Issue 041

Hi John, how's life? Talk us through a
typical day for you.
Hi there! Life is good! Busy! Typical my day starts
with walking the dog (non-negotiable) before sitting down at
8.30am. I’ll work through till 5 or 6, but the evenings -
unless there’s a pressing deadline - are strictly for time with
my wife and chilling out.
I think the biggest influences for me in the last few
years have been the variety of work other than writing
‘Electronic Dance’ music I’ve done in the last few years.
Scoring work and music to picture is completely different to
writing a dance track, and has naturally directed me to use
more orchestral influences in the music I write. I think that
naturally also pushes you to be more daring and bold
melodically as well as experimenting with tempo, drum
programming and sound design.
Work can consist of several things. Whether it’s
something creative such as some scoring work or some
sound design, running my own audio business, Sonas Audio
Services, mastering other peoples music, or the other side of
the coin, responding to emails and catching up on admin for
my label Likeminded Music.
No day is ever the same! I’ve just finished writing
an album of cinematic breakbeat for a music library company
so I’m in the midst of mixing that. Alongside this I’m
currently studying an MA in Music Production so need to fit
that in somewhere as well!
Busy indeed! Let’s start at the
beginning. What got you hooked on
electronic music and who were your
inspirations?
To put it simply, two words: Big Beat. I was 15
years old when The Chemical Brothers and Fatboy Slim were
taking over the world and they well and truly opened my
eyes to electronic music. From there I got really into hunting
for the samples they used so naturally found an interest in
funk and then hip-hop. At that time as well it was
inescapable to get away from trance and progressive house
as well so acts like Bedrock, Futureshock and Sasha were
huge influences on my musical tastes growing up. It was
such an exciting time around the turn of the year 2000, so
much creativity and experimentation going on.
Now you’re a professional audio
engineer, working with some of the
scenes biggest artists, how do you
feel your work life bleeds into your
own productions?
It's impossible not to be inspired and
influenced by people you work with. However, I
always feel that everyone needs to tread their own
path to stand out.
If you try and imitate something that’s popular now,
you are already behind as the next wave of trends is already
on its way in the underground. That’s where you need to
focus and draw inspiration from. But as I say, be unique and
have faith and confidence in what you’re doing.
As an artist yourself, you’ve released
4 albums plus countless singles.
D’you ever wonder when that ‘big hit’
will catapult you into stardom or are
you content to make music other
people enjoy?
The thing with me is that I am pretty much always
writing. The previous 4 albums were the product of that and
were very much a record of me learning my craft as an artist
and a producer. You can hear the music develop in structure,
melodic content and also in production value as the albums
were released.
I’m sure many fellow artists and producers can
relate to having folders full of unfinished projects. I write
music because I enjoy the process of creating something
from nothing. The fact I don’t actually play an instrument or
have any knowledge of music theory means my process of
actually writing anything melodic is quite long winded, but
it’s a great feeling when things click.
So what I did a couple of years ago is make a
conscious effort to get everything that was worth finishing,
finished. The result of that was about 40 tracks that made
up a lot of things that were used in scores, other kinds of
media as well as used for other people. The ”Big Hit” would
be great! There’s no point denying that. Everyone who writes
music wants it to be listened to by as many people as
possible, and it gives you validation to what you’re doing. I’ll
keep doing what I’m doing though, and hopefully it’ll come.
Aside from a Beatport number one,
have you afforded yourself a
moment to daydream about how it’ll
do on release day?
I don’t know, the feedback from DJs has been
amazing. Support from Anthony Papa, Nick Muir,
Kasey Taylor and Just Her (to name a few) has been
brilliant and the feedback has been amazing. People
have been playing out all three versions and getting a
great response. Who knows! I’ve got a good feeling about
it though.
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