Not Quite 20 Questions with E*Rock of Audio Dregs Recordings
http://www.circleintosquare.com/feature/44
By Hiram Lucke
(photo of E*Rock by Anthony Gerorgis)
HL: How and when did Audio Dregs Recordings start?
E*Rock: I'm not sure exactly when it started, but it's been over a decade
at this point. It was a cassette duplication project for music that
I recorded at home as well as my brother's music (E*Vax) and then friends
with recording projects that wouldn't have left the bedroom otherwise.
Later I discovered the cassette labels Shrimper and Sonic Enemy and
realized that what I was doing a "record label" too. I was
just operating on intuition, inspired by DIY music recording that I
heard on college radio growing up outside of Cleveland. The idea that
musicians created something outside of normal cultural boundaries was
fascinating to me. Step by step I got more serious with it. The ADR
catalogue numbers start in the 30's and the secret there is the previous
incarnation of the label was maybe 30 or so tapes. ADR is on 76 now.
HL: How did you find the artists on your label? Are they friends, family,
demos sent in?
E*Rock: Its still mostly friends and family. I met a few people via
demos, but most people are friends that I've made via musical interests.
I like to think of it as sort of an artists collective since it was
more about cultivating people's craft and growing rather than a commercial
venture.
HL: When and why did you start Fryk Beat?
E*Rock: I had this idea to do something more vocal combined with an
influence from my interest in dance music. Its also kind of my idea
of "pop" whereas ADR is more the "headphone" label-although
this isn't a hard defined thing. My friend Eric Johnson was working
at a big local ad agency called Wyden & Kennedy and their Tokyo
office operated a nice label so he was trying to get something going
in Portland and asked me to get involved so I presented this idea for
Fryk Beat that I came up with when I was doodling in my notebook on
an airplane to play a show at AMODA in Austin. I was hoping for something
more collaborative but WK didn't end up biting; we decided to run with
it because we were excited about the idea and wanted to get the music
out but it is now more of a sub label that I do by myself again.
HL: Do you have a favorite music format for listening?
E*Rock: I like different formats for different reasons. The vinyl LP
is probably my favorite; with vinyl download is nice for convenience,
especially for traveling, but the clarity of CD sure beats mp3s. I like
cassettes too, and will probably release some more cassettes soon of
my own music, but I don't miss making them, so it will be on other people's
labels! It's cheap but has a totally new context. Once it was about
availability, now it's almost more an idea of exclusivity and being
a rare, handmade object. I'm not one that sold all their vinyl for CDs,
then all their CDs for mp3s because I have a hard time to get rid of
any music, to a fault. My room is just crammed with recorded music;
its a joke and will some day be the death of me.
HL: How about for your labels' releases?
E*Rock: LP+DVD+mp3 is maybe the ultimate. The only way it would be better
would be gatefold jacket with clear
HL: Do you find that you have more sales with vinyl, CD, or mp3 downloads?
E*Rock: Everyone stopped buying CDs near the end of 2009, so that makes the label release schedule slow way down since that was our bread and butter. More mp3s sell now, but its so easy for people to get things free you can't really depend on that either. I don't really want to do a digital only release, but that might be better than doing a couple LP releases a year and waiting for them to recoup before moving on? I have no idea what things will be like in six months from now. I probably won't do many more CDs, so the next release we're doing is an LP+DVD+mp3 download by ROTFLOL (aka Jacob Ciocci from Paper Rad) and then maybe the new Copy album will be CD and LP. I should know by next month, but really I'm winging it at this point.
HL: Do you have any favorite music labels? Ones that you can depend
on a quality product when you buy it?
E*Rock: I like DFA a lot. Mostly I pay attention to local friends' labels
like Marriage, States Rights, Community Library, Gnar Tapes, UHU, Portland
Bad Date Line, Night People... My favorite radio show is still King
Loser's Cut Out Bin on WSPN 91.1 every Sunday night. I don't believe
in the preciousness of genre and I've always tried to release things
that are non-genre. There were tons or genre labels that I followed
a few years back, and its nice to know what you're getting, but things
are so spaced out now I can't say there are many that I follow for that
reason.
I find myself following artists more and a few solid blogs which act
as more the modern version of a zine crossed with college radio show.
I like the blogs Wave at Night, Disco Delicious, 20 Jazz Funk Greats,
Tumblr!....
HL: Is there a label that you've thought of as a model for either label?
E*Rock: I really liked Homestead when I was younger. Puik, a small cassette
label that was run by Jelle Crama had the best artwork ever.
HL: Any music right now that catches your ear?
E*Rock: Restless People from New York, White Flight, Delicate Steve...
can't wait for Ratatat LP4 (I've only heard rough draft). There's so
many great local Portland bands these days, I don't even want to start
naming names.
HL: Has there ever been an album that you've heard and thought, "Damn,
I wish I would have put that out."?
E*Rock: Not really. If someone else put it out the I don't have to...
releasing and consuming are not really an end to a means, its better
to put your efforts into sharpening your skills and creating.
That said, I'd love to be putting out another E*Vax album (if he would
finish it) or even Ratatat, but they're too popular. If I was doing
that I wouldn't have time to do anything else creative. Its more like
I hear a song and think, "Damn, I wish I had made something that
epic," or "written a song that made me feel that way."
Its nice to have things that sell though so you can put more things
out without having to worry about finances. Actually, I'm listening
to Bobby Birdman remixes right now that we made a tour CDR of and thinking
damn, this would have been a nice 12", but it will probably come
out later as mp3 release.
Actually, I'd love to re-issue the Springwater LP, some Matt Brinkman mystery synth, more crazy silk screened small runs maybe. I wish someone had reissued all the Super Roots series on vinyl, but I really don't need any more records in my life, so whatever.
HL: Any big projects coming up, whether in art, your label, or music,
that you'd like to tell us about?
E*Rock: Yes! This ROTLFOL release, new Copy are next. New E*Rock album?
Yuichiro Fujimoto, Dim Dim, Melodium have new albums too. Atole, Bobby
Birdman remixes.... We're doing a re-issue of Fantastic Palace, an old
favorite of mine, though very obscure. There aren't enough hours in
a day.
Also, together with Copy and Manny from Atole we organize a monthly
dance party at Rotture called Supernature; a couple live bands and we
DJ. Its kind of like "Audio Dregs presents" even though we
don't bill it that way.
HL: Any words of wisdom for those who'd like to start a label of their
own?
E*Rock: I think keeping local, working with friends is the best way
to start, and to stay at this point. Bands these days are their own
business, its less about the labels, so the label should be more of
a community for ideas and ventures; another way to communicate those
ideas. Its pretty thankless and not too glamorous. I never wanted to
be a "label guy," but its a good way to create some activity,
work some video, get into design, music, DJing, making zines, print
shirts, whatever you want to get into... its all part of the bigger
picture. I'm still trying to find the bigger picture, but that's the
point, I guess. You never reach that point where you "got there,"
you have to keep experimenting, working and evolving.
"Oh we're famous, we can die now!" What's the point in that?
Audio Dregs @ Cuemix
What’s behind the name of your label? How did this name
come about (by accident, a word game)? Or does the name express or reflect
the philosophy of the label?
I thought sounded subversive and
underground to me at the time. I sat in my room for an evening or two
and brainstormed names until I came up with it. "Dregs" being
something overlooked and of no use to people or society and "Audio"
was self explanatory.
When was the label founded? And who started the label?
After I graduated from college in upstate New York I moved to Portland,
OR on the opposite side of the country and started doing more with the
label. I did some CDR releases and decided to put out my brother's first
solo electronic release on 7 inch. That was the first E*Vax release.
He moved to Portland in 2000 and partnered up on the label with me at
that point and we released his full length at that point on CD/LP.
That's also why the ADR catalogue numbers start at about 25. I'd released
about 25 cassettes on my previous label that I started in college.
What was the intention behind starting a label? Did it start
as a "witty" response like, "Let's try out to run a label,"
or was there kind of a business idea right from the start?
When I started doing a cassette label in college, it was more about
putting out stuff by friends so that more people could hear it, so I
wasn't out to "start a label" so much as just wanting to duplicate
things to share the music. When I discovered this DIY cassette label
called Shrimper I realized that I was doing was already a "record
label" in the basic sense. I didn't know anyone else who was doing
a label at the time, so there was no one to tell me that it was a bad
idea. I don't really run Audio Dregs like a business still, it operates
more like a collective of sorts.
Do you also run sub-labels? Why and when did you add them to your label
roster?
I started Fryk Beat in 2006 with another friend. This label has a different
musical focus. I also started Jyrk with some friends which would be
more of a free art and noise CDR label, but I stopped contributing and
just do videos for that now.
How would you describe the style/sound of your label (sublabel)?
What are the musical boundaries? Which musical "drawer" do
you like to fit most of your label's music?
Audio Dregs was always about music that sort of fell between genres,
though it tends to take the form of solo projects of a somewhat electronic
nature, usually its instrumental too, but not always. I think of this
as more of the headphone music, where as Fryk Beat is more social, like
music you would put on at a party. Fryk Beat is more of a "pop
label" in this way, music with vocals, and some more DJ friendly
moments. But there's also some ADR artists like Copy and the upcoming
E*Rock and E*Vax records which are pretty dance floor friendly as well.
Which kind of media do you use for your releases (MP3, CD,
Vinyl...)? Are there any plans in the near future to add new media formats?
Which media formats are definitely uninteresting to you?
We do mp3, vinyl, CDs, zines and t-shirts. The upcoming Panther CD+LP
coming in March 2007 will include a DVD. In 2007 I'm probably going
to releases a book+DVD of my own artwork as well through Yeti Publishing
and would like to do a video collection DVD at some point on Audio Dregs.
Do you own/run a shop or web-shop? How important is owning
a store for you?
I do run a web shop, but its hard to maintain when touring, so its nice
that my distributor Darla also does a very complete web shop as well.
Still its nice to offer direct orders on limited LPS or CDR releases
that are more handmade, with hand screened cover art.
In which countries do you distribute your records? Do you work
with a Distribution? Or do you manage the distribution by yourselves?
Darla manages my distro, which does well in Japan and the states, but
we don't have much distro in Europe at all.
How do you become interested in new artists?
It's like making friends. If you meet someone and you like and you like
their music then sometimes there's a possibility to collaborate.
What do you think about the range of artists a label should
sign? Less is more? Or does a big range of artists help to get more
attention?
I go back and forth on this, sometimes I think its great to branch out,
but I also like labels with a consistent sound as well, although consistency
in quality is the most important thing.
Do you have a demo policy? Who listens to the demos and decides
to take new artists onboard?
I listen to all the demos myself, but I stopped accepting them because
it was too much to keep up with. Maybe I’ll start again someday,
but as it is there's more music to release than I have time for.
What about the number of releases in one year. How many releases
do you usually have in one year? And how much ahead do you plan your
releases?
There's no game plan to the number of releases, and sometimes there's
more time to plan ahead, but sometimes I just release them as they get
finished.
Is there a connection between the hometown of your label and
the label itself? Do you think if you would move to another city your
label probably would lose his identity?
For a long time almost every artist I released was from outside of Portland,
and often the USA, but I'm doing more with local artists now. I wish
I had more local artists actually, but most of my friends here don't
need another label because there's a lot of small DIY labels. Everyone
in Portland has their own label.
Which of your releases would you name as the most successful
release?
The E*Vax - Parking Lot Music was the biggest seller. E*Vax's new band,
Ratatat has been doing really well, though now they're now on a big
label which can give them a lot more promotion. Hopefully, we'll have
the next E*Vax album done by the middle of 2007. I think the new Lullatone
is going to do real well also.
Besides the sales figures which one is your personal number
one?
There's a lot of favourites.
Nobody likes to talk about failures, anyway, how much time must pass
until you would call a release a “flop”?
Any records which hadn’t any success in the beginning
and after you named it a flop it became successful by accident?
There's a couple that didn't sell as much as I thought, like Lineland,
but its a really strong albums so I'm not sure why these got overlooked.
Bad timing maybe, but then recently there has been some new movement
and things like a song is supposed to be played on "This American
LIfe"'s new TV series.
Your feelings about the music market: Would you say things
are getting harder for record labels through things like p2p, mp3….?
Some things are easier, but it is more complicated too. There's more
details and formats, and it takes up a lot of time to deal with everything.
I wish I could do just LP releases and offer free mp3s with vinyl, but
I don't know an easy way to do that.
Which kind of medias/press do you use for promotion? How do
you select the media you work with?
Its a crap shoot. I don't have much money or time to do much promotion
so I keep things small and as simple as possible.
In general; how important is the press for electronic music?
There's not a lot of outlets right now, not too many adventurous indie
type zines rightnow. Most places write about the same 10 bands, which
has always been normal, but I guess I don't read reviews so much and
I really don't need to read about Sufjan Stevens every day on Pitchfork.
Someone needs that hourly update, but not me, I have enough to do already.
What makes you really upset when you work with the press? A
bad review, no response…
No response is the worst, but not everyone wants to be challenged to
make up their own minds.
Music is business, like every other business. With that in
mind, how important is "friendship" and "trust"
to you when you work with artists, promoters or distributors? Or do
you separate things?
That's totally important. I won't work with an artist that I wouldn't
want to hang out with.
Although your whole day is centered around the music business,
do you sometimes walk into a recordstore to buy a record?
I work as a buyer for a record store for the past eight or ten years,
so I go there twice a week. I also go to other record stores pretty
often as well. I love the vinyl format, the large format artwork combined
with discovering new sounds is a medium that I'll always love, but I
also love a beautiful handmade CDR or nicely packaged CD. The music
as an object has always captured my imagination in this way that's more
than just what the music sounds like, but gives you a peek into the
minds behind it.
www.audiodregs.com
All images taken from audio dregs website and E rocks website.
Interview Michael Mück/Winter 2007
All rights reserved Cuemix-Magazine
WW’s Local
Cut team picks the five biggest local music surprises of 2006.
Copy Wins WW’s “Best New Band” Poll: Maybe
you’d call it a fluke that a dude with a laptop, a fancy suit
and a keytar won this annual title by a near 2-1 ratio. I call it PDX
opening its eyes to the awesomeness of our local electronic scene. Last
spring, a member of that scene—which was once largely confined
to a small tiki bar called the Jasmine Tree—took center stage
for a capacity crowd at Berbati’s during WW’s Best New Band
showcase. Portland realized something great was happening here, and
it didn’t have anything to do with rock. MICHAEL BYRNE.
WW’s Local Cut team picks the five best performances
by local bands in 2006.
SHOWS OF THE YEAR
White Rainbow, E*Rock, March 23 at Towne Lounge: Every
stretched and bent guitar or vocal layer White Rainbow’s Adam
Forkner packed into this half-hour psych meltdown was met with pure
anxiety. In every corner, a member of Forkner’s phantom band lurked,
cutting and shoving strands of anti-song into our heads. My companion
visibly melted down, saying, “It’s just too much.”
I replied, “Never.” She ducked out of the room two songs
into E*Rock’s set of techno-noise—which was accompanied
by a screen showing 8-bit epileptic candy. Never, indeed. MICHAEL BYRNE.
SHOWS OF THE YEAR–RUNNERS UP:
CASEY JARMAN:
Bobby Birdman at Reed College Student Union, March 2
This was my first time seeing ex-Portlander Bobby Birdman, and after
some technical difficulties, the electro-crooner totally killed it (with
tenderness) by performing a campfire-style set to his cross-legged crowd.
It was a beautiful thing, and Birdman is one of my favorite singers
in the whole world.
MICHAEL BYRNE: Audio Dregs
I imagine mass pressing an album by a reclusive Frenchman who will probably never tour, let alone in the US, is a bad business move. So Melodium’s 2006 release of hypnotic, shimmering guitar loops Flacana Flacana on Eric Mast’s Audio Dregs is proof-positive that Mast’s priorities are in the right place: with the music. Add to that stellar debut releases by locals Plants and Copy, and Audio Dregs is at the top of its game.
MUSIC STORY
INDIETOWN, U.S.A.
A look at the small Portland record labels that are rocking the music
industry.
BY MIKE MCGONIGAL
[Willamete Week]
E*Rock started his own record label because his car broke down. And
because he lived in Portland, where he could live cheaply. That's the
simplified version of the story behind the 1998 launch of E*Rock's label,
Audio Dregs. He was on his way to performing his first DJ gig at a going-away
party for a member of his rock band when his maroon 1992 Ford Taurus
fired its last piston. That led to his epiphany. "I realized that
you don't need a car in Portland," E says, "so I saved up
the money I'd otherwise have spent on gas, car insurance and upkeep
to release a 7-inch by my brother." Now his brother, E*Vax, is
recording with Björk, and E*Rock is still releasing albums on Audio
Dregs, a label David Byrne recently named as one of his favorites. E's
accomplishments are remarkable, but his story-that combination of pluck
and opportunity-is a common one here, according to interviews with owners
of 20 of the more than 60 independent record labels that call Portland
home. Why do labels grow here? Owners credit some of the standard attributes
of the city's creative culture-cheap rent, a pool of talented artists,
individualized printing presses and cool independent record shops. And
it's also homebase for Allegro/Nail, one of the country's top five indie
distributors, representing releases by more than 100 small record labels.
"Portland has more of everything than other towns of a similar size-the whole 'more per capita' aspect; more restaurants, movie theatres, independent record stores, strip clubs, breweries and indie labels," says Chris Scofield of the Strange Attractors label, who works at Allegro as a day job.The majority of Portland's labels are "mom and pop"-sized businesses, employing up to five people while generating modest cash flow. The exception, of course, is the local swingster-lounge band Pink Martini, whose Heinz Records label has sold 140,000 of Hang on Little Tomato, the band's second self-released album-a staggering number in the world of independents, where cracking five digits for a single release is considered a success.Two of Portland's most invigorating labels (Jyrk and Temporary REsidence) may have split town in the past year, while at the same period more people with established record labels have moved in (Aesthetics, Dirtnap, Arena Rock). In addition, new businesses pop up almost weekly (Mississippi, Community Library, Piecemeal, WK Lab). To get an idea of why and how these labels exist, WW chose 10 very different, but like-minded, Portland labels and gave them the once over.
audio dregs
proprietor: E*Rock
day job: Freelance designer and animator, record-store clerk
roster size: 19
cds and lps sold last year: 7,200
downloads sold last year: 6,500
employ anyone full or part-time? "I wish."
released music by: Lullatone, F.S. Blumm, Ratatat, E*Rock
says he has a love for music that squiggles in and out of genres, matching
experimental electronics with pretty sounds. Audio Dregs has done well
selling MP3s via pay sites such as eMusic and iTunes. For the first
time in years, the label is getting ready to release music by Portland
bands, such as Copy and the Plants. (audiodregs.com)
Electronica music, be it clicks_+_cuts, microhouse or glitch should
not actually be geographically limited since anyone with a computer
and somehow part of a network, would be able to participate but the
Audio Dregs label typically operates from one of the North-West American
boomtowns, Portland, Oregon. E*Rock has run the label since 1998 after
he moved from his native Akron, Ohio leaving Art School which taught
him those wonderful designer skills and moreover, by which he's established
the audiodregs dot com website as a key feature to the music label.
The website first brought to my attention the animated movies by Mumbleboy.
Co-operating via the internet, Mumbleboy resides in The Big Apple, the
Audio Dregs music always comes with mindlike animation. The light-hearted
tone to the electronica music finds a warm welcome with the playful
yet sometimes dead serious flash cartoons from Mumbleboy. The Audio
Dregs roster includes such artists as diverse as Bruxelles' little genius
Dim Dim, a remotely operating little Texan wonderboy by the name of
Inkblot or E*Rock's brother E*Vax who's just signed with XL Recordings.
The label barely breaks even but E*Rock persists in maintaining the
standard and in the function of Audio Dregs A&R Manager, E*Rock
evidently is a keen spotter of composing talent. His own two album releases
hint at an intrinsic quality as well, with the simple, yet effective
use of keyboard features. I'd be happy to be quoted in The Year 2525,
having named Audio Dregs as the late twentieth century, early twenty-first
equivalent of Chopin, but I'm afraid I won't be there to witness. On
16. September, 2003, the Nijmegen record store Waaghals celebrated its
eighteenth birthday and E*Rock was there to join festivities. For three
nights as a DJ, a VeeJay and to some surprise as a performing trio on
Saturday. Strolling along Nijmegen streets in the summer heat, I shaped
up for it without knowing to how. You'd never expect an actual stage
performance. For a stint there was one, in just another Nijmegen club
facing competition from so many other Nijmegen clubs that only like
150 people were there. E*Rock dashed on and off stage and left the audience
insecure of a follow-up. Mumbleboy on the Flash Controls and Colleen
on various instruments introduced an intrigueing concept. The fragility
to the E*Rock sound got across very well; on stage E*Rock is about a
subtlety clash of acoustic instruments with hardware programming. A
frontline needs to be determined, yet E*Rock does not shy off from sharing
the progress. At the moment, E*Rock is reporting back through echoes
from living with computer music; but only as a means to the exposition
of the ultimate in Audio Dregs; electronic music through humane composition.
-Maarten Schiethart
AUDIO DREGS
(E*ROCK & E*VAX interview)
MAP magazine #3 (Japan)
[Norio Fukuda]
To begin with, please tell me the history of your label, AUDIO DREGS. When, where, how and why you started the label?
E*ROCK: I started the label the summer before I left for college. At that point it had no name and was just me dubbing cassettes of my four track recordings. Then it was me dubbing my friend's music which i thought other friends would like to hear, some 7"s, then CD-Rs, then CDs. Later I asked Darla to help with manufacturing so that we could afford to put out more records, and when E*Vax graduated from college I asked him to join the Audio Dregs Board of Directors. It's always a learning process, but we hope that it will always get better as we go along.
At the time when you started the label, which one of the 3 labels
below was your ideal label, if you dare to pick one. And how about today?
Please give me the reasons for both picks.
**DISCHORD
**GRAND ROYAL
**WARP
E*ROCK: I like that all those labels have their own agendas, but I probably wasn't thinking about any of them when I started making cassettes. It was just something that I started to do because the music I made by myself had no other outlet. When I started to get into cassette labels like Sonic Enemy and Shrimper I thought, "Hey, that's cool. I should come up with a name for my own label." I was into the DIY aesthetics that I got from punk rock and indie rock as a kid, but all the different "genres" imposed too many rules on the music and style, which I found restricting.
Are you two bros only people who manage the label? If so, please tell me the differences in role.
E*ROCK: Yes, it's just the two of us running the label. There are no defined roles, but it's good to have another person to get feedback from, to get constructive criticism from, and work out ideas with. We have a pretty similar ideas about music, art, and design though.
E*VAX: We end up passing things back and forth a lot. I'll work on a CD design for a while and then send it over to E*Rock and he'll add to it or change it and send it back. We tend to consult each other whenever there's a decision to be made.
What do you think is the most attractive feature and the weak point of your brother? Please evaluate each other.
E*ROCK: I really trust E*Vax's opinion. He is like 5 years younger than me. I think we argued and fought most of our childhood, but once we got older I realized, "hey, my brother's pretty cool!" His weak point is probably his ass, it's huge! You can't tell from the pictures, but he's got a massive ass. It's got it's own gravitational pull and he falls over a lot because of that.
E*VAX: E*Rock's always been jealous of my ass. He's a good person to work with though, because he's got a good work ethic and isn't afraid to take on multiple huge projects at once. He really tends to get things done.
One of the reasons why I like your label is that the surroundings of the electronic music and electronica in Japan is very snobbish and academic for example, but you seeem like you are based on the DIY spirit, and very friendly and humorous. You even seem like you don't draw a line between indie guitar pop and Hip Hop. Please tell me your journey through music that you had been listening when you grow up.
E*ROCK: It can be pretty snobbish in the states as well. I don't think the "electronic" scene, or the "indie" scene, or the "experimental" scene, or any other scenes are really into what we do. That's okay though because we don't cater to any of them, or any other scene. We're enthusiasts over so many types of music even though we're very picky. It's not like I make any money doing it, so I better like what I'm doing. The first time I really got into any music was probably Run DMC and The Beastie Boys in junior high school. I would just make tapes from what I heard on the radio. Then I got into punk and underground rock, noise-rock, and things I couldn't describe in high school. It wasn't until the later end of college when I started getting into ambient, space rock, and electronic types of music. I went from listening to college radio a lot to, DJing, doing college radio, then working in a record store...
E*VAX: I think a lot of what I listened too growing up came from E*Rock because he's older and would always pass along the good music he'd discovered. He still does actually. I'd like to think that Audio Dregs isn't a genre specific label. We're doing mostly electronic stuff these days but I'd have no problem releasing another type of record if we came across something we really liked.
Please give each one of the artist below a short comment. You can take this as a chance to introduce them to the music fans in Japan.
**DIM DIM
E*ROCK: He lives in Bruxelles, Belgium. He makes upbeat, animated tunes
with singing animals and little kids. He used to be cartoonist, and
his music has a cartoony feel to it as well.
E*VAX: I find his music really inspiring. I can't imagine where his
ideas come from. The music is so bizarre but so listenable at the same
time.
**THE SENSUALISTS
E*ROCK: The Sensualists were my favorite live band in Portland, part
psychedelic, part pop, part electro--so I asked them if they'd like
to put out a record. Their music combines lots of farfisa, analog synthesizers,
with live drums and bass, as well as electronics and homemade instruments
and films.
E*VAX: They just have a really good sound. It makes you want to dance.
**CARPET MUSIC
E*ROCK: This is more quiet, subdues music that's like taking a nap in
the daytime. Circular melodies and gently pulsating beats make for very
organic listening.
E*VAX: really nice melodies. It manages to maintain a looseness and
an openness that a lot of electronic music lacks.
**THE GRACE PERIOD
E*VAX: Lots of airy melodies and driving beats. it's a nice contrast.
very emotive.
E*ROCK: Seamless flowing loops under more down-tempo bombastic breaks.
Please tell me why you two had started calling yourself as E*vax and E*rock.
E*ROCK: We started this "band" called King Pang, and for the first cassette album was all sound collage type music that I made with turntables, microphones, effects and loops, with E*Vax on theremin. I made up the names as a joke to be our fake "electronic" names. When we started making music that was actually considered electronic later on, both on our own, the names just kind of stuck.
7 inch records and package design for CDs as well your wonderful website design are really impressive. Do you have any policy to the design?
E*ROCK: We like simplicity.
E*VAX: And we never release anything until we've both ok-ed the design. I really think our designs are getting better and better as we go.
E*ROCK: We both have fine art backgrounds and are designers, so i think we draw very little distinction between art and design.
I really like the illustrations and pastel drawings by E*rock. Who is the painter or artist you are especially influenced by?
E*ROCK: I really like Eye Yamatsuka. My friend Casper Hargreaves has been a big influence and also a little drawing made by my cousin when he was really young. For a while I was trying to make my art more like exploded cartoons, but it's been almost pure abstraction lately. I like art that isn't dependant on genre, that's unselfconscious, and confident.
What is in your mind when you draw pictures.
E*ROCK: I generally listen to music when I draw and try not to think of anything at all. The less I think the better it turns out, but sometimes it can be hard to get in the right frame of mind when there are so many distractions. Right now I'm trying to finish 500 scribble drawings on paper, sometimes not looking at the paper even, so that I can develop the marks themselves more. When I finish that I want to do a series of photo portraits, and then maybe do some realistic portraits to follow that up.
Many pictures E*vax shoots are cutting off the common everyday life, but they somehow contain a chilly melancholia element. I can say the same thing to the music that E*vax made. Do you think this kind of lyrical element is coming from your charactor?
E*VAX: I suppose it is. With the music the meloncholy feel wasn't really intentional, it just sort of happened naturally but the pairing of the music with the photos seemed to make a lot of sense.
Many of your pictures are taken at the lonely places. Why is that?
E*VAX: I did a big series of photos of parking lots during my last year of school and that's where most of these photos come from. We grew up in Ohio where there are loads of parking lots, it's just a part of the scenery there. Almost all of the photos I've taken since that series I've taken in my apartment, which isn't really a lonely place at all.
Your website has lots of contents such as animation, quicktime video, gallery and games. It is not only for introducing the label and some information, but it's a very playful website. I think this website represents your everyday life environment. But do you still think music is the most priority thing to your dayly life?
E*ROCK: I listen to music at work, while I'm doing email, eating, or doing this interview. I write a zine about music, and I make music myself, so I guess I do spend a lot of time in my daily life concerned with music. Music is an expression, like any kind of art, but we get excited about different ideas and mediums and want to try it ourselves. There's lots you can do with a web site, so we wanted to play with that as another medium and not just be an advertisement for the label. I hope that the site is fun for people who don't even listen to our music.
E*VAX: Music is definitely my first love, but all of those other things are fun too. The website just gives us a place to share whatever we've done with anyone who cares to see it.
It might be a very abstract question, but what point of music has attracted you most?
E*ROCK: It's great that music can represent many different things. It can be enjoyed as background or as something emotional, or entertaining, or > humorous, so that is attractive. Music can be an escape from reality or an out of body experience. It's some individuals or group's expression that can be easily mass produced and appreciated, so it's an interesting way to communicate ideas. It's much harder to mass produce a painting and share it with people and there aren'tmany bands making paintings as a "band".
E*VAX: I think my attraction to music is always changing and evolving, but at this point it seems almost like an addiction. I really couldn't stop making music if I tried. I guess the best thing about music is that there really are endless possibilites.
What kind of music you are most interested in lately?
E*ROCK: I like good music.
E*VAX: Lately all I've been listening to is hip hop and '60s pop.
E*ROCK: The past couple days for me it's been highly abstracted stuff like Aki Onda or Ribert Lippok, then some pop like Adorable or Stone Roses, and even The Deviants and Moldy Peaches. It'll change up in a couple days, I'm sure.
What freak are you now? Please pick something you are currently enthusiastic about. It doesn't have to be music. It can be anything like baseball or basketball team. And please tell me why. Please tell me if you have some strange obsession to the subject.
E*ROCK: I was really into these squid flavored chips last week, those were really good, but don't really taste like squid. My girlfriend loves to draw pictures of octopuses and squids so she kept buying the different chips for me and she would copy the cartoon squids from the packages.
E*VAX: Right now I'm really excited about a band I started with my friend Mike called Cherry. We work really well together. Every time we get together to record a song something amazing comes out of it. Our ideas just seem to blend perfectly.
E*ROCK: I'm also into the idea of building a sort of handmade lathe cutter, so press playable records, almost like art objects. I'm sure it will sound very lo fi, but I'm really into that idea.
Audio Dregs to begin with, you published the zine THUMB, and it seems like you are very aware of being independent. I think I can say the same thing to myself for publishing "map". What do you think is the 3 critical conditions in being independent?
E*ROCK: It's more work to be independent, but you can have much more freedom. I like to have control over the content, but also experiment with the design, and be able to talk to other artists that I admire. You can learn a lot, but it can be really pricey to publish yourself and take a lot of time.
Please tell me about your zine, "THUMB". When, where, how and why you started publishing it?
E*ROCK: Some friends and I started it together in college, but eventually everyone else dropped out but me. I would photocopy and staple them all by hand. It's changed a lot since then.
Please tell me the best interview you had in the past, as well as the worst. Please tell me how they became the best/worst.
E*ROCK: Interviews that I've set up through record labels tend to be not nearly as good as when I contact the artists directly. Interviewing Harald "Sack" Ziegler was great because I was a big fan of his music and it led to him checking out the Audio Dregs web site and suggesting that we work together, which resulted in the Mind as Master CD/comic. That was really cool. Email interviews where the artist says barely anything are disappointing. They say yes and no with no explanation... The first few band interviews I did for a magazine in high school were pretty awful, but I suppose it was a good experience.
Who would you like to interview most now? You can pick anyone, even those who passed away.
E*ROCK: I'd like to interview Kim Hiorth¿y or Bjork, or the guy in the 1800's who could whistle out of his anus! I'd like to interview Eye someday too.
Please tell me the best and worst part of each one of the zines below with brief reasons.
**Duplex Planet
E*ROCK: I haven't seen this in quite a while. This zine is totally original,
and the conversational way it was written probably influenced me to
do "Mom's Record Reviews". I always wished that each issue was longer.
**Bunnyhop
E*ROCK: I liked the way he stuck to a theme for each issue. I liked
the concept of the record reviews, but never actually read them because
they weren't informative.
**Sound Collector
E*ROCK: Laris raised the standard for music zines with Sound Collector,
and has given me good advice on printing and distro. I like how informative
the articles can be on people I'd never heard of, and then get to hear
as well on the CD. I'm glad that he doesn't put all the pictures at
the end any more, seperate from the articles, because I'd find myself
flipping back and forth and it would interrupt the article because I'd
get curios to look again... I've actually got a song in the latest issue,
SC#7, but it' under a fake name.
I'm always looking forward to read your mother's short comments on the review corner on the THUMB ZINE. What was the record your mother didn't like the most.
E*ROCK: I think that would be Pan Sonic, because the high tones and monotonous beats drover her crazy, but I still haven't played Ol' Dirty Bastard for her yet!
At last, please give me a short comment to George Bush Jr.
E*ROCK: That guy makes me want to move to Europe.
E*VAX: Don't do anything I wouldn't do.
E*ROCK: Be excellent to each other!
thank you very much!
label
profiles 
Brain Candy 
COLUMN