As many have seen and experience, the music vibrations in Denver have expanded like a boulder dropping into a lake, reaching into uncharted territory and flowing into new waters. For The Reprogramming Project CD, the cellular structure of Cacheflowe, Scaffolding and Wayne Winters has mutated into layer upon layer of futuristic, electronic experimentation that could well accompany a 2012 rendition of Space Odyssey.
The three met in the typical fashion, in our close quarters of shows, mutual friends and random connections around town. After experiencing each other’s live shows and musical production, they became peers and collaborators, which led to a mutual connection, respect, the making of their new release, The Reprogramming Project.
Equipped with over 25 years of combined electronic music production experience, each wrote an original song without the influence of another, and then exchanged songs to create remix versions of each, using the basis of the original song while adding new sounds to warp the structure and rearrange the elements. The creation process continued when they took the source material and each made an additional mega-remix.
Cacheflow tells their story, while preparing for the CD release party scheduled for this Saturday, March 1 at Quixotes. Headlining the bill is one who has stirred things up in the dance and glitch-hop circles, coming in from Brooklyn to put the icing on the party cake.
Kaffeine Buzz: How do you three mesh your various styles within this eclectic genre?
Cacheflowe: I think all three of us are influenced by many different styles of music, and have ended up where we are because we want to experiment with blending styles. Given that fact, we all felt completely free to do whatever wanted with this remix album. Despite the experimentation and regardless of the combination of genres and styles, the music that each of us makes sounds like it was made by the respective artist.
KB: How you collaborate during the songwriting process?
CF: This was a remix project, so each of us wrote 4 songs without any help from the other producers. We each wrote an original song, and gave the audio to the other 2 producers to remix. After all those tunes were made, we took all the source material and each made one more mega-remix. Every remix uses lots from the original, but adds new sounds and completely warps and rearranges the elements.
KB: How you feel this style of music, particularly glitch-hop, has evolved over the years?
CF: Glitch hop’s roots go back to artists like Autechre, Aphex Twin, and Squarepusher, who would occasionally mix in weird downtempo beats with their otherwise spastic abstract electronica. In the early 2000s, you saw Prefuse 73 get big on Warp Records, Machinedrum doing a similar kind of thing on the legendary experimental label m3rck, and Dabrye creating his own version via Ghostly records. I think they really defined the sound that’s now bled into other genres, and is even splintering off into different types of glitch hop. edIT and Tom Burbank were a couple of the newer notable producers of glitch hop, in 2004-2006, and thier efforts were still largely downtempo headphone music. More recently, edIT’s headed the Glitch Mob in California, who’ve helped spawn a form of glitch hop (thanks in part to Burning Man), that’s much more about dancing than chillin’. I love a groove, but I’m still much more into the downtempo side of glitch hop, where experimentation and pushing new directions is more important than blowing up the dancefloor. There are artists that can marry the two elements beautifully, most notably the UK’s Tipper.
KB: What you see happing in terms of innovation, including its stars such as Machinedrum?
CF: I believe it’s going to mature further as a genre, and keep influencing other genres along the way. I’m sure there will be a lot more of the danceable side of glitch hop, as well as great new artists on the more downtempo and experimental front. At the end of last year, edIT released a new album that’s received lots of good press, and pretty much reset the bar for bangin, dancefloor glitch hop (while great to listen to on the headphones). There’s also been crossover with dubstep, and I can imagine that will continue in the world of glitch hop. I’ve heard little spats of dubstep in Machinedrum’s new work, but he’s definitely one to experiment in all directions, which is why he was the perfect choice for our show (besides the fact that we all really wanted to see him play :). I always wonder what else could possibly be done with electronic music, but someone will always come out with a new style and new techniques that totally blow open new directions for music.
KB: This seems to be a great undertaking, which spanned over two years. Do you have other works in the works?
CF: It was a long term effort by all parties: trading files, waiting for each other to finish tunes, getting all the design together, making the music video, putting up a nice web site, promotion… it’s a lot, and we’ve all had busy lives, but it turned out amazing as far as we’re all concerned – we’re very proud of our collective efforts. Upcoming music releases are: the official release of an EP by Scaffolding vs. Heft, a CacheFlowe dubstep/glitch-hop EP, a full-length album by Scaffolding, a Wayne Winters EP, several other EPs from local artists, and compilation EPs exploring the Plastic Sound Supply interpretation of different genres. There will definitely be several releases in 2008. We’re also going to be releasing visual art from our incredible designer Anthony Cozzi (Snowblinded.com) and our video/visual artist Movax, who created our Album’s music video.
KB: What other artists to you plan to support under Plastic Sound Support?
CF: Besides the core crew of CacheFlowe, Scaffolding, Snowblinded, and Movax, we’ll put out more music from Wayne Winters, Equulei, George & Caplin, and several other artists to be named. We’re discussing the possibilities of having higher-profile artists remix or write exclusive tunes for us, but have quite a backlog of music to release before we get to the bigger plans.
KB: Will there be more PSS parties in the future and/or tours?
CF: There will definitely be more PSS parties in the future. We’ll have one for each important release, and likely bring more out-of-state talent. We also want to integrate our events more with the art community. I think our blend of audio and visual is at the forefront of local digital multimedia entertainment, and should be as comfortable at an art gallery as it is in a forward-thinking metropolitan club. There’s been a little talk of tours, but since we all work (or have worked) in the advertising industry, we’re taking that knowledge to the net, and have low-cost, targeted, national and international marketing plans. We plan on building support and becoming an important player in the world of original experimental electronic music.
The Reprogramming Project’s record release party and Cacheflowe send-off happens Saturday, March 1 at Quixote’s. Special guest Machinedrum headlines, performing along with Cacheflowe, Scaffolding, Wayne Winters, and Ten and Racer, with VJ Movax (who created the video for the Cacheflow remix of “Rebuild,” http://vimeo.com/725215) and An-Ism on visuals.
