Interview

Derek Vincent Smith isn't your average Colorado born-and-bred boy. This wunderkind stands out, and not just because he's six-foot-nine. Better known to fans as Pretty Lights, Smith has released three records to date, the latest of which dropped last Tuesday. Thirteen tracks in length, Passing By Behind Your Eyes fuses deep beats and undercurrents of core-reaching soul and blues tunes. From radio-played Rihanna to The Notorious B.I.G., Pretty Lights doesn't hesitate to merge radically different ditties to bring out the best he has to offer ears eager to hear something more interesting than the average dance number. In the past, he's paired the rich velvety vocals of Etta James with synth and futuristic textures, a combination that touches the heart while encouraging shameless dance floor behavior. Expect nothing less from the newest release available for free download on his site.

Currently on tour, Pretty Lights' performance is not to be missed. It comes complete with lasers, stimulating visuals and, to top it all off, a live drummer, who absolutely matches Smith in energy and stamina (they play straight for over two hours).

NELL ALK: You do what a lot of acts are still unwilling to do: give your music away for free. What prompted this altruism?

DEREK SMITH: I started giving my first album away for free because I was tired of trying to convince people to pay for music they had never heard of. I wanted the music to reach as many stereos as possible. I figured the only way to make that happen was through giving it away. I've been adamant about sticking to this model of releasing Pretty Lights music, but, as the name and the audience grows, it presents a few issues. This newest album, Passing By Behind Your Eyes, I've decided to give away for free. But, because there is so much traffic, I have to switch to a server that can handle all the bandwidth, which ends up costing me to give my music away. Right now, it's fine. I am happy to absorb the expense in order to get the music to the people that want it. But, as that cost grows, I will need to find ways to offset it. I give people the chance to donate, and I am hoping those donations will be enough to pay for all the albums that everyone else downloaded. 

MORE »

Photo by Kyle Dean Reinford

Manhattan's Baryshnikov Arts Center might seem an improbable site for the first ever US SonarSound event—it is the namesake of a ballet dancer, no matter his many skills—but for five hours the industrial space transformed four auditoriums into a multi-level audible playland. A States-based preview to the more robust, permanent festival held annually in Barcelona, the event consisted of multimedia, dance and DJs and attracted nearly 1,000 guests, among them Lou Reed. The legendary rocker seemed particularly taken with the ReacTable, a revolutionary new electronic musical instrument and, based on my experience, an ultimate noise "toy."

While part of a larger exhibition titled "Catalan Days: Music and Media from Catalonia and the Balearic Islands," two American musicians with intimate ties to the region bookended the event. Oft-New York-based Prefuse 73 opened the night; later Brooklyn-based DJ/Rupture left attendees on a high note with a two-hour spin set. In addition to these NYC natives, music was provided by Fibla + Árbol, Balago, Hidrogenesse, Del Palo Soundsystem (Griffi + DJ2D2 + Aqeel) and d.a.r.y.l.. Installations were provided by Marcel.lí Antúnez (with his show "Metamembrana") and the University Pompeu Fabra team with the internationally renowned ReacTable. After the show, Rupture (born Jace Clayton) took time out to discuss Sonar and his return to New York after a seven-year Spanish exile.


NELL ALK: So, you're located in New York now?

JACE CLAYTON: Yes, I live here. I've been here for the last two years and before that I lived in Barcelona.

NA: How'd you get involved with Sonar?

JC: It's an electronic music festival in Barcelona. This is the first time they've done it in the States. This is a one-off event called SonarSound. [It's] a weird, displaced home reunion. The Barcelona scene is invading New York for one night.

NA: What else have you got going on right now around New York City?

JC: I've got a crew called Dutty Artz and we do parties once a month at Glasslands in Williamsburg. The parties are called New York Tropical. At the end of June I'll probably be playing with Jahdan Blakkamoore. You'll be hearing his name a lot in the very near future.

NA: Your record Uproot, which came out in October 2008, was the first mix you did where nothing was bootlegged. It got an amazing response.

JC: It's interesting. Everything's totally cleared legally. The first mix I did couldn't be licensed legally [due to pulling so much material from other artists, including Missy Elliott]. The idea that gave birth to [Uproot] was this remix [by my friend Matt Shadetek] of the song called "I Gave You All My Love" by Jahdan Blakkamoore. I spoke to a friend of mine, a Scottish cellist, and asked her to compose a string quartet piece to mix out of this track. It was totally beautiful.

NA: And you already have the follow-up lined up.

JC: Right now I'm mixing a follow-up to Uproot called Solo Life Raft. That's going to be out this October. This is the next step: another mix. After Uproot, I did an album called Patches. I did this with Andy Moor, one of the guitarists in a Dutch band based in Amsterdam called The Ex. He's really amazing. It's basically improvised music for guitar and turntables. That's more about experimental turntablism and using hip-hop techniques in a totally different way, responding to the guitar. It's great being in a band. It's really spontaneous. We don't even talk about what we're doing, we just get into it. [This album came] out a few months ago. Andy recorded all of our live shows for one of the tours we did, so this was us coming together, choosing our favorite moments and editing it down.

MORE »

Photos by Thomas Cantley

The month of April marks the six-year anniversary for ISSUE Project Room, the performance space that opened in the East Village in April 2003, and has moved twice, most recently finding itself in Gowanus, Brooklyn. The address is changing yet again, this time to Downtown Brooklyn, but renovations and funding needs slow this transition significantly. Founder and creative director Suzanne Fiol, Moby, and I sat down to talk about past performances at ISSUE that failed and why toxicity is great for real estate. Moby's also supporting a forthcoming record release, Wait For Me, due out at the end of June, and he showed a disturbing, beautiful music video for recent single "Shot in the Back of the Head," directed by David Lynch. Afterwards, guests including Steve Buscemi gathered in an oversized, candlelit garage where Moby performed his first ever live solo ambient/electronic set. He played and swayed, eyes shut, against a montage of projected images—from a bizarre animated ballet to houses that whiz by as if driving a suburban street and looking out the window to trippy, psychedelic color patterns.


NELL ALK: So this is your first ever ambient or electronic show. That's surprising.

MOBY: Yes. I've been making electronic music for twenty some odd years but, because I grew up playing in punk rock bands, when I started touring, I thought in order to be a viable touring musician I had to do it with a band. I would DJ or tour with a full rock band. When Suzanne [Fiol, founder of ISSUE Project Room] asked me to be involved in this, I realized I'd never done a solo electronic show, which is strange, being an electronic musician.

NA: What's specific to ISSUE that brought it out in you?

MOBY: Maybe it's a form of overcompensation, but whenever I've toured, I've always needed a huge performance component. One of the things I love about ISSUE is that it's so focused on the music. You come here and you sit and you listen. There are visuals sometimes, but it's not like a traditional performance where there are people running around onstage. The show I'm doing tonight is something I've never done before; I'm just presenting the music, not singing and not talking and not stage-diving and not climbing scaffolding.

MORE »