1. If you had to choose only one song from yours, what would it be?
Probably whatever it is I'm busy writing/recording, because nothing beats the feeling of seeing music getting born right in front of you. From something I've released, probably Written For You After You Left Us from the Lonely Suburbs EP. The human voice as a component to the music - but not necessarily the element that foregrounds it the way most songs do - is something I'm pretty hooked on at the moment.
2. If you had to choose only one instrument, what would it be?
The more important question would be whether or not I can manipulate the sounds once I've recorded them on the instrument. Most of what I've done has been on the piano. Definitely not in the mood to part with it anytime soon.
3. Hey! Why don't you record the song you've just chosen with this instrument?!
I try not to look back and revisit what I've done.
4. What's your definition of DIY music?
Music made out of an absolute need and done stubbornly (or insecurely) by yourself while your teenage girlfriend tries to keep your 3 month old daughter quiet so you can record.
5. If your music was a shape, what would it be?
The shape of a hopelessly incomplete and barely populated house.
6. Pick a photograph that would fit in with your music and tell us more about it.
Look at the album covers while listening to the music. I don't really want to explain the connections, because ultimately I did not choose them based on any ideas that could be clearly described. For me, music is the art form that is most easily able to slip into the realm of 'pure' emotion. It's a feeling thing.
7. What's your vision of live music?
I never play live, though I have nothing against the format. It's more a logistical/equipment issue. Though if I did play live, it wouldn't be to recreate what's already been recorded. I'm interested in the jazz approach, where the emphasis is on spontaneous newness. A constant state of reaction to others and your own feelings and impulses at the time. Memorising and playing what you've already created seems pointless to me. If I ever played live, I would like to do it with some other musicians. Live performance is a social event. Others should partake.
8. What are your current / future art projects?
I don't know what you mean by "art projects", but I've got a new album coming out in December, tentatively titled travelsongs. A teaser EP, More Wind For Lonely Suburbs, is currently available for download. I'm also working on an album I hope to put out sometime early next year, which will be a singer/songwriter kind of thing. Part of me just wants to do that album now. Doing a more direct, lyrically and vocally driven record is a very exciting thought at the moment. I've been at work on a video installation which is more or less done. About half of the album to be released in December was originally written for the installation, which should be out next year sometime. There's also an album of much heavier stuff - also more song-based and vocally driven - which will be finished sometime, though I can't say when.
9. Are you a free artist?
In the economic sense, no. If I was then I would be able to make music all the time. Creatively, I would like to think of myself as free and certainly, I can record whatever I want. But I suppose I'm limited creatively by my own aesthetic prejudice, which excludes certain kinds of music. Also by the limitations of my own musical skill. In the latter sense I'm certainly less free than Mozart, Beethoven or Coltrane for example. Also, in South Africa there's very little cross-polination between white and black musicians and music scenes, though it has obviously improved since racial segregation came to an end in 1994. Nevertheless, on the music level it's been a tentative process of sharing and integration. The love for hip hop amongst white audiences, for instance, is nowhere near as big as it is in the States. And this is a direct result of a racial codification of music that arose through the racist Apartheid system we had in place for half of the 20th century. So that's a limitation of influence that I'm slowly trying to expose myself to and overcome. But in the broader sense, I don't think any artist is free, because we all lack the mentality to openly embrace the whole musical spectrum. We are all limited in that sense.
10. What's your vision of freedom?
That's obviously a tricky and dangerous question, and one I have avoided finding one answer to. While you need a long-term plan to try and push towards freedom, I also think that struggling your whole life to find it is ultimately not freedom of any kind. I think it is best achieved through trying to liberate your inner self as much as possible on a purely individual level. This is going to sound like some strange hippy bullshit, but being comfortable with your own nudity/sexuality is a big part of it. It takes you back to a state before we all felt all these useless and wasteful social pressures. Most of the time though, it's something I think needs to be taken on a day-by-day basis. There are a lot of temporary escapes. Sharing true intimacy and emotional openness with someone is one of them. Making music is certainly another, though I don't think it really frees you. It shouldn't really, because it's a way of conveying the lack of freedom, the injustice, etc. I'm not necessarily talking about politically motivated music. Sometimes you just try and convey an oppressed state of existence, even if you don't point any fingers. I'll be the first to admit that most of my music is very sad. That's not because I'm sad all the time. But for me it's a way of describing the negative sides of modern life, the suffering that's all around and sometimes inside me. The heaviness that descends when you face all the things that are immensely fucked up with my country and this planet at the moment. The music's a requiem for all that gets lost with that. I think freedom could begin by recognising you are not actually free and that others are even less so. But I don't think real freedom is possible, because the sources of oppression and imprisonment are immense and exist on all sides of the spectrum. That's a very negative way of looking at it, but a great deal of beauty can come about if we struggle for ourselves and, more importantly, for other people. Most societies, particularly capitalist ones, discourage any genuine charity.
I could go on in this vein. This is nothing new. You get the general idea.
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