SHUTTLE358
COGNITION AUDIOWORKS (CA)
INTERVIEW
WITH DAN ABRAMS
by Andrew Duke
Pasadena,
California-based Dan Abrams records as Shuttle 358 on 12k. A
design student at the Art Centre College of Design majoring
in product design, Abrams is also involved with 12k not only
through his audio, but also in a visual aspect. He was responsible,
most notably, for the packaging of the .aiff and 0/r releases
on 12k.
How
did you hook up with Taylor Deupree and 12k?
"I
had just been doing music as a hobby and I had been a fan of
Taylor-mostly his ambient stuff, I didn't really follow his
techno projects-and I saw that he had started 12k. He had a
page on his website that said where to send demo tapes if you
were interested. So I dropped him an email and said, 'I've got
some material; some things I think you might like, would you
like to hear it?' And he said, 'You can send it to me, just
make sure it doesn't suck.' I sent him a tape of some of my
best work at the time, ambient mostly, and a week later, he
got back to me and said, 'It doesn't suck.' (laughs) A year
from then on I would just send him material occasionally and
he would pick what he liked as I worked on focusing my sound."
Tell
me about your program at the Art Centre College Of Design.
"My
first love and career path is in industrial design. We have
a lot of corporate-sponsored projects from companies such as
Reebok, Honda, Peugeot, Acer; it's really demanding, kind of
insane. It's like the torture/beat-yourself-up school, we all
live in this crazy alienation. It's quite strange, but I think
it lends itself well to doing music in my spare time. All the
tracks on optimal were all written between 3 and 6AM because
I absolutely cannot write music during the day. I would come
home and instead of getting four hours of sleep, I would go
with one hour of sleep and then crank out another track. My
favorite moments of inspiration are under that kind of pressure;
I cannot write music for a living, it just doesn't work."
The
packaging you did for the .aiff compilation on 12k was quite
remarkable. How did that come together?
"I
believe the budget was the same for that as the standard CDs,
but Taylor wanted to do something special because it was a representation
of the label, the music, and his own visions of the future.
Originally he wanted to put the CDs in actual floppy disk housings
because the logo for 12k is a floppy disk. I didn't like that
[idea] because I'm not very fond of literal design and
we were having problems finding old floppy disks and a method
of manufacturing. So I came up with the idea of how can we abstract
it a little bit. I thought, if we made it translucent, you wouldn't
necessarily make the connection right away that it [the
packaging] was a floppy disk , but the idea is that initially
you focused on the disc art, or the booklet--which also turned
out to be clear on acetate. The mylar we used was laser cut
into [the shape of] these packages and, since it was
translucent, we came up with a folding package with tabs that
would fit. It was received very well and I think it was really
appropriate for this style of highly synthetic, artificial music
that's inside. We're now exploring more standardized packaging
for 12k, but still trying to keep it original and custom. The
budget, though, is very tight. We don't have the luxury of being
able to hire famous design firms that some large labels have."
You
used a cardboard paper sleeve for the 0/r release, but again
it was quite unique.
"Taylor
originally wanted to do this, and I thought, why don't we die-cut
the logo into it and have a window where we can have the accent
colors of the booklet showing through and that way we'd take
the load off of having printing on the outside of the package
and you could still have the color and the design on the inside.
We're also looking into sealed packaging, where you would tear
a release open, almost like a Fed-Ex package, just to push it
a little bit more, but always to represent the experimental,
cutting edge synthetic nature of the label 12k and the artists'
music that is released on it."
Through
the design and the music, you and Taylor and 12k are focusing
on the clean and minimal aesthetic instead of the bombastic
"bigger equals better" adage.
"Taylor
and I and the people we associate with are all into minimalism.
With the packaging we want it to be enjoyed on a variety of
levels, plus there's a practical side because it is a small
label. Working with very minimal designs all the time is a great
way of reducing costs without affecting the design and having
it not be appropriate. It fits really well with our goals, and
ultimately it's the music that matters."
You're
21 and have been doing music since you were 13. What drew you
to the type of ambient music you're now recording?
"I've
been using computers every day of my life since I was six years
old, doing a lot of computer programming as a kid and I was
online at a very young age. When I was about 13 there was tracker
music, mods, demo groups, things like that that I did. I did
traditional music in school, but I was always fascinated with
electronics and music. Now that I'm working in design, I'm bringing
more of that into my music-focusing on sound design as opposed
to pure melodies and structures."
What
was involved in putting together optimal.lp?
"I'm
not into programming now like I used to be, so I didn't get
into Soft Synth and C Sound and programming things that some
others are using. I do some programming in Generator; other
than that, it's just using my modules and my synths, but coming
at it from a design attitude. This is what I think Taylor does
and what he likes and I think that's what he likes about my
music. Design is really what's appropriate and bigger and more
complicated is not always better. The pinnacle for sound design
that I keep in mind is not the most sophisticated and complicated
sounds-it's how they work together. When I write tracks, maybe
I'll do a lot of extensive programming on my computer or maybe
I'll keep it straightforward with my own collection of sounds;
it's just how they fit together for my own aesthetic vision
of the track."
optimal.lp
was put together over a long period of time. What was your final
goal for the album?
"My
down-to-earth inspiration is really thinking in terms of sound
ecosystems and how sounds interact with each other. I would
accomplish this in a variety of ways; I would use ring mods
to run other sounds through to bounce off each other, and it's
different each time. I like to set up themes so that the sounds
evolve through the tracks. I want them layered to an extent,
but I don't want them overly complicated. I want to add depth
to it, but I don't like having the sound just come in and leave
and really serve no purpose, so all of the tracks revolve around
central samples and themes that I've come up with. Ambient music
to me is not something that you can directly listen to. You
can't be in your car and put in an ambient CD and say [to
your passenger], 'hey, check this part out here!' It just
doesn't work that way for me. The whole time I'm writing tracks
with this idea of background music in mind. It's really subtle,
but it's there."
optimal.lp
is out now on 12k. Expect a sophomore album from Shuttle 358
before summer 2000. Hear the interview with Shuttle 358 in RealAudio
on Andrew Duke's In The Mix show 595.
