Chelsea Press 2
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Post by Chelsea Press 2 on Sept 13, 2005 12:18:14 GMT -5
Rhys Fulber (Conjure One) Interview
From Star
Few artists can honestly say that they witnessed and contributed to the birth of modern industrial music... Rhys Fulber can. Widely known for his work with Austrian musician Bill Leeb on a little project called Frontline Assembly, Fulber has cemented the use of synthesizers and electronic drums in industrial music. Since Frontline Assembly, Fulber has expanded his musical horizons by composing for numerous side projects such as Intermix, Delirium, Synaesthesia and now Conjure One. Living outside of his hometown of Vancouver, British Columbia, Rhys avoids the big cities and mostly keeps to his quiet rural home. There he works on remixes and production for acts such as Mindless Self Indulgence, Megadeth, and the Tea Party. Despite his busy schedule, Rhys Fulber takes some time out to talk with us at About.Dance.com about the release of the new Conjure One album; Extraordinary Ways.
Star: So Delerium and Conjure One are both very ethereal feeling, how do you see them interacting with the more club-oriented genres like industrial and EBM?
Rhys Fulber: I don't know, I never think about it to be honest. I thought it was something kind of different, I don't really connect the two things that much really. The Conjure One stuff is pretty different than what influenced what you would call industrial. So I don't know, it's hard for me to say because it seems to me that it's a different audience, but I could be wrong.
Star: Well, given the similarities between Delerium and Conjure One, I guess could you contrast the two for me, or I guess what was the intention behind having them as two separate projects?
Rhys Fulber: Well, I don't think they sound that similar. The way the music's put together, to me, is quite different, the way the songs are written for Delerium and the way the songs are written for Conjure One, the working process differs a fair amount.
Star: How so?
Rhys Fulber: Well, with Delerium, I'm working with Bill and he will bring an idea of something and then we'll assemble a song, a lot of the times we're assembling songs around samples and stuff like that, whereas with Conjure One it's more like stuff that's just sort of written or it's just a piano and stuff like that. I mean there's a lot more live instruments on Conjure One than on Delerium. I think as I'm doing all the programming on both projects, that's probably where you're going to have a similarity because it's the same person doing a lot of the texturing and stuff like that. But the feeling of the music feels different to me. That's the only way I can describe it, Conjure One feels a little more intimate from my perspective.
Star: It's interesting that you say it's personal because it seems like with Conjure One you're working with so many vocalists. How does that songwriting process come in when you're working with so many different vocalists, and what inspires you to work with so many different vocalists?
Rhys Fulber: Well, what inspired me to work with different vocalists is that I'm not much of a vocalist myself, so to get things on a level that I'd be happy with, I have to bring in someone who is a singer. It's like I don't really want to work with a bunch of different vocalists, but because I don't have a permanent vocalist yet, I'm kind of left with that. The music is quite personal to me, the musical writing process and everything. And then basically what I'm doing is I'm presenting someone with a pretty near complete picture of the music, and then just having them write some vocal melodies and lyrics. And the ones that I really related to are the ones that ended up on the record. And it's just the themes of the songs seem more personal to me.
Star: So you decide who's appropriate for which song based on that, or how does the match up process work?
Rhys Fulber: Well on the new record, the match up process was really not that complicated. The songs with Jane were just like 'here, here's these songs,' she writes the lyrics and sends them back, and that was basically it, it was really pretty simple. Songs like Face the Music, I did with this guy named Peter Wright, who's a writer, and he just had Tiff Lacey sing it because he needed someone to sing it to hear what it would sound like, and it sort of stayed. I mean it wasn't like we went through as much as I did on the first record or like we do with Delirium with auditioning stuff, this stuff all kind of just happened, you know, it was pretty free-flowing. This song Forever Lost, I actually wrote that with a friend of mine, and we just had her sing it, you know, so we had already worked on the lyrics and stuff ahead of time and we just needed a voice for it. So I think that's sort of how this record differs.
Star: So how do you hook-up with some of the bigger name vocalists, like when you worked with Sinead O'Connor?
Rhys Fulber: Well that was a little weird because, to be honest, I was kind of disconnected from the whole process. On the first record I had worked on a couple of songs with these guys who were pretty well-known songwriters and it was something I'd never done before. And at the time I was, you know, in LA and I'm like, I've got to get some vocals for these songs. I asked a few people and they said, 'well, why don't you
Star: t working with some songwriters, you know, and maybe they can help you.' So I got into a circle with these people in LA and they kind of made it all happen, they were like 'we've got this song, we think it would really work with what you're doing and we're going to get Sinead O'Connor to sing it,' and I'm like 'OK, great.' I didn't meet her or anything.
Star: During the whole process, you never met her?
Rhys Fulber: No, because she did it in Ireland. We did it with this- kind of outdated technology now, it's called Ednet, and I've actually used it twice before, and it's sort of like ISDN. It's like they'll be at the studio in Ireland and we can hear them, so you're kind of running the session from LA while they're in Ireland, so they'll do a vocal and then we'll hear it and then, you know, we can make comments after. So, I mean, I heard her speaking through speakers inbetween takes and that was a bizarre process. To some people it was supposed to be revolutionary for collaborative records and stuff but nobody really uses it anymore. But that's how we did the Sinead O'Connor thing, so I never met her or anything. It was strange.
Star: Yes, it is kind of. So what inspired you to
Star: t doing your own lyrics on this album and why.?
Rhys Fulber: I didn't really do my own lyrics, I just was more involved in some of the process, you know, like I would maybe go back with the people writing and sort of say 'maybe we should do this here and maybe this line could be better.' I just was more involved in that process than I was on the first record. The first record, I was just sort of going along with some of these other peoples' plans, whereas on this one I didn't really do that. Because there were things on the first record that I'm not crazy about that now, so I didn't want that to happen again, so I was involved in every little detail of the record.
Star: On "I Believe," how did you feel about stepping up and doing the vocals?
Rhys Fulber: Well it was kind of weird, I was really nervous about it. I'm a big fan of Buzzcocks, I still listen to it all the time, I love the band. And I was just in my studio and diddling around and listening to some of their songs, and I just
Star: ted playing the keyboards along to it and then I'm like 'oh, that sounds really good on a keyboard,' so maybe I can try doing a cover of this. And so I
Star: ted working on a cover of the song and I'm just going to throw some vocals down myself just so I hear what this is all going to sound like together. So I just, with a hand-held microphone threw down a rough vocal, and just said this is what it's going to sound like, basically to make a demo of the song. And then the record company and a few people I knew heard it, and they didn't know it was me singing it, and then they said 'that sounds really cool, you've got that guy singing on it, that's kind of different.' And I didn't really say anything at first, I'm like 'really, you think it sounds good?' And they go 'yeah, we think it sounds good.' And I'm like 'OK, well maybe I should just run with this.'
Star: How do you feel about it now?
Rhys Fulber: I like it now. I mean, it's still hard, the singing is weird, the sound of your own voice is usually a traumatic experience for a lot of people. And also because I've worked with so many singers before and as a producer I kind of know what to tell them, but when it's you and you kind of know what you have to do- it's something that takes a lot of practice. I'd never really done it before, so it was like my brain knew what to do but my mouth didn't know what to do, you know. It was a little nerve-wracking but I just sort of trusted some of the people whose opinions I respect and, you know, they were kind of like 'believe me, it sounds really cool,' so I'm like, 'OK, we'll run with this.' Because my ultimate goal is to not have to have so many people involved in making these records, so the more I can whittle it down, the easier it is for the creative process. So that was an experiment to see if I could, you know, pull it off. And it's a song that is really, really close to me, I love the lyrics. I can really relate to a lot of the lyrics, and it sort of almost feels like it's my own song even though it isn't, you know, it's one of those kind of things. So if I was going to sing something, that would have been perfect, you know. But as far as writing my own vocals and stuff, there's still a way to go.
RS: With Tiff Lacy, I know she's singing on a lot of different trance records right now, how did you get to hook-up with her?
Rhys Fulber: To be honest, I'd never heard of her. I was working with Peter Wright, who wrote a song on the Oakenfold record, and he's published by Nettwerk, and he was suggested to me by someone at Nettwerk, and I had a piece of music that I wanted somebody to write a nice vocal for, and so they said 'try Peter.' And I talked to Peter and I sent him that song, and he sent me back a demo and the vocals sounded really good, I don't know who it was, and I had a few people try and re-sing it and it kind of didn't really work because of the sort of sound of the voice was kind of unique and some of the parts didn't sound good with anyone else doing it. And then I found out it was someone named Tiff, she sang on the Oakenfold record I did and I've worked with her before so I used her, but at the time I had no idea. And then I later found out she sang on a Lost Witness record. I still don't know much about her, I've never met her. You know, it was like I'd sent the track over, they recorded it in London and then sent it back to me, so yes, I just thought it sounded really good and that was all I knew really.
Star: Let's chat about a few of your other projects When you hooked-up with Sarah McLachlan and she appeared on Silence, a lot of people were surprised because of her previous mainstream top forty success. How did she come to be the choice for an underground song like Silence?
Rhys Fulber: Well she's on Nettwerk in Canada, so we're on the same record label, so it's just kind of like the same group of people. She lives in the same city, in Vancouver. And, you know, she was pretty successful at the time but she wasn't as big as she is now, and we were just making that one Delerium record. And it's quite a while ago now, I mean it's like 1997 when we were doing that. And Nettwerk said, maybe we'll get Sarah to come, because she'd actually sang on something before, this industrial band from Boston called Manufactures, she'd actually sang on one of their records previously. But that's going back a little bit. So she'd done this before with Nettwerk when Nettwerk had another artist and they wanted a female vocalist, so she did it. So at that time she had already sang on an underground record, so we didn't really think of it in that way at all. I mean, at the time it was no big deal, you know, it was like 'oh, she's going to come down the studio and sing.' And at first she was just going to sing sort of oohs and ahhs, it wasn't going to be a lead vocal, and then she came in and laid down a vocal on it. You know, and it was pretty fast, I mean looking back on it, it was really like just, you know, she was in the studio a few hours and that was it, and I mean we didn't even think it was going to be a single, we just thought it was an album track, it was like 'yes, that sounds cool.' But by no means were we like 'oh yes, that's the one,' I mean it all happened way later. And I still think it's really strange how it sort of took off like that. It wasn't really until the remixes where that thing really kind of got a light shone on it, because it wasn't even going to be a single.
Star: Do you feel like you've done better at picking out singles, or do you think it's still always a surprise?
Rhys Fulber: I let the record company do that a lot of times, because I'm not a marketing person, you know, I try and make as many songs as I can and then let them decide. I don't know a lot of artists who pick their own singles. You try and make a bunch as songs as good as you can and then the people who have to sell the record ultimately, they're usually the ones that make that decision, you know, it's usually not one person, it's usually a whole bunch of different people.
Star: So as one of the forerunners of kind of the more modern industrial, how were you inspired to
Star: t doing electronic music?
Rhys Fulber: I've been around music my entire life, I don't know anything else. You know, I
Star: ted playing music when I was really young, playing drums, and my father was in bands and had a recording studio, so as a child I would just hang around all the time. And I remember synthesizers back in the 70s and I remember playing with them and being really interested in them and I played drums, I got really into punk rock when I was young. Around 1984, I think I'd say, about 1984/83, I kind of got more and more into synthesizers and playing with drum machines instead of playing drums and just listening to electronic music a lot more than other types of music, and it just sort of went from there. And then eventually I kind of got around to discovering all this underground industrial music. This probably came through because, you know, when I was a kid in Vancouver, pretty early on Skinny Puppy came out and blew everyone's mind. 1984 is when I got a synthesizer and kind of
Star: ted fiddling around with it, and then I met Bill about 1986 and he was in Skinny Puppy and it just sort of went from there. Everyone was just sort of mucking around and I knew so many people, everyone was making tapes and stuff. Not so much like tapes to get record deals, but everyone was just experimenting. It was a really cool time actually, it was very artistic. I just knew so many people that had, you know, a little studio to twiddle around in, and that's sort of where it all came from.
Star: So what is it like to
Star: t out being a fan of people like Skinny Puppy and then turn out to be their long-time colleagues?
Rhys Fulber: Well it was just because there was a lot of stuff like that happening in the city, a lot of people just kind of got into it, you know, and it's sort of like how the Sex Pistols were basically the first punk rock band. I was there when it sort of happened and, you know, everyone was getting creative just around the same time.
Star: Well nowadays it seems to be like a more modern trend that people are making most of their music exclusively with the computer and moving away from using like manual instruments. How do you see that fitting in to the picture of things stagnating, do you think that it's going to come full circle and they're going to
Star: t picking up instruments again?
Rhys Fulber: Well that's kind of what I'm doing, because I'm kind of bored with it to be honest, so that's why on the new Conjure One record there's a lot of guitars, there's real bass, there's live drums. I'm kind of going back that way because there's only so many ways to skin a cat, you know, and after a while you go 'OK, I've got to try something else.' And one thing I thought was cool about those old Skinny Puppy records is that a lot of the keyboard parts is someone playing it and just recording it on tape, it's not necessarily even sequences, and that's what gives it that sound and I think it's really cool. Personally I am trying to go back more to doing things that way, because the technology's become more accessible and anyone can have a studio. But that doesn't necessarily mean there's going to be a lot of better music, because the ratio is about the same as it was back then. I just find with that kind of music, no one's really picked up the ball and reinvented it. People are still influenced by the same groups and no one's really pushed the boundaries.
Star: So talking about other bands and what-not, what about other peoples' music makes you want to produce it or makes you want to engineer or work on that album with them?
Rhys Fulber: Well, a lot of times it's just whoever asks. I mean, I did a couple of records with an English band called Paradise Lost, and that's one of the cases where I really liked that band. But for the most part, it's just whoever calls up and has an interest in what I'm doing and wants to incorporate that into what I do, I mean that's usually how it works. I mean, I don't like be so arrogant to assume that all these different people want to work with me, so I just kind of sit back and just, you know, let things sort of happen how they happen.
RS: What's in your CD player or iPod right now?
Rhys Fulber: I'm listening to the Buzzcocks all the time. The single's going steady, I can't stop listening to that record, I loved it when I was eleven and I like it even more now. And I've also been listening to Future Sound of London and this band called Parkive, this trip-hop group that not a lot of people cotton on to. I'm just sort of going back through my record collection and rediscovering stuff lately, stuff that's a few years old, ten years old plus, that's kind of what I've been listening to a lot. I'll buy new records and then I'll just listen to them for like a week and then that's it, you know.
RS: In your studio, are you PC-based or Mac-based.
Rhys Fulber: All Mac.
RS: Are you using Logic or Cubase?
Rhys Fulber: You know what, I hate Logic now. I loved Logic for years and now I hate it, I can't stand the sight of it, I use ProTools for everything. I was a hardcore Logic user and then one day I just snapped and I switched to ProTools, and I think it's far superior. I mean I still use Logic for the odd little thing midi-wise, I'll go back in and do something, but as far as handling audio files, I can't stand Logic. I'm actually going to come out and say it sucks now.
RS: Really?
Rhys Fulber: ProTools blows it away, in my option. Because since I've
Star: ted using ProTools, I think my work sounds better, I just think for handling audio, Logic is pretty terrible and ProTools is much better. So I do everything more audio instead of midi now, I don't use midi as much as I used to, it's all pretty much audio.
RS: And what's your favorite piece of outboard gear?
Rhys Fulber: I just did a remix for Mylo's Self Indulgence, I was finishing it yesterday. And Greg Reely has this compressor, it's like a compressor limiter rebuilt from the old EMI studios that they did the Pink Floyd records on, it's called a Chandler and it's a compressor, and I just found out what it is. It's just discrete processing, there's no chips or anything, and you just run your sounds through it and it sounds absolutely unbelievable. So I have to say right now that's my favorite piece of gear, because I sort of whittled down a lot of my studio, I don't have the piles of keyboards like I used to, I kind of just have a few select pieces. And now I'm more interested in things like, you know, compressors and EQ units and not using plug-ins for everything so you've got a nice thick sound. So right now I'd have to say that Chandler compressor.
RS: Thank you so much for your time today.
Rhys Fulber: Y'all are in Nashville aren't you? We're actually working on some music with Leigh Nash, who's from Nashville , right now.
RS: She's the singer from Sixpence None the Richer and she did a track with Delirium, right?
Rhys Fulber: Yes, we're doing a whole record with her. Electronic music with her singing. It's probably is a bit like the Delerium-style but it's a little more retro-sounding, you know, more instruments and stuff. It's like a side project we're doing.
RS: Is it religious-based or is it going to be secular?
Rhys Fulber: I didn't even know she was a Christian or anything, I didn't know. I imagine it's secular because I don't really hear any references to it in the lyrics, so I imagine it's secular.
RS: OK, cool, that's awesome. It's interesting because they
Star: ted as a big Christian band here in Nashville, but when they went pop they totally lost that.
Rhys Fulber: Well, you know, probably to reach broader people because, you know, the more ambiguous you are in that, the more you're going to be able to connect with a bigger variety of people, so that's probably the mentality behind that. I don't really know, I didn't even know that that was the angle, I just know she's got a nice voice.
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