Igloo: First of all can you give us a little background on Carpet Bomb. Any agendas for the label?
A75: Carpet Bomb is a tiny artist run label, with me and my friends Doron and Pablo being the artists. Back in ’94 we put a cd together under the ‘livestock’ name. We made a half-hearted attempt to release it on our own label, then called ‘lo-tek’. It never went anywhere, as we were absolutely hopeless at promotion and unable to find interested distributors. We continued to make music and in ’97 doron felt we had some tracks that were strong enough to release and he wanted to try the label thing again, so we put out two 12″s that year. As far as an agenda, it’s basically about releasing eclectic groove music. Stuff that isn’t instantly catagorizable, but draws from different sources, that’s usually the kind of stuff that interests us. We have really broad tastes from jazz to classical to rock to IDM, so anything that tastefully synthesizes elements from disparate types of music into something new is going to pique our interests.
Igloo: Your compositions move pretty seamlessly between conventional instrumentation and MIDI/sampled material. Do you have a preference? Does one feel more intuitive than another to you?
A75: The easiest thing for me to do is whip up a MIDI/synth track, but then those end up being a bit boring. Once I start throwing stuff into the sampler it gets a little more interesting and then playing live on top… it adds more personality. So it’s not really about preference as much as how much work I am willing to put into the track.
Igloo: This seamless crossover is especially evident on the new Unagi Patrol CD. The lines were blurred as to what was being actually played and what was coming from the sampler. What would you say the percentage sampled vs. played was?
A75: From the beginning Doron has always been very keen on using samples of real instruments and adding live playing. That’s why the Unagi stuff sounds like it does. It’s hard to give a percentage. A lot of times we’ll record ourselves playing along with a track (on guitar, bass, and other random instruments that may be laying around) and then take snippets from the recording and arrange them to our liking, so the line between sampled and played gets a little blurry
Igloo: Do you find collaborating (Microstudio, Unagi Patrol, Livestock) or doing solo work to be more artistically fulfilling ?
A75: If I were forced to make a choice between doing one or the other for the rest of my life, I would go with solo work, because I’m just more comfortable in that mode. However, collaborating has some great aspects to it. Oftentimes working with someone else causes you to try a little harder, because you don’t want to waste their time with wank. There’s also a great feeling that you can share, when at the end of the day you see your combined effort produce something nice. It’s also cool to make something you like that you wouldn’t have made without the other person’s influence. In other words, collaborating can take your music to new places, and that’s exciting, but it’s not always easy. Sometimes you’re just not on the same wavelength, and the track doesn’t go anywhere, so there can be a feeling of disappointment, which hopefully doesn’t turn into resentment.
Igloo: You have quite the collection of unreleased tracks up on MP3.com. What are your feelings on the MP3 format and downloadable music in general?
A75: I think MP3s are a wonderful way to find new music. I’m not really concerned about MP3s destroying the music biz. If it does it does, if not fine. I like to think of music as an art form, rather than an entertainment commodity, so I’m going to want to make music whether or not people are buying CDs or downloading MP3s. Personally, I think the sound quality of an MP3 isn’t good enough for me to encode my CD/record collection and sell everything. I mainly listen to MP3s at work, because it’s more convenient than having a stack of CDs on my desk and the sound quality of my computer’s speakers is so low that you can’t even hear the difference between a CD and an MP3. My songs on MP3.com are ones that I’m not so excited about and I would feel better if people got to hear them for free instead of paying money for them.
Igloo: Does living in New York have an influence on your music?
A75: Maybe on a subconscious level, but I can’t say that it does specifically.
Igloo: How did Carpet Bomb get hooked up with re-releasing The Neck’s ‘Aquatic’ ?
A75: Aquatic came out in ’94 on the Necks’ label and never got much of a US distribution. It’s a really neat album, basically a jazz album but it’s played with such repetition and restraint, based on a funky groove, so it really occupies it’s own niche. I think that really attracted Doron to it, and he felt it was in line with Carpet Bomb’s agenda, so to speak. So Doron got in touch with them to ask if they were interested, and that was that.
Igloo: What do you have on the horizon, release wise? Any plans of any new Microstudio material?
A75: I’ve agreed to do some full-lengths for Worm Interface, as ‘757’, so we should see the first one at the beginning of 2001. I’m also moving back to Los Angeles after seven years in New York, so I’m really looking forward working with Pablo on some new MicroStudio material.
Igloo: What’s been in heavy rotation on your stereo lately?
A75: Aquaboogie, Savath & Savalas, Languis, Lou Harrison, Cole Porter, and Louis Armstrong.
