a lil about me, Flying Lotus has been bugging me to put something up and clue people in :-) so here goes …


photo by peter molignano

Lived in LA my whole life, born and raised. I’ve been making electronic
music since I was fourteen when I got a copy of Protools LE ; my Dad is
a production sound mixer for film, so he always had cool audio-gear
lying around that I could play with. I was a part of a lot of bands in high-school,
a math-metal band, noise-music, punk, but always found myself cutting up
sounds after school and delving into the sonic possibilities that you can get
with computers. 

 

I met Steve [Flying Lotus] at the Academy of Arts in San Francisco, we were both very 
interested in avant-garde film, crazy japanese stuff, fringe forms of electronic music, 
and I was really impressed by a short film he had made called ‘Use Me’ I think that’s
what it was called…. We became friends pretty quick and since then, I’ve always found 
his open-mindedness and forward-thinking creativity really inspiring.

 

we spent a good chunk of the year smoking, playing atari, and listening to drum and bassy stuff. 
At one point I was taking taking hallucinogens kind of recklessly while I was up there, and he 
helped me out when I might have gone right over the edge. I was pretty sure I was at least 
partly mad for awhile, and during that period, I made a bunch of music that Steve was convinced 
we had to release. Nothing came of it for awhile, but Steve and I always talked about doing more 
collaborative work. 

 

Later, we both moved back to LA. I was primarily doing the experimental film thing and Steve 
was doing the music thing, and eventually he asked me to VJ for a Brainfeeder event. 
After that, I realized that VJ-ing was really one of my forms, something quintessential to me. 
When I realized that, I started getting all these opportunities; was able to play Coachella
thanks to Sam XL and the whole PureFilth crew … it was great.

 

VJ-ing had all the elements that I felt were missing from being a film-maker. It was
live, spontaneous, a chance to be transgressive and irreverent with media, and
a place where I could bring all the work I’d done with video, merge it with sampled work,
and project it in one medium. Since I’ve gotten into it, I’ve treating it really as a form
of real-time cinema, not just background imagery.

 

Currently, all my imagery is triggered in real-time with a midi-controller in response to the music,
 there is no midi-synching or stuff timed before-hand to the music. Its live.
Sometimes I just get a feeling, and know what to do, all of a sudden things
synch up in this miraculous way. Other times, its just visual chaos, which
I’m comfortable with. Destroying media can be really fun.

 

see Flying Lotus and me at DudLab’s LabRat Matinee, Downtown Independent Theatre :
Flying Lotus @ Labrat Matinee
Flying Lotus performs a custom set with visuals courtesy of Dr. Strangeloop.
Dublab’s Labrat Matinee VI: Selections From An Astral Projectionist ….

 

As far as jams, I’ve posted things here and there, and released some stuff on an
internet label called Expanding Electronic Diversity (under the name NuOpSys) 
and have probably thousands of hours of music I’ve made, but have not released.
My first real release will be on Brainfeeder June 30th. It’s called Are We Lost
Mammals of an Approaching Transcendental Epoch? whewww… 
long title. I made it about a year ago, and it is probably the strangest thing 
I’ve ever shepherded into this world. It is one track, 18 minutes long, very lo-fi, 
and I picture it as some sort of narrative about the Singularity, mystical states, 
and the evolution of man. It is more post-rock influenced than the stuff I’m 
working on now, and is divided into three idiosyncratic movements.

enjoy!