My Journey Back to Music
Once upon a time
My adventures in music started inadvertently in 1992. Yes, that’s 30 years go. A friend of mine in high school said he played the guitar and asked me if I played the drums. I said yes. In fact, I didn’t play the drums or he the guitar but that didn’t stop us from forming a band. That was my first band and that’s how it all started. With these tactile pieces of gear called instruments. 30 years later I still can’t seem to stop making music.
Burning Out
However, at one point, about three years ago, I started experiencing a severe form of burning out. Many years earlier I had linked paying the bills to making music and while that enabled me to learn at a pace I wouldn't have been able to otherwise, at one point I just had enough. I noticed I would happily sit down to play the piano but once I would take the idea to the computer, what I felt was something I can only compare to disgust.
Photography
Then photography happened. Instead of hiding in the studio working on music, suddenly I was out on the streets in every last bit of my free time doing street photography. Learning something from scratch was extremely refreshing and lead me to the realization that creating art can’t be predominantly a business for me, it has to be mainly therapeutic. I process the world around me and understand my place in it via my artistic output.
The Path Reveals Itself
Then one day I dug out my Maschine Studio. I felt a slight but definite buzz but I needed the immediacy and I needed the absence of a computer. So I purchased a Maschine Plus, the standalone and updated version of the same instrument. I knew I was onto something. My creativity flew, I couldn’t stop making beats. I needed a synthesizer so, some time later I picked up a Novation Summit. Through the exploration of this combo, the path leading back to music started to reveal itself.
Music for me started with instruments. Playing the drums, the piano, the guitar, and that's what lead to the music I recorded. That's what I had been missing. As a professional music producer efficiency was always the highest priority, so I never had the time to experiment with instruments. In hindsight, I probably chose quantity over quality. In lack of a day job, I didn't seem to have another choice as my musical output defined my income. No surprise then that I wasn't aware of the plethora of modern instruments that had flooded the industry in the meantime—some of which are extremely well designed and engineered, and, as a result, are insanely inspiring.
A New Dawn
Then came the Novation Circuit Rhythm and the Tracks. Then the Polyend Tracker. And the Polyend Play. And the Elektron Syntakt. There is no doubt in my mind that the people over at Novation, Polyend, and Elektron are bizarrely talented and just get it. They get it. These instruments are absolutely amazing pieces of gear.
This is how I arrived at the highly and aptly controversial OP-1 Field. This wildly portable digital audio workstation dropped on the market as a successor of the OP-1 OG and its very steep price instantly triggered the entire industry. Maybe I was just GAS-sing over it or maybe it was intuition, or quite probably both, but, I bit the bullet and made the purchase. I had never previously used an instrument that made this little sense to me prior to purchasing it while watching all the YouTube videos until I actually had it in my hand and started using it. It all fell into place that moment—the design, the features, the workflow, everything. Someone asked me recently if I think it's worth the steep asking price and my answer was: "My short answer is yes. My slightly longer answer is that of course what’s worth what is a very subjective thing and if what this thing brings to the table for you is something that you want and or need and you can also afford it then yes—otherwise no". I know a lot of people are convinced that it's way overpriced and insane or even insulting and that's perfectly fine, everyone is entitled to their opinion.
Bitwig—The Last Piece
In the meantime, I arrived to what appears to fill the last gap in the process: Bitwig. I was experimenting with this software some time ago and sporadically throughout the years but oh boy, have they come a long way. I have switched over to Bitwig from Ableton Live. Nothing wrong with Live, quite the contrary. I just find a long list of things I wish Ableton had or was able to do with such elegance and simplicity that Bitwig can. I am currently compiling an album's worth of material that is four years in the making and it’s getting dangerously close to wrapping up. Exciting times. Until then and in the meantime, let me share with you my journey of exploring these instruments. Click below to see the videos I have recorded recently. I have been uploading these to YouTube and I intend to keep it up so please feel free to subscribe and also share your thoughts.
I hope I’ll have a new update soon—either here, or in a form of a new upload, or who knows, perhaps an album. Follow me on my socials to be in the loop. And share your thoughts or just let me know what you think I should know. Thank you 🚀🙏🏻