AAA - Ask Autechre Anything - Sean and Rob on WATMM!

1) At gigs, does the crowd (re)act notably differently depening where you are? Rob said you chose "Zurich 2001" as a bonus track because it's "a good display of how well it can kick off in Europe at a electronic gig". Things don't kick off like that at other places? Do you know what kind of mentality to expect from a crowd before you perform? You did say it's mostly Americans constantly checking their phones, iirc. Are crowds notably different from country to country, or is it more notable on different continents?

 

 

2) How do you consider the Belgian crowds like? Dull? Bangin'? Just ok?

 

 

3) You have any anecdotes involving Belgian gigs you are willing to share? Or just Belgium, doesn't have to be at a gig per se.

 

 

4) Sean, do you know that Rob has already updated his status here, chatted a little bit in chatmm, and added a bunch of friends to his list? Using nearly all functions of this forum. Just saying, because I heard somewhere you guys like to one-up eachother ;p

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:33 PM, Tok said:

 

  On 11/7/2013 at 3:20 PM, Tok said:

Can you give us a hint about wether there is a hidden message encoded in the covers of Exai and/or L-Event?

Many cryptomancers are working on it. But without any result yet:

 

http://www.reddit.com/r/codes/comments/1mmmqu/hidden_message_in_autechre_cover_art/

:wang: :wang: pls

 

 

 

yeah cos revealing hidden messages is a brilliant idea :D

massive thanks for doing this!!!

 

my questions are, who is your favorite visual artist at the moment?

i, personally, am very into illustration and arty stuff...

 

and do you sometimes make tracks pure for your own listening pleasure, like Boards of Canada with their cassetes, and Richard with his Thousands of tracks? perfectly finished tracks, but specially made to never leave the studio?

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:32 PM, Rob Ae said:

 

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:19 PM, DorkingtonPugsly said:

So my music teacher wants me to write a paper on Augmatic Disport. But I don't know what to write. Help pls?

why don't u write about the polarity of the beats or something, just made up stuff. something about the to-and fro of the 'forward looking vs the backward looking' bits. and the amount of the percussion thats where it should be compared to the parts of percussion that are inexplicably absent in others. dunno see if yr teacher buys it.

 

Aye that's an ace idea - DorkingtonSmeddlebuck, throw in some of these phrases too: 'modular radiance of harmonic attrition', 'apliqué de spectrale', 'physically moderated quantisation', 'progressive frequency vocoding', 'non-deterministic stochastic lookup-tables', 'FFT wall', 'differentiation compression' and 'stamina synthesis'

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:33 PM, Tok said:

 

  On 11/7/2013 at 3:20 PM, Tok said:

Can you give us a hint about wether there is a hidden message encoded in the covers of Exai and/or L-Event?

Many cryptomancers are working on it. But without any result yet:

 

http://www.reddit.com/r/codes/comments/1mmmqu/hidden_message_in_autechre_cover_art/

:wang: :wang: pls

 

no need for hints, looks like the Experts are already on it. =)

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:40 PM, Sean Ae said:

 

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:33 PM, Tok said:

 

  On 11/7/2013 at 3:20 PM, Tok said:

Can you give us a hint about wether there is a hidden message encoded in the covers of Exai and/or L-Event?

Many cryptomancers are working on it. But without any result yet:

 

http://www.reddit.com/r/codes/comments/1mmmqu/hidden_message_in_autechre_cover_art/

:wang: :wang: pls

 

 

 

yeah cos revealing hidden messages is a brilliant idea :D

 

 

lel

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:30 PM, Sean Ae said:

 

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:09 PM, nizzleone said:

Speaking of limiters, and this goes back to the mastering question I asked before, but do you usually put any compression/limiter on the main bus or do leave that up to Noel?

 

Do you guys make more money from releases or touring?

 

we might but noel never does, all he ever does is roll off a tiny bit of bass (we have smaller speakers than him)

 

more from releases but touring doesn't make a lot of money for us cos of all the expenses, we like it like that tho

one off gigs are a lot more profitable than both

 

What kind of monitors have you guys been using recently?

You mentioned Sunvox and Renoise but have you got any background in older trackers like Impulse or FastTracker ?

 

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:23 PM, Rob Ae said:

EH is now called The Splund

 

Favourite episode of "the trap door" ?

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:39 PM, triachus said:

1) At gigs, does the crowd (re)act notably differently depening where you are? Rob said you chose "Zurich 2001" as a bonus track because it's "a good display of how well it can kick off in Europe at a electronic gig". Things don't kick off like that at other places? Do you know what kind of mentality to expect from a crowd before you perform? You did say it's mostly Americans constantly checking their phones, iirc. Are crowds notably different from country to country, or is it more notable on different continents?

 

 

2) How do you consider the Belgian crowds like? Dull? Bangin'? Just ok?

 

 

3) You have any anecdotes involving Belgian gigs you are willing to share? Or just Belgium, doesn't have to be at a gig per se.

 

 

4) Sean, do you know that Rob has already updated his status here, chatted a little bit in chatmm, and added a bunch of friends to his list? Using nearly all functions of this forum. Just saying, because I heard somewhere you guys like to one-up eachother ;p

 

1) well thats a lot of questions for one question

yeah it varies tons, every city is different, and countries have their own tendencies too

 

2) really good so far, they get it no matter how hard or weird we make it

 

3) yeah once i re-eq'd derrick may's dj set from a mixer which he was running thru but was like at the other end of a venue behind a curtain

i was hyping up all his snare rushes with eq sweeps and stuff, was p good lulz

 

4) yeah but i answered like 10 times as many q's - TAKE YOUR PICK

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:39 PM, triachus said:

1) At gigs, does the crowd (re)act notably differently depening where you are? Rob said you chose "Zurich 2001" as a bonus track because it's "a good display of how well it can kick off in Europe at a electronic gig". Things don't kick off like that at other places? Do you know what kind of mentality to expect from a crowd before you perform? You did say it's mostly Americans constantly checking their phones, iirc. Are crowds notably different from country to country, or is it more notable on different continents?

 

 

2) How do you consider the Belgian crowds like? Dull? Bangin'? Just ok?

 

 

3) You have any anecdotes involving Belgian gigs you are willing to share? Or just Belgium, doesn't have to be at a gig per se.

 

 

4) Sean, do you know that Rob has already updated his status here, chatted a little bit in chatmm, and added a bunch of friends to his list? Using nearly all functions of this forum. Just saying, because I heard somewhere you guys like to one-up eachother ;p

1 it differs, we just need to get the right spaces/people/mood ratio right and it can go anywhere really. there are exceptions here n there.

 

2 yeah belgian crowds are cool, as in, they do it properly in all contexts, be it at a botanical garden, or the First Techno Club in belgium (FUSE)

 

3 where Renaat R&S told us we should definitely rethink about releasing some tracks, after seeing us live, on our post Incunabula / Basscadet timed tour.

 

4 heheheh ok were there already are we?

  On 11/6/2013 at 5:33 PM, Sean Ae said:

 

  On 11/6/2013 at 5:29 PM, Alcofribas said:

given your maxmsp setup is capable of such a wealth of variation, do you ever feel the urge to release a lot more than you do? it seems like you would have tons of wicked alternate takes a la quaristice ready to go.

then again, exai + l-event is 10 sides of vinyl...

 

yeah we can't release everything, even 2.5 hours is too much for busy people

there are loads of people that would defo listen to a 10 hour release, let alone a 2.5er.

helps, me personally, focus on my werk. could be themed into chunks for those with shorter attention spans. [thank you internet]

 

long and short of it is....seems like the crowd here can't get enough Ae ;)

 

as this is supposed to be questions only, one more if i'm not too late...

sine, square, saw or random?

 

thanks again for taking all the time you guys have to wade through and answer as many Qs as you have.

Dunno if its been talked before but there is this Seefeel remix of yours, Spangle, could tell a bit more about it ? its been released on cd in 2003 but i was wondering if it was from amber era, some forgotten tune that took years to release.

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:40 PM, Little Lord Faulteroy said:

massive thanks for doing this!!!

 

my questions are, who is your favorite visual artist at the moment?

i, personally, am very into illustration and arty stuff...

 

and do you sometimes make tracks pure for your own listening pleasure, like Boards of Canada with their cassetes, and Richard with his Thousands of tracks? perfectly finished tracks, but specially made to never leave the studio?

 

i like john berkey a lot, i like how he manages to convey scale but using really vague strokes, think he's a bit of a genius actually

and i really like syd mead and jean giraud as well

 

yeah we make tracks for ourselves all the time but sometimes i expressly make say a hip hop track or a straight 4/4 techno track, but i usually get bored before i finish them

i dunno how other people get anything like that finished tbh

  On 11/6/2013 at 11:30 PM, Joseph said:

In total, how many ae tracks have the vocal sample from draun quarter :) in them?

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:49 PM, phaelam said:

 

  On 11/6/2013 at 5:33 PM, Sean Ae said:

 

  On 11/6/2013 at 5:29 PM, Alcofribas said:

given your maxmsp setup is capable of such a wealth of variation, do you ever feel the urge to release a lot more than you do? it seems like you would have tons of wicked alternate takes a la quaristice ready to go.

then again, exai + l-event is 10 sides of vinyl...

yeah we can't release everything, even 2.5 hours is too much for busy people

there are loads of people that would defo listen to a 10 hour release, let alone a 2.5er.

helps, me personally, focus on my werk. could be themed into chunks for those with shorter attention spans. [thank you internet]

 

long and short of it is....seems like the crowd here can't get enough Ae ;)

 

as this is supposed to be questions only, one more if i'm not too late...

sine, square, saw or random?

 

thanks again for taking all the time you guys have to wade through and answer as many Qs as you have.

 

 

oh wow that's actually quite tough

prob square

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:50 PM, k h o v said:

Dunno if its been talked before but there is this Seefeel remix of yours, Spangle, could tell a bit more about it ? its been released on cd in 2003 but i was wondering if it was from amber era, some forgotten tune that took years to release.

 

yeah we gave em that before basscadet came out, we did the swap at the same time roughly

i dunno why warp didn't release it (lightweights)

how much percent of recording actually turns up on an album? I hope you understand what I mean

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:52 PM, Joseph said:

 

  On 11/6/2013 at 11:30 PM, Joseph said:

In total, how many ae tracks have the vocal sample from draun quarter :) in them?

 

 

is there a vocal sample in that?

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:55 PM, Sean Ae said:

 

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:52 PM, Joseph said:

 

  On 11/6/2013 at 11:30 PM, Joseph said:

In total, how many ae tracks have the vocal sample from draun quarter :) in them?

 

 

is there a vocal sample in that?

 

Yeah and it's a mindfuck

Edited November 7, 2013 by Joseph

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:32 PM, Rob Ae said:

 

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:19 PM, DorkingtonPugsly said:

So my music teacher wants me to write a paper on Augmatic Disport. But I don't know what to write. Help pls?

why don't u write about the polarity of the beats or something, just made up stuff. something about the to-and fro of the 'forward looking vs the backward looking' bits. and the amount of the percussion thats where it should be compared to the parts of percussion that are inexplicably absent in others. dunno see if yr teacher buys it.

 

Okay will tri(achus). Thing is he wants more like feelings and imagery and what does the piece mean to you and stuff. Like fuck idk it's lush and the beats cool what else...

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:50 PM, Sean Ae said:

yeah we make tracks for ourselves all the time but sometimes i expressly make say a hip hop track or a straight 4/4 techno track, but i usually get bored before i finish them

i dunno how other people get anything like that finished tbh

 

 

Man, I would love to know what your techno stuff is like. Can we hear some?

I will repeat my request that you guys pls post some pics in the recent pics thread in Gen Ban; if only so we have some new material to photoshop to hell and back.

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:42 PM, Rob Ae said:

no need for hints, looks like the Experts are already on it. =)

 

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:40 PM, Sean Ae said:

yeah cos revealing hidden messages is a brilliant idea :D

 

Aha! Enough information for me to see reason to keep on searching.

So then let's continue exploiting the mighty powers of the clouds and run the CPU's hot for good.

Thank you.

  On 11/7/2013 at 4:55 PM, rd1994 said:

how much percent of recording actually turns up on an album? I hope you understand what I mean

 

varies a lot, some albums it's about half and some it's like 10%

the last couple have been more like 5% actually, maybe less

actually- including things like sketches and test files it's <1%, but you wouldn't wanna sit thru all them unless you were mental

Great fun reading (most of) this thread last night and today. Some of the insight in here covers topics I never thought the fanbase would ever get an official word on, so that's excellent. Thanks both for doing this.

Apologies if any of this was asked from around the 100-page mark, which I've yet to get through. Most of the stuff I would have wanted to know about has been covered so excuse if any of this is mundane.

1) Any thoughts on Funckarma and other output by the Funcken brothers? The structure of some of their early stuff is somewhat reminiscent of mid-90s Ae, and they've done loads of music without much development after getting in their comfort zone of sci-fi music (I often find it evoking the 'high tech low life' atmosphere of cyberpunk). I just have such a soft spot for that, and along with your own catalogue find bits and pieces of it among my favourite electronic music at the moment. Does it hit that spot for you too?

 

2) The track you did at Stormy Waters in 1995 is one of my favourites. Rumours went around here lately that it went by the name 'Second Crane'. Was this the case, or is it a fan name?

 

3) Dunno if we're still playing the naming game by this point (just got home) but well: I don't know how either of you feel about spiders, but I keep tarantulas as a serious hobby. Having passed the 50 mark I'd appreciate some help with names. If you wish to suggest any for my two Pamphobeteus sp. "Machalla", it would be a great/amusing honour. I include a photo of one in the spoiler should you wish for a visual reference.

 

 

 

 

Again thanks. Keep up the great work!

  On 11/6/2013 at 7:53 PM, Redruth said:

ally wish u enjoy?

if u that is the me of musics thinking to mind the speaker?

who do u, one one then that u uncomforthy ethis exact momes that makes describe?

choose a ver of the what u rate?

what u can to at do u, one that u reatestening?

plees would name particular bird or to mind it?

is to it?

plees describe?

again, what music think i think of this exact makes that u comfortable watched. what could interest plees that do u r u plees name one that makes share?

is that is expect, plees?