voices #10
◦ “voices” is the place where we ask, artists reply and you read.
here we got:
Alan Graves
answering some questions. We have already observed his ambient / electronic work here.
[1. IDEA]
■ The A. O.: The track from “A Possible Wind” that we prefer is “Atmospheric Drag”. Can you tell us how it came to light?
► Alan Graves: For more than a decade now I’ve been taking a field recorder with me everywhere that I travel and recording the sounds of the atmospheres that I find myself in. I had been going back through my archive and pulling recordings of wind from different environments to use as the foundation for this record. For the track ‘Atmospheric Drag’ I used a field recording I had taken of the wind while hiking through a bamboo forest in Hawaii. I started the track by running that field recording through a series of hardware filters and effects and turning it into the basis of what I would build the track on top of. I created patches and performed synthesizer improvisations to those field recordings in layers. It was actually the first piece that I made for the entire record, and it helped inform where the rest of the project would end up.
[2. CREATION]
■ The A. O.: How do you usually approach composition? Do you start with a concept, a sound, a state of mind or what else? How do you generally proceed from the initial seed to the complete work?
► Alan Graves: When working on more abstract or ambient works like ‘A Possible Wind’, I try to always start with a theme, story, or some sort of imagery that I can use to help find the mood and tone of the piece as it takes shape. I usually impose constraints on myself to help prevent getting lost in the endless possibilities of a DAW. That tends to be limiting myself to a certain set of hardware instruments and effects, and only working with those tools for the entirety of the project. I try to also limit myself to using the first takes of each part when possible. Recently I have been layering improvisations of different sounds until the work is on the verge of feeling crowded, and then do a pass of subtraction until I think that the right balance has been struck.
[3. FEEDBACK]
■ The A. O.: What do you hope listeners feel or experience when engaging with your music?
► Alan Graves: For this project, and also as a co-founder of Bathysphere Records, I’m hoping that the instrumental music that we’re putting out into the world can assist in creating a space for listeners to process their thoughts or to be the general background sounds that help the day move forward. In the context of modern media, I’ve personally felt overwhelmed, distracted, and turned off by the inundation of overt messaging being stuffed into lyrics, movies/tv, social media, etc. I think the true appeal of abstract art and instrumental music is that a piece can encourage the audience to think for themselves and to draw their own conclusions, rather than being told what to think or believe.
[4. IDENTITY]
■ The A. O.: In a world saturated with digital music content, how do you try to keep your sound distinct and personally meaningful?
► Alan Graves: Whenever I’m working on music for my personal projects, I am only making music that I want to listen to. I don’t find much value or inspiration in trying to figure out what might appeal to others. My hope is that if it’s something that I enjoy, someone else may as well. I also don’t put much thought into how to keep my sound distinct, but I do intentionally work with a specific set of tools that I know well, and am always pushing myself to learn new ways to use those tools on each release. Hopefully, that paired with my personal taste and sensibilities coalesces into a distinct sound. I also think that it is important to bring a piece out of the digital realm and into the tangible world by giving each finished work some sort of physical release, no matter how limited a run. My strongest relationships with records are the ones that I own and have on my shelf. It’s so easy to listen to a record on a streaming service, and for it to disappear back into the void. But if a record is in your home, you come back to it over time, read the liner notes, get to know it in a way that you wouldn’t otherwise. Being able to have my own records in physical formats is very important to me.
[5. INFLUENCES]
■ The A. O.: Name three albums that you consider relevant to your musical path and why.
► Alan Graves: ○ Miles Davis – In a Silent Way
In a Silent Way is a massively important record for me and has been for a long time. Teo Macero’s production opened my mind up to what a record can be, and how it can be put together. The idea that this larger work could be made of segments edited out of improvisational recording sessions has really informed my production work on the Bathysphere Records releases that I’ve contributed to. There was a long stretch of my life that, whenever I had a friend over to my house, In a Silent Way would always make it on to my turntable and be the soundtrack to late night conversations. That’s part of why I love it so much; it can be the background music that helps propel a conversation forward, but it’s also such a rewarding record to give active, attentive, listening to. There is always some new detail to be uncovered on each repeat listen. Everyone involved is experimenting at the highest level, which resulted in a truly timeless work.
○ Brian Eno – Ambient 4: On Land
I had been a fan of experimental and ambient music, and of Brian Eno, for many years before I heard Ambient 4: On Land for the first time. I heard it while deep in production on a lyrical record that I wasn’t feeling very inspired by, and it grabbed me so hard that I listened to it on repeat for what was likely months. The mood is so complex. Its use of field recordings always leaves me with a sense of place that’s grounded in reality, but also feels otherworldly at the same time. It’s been very influential on me in how I think about ambient music and what it can provide to the listener. Everytime I listen to it, I’m transported to the very specific sonic world that he created. My copy of the vinyl also has this incredible wiring schematic that Eno provides for an alternative listening environment that he calls ‘An Ambient Speaker System’. He gives instructions on how anyone can add a third speaker behind the listening position in their system to hear the record in the way that he made it. Those sorts of touches make a physical release really special to me. I cherish my copy.
○ Floating Points, Pharoah Sanders and the London Symphony Orchestra – Promises
I was having a hard time narrowing down to a third record for this question, but I walked over to the recently listened to records on my shelf and saw my copy of Promises, which has stayed in rotation at our house since it came out. I think it’s one of the few masterpieces of the modern era. Much can be said about it, but the way that electronic music is so beautifully balanced with the organic, and the human, is stunning and very influential to the way I’ve started to think about how I’d like to create electronic music moving forward.
[6. REGARDS]
■ The A. O.: Leave us with a quote you love.
► Alan Graves: “People in the arts often want to aim for the biggest, most obvious target, and hit it smack in the bull’s eye. Of course with everybody else aiming there as well that makes it very hard and expensive to hit. I prefer to shoot the arrow, then paint the target around it. You make the niches in which you finally reside” (Brian Eno)