cultus vibes. interview #31

Something is about to be born. The only thing that makes me more happy than discover or feature a new artist that I truly believe is to discover a new label. And if it's a net label releasing free digital music, well, than I feel like it's Christmas. That's what happened with Holiday Records, Beko-DSL...

The thing that fascinates me about this kind of label is the idea that they are created due to the love of music, since there's no money or big corporations supporting them. 

In two days, on Feb. 1st, Cultus Vibes is joining this group. For what I've heard so far (and as you can read below) they'll be featuring electronic acts (with warm and bliss pop influences) and folk-ish roots music. 

We had the opportunity to talk with the label's creator. 

So, Cultus Vibes: Welcome! And already thank you for the effort! 

And boys and girls (and every gender in between), here's Cultus Vibes, in its own words.

01. The label is about to be born. on feb 1st the site will be launched and the first digital EP released. Tell us what led you to start a digital label and what's the idea/concept behind it. What kind of music will you feature and where does the name come from...

The idea came to me during one of the many drives that I do from my hometown to the town that my girlfriend lives in. It's about 30 mins of driving, and it's actually really therapeutic. It's nice to have a bit of time to just sit and think, or just listen to music. Anyways, during one of these drives the idea just sort of hit me. 

The whole concept is based solely around the idea of using some of the successes that I've had over the last year, and sharing them with my friends, who happen to be talented musicians. One of the main reasons I've been as productive in terms of producing new music, is because I'm surrounded by people that are constantly challenging me to make better music everyday. So I basically wanted to expose some of these great artists to a group of people that may look past them, or possible never even hear them.

We're going to be quite eclectic in terms of what type of music we actually release, but for the most part its going to be electronic and roots/folk music. That being said, we're open to pretty much everything.  

The name comes from a lake, Cultus Lake, that is a pretty integral part of summers for anyone that lives in the area that I live in. I wanted to call it something that would be familiar for people who live here, but still intriguing to people who are unfamiliar with it.

keep reading...

procedure club. interview #30

We've been following Adam and Andrea since their 2009 single release on Beko-dsl. It was fuzzy and a bit noisy, but nothing could've prepared us to Doomed Forever, their debut album on Slumberland Records: 30 minutes of lo-fi, chaotic (layers of) guitars mixed with (layers of) Andrea's soothing voice.
The album flows perfectly. It has timing and balance between the heavy guitars, electronic drum machines and more 'trippy', electronic influenced songs.
It's intense. Quirky. Angry. Twee. Shoegaze. Vibrant.

Go to Slumberland, buy the record and prepare your ears.
On Scribble Kite, you can download their first release, from 2008.

On Beko (or here on the blog) you can download their single from 2009 and after the interview, you'll find their latest album, also released on Beko. 

In our first interview of the year, Adam and Andrea talk about getting high and drunk during freezing nights, collaborations with record labels, buying spandex, music distribution and creative directions. Always with a very peculiar sense of humour. Enjoy!

01. While gathering information about the band when I first discovered you, I read that you started to make music during the freezing winter nights of New Haven… Do you remember the first time you did that? What you had in my mind by that time? And where does the name come from?

photo by jim of fnu ronnies

ADAM: Eastern US can be quite cold and snowy during winter times.  Despite the fact that many times Andrea and I hate cold and snow and sometimes we would rather be in Brazil on the beach or in the amazon jungle, we like to romanticize the idea of winter. Both of us are somewhat of a winter folk. I grew up in Eastern Poland and Andrea is from the Berkshire Mountains in western Massachusetts and both of us are excellent skiers, to say the least.

Anyway, it was during those long winter nights in 2007 when we would stay up all night get high and drunk and play with the recording gear in my room,  until one night I made some few catchy and trippy instrumental tracks with Andrea (sometimes literally half asleep) laying her multiple vocal tracks on  top. First few songs that we made were Awesome Animals, Dictionary of Psychology, Different Shot, and Behemoth.   All these songs are on the scribble kite rec.

2008 release as well as the latest beko-dsl 2011 release. We were instantly very surprised, happy and proud with the way they all sounded and couldn't wait to make more tracks somewhat the same way.  It wasn't until few weeks after, that we realized we have a solid body of work and we needed a name.  Coincidentally, our friend Crystal Ward had a funny little name for her imaginary club on her facebook profile.  She named it Procedure Club.  We all found it really funny for it's sheer meaninglessness and  vagueness.  We asked her if we could use that name for what, at the time, was our imaginary band, and that's how Procedure Club happened.

keep reading...

music to see #11 (vacation edition)

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