So much of the making of Blurry was you experimenting and trying different things, and it’s really cool that it became something that speaks for itself and is complete on its own.
That’s nice to hear. This experimenting is the place where I can switch my head off and not think about anything. Often when I do other music stuff, whether its producing for other artists or doing some fashion stuff, I always have some idea of what it’s supposed to be. With my own stuff, I can come back and have a blank piece of paper, basically, and kind of meditate on it. I don’t have that many other hobbies.
I saw you’re a skateboarder as well, and I was wondering if that influenced your music taste at all?
It definitely did. As a teenager, for sure. That was my main source of music. There was MTV and stuff, but I wasn’t allowed to constantly watch MTV. With skate videos, the soundtracks and visuals together had quite a big impact on me. It was also a way to easily explore those different genres because I didn’t know about blogs and maybe at some point would order CD’s from England. There weren’t many places for me to find music besides skate videos. I’m actually not really a skateboarder anymore. I rarely properly skate anymore these days. But I used to skate a lot as a teenager. Broke my arm three times and got kind of sick of not being able to play guitar every time that happened.
What are some musical influences of yours?
I love Dinosaur Jr. That’s one of the first bands I discovered. Always absolutely love My Bloody Valentine. That band is the perfect example of this kind of “texture” thing. One chord for three minutes, but the textures are so mesmerizing. Definitely a huge influence. One of my favorite bands is definitely Black Sabbath. Still listen to them every other day. I really love Duster. If I had to name one band, that’s probably the band that influenced me the most, in recent years. I keep going back to them and feeling like that hits exactly the spot for me.
How has the reception of your first single been, “Blurry,” released Nov 17th? What was it like releasing the first taste?
It was really cool, actually. I was very excited to post it and to share it and show the new direction. I was really enjoying it. I was nervous, of course, also. With streaming services these days, it’s always good if you fit in some certain category. All the alt stuff, electronic playlists, you think about whether they’re gonna get that, maybe you’re stuff’s difficult to put into a genre. I also don’t care too much. I was really feeling good about it, though!
Tell me about your second single, “Smiling Dog” with Clayjay.
We released the song last week, and the video today. The video is pretty basic. I wanted some sort of performance in the video. Since Clayjay’s in the U.S. it was difficult to get together, and it didn’t sound too great. We were thinking what else we could do, and we found this really cool looking grandpa. I filmed it in my favorite corner pub here in Berlin, playing the song on guitar, and he’s singing Clayjay’s part.
If you weren’t making music what would you be doing?
I studied economics, which was horrible, but I wouldn't know what else to do, so I would probably do that. I’d feel pretty bad about it, I think.
What’s it like recording on cassette?
I have a 4-track tape deck. I can record 4 tracks at the same time if I want to, or one at a time. I just take a tape that usually has some other shit on it and just override it. Record some stuff on it. What’s so nice with tape, as soon as you drive tape a little hotter, put a little more signal into it, it starts to distort in a really nice way, that you can’t, in my opinion, recreate in your DAW or whatever. Tape decks have varied speed so you can pitch things down or up in a much more natural way than it sounds in the computer. It’s nice to have an actual tape afterwards so you feel like you actually achieved something.
Big fan of tangible objects over computer files.
It’s also nice to switch the laptop off.
Your press release states your evoking the ambience of “Lost in Translation.” I really love that movie, and I was wondering if that’s something someone else said, or if those are your words.
I think I was talking to Linda, who does PR, and I was telling her that it's one of my favorite movies. To her, it was fitting. It’s not only the movie, it’s the music as well. The soundtrack is one of my favorite soundtracks ever.
Yeah, I was gonna say, It’s an amazing soundtrack. And I do think your music does somehow evoke the ambience, and also just the sense of loneliness and observation from the outside of something.
That’s really nice, I’m really happy it comes across that way.
What does RIP Swirl mean?
I wanted some kind of moniker to kind of detach the music from myself in some way. Like to have it less connected to me as a person, making it easier for the listener to take the music and interpret it their own way, especially with a name that doesn’t really mean anything. I kind of like my music to not have too much background or story so you can just paste it onto your own life. I’d rather have it just be a feeling, you know? There’s this TV show called the Larry Sanders show, which I really love, and my favorite character Artie is played by Rip Torn. Which I thought is a really cool name, and I also kind of like how it sounds a bit dark. So, I just took his first name, and I’m not even sure where I got the swirl from, but in retrospect, I feel like maybe it’s just me swirling all the different genres together!