland System100 semi-modular, with expander, sequencer (12 step yeah baby!!?) and mixer. Original Virus is up there too (although Yes No Maybe stole mine! jerk). I haven’t bought a new synth in a while so I’m looking forward to finding something a bit more weird. Always been fascinated by the Kurzweil K2000 series so maybe I’ll try to track one of those bad boys down. Controller-wise I mostly just use my MicroSampler because it’s USB and is always plugged in, or if I’m feeling a bit more fruity then I have an EWI-4000S, or padKontrol.

From a recording standpoint, it’s LPs -> Shure M44-7 -> SL1200 -> Pioneer DJM 600 -> dbx 376 tube strip eq, compressor and de-esser, or straight from synth/sampler outputs to the dbx or direct to interface. On that side, I use a MOTU 896HD interface, all routed into Cubase. Most sequencing, processing and extra FX are within the box, with a range of VSTs. I won’t say exactly what (come on, a girl’s gotta have secrets) but there’s distortion FX, delays, EQs, filters and sequenced fucking-with-shit FX. Brands like Waves, Camel Audio, TC Electronic, Audio Damage and Ohm Force. I’m using a Windows 8 PC, with an i7 CPU, Kingmax RAM, Gigabyte boards and Samsung SSDs. I’ve always been a PC hardware guy so I’m fanatical about things like having a good PSU, top end motherboards with good controllers, really inane stuff like that. Makes the tunes sound better, haha. I use Macs at work and hate them, plus a lot of my hardware has stopped working with Macs as they’ve updated things in the last few years. I’ve always been able to make PCs work in the past, and now they just work without any fuckery, so that particular choice is a no brainer for me.

In terms of monitoring I’m outputting to a Mackie Big Knob which is the piece of kit I touch the most in my little studio. Big fan of a Big Knob. I’ve got Mackie 824s (the old ones) hooked up to that for near-field monitoring. I use the headphone outs to see what mixes sound like on shitty canalphones, those TDK ones you see for $12 on the high street, as well as Sennheiser HD 202s (which I maintain are the cheapest yet most flexible headphone on the market, if you need something that you can DJ with, check mixes with in the studio and use on the train without looking like too much of a cock). I also have reed fencing, plastic plants, and fairy lights. And a 40” LCD screen so that I don’t have to squint.

In terms of tunes, sometimes I can hear a sample, flip it, add a break, chop the break, add another kick and some sleigh bells, layer a bassline, play a synth line in, loop it up, arrange and vary it a bit, export it and be done inside an hour. Other times, it takes me three months to go through exactly the same process. I try not to force things too much - if I try a few things and they suck, well, not point trying to rape a track out of the sample. That said, if a sample sounds like it has potential but it’s not quite there yet, then I keep trying. I make on average about 2 beats I’m happy with per month. Slow, but I’m happy with everything that is coming out now, which wasn’t always the case. People are noticing and that’s really motivating because it means that my process is working, even if it is slow. I am jealous of people who can crank out quality beats much faster than me, but I’m happy with where I am, so doubt I will pressure myself to up the ante in terms of sheer output volume.

What are your influences?

I’m heavily influenced by: hiphop. rave electronica, acid house, and a range of drum and bass from 90s jungle to current 2010s tech. youtube. the rings of saturn. hardcore (all kinds). thrash and doom metal, animated gifs, breakcore music.. um.. dobermans.. and magic mushrooms. and whisky. That’s definitely what my music sounds like. It’s the sound of tenuously controlled techno-alcoholism punctuated by psychedelic experiences, amen breaks screwed to 69bpm and Tony Robinson from Time Team smoking a blunt on the site of a Roman villa excavation.

When I was a kid, my older brother was my god, and he was a grunge and metal guy, so that’s what I was. It was acceptable to like The Prodigy, NIN and Cypress Hill because they crossed over. Then I heard Temples of Boom.. the production on that album is godlike. Muggs absolutely kills it. That disc hit me at exactly the right time. I spent some time in Sweden when my mother went on a lecturing exchange there when I was a teenager and it was just a perfect soundtrack to the eternal darkness and heated bus stops in the north of Sweden. It opened my eyes up to hiphop in a way that no record before it did. It’s funny how a ‘3 and a half star’ album can hit you like that sometimes. I was born in ‘84 so I missed rap music the first few times around, but after discovering Gravediggaz and Wu-Tang after that fateful trip, my path was pretty much set (even though I didn’t know it at the time).

I would say that my list of influences is getting smaller over time as I find more confidence in my own sound. But that might just be the sake talking.

Seeing that you're from Australia, what is your opinion about the hip hop/beat scene over there?

I’m probably not the best person to ask about that really. I have never been much into the scene here. This is going to sound like a cop out but.. all my favourite rappers growing up were from the USA. That’s just how rap music sounds to me.

That said though, I love the fact that a lot of crews in Australia don’t really give a fuck about what’s happening on a larger scale, they just do what they want. There’s a big wonky beat scene here but I don’t get into that much... and there are a lot of Dilla-likes fucking everywhere. However, there are lots of people who represent originality in pretty much every city in Australia and I have a lot of respect for that. I think that’s what I like about the scene here - people are really dedicated and you can tell that they love what they do. My Dad always told me that was the most important thing in any aspect of life - loving it and being proactive about what you love - and that makes me optimistic about the future of hiphop and beat music in Australia. A lot of guys are having commercial success too which is great because it always drives more engagement with the more real scenes, no matter how commercial and fake the progress might seem. It might seem like those guys have it easy but a few people around me are on that path and it has a whole lot of other stresses and troubles that underground guys don’t even have to know about. Imagine your whole career trajectory being determined by an FM radio tastemaker! crazy.

I’ve been really lucky in that I’ve been at the right place at the right time when it’s come to meeting the right people in my journey through the underbelly of the weird music scenes in Australia and via the internet, the world. Hooking up initially with The Community was a godsend, and then when I moved over to Melbourne from Perth, the genesis of L-Burn was happening and I just lucked straight into such a tight thing with those guys.

Tell us a bit about The Community and L-Burn ILLuminati.

I met Mathas from The Community when we were in high school. We both went to a pretty conservative school that was pretty supportive of the traditional arts like orchestral music, theatre etc. so it was a strange place to meet someone like that. Mathas is a great MC and awesome producer, but I didn’t know that at the time. I knew he was a good actor because I played in the bands for the school plays. I knew the guy and we were friendly but we weren’t tight. A couple of years later I started getting a bit more confident with my beats and my man Loss suggested that I talk to Mathas because ‘he does hiphop’. Fucking lucky that I did too, I took a beat CD down to the Hyde Park Hotel in Northbridge, WA one night because I saw Mathas on the bill there. Shout outs to the old Hyde Park, 40 cent pool representing. I got chatting with him after his set, gave him the CD, and boom, things were rolling. He guested on tracks for me, I recorded his 10lb Hairless Sasquatch album at the house I was living in at the time, and Diger and the whole Community family just opened their arms to me pretty much just through that. Looking back they were insanely tolerant of me, which was lucky because I was a bit of a cunt back when I was younger. Drank way too much, got out of hand easily. I remember once trying to choke Diger’s partner because she stole my walking stick at a party. I bumrushed the decks at another party when YLEM was playing. I was mortified afterwards of course. Getting off on the wrong foot like that can be fucking damaging in the wrong scenes. But they were patient and I am forever indebted to them for that. These days, The Community has grown into a huge artist and creative collab group, making dope beats, tunes, raps, art, visual, everything. Nothing but good shit comes out of there. Peace Community fam, I still got you.

Things were going good and I was getting my MySpace friend numbers up (shout outs Justin Timberlake bringing that back) when a guy called Brendan Webb hit me up asking me if I wanted to play the opening of a night called Render in Melbourne, and he knew this rapper GDP who was coming out, did I have any beats I could send for him? I went over, played the night, met AOI, Mr DNA and GDP (who was in town at the time, in from New Jersey). Got drunk as hell, as usual. GDP and AOI and I made the Magic Bullet tape, in our bedrooms and whatnot, over the internet, which I think still bangs pretty hard. A few years later, after I had moved over to Melbourne and met a few more guys, L-Burn was born. Props to DNA and AOI for getting me in on the ground floor with that!! haha. L-Burn is going from strength to strength now. We’ve got some great releases coming in 2013, Kwasi just dropped his EP which is dope as hell, Yes No Maybe dropped his tape loops EP which is on repeat in my headphones right now, amazing, me and DNA are just about to drop our EP, AOI is still going nuts with the records to prove it coming out left right and centre (24 releases in 2012!!!! what the fuck!?!?!!), Epps is coming hard and killing the battle scene as well as making waves in the acting community and recording on the side, we’ve got Tigermoth down in the L now throwing out MAJOR waves across the globe, watch out for his new disc, KLB is rolling out the soundpond crew in Melbourne, what up Calum, Class A is up for best female MC in the ozhiphop.com awards this year and has more Facebook likes than all of us put together!! GDP starting some major shit in NYC/NJ, NoEmotion GoldMask cranking out videos and internet hits from Miami, Suckerfish P Jones is in Melbourne reppin’ L, watch out for him, RIP Prince Mackadilly, Namine is going to blow everyone away, that kid is amazing, watch out for his album in the first half of this year, DJ LAME rolling out his Drty Shdws Prjkt label worldwide, DANKCITY filming more amazing shit, So High finally being persuaded to release his beats (COME ONNNNNN!!!), watch for that, Dyl Thomas smoothin’ out on y’all, fuck son and we got the L-Burn crew album starting recording in two weeks!!! I’ve heard a lot of the beats for it already and they are m_e_n_t_a_l. so.. watch out for L-Burn in 2013, is what i’m tryin to say I guess, haha.

Do you have a dream project that you would like to work on?

Yep I’d love to produce a record featuring Sadat X, Count Bass D, Klashnekoff, Prodigy, B-Real, GDP, No Emotion and Danny Brown. Then, I’d just put out the instrumentals. Release the raps on like limited bonus 7”s or something :)

What do you want to accomplish with your music?

Strange question. I’m not consciously trying to accomplish anything, except for self-gratification. I make music because I do, and always have. It would be nice to leave something other than a gravestone and a few memories on this earth, so music is a good avenue in there. Seriously though, I’m not really sure. I think that’s why I enjoy it so much. No boundaries, no expectations, just art.

What are you up to when you're not making music?

I work in user experience design, which is kinda like at the junction of designing interactions (so things like web sites, apps, etc), market research (finding out what users of said apps, sites etc actually want and need) and service design (making sure all touchpoints between a user and a brand, business or organisation are cohesive and comply with a consistent message and vision).

Basically I’m a designer who can also do research and analysis. Sounds sexy, no? I work 9-6 like a good boy, and work my music around that.

I live in Hawthorn with my girl and a cat called Pepper who meows at me a heap. She’s sitting next to me right now actually. I like to watch QI, Time Team, nerd shit like that. I like videogames too, but after 25ish years of playing them, other things in life are taking priority. I used to play maybe 8 hours per day, videogames on PC, when I was a teenager. Now I try to funnel that energy into more creative channels and for the most part it is working. I play games to relax now, not to hone my Counterstrike skills to the next 0.01 percentile. That said I have clocked more than 300 hours in TF2. :S

What can we expect from you in the near future?

The near future: DNA x DOS is coming out very soon, early April. We’re in final stages of mastering it, so it’s done, 99% there. Release party at the Croft on April 13!! I’ve also got a few remixes coming out soon that have been in the bag for a while, most notably a remix for Walter Gross + sole that I did late last year, as well as a Cult Favorite remix that I’m really liking at the moment. New L-Burn album, as I mentioned before - I will have a couple beats on there. New DOS4GW instrumental record, the follow up to SUICIDE, called SUISIDE B, is coming along slowly... it’s a year since I put out SUICIDE and I’ve been getting distracted with other projects so haven’t been spending enough time on it like I planned. That’s the big one for me this year though, I’m getting it done no matter what before mid year so that I can ramp that up with a bit more publicity and what not than I usually do. I’ve got another release with GDP coming this year hopefully too, if I can get onto the guy. AOI/DOS4GW split cassette dropping soon on Seaby Records. DOS x k(no o) split EP also, look out for that, we haven’t started though haha!!

I could drop a bunch of names and say oh I’m hoping to write with this person and collabing with that person but to be honest who knows what will happen this year. I actually want to get started on that dream record I mentioned too (and have a couple of ins so ... who knows, it could happen!). Basically what I’m gonna do is write a whole bunch of music, put it on the internet, update twitter, and see how things go. I have the luxury of hardly anyone knowing who I am, so pressure is self-created for the most part. The blessing of being ‘underground’. But don’t worry, lots of stuff coming, for real.

Shout outs?

You know who you fucking are. L-burn. Community. Reservoir Sound (whatup AM, elucid, let’s do it). GDP, Slangcorp, if you’re still around. Can’t wait for AOI x TMFSE. 3BY3, thanks for the mixtape love - same to SKYWLKR, thanks for putting me on the mixtape god. Shouts to all my heads working community radio and online radio, soundpond, RTRFM, 3RRR, PBS, electric crush, down underground. Shouts Seaby. Kimi Räikkönen, come through this year son. Glenlivet, I’m keeping y’all in business so how about a free hat or something? Dan Murphy. My new dentist, you rock, and BUPA for footing most of my bills like a boss. Insurance is finally paying off. All the hardworking people I pirated programs off of over he last 15 years, I’m sorry, I’m paying for your shit now mostly, I got you, you know me, shouts. I’m good for it. Meow outs to Pepper and to Stevens, RIP you crazy motherfucker. And Kerrianne, I love you, and now you can’t tell me I never shout you out!! and beats breaks & big smiles :) peace!