Autechre's Interview to Grooves Magazine, September 2001

Published September 28, 2001. Interviewer: Alex Reynolds.

Below are two articles from the same publication. The first is a article summarising the interview [1] and the second is the original interview transcript between Alex and Sean. [2]

Article Transcript

Anger Management and Random Myths. Autechre's Sean Booth gets serious about music journalists, generative music and biology

As I finish punching in a series of 20-odd numbers to reach Autechre's pastoral manor in the English countryside, the dial tone returns a series of eardrum-rending screams from a fax machine on the other end. I think to myself that the two musicians might be playing some new material for my benefit, or perhaps they're having a few laughs. A second call follows through to a human being--too bad,I thought, as I was grooving with the beat of the fax--and after brief introductions, the flesh-and-blood voice of Sean Booth mentions something cryptic about a baffle to filter incoming calls to explain the noise pulse:"I don't think it's very audible for international gates; it's confusing up me phone lines. 'Cause you got a noise gate on an international call you don't hearthe message 'cause it's so quiet."

Frank Zappa's oft-cited observation that "writing about music is like dancing about architecture" seems relevant to Autechre on several levels, not least in the way that the Manchester duo's work overthe last decade has been compared with the act of dancing to design,of building ordered structure from the mire of chaos: the arrangement of base elements into a richly detailed, multilayered architecture of sound for crowds in dance clubs. From the early Artificial Intellegence days of Incunabula, to the deeply hypnotic environments of Amber and Tri Repetae, to the chaotic. messy sculptures of regression and evolution in Chiastic Slide, EP7. and its latest full-length work Confield, the group has progressed not only in technical and conceptual complexity, but almost amazingly in its ever burgeoning popularity, despite the challenging and wholly unique nature of the Autechre sound.

Yet too much fame and respect have seemingly become impediments to the pair's progress. The act of translating music into words by the press has been largely a Zappaesque exercise in futility, in Booth's mind, and playing the role ofthe detached, manic autodidact. he jumps nimbly from the subject of telecommunications to answer my opening question about his reluctance to do interviews. "Yeah, I don't know if this [interview] will be the last one, but, ah, yeah, I don't want to do any for awhile," he says, frustrated about questions about his work with Rob Brown over the years. "I mean, I could just say something. But, whatever, I can't be bothered anymore.

"It's just too much bullshit game-playing, you know? It's like,I don't know--it's weird, that part of life. It's like a 'you're expected to do it' sort of thing, like you've got an onus from people that buy your records to explain what you're doing, even though you wouldn't even bother to explain it to your mates, you know what I mean? You feel like you should be honest. to a point I mean, yeah, why not just play the game and bullshit and keep everyone entertained? But I don't know, it's kind of like being a conjurer or something. I'd rather not. "The reason I'm bored with doing interviews is 'cause everything seems so obvious to me, you know? All the things I have to explain to journalists are just really obvious. I don't think I've ever said one thing to a journalist that wasn't completely, totally, patently obvious, you know? You know what I mean? It sort of gets... you get bored after a bit. It's kinda like playing tennis with someone who's really shit. I don't know; it's not my fault, so it doesn't bother me, really, stopping doing them. Anyway,I think journalists quite often think their readers are thick. And I think people know what we're saying most of the time, really."

If their popularity irks them,I ask, why not change Autechre's name and release works under some other alias? Booth laughs out an answer: "Yeah, we do all the time, but it wouldn't be a secret if I told you about it, would it?

"I think I'm just more interested in making music." he says. "You just get to this point and you realize you're being told that your music is sort of relatively popular ... how would you react? What would you do? Would you do loads more press and milk it? Or would you take the opportunity to maybe create something to be digested ... If you know lots of people are going to digest something, would you make something normal and typical forthem, or would you try to make them something special? It's like being a chef, you know what I mean? It's like you got 600 people in the room, and you know they're going to love whatever you cook ..."

While Booth might recognize that something Autechre puts out might not be the most accessible work, he gets audibly irate at any suggestion that the two musicians have taken advantage of their position in the music community to deliberately pass off subpar efforts on their fans. "The whole point of making music is to put something new into the world, you know?" he says. "To inject a little piece of yourself, and the more you can put in there, the more honest you can be with your expression, the better everything is, the more point there is in doing it. You only get one chance, really.

"What I'm saying to you is that you get one chance to make an honest expression, and you fuckin'take it And if you've been told, 'Yeah, your album is going to sell fifty thousand copies,' the best thing you can do is to make that album the best album that you've ever released, not to compromise it commercially at all just because you're guaranteed the sales. The whole point is to ignore commerciality and be as fucking honest as possible, you know, and the closer you can get to that the better it'll be. That's how it is for us, totally. We just want to get more interesting.

Shifting gears, I ask about the pair's latest release Confield, a work that has drawn as much criticism as it has praise. Reflecting development of some ideas first expressed in EP7. frameworks oftracks on Confield seem built up from sound information that reproduces and mutates at the behest of the two musicians. Beat genes, melodic genes, noise genes, all looping and constantly changing themselves and each other, fighting and cooperating within the parameters set by the artists. The end product heard seems a recording of the birth, growth, and death of these "generative" entities, a term that further annoys Booth, wording that he feels gets misused by the press. As the conversation gets drawn around the point of "generative music," I try probing around the edges, trying to pick out hints of meaning. starting with cover artwork to EP7and Confield.

"The graphics are just another example of what we like, really," Booth says. "Maybe everything seems like its personaL. If that's the case, then I guess we've done a good job of being honest of what we like, you know. I mean the images don't really necessarily relate to the music anymore then that they're just, you know, what we like at the time, the same way the music is, really. I guess the only thing that relates one to the other is that we did it."

"If you want to create a tangible link, then we are it, because there isn't any other. We don't sort of go, 'Oh, well these tracks would look really good with this kind of graphic.' It's more like, 'I really like this, I want to put this in the sleeve, what do you think? Do you like this?'--'Yeah, I really like that, that's the kind of thing I'm into at the moment.'--'Excellent, let's do it.' And then it's on there-you know, that's it, I mean we don't really think any more about it, really. It's just what kind of mood we're in at the time, same as the music, you know.

"I think that the fact that there's only us tying the two things together makes it more interesting. I think, you know, we're revealing more about ourselves over the years, when we're doing it that way. I think the less contrived you are about the way you present music the better, really, although there is an opportunity for expression, so it's good to take it and to do something. I wouldn't call it art in itself, though. I mean obviously it only exists as packaging for music."

For all the bubbling chaos of Autechre's algorithmic music, don't talk about randomness or living, breathing music to Booth. "For start, the word 'random'--it takes the shit right out of me," he says with a laugh. "There's absolutely nothing random about what we do. There might be a lot of number crunching going on, but there's nothing random in there....

"No, I don't use random-number generators--I fuckin' hate 'em. They're rubbish. I use a few chaotic operators, but in terms of how much of it is bound to the system, I'm not really sure. It's kinda like saying, if you program a drum machine, that the drum machine is writing the track. If that's the case, then we might as well not bother doing anything. I mean, should we give up?"

It's okay to talk about generative music with Autechre, so long as the two artists get to keep control overthe output. Booth refers to their computer-program releases on Web site Fals.ch as recursive experiments, or "recordings of systems that generate recordings," but he regrets the loss of contact between the musician and listener that comes from such efforts. "We've done a few things like that," he says. "You don't get the familiarity aspects, you don't get the sort of direct communicative aspects you get with recorded music... For me personally, it's nota succinctercommunication. It's kinda like writing 50 different poems, that are all very, very similar. I tell you, it's almost like releasing every version of a track we'd do."

But he returns again to how software is not what makes Autechre unique. "Taste is what defines people; it's what makes us different to software," he says. "We're not software; you can't possibly consider a bit of software to be like a person. It's not 2001... We're not talking about fucking HAL; we're talking about a few bits of number-crunching objects that don't really do a great deal until you feed them numbers and tell what to come out with. "It's like any generative processes are so-called life-like algorithms; it's like cellular automatons supposedly replicating life-type behavior. It's all fucking rubbish! They don't do anything of the sort, but they make really nice patterns. But I wouldn't imbue them with intelligence, just because there is intelligence behind their creation. It's like saying pyramids are clever."

Skeptical about efforts towards carving music out of living information, such as a DNA-based music-sequencing project from the University of Aberystwyth in Wales, Booth rails against any kind of sound based on the use of static data. "It's kind of conceptually quite interesting, but it might sound crap, and, you know, if we thought it sounded crap, then we wouldn't pursue it," he says. "We wouldn't say, 'Well, like let's continue this project because it has to be a representation of a DNA sequence,' because then you'd be sort of denying your own taste, and I think taste is all that can define you in making something.

"You wouldn't be in control of the numbers--you'd be a slave to a number set that isn't anything to do with you. It might be that you really like that number sequence, but I don't think there's a great chance of that happening, not compared, say, to algorithms, where if you just keep increasing one number then another number changes and creates a nice curve, and you might really like that curve. But I don't think a DNA sequence is going to generate any really nice curves. I think it's just a set of switches, isn't it? I mean, it'll appear almost like a random sequence, so I can't see it being that aesthetically pleasing...I couldn't work like that. Nah, I'm into extrapolating data, but I think that you have to create it in the first place. You ca n't just start with somebody else's data."

Evolution might be creating new genetic information all the time, but Booth then asks in turn why artists should be relegated to the role of observers. I nstead, Booth and Brown's idea is to make evolving systems of their own, to avoid creative reliance upon natural processes as much as possible. "You're just reiterating something that already exists, and, alright, fair enough, it's beautiful," Booth says. "But you're not responsible forthat ...If you throw a rock in a pool, you're responsible for the ripples. So using the ripples for information would be quite nice. And also you'd be responsible for that, because of the angle of the rock going into the pool, and the shape of the rock, and the depth of the waterwould all be influencing the way the ripples worked, and you'd be wholly responsible forthe ripples. "If you just take something that exists from an independent interaction, then you're essentially sampling, which is like photography and like a lot of other things, which is not quite as i nteresti ng to me personally, though I do see there is a great forum for exploration, for communication or sort of comment within those areas. I don't thi nk these are necessarily as interesting to us as those of synthesis. I think we're more interested in synthesis, really.

"I think natural processes will inevitably... be a part of whatever system you use. I mean, without electrodynamic properties we wouldn't have any of the systems, any of the systems used to make music, period. I mean, in terms ofthe sort of music we make, I think it's there inevitably anyway."

In the end, what motivates and inspires Autechre's creative decisions boil down very simply to an evaluation of taste made between Sean Booth and Rob Brown. "The trick is to be aware of what you like within that, just the same way it is with everything," Booth says. "Probably all it comes down to is taste, that's the only thing you can say is constantly there and is constantly feeding what you're' doing, and it's the only thing you can possibly lay claim to... It's all about taste, completely about taste. Yeah, 100 percent. Totally."

Interview Transcript

Featured in Grooves 7, this interview started out a little hostile but gradually Sean Booth warmed up...

AR - Alex Reynolds SB - Sean Booth

AR - Hello this is Alex Reynolds from Grooves Magazine. Is Sean there?

SB - Hello Alex. This is Sean.

AR - Hi Sean how are you doing?

SB - Ah pretty good. Average. Well, above average. About 65% (laughs).

AR - Sorry for all the trouble.

SB - It's cool man, no problem. I should have a more verbose message on the machine. But I don't think it's very audible for international gates, it's confusing up me phone lines. Cause you got a noise gate on an international call, so you don't hear the message cause it's so quiet.

AR - I just wanted to thank you for doing the interview; I know you don't have anything to promote.

SB - No, not really.

AR - And I heard that this is going to be your last interview, or probably close to your last interview.

SB - Yeah, I don't know if it will be the last one, but uh yeah, I don't want to do any for awhile.

AR - Any particular reason for that?

SB - Not really; just want to lock down for a bit. It's just periods in life when you don't want to handle any of that, so you don't and that's that, really.

AR - You finished live tours. What are you doing now: just relaxing, working out new stuff?

SB - New stuff mostly, hence the lack of interviews (laughs). It's easier to write tracks when we haven't got anything else to think about. Yeah, it's quite good. But yeah, it won't be our last interview I just don't feel like doing any for awhile, so I just had to tell everybody nothing cause otherwise people just get on your case, you know?

AR - Any new ideas since Confield came out?

SB - Um yeah (laughs), yeah (laughs) you can't really stop it, it just comes, you know what I mean? It just something that happens. So yeah, a constant flow of shit. Always doing shit, I suppose. I mean, a lot of the tracks on that album are like getting on two years old, now. It's kind of like yeah, we've done quite a few things since we did a lot of that stuff, anyway. So, a lot of the stuff we did for the tour was, well none of was on the EP, so that was all a bit of rinse. And since we came back we've been developing shit, really. Yeah, it's a constant thing, there's no point where we are or are not making tracks, you know what I mean? If we've got a computer there's a good chance of thinking about working even if we're not working.

AR - How do you think Confield, do you really care how Confield was received by people?

SB - I don't really know, I'd have to speak to everyone, wouldn't I? Haven't got time, so. (laughs) Absolutely no idea how it was received, can't even bother to find out, even, really. So, I know what my mates think of it, um, I sort of get an idea of what their mates think about it through them. So yeah, I don't know, really. I mean, a lot of reactions based on are what people perceive your attitude to be. So, there are some people who've got no idea what our attitude is, so that's that really. Not a lot you can do about that, really.

AR - If Autechre was just starting out, do you think you'd be able to make an album like Confield?

SB - I have absolutely no idea! (laughs) I hadn't really thought about it. I mean if one had already existed already, yeah, there would be a much better chance. Do you know what I mean? If it existed already, eh, you'd be able to reference it and make it, so yeah of course you would be able to do it. I mean it's not a question of whether you're able. I don't whether we'd be able to just pluck it out of thin air the way that we did, if we'd just arrived on the scene. I'm not even sure if we'd be the same people, so we wouldn't be making the same music, for definite.

AR - I guess what I'm asking is if there were necessary steps between your first album and where you are now?

SB - Yeah, it's inevitable I mean if you do anything for a long time you get familiar with aspects of it and things become easy and transparent. You don't have to think as much. I mean the thing I've noticed all the time is just how natural things have become. I don't have to consider things at all anymore, you know, you just literally sit down and do what you feel like doing, because the machine has just become an extension and you don't have to think about learning about using it at all. It's like having an extended finger (laughs). But yeah it's sort of I mean I don't know really, I mean you can't really say, whether or not you'd do something "if", "if", because that "if" is just, if it's just far enough in the past there's gonna be so many things it would be corelative with, you know? You just can't possibly say, it's not even the sort of question you can answer honestly, you know? I mean I could just say something, but whatever, I can't be bothered anymore that's why I can't be bothered doing interviews; it's just too much bullshit game-playing, you know. It's like, yeah. I don't know -- it's weird that part of life, it's like you're expected to do it sort of thing, like you've got an onus on people that buy your records to explain what you're doing, even though you wouldn't even bother to explain it to your mates, you know what I mean?

AR - Do you think Warp would take a chance today on something like Confield, if you were just starting out?

SB - Yeah, Warp.. I mean, I don't know, it's hard to say. I mean, when we met em they were really taking a lot of chances and they were really against the grain at the time it was like pure hardcore. When we met em they seemed like the kind of the label that would really, I suppose they just let the artists do what they wanted. They just seemed that way, just from the stuff they'd been releasing. Like "A Word of Science" is pretty nash album and "Frequencies", even though they were like pretty unpopular, I thought they were wicked. They're obvious a label that are prepared to stick their necks out for something they like, so, yeah I don't know really. I can't really say what they'd be like if I met em now cause I know em too well, it's impossible to say, and it might be the same for them. I don't even know if something like Confield could have developed hermetically, completely hermetically, you know. I don't know if we would get to that point naturally without anybody having heard our material, it's impossible to say, you know. I mean this speculating about what the future could have been had the past been different, and that's just complete denial of the chaos of existence, innit? You know, you have to appreciate that everything relates to everything.

AR - I look at the covers to EP7 and Confield and I see fractals and crystals. Any theme to relate to the music?

SB - Well we don't do it by means of explanation, we do it because it something else that we're satisfied with aesthetically that we like and then we don't really plan any other consideration if there's something that we've developed a technique for or something that we've got an interest in there's a good chance that there's an aesthetic reason for it that's pretty pure, if there's an intent to be anything beyond that, it just tends to be the love of the thing in itself, you know and the way it relates to us, I suppose, I mean that's kind of it, and yeah the graphics are just another example of what we like, really.

AR - No statement about...

SB - No, not at all, no more than the way that I tie me shoelaces, you know. I mean it's just to what kind of people we are, and you know, I mean we've been doing our own graphics since, well since LP5. I think you've got a sort of idea of, I mean we're quite diverse aesthetically as well, you know, in terms of visuals, so but at least we feel we are, maybe we're not, maybe everything seems like its personal if that's the case, then i guess we've done a good job of being honest of what we like, you know, i mean the images don't really necessarily relate to the music anymore then that they're just you know what we like at the time, the same way the music is, really. Um, I guess the only thing that relates one to the other is that we did it.

AR - No statement about generative music...?

SB - No more than like the tracks are making statements about each other, do you know what i mean? I mean if you've got two tracks in a release, you don't say track 2 is making a statement about track 1, so it's just the same way the sleeves isn't making a statement about the music, do you know what i mean?

AR - No hint about you and Rob operating as a pair?

SB - It will do inevitably, because we did it, you know? What I'm saying the link is, is... if you want to create a tangible link, then we are it, because there isn't any other. We don't sort of go, oh well these tracks would look really good with this kind of graphic, it's more like, i really like this, i want to put this in the sleeve, what do you think? do you like this? yeah, i really like that, that's the kind of thing i'm into at the moment -- excellent, let's do it. And then it's on there -- you know, that's it, i mean we don't really think any more about it, really. It's just what kind of mood we're in at the time, same as the music, you know. I think that the fact that there's only us tying the two things together makes it more interesting, I think you know we're revealing more about ourselves over the years, when we're doing it that way, i think the less contrived you are about the way you present music the better, really, although there is an opportunity for expression, so it's good to take it and to do something. I wouldn't call it art in itself, though, I mean obviously it only exists as packaging for music, so.

AR - No message to listener; just information passed between you two artists?

SB - Inevitably when you produce something there's a dialog; but um i think in the case of sleeves it's just designing a package that we'd like to hold at that time. Um, I guess we make a consideration about the music, beacuse its, the music is usually already there by the time we get to doing it, but it's usually a case about just sitting and making something that we like, cause i guess if you like it then that's all you need; you don't need anything else related to it. We're not creating conceptual products, it's just an expression of taste, that's all, you know. We're not trying to say anything with what we're doing. We'reliterally just putting out what we'd like to be out there, you know, i mean i buy quite a lot of music and i think the world would be a better place if confield was in it, you know, if i could go into a record shop and buy it, i'd be pretty happy, i mean that's the only reason we do it, no other reason to make music really.

AR - Daily working relationship with Rob?

SB - Um (laughs) Don't know, a given day? What, like today? Ah, got up, drank shitload of coffee, walked in, turned on the computer, restarted it about six times cause this cubase is fucking me about, went out for more coffee, came back in, got a track going, farted about for a bit, realized i was going to do an interview in five minutes, then came in here (laughed) that's what i've done, i mean i don't know i mean it varies from day to day you know what I mean? (laughed) It's a bit normal, really, innit? (laughs)

AR - Rob...

SB - Yeah, and then he got up about five minutes after I did (laughs) and just like didn't have any coffee. That's the only difference, really. We've just been drinking loads of PG Tips. We're slightly misaligned caffeine-wise but apart from that we're on the same tip, really.

AR - Same room...

SB - It's really funny. We've got three computers in there. It's getting really intense, but it's quite good, acutally yeah. (laughs) There's so many ways that we can network stuff up now and we can be working on stuff simultaneously and sharing stuff. So yeah it's quite healthy. Yeah, like two of us poring over a 202 trying to program one melody sort of thing.

AR - Ever want to work apart?

SB - We do quite a lot. We do tracks on our own. I'd say about a third of what we release is either one of us on our own. Over the years it's always been like that, most of the albums, a third of them is solo tracks. I guess it's whatever you feel like, you know what I mean? We don't try to tie things down too much if we feel like doing a lot of stuff seperately, then we just do it. It just whatever happens to be there at the end of the year, you know. I don't think too much about it. It's just, you know what I mean? I don't think there's any point really in getting too bogged down in how you work, you know, cause then it's not really natural, you know you kind of force this thing. That's what you always get with these five-piece bands, you know? They're all fucking compromising and the music has no permanence, you know what I mean? If you've got something that you really really want to do, and you feel like you really want to do it, and the other person's not about it, then you just do it. If it's good then they'll like it, and that's it, really. That's how we are with it, anyway.

AR - Give and take...

SB - Everything from sort of casual "what do you reckon" -- "yeah" or "no" to "full-on sights" -- yeah, like every kind of reaction.

AR - Your popularity irks you. Why not change Ae's name?

SB - (Laughs) Yeah, we do all the time, but it wouldn't be a secret if I told you about it, would it? Obviously we don't always operate under the same name and don't always produce the same kind of music. I mean, yeah, it wouldn't be free if I was gonna dish out all the info in interviews like this.

The reason I'm bored with doing interviews is cause everything seems so obvious to me, you know. All the things I have to explain to journalists are just really obvious. I don't think I've ever said one thing to a journalist that wasn't completely totally patently obvious, you know? You know what I mean? It sort of gets... You get bored after a bit. It's kinda like playing tennis with someone who's really shit. But I mean.. I don't know, it's not my fault, so it doesn't bother me, really, stopping doing them. Anyway, I think journalists quite often think their readers are thick. And I think people know what we're saying most of the time, really.

Yeah, it doesn't stop me wanting to stop bothering. Dunno. I think I'm just more interested in making music. You just get to this point and you realize and you're being told that your music sort of relatively popular, how would you react? What would you do? Would you do loads more press and milk it? Or would you take the opportunity to maybe create something to be digested... If you know lots of people are going to digest something, would you make something normal and typical for them or would you try to make them something special I dunno, it's weird. It's like being a chef, you know what I mean? It's like you got 600 people in the room and you know they're going to love whatever you cook...

AR - Ever take advantage of it?

SB - Totally. The whole point of making music is to put something new into the world, you know. To inject a little piece of yourself and the more you can put in there, the more honest you can be with your expression, the better everything is, the more point there is in doing it. You only get one chance, really. Obviously, if we feel like our work is more successful, then we're going to use that to sort of make our work more successful, which is what most people do, to make our work better.

AR - What I meant was have you ever released something deliberately shitty?

SB - That's the fucking complete opposite of what I'm saying to you. What I'm saying to you is that you get one chance to make an honest expression and you fucking take it. And if you've been told, yeah, your album is going to sell fifty thousand copies, the best thing you can do is to make that album the best album that you've ever released, not to compromise it commercially at all because you're guaranteed the sales. The whole point is to ignore commerciality and be as fucking honest as possible, you know, and the closer you can get to that the better it'll be. That's how it is for us, totally. You know, most fucking artists that come out making music start off interesting and become shit. So, we just want to get more interesting and we're gonna keep getting more interesting.

AR - Software used and direction with software involvement in how Autechre

SB - I couldn't give a shit, really, I don't think about method too much. I just get into what I like. It's impossible to say what kind of music you'd be making cause you'd be reacting to things that wouldn't exist.

AR - Does software you use have any control over Autechre output?

SB - No, you have to define everything before you can even start. I don't understand what part you think the software is responsible for, exactly.

AR - Generative music...

SB - Well, no no what is generative music?

AR - Algorithmic music, random elements in system...

SB - This is the part you don't understand. You don't know what you're talking about. Do you know anything about generative music?

AR - Generative to me means generative algorithms, evolving systems of...

SB - So you know about mapping complex numbers against imaginary numbers, but what can you tell me about our music? Do you actually know anything about the way that we make music, or are we speculating? (laughs)

AR - I am speculating, so tell me...

SB - For start, the word 'random' -- it takes the shit right out of me. There's absolutely nothing random about what we do. There might be a lot of number crunching going on but there's nothing random in there.

AR - So you're not making instantaneous decisions based on whatever the computer is spitting out at a given time?

SB - Well I don't know, it depends what kind of action or reaction to a situation you've got. I mean, yeah, if I'm controlling a patch that behaves recursively then there's a vague quantum where I can only use my ears to determine exactly what's going on process-wise because I couldn't possibly see and process the numbers in realtime. Any sort of perceptive reaction on my part is going to play a part in the way that we react to the system, or the way we react as part of the system, but, like any quantum value as soon as you kind of ascertain what it is it changes. The problem with it is that it crumbles as soon as you discuss it.

I mean, all music is generative. Okay, any music. There's no.. as long as there's a rule and there's a determination in terms of process and you've got an algorithm. Any music can be broken down like that. I mean, it's really easy, the algorithm just becomes more complex in certain cases and simple in others. It might not have anything to do with how the music sounds, either. It might not be exactly directly or indirectly related. No, I don't use random number generators -- I fucking hate em. They're rubbish. I use a few chaotic operators but in terms of how much of it is bound to the system, I'm not really sure. Um, it's kinda like saying, if you program a drum machine, that the drum machine is writing the track. If that's the case, then we might as well not bother doing anything. I mean, should we give up? (laughs)

AR - What I mean is, is the instrument a third member of the group...

SB - No not at all. It just facilitates. It's just tools.

AR - Seems chaotic, like you're on the edge of losing control..

SB - The software is available, so as far as we're concerned we have to consider its use, and so we apply it where it is necessary, where it seems applicable. I mean, you know, they are tools, we're the people that are using them, there's a definite distinction got to be made -- you can't start treating software like it's got a personality or taste, you know? Taste is what defines people, it's what makes us different to software -- we're not software, you can't possibly consider a bit of software to be like a person. It's not "2001" -- I mean, it is, but it's not. We're not talking about fucking HAL, we're talking about a few bits of number crunching objects that don't really do a great deal until you feed them numbers and tell what to come out with.

It's like any generative processes are so-called lifelike algorithms, it's like cellular automatons supposedly replicating life-type behavior, it's fucking rubbish. They don't do anything of the sort, but they make really nice patterns. But I wouldn't imbue them with intelligence, just because there is intelligence behind their creation. It's like saying pyramids are clever.

It's silly, really. Yeah, I'm well into like messing with algorithms, 'cause I like the way things can interfere with each other, but... and I really like the exactitude of control you can get and the amount of math you can have within your system, or amount of system within the system, you know. I don't think any different now, to the way I felt when I was plugging a 202 into a delay unit that reads the square wave and generates a delay at that pitch and then changing the square wave width so that the delay unit gets confused. I don't feel any different now to the way I felt then, it's just the same, I mean, the fact that we're using computers to do it now, just makes it different set of criteria, different quanta.

I suppose the best part about it is designing systems from the outset using raw components, but that's not really different any from knocking PCBs up in college, so. It's all the same kind of thing, really. Electronics and the kinds of systems we use for programming are dead similar, that's probably why I use them. I don't do a great deal of codebase stuff, I'm pretty shit with code.

AR - CDs of programs that run and sound like Autechre?

SB - Yeah, we've done a fair bit of that. We've already done a couple of releases of recordings of systems that generate recordings. I think our first Fals.ch release came out about 18 months ago, maybe even two years ago. We've done a few things like that. You don't get the familiarity aspects, you don't get the sort of direct communicative aspects you get with recorded music.

AR - Why?

SB - Well, because it's not direct communication, really. Well, you could say that it is. There's a case to argue either way. For me personally, I don't feel like it's a "direct-er" communication, if you like, or it's not a succincter communication. It's kinda like writing fifty different poems, that are all very very similar. I tell you, it's almost like releasing every version of a track we'd do. Instead of doing eight versions of a track..

AR - Recycled tracks?

SB - No, a lot of them are just sort of remixes of the same track. Same basic premises with a few things changing. Might be based on the time between pressing stop and start, or something. Quite often its user input-based, but the users don't know that they're creating input, you know. I think these are the most interesting systems, really, cause they think its random, but you know it isn't.

AR - Try ideas on live audience?

SB - I love audiences; they're fucking brilliant. It's like a force-feedback. Yeah, playing live is probably better than dj'ing as well, I reckon I enjoy it more. Just like a constant... Yeah, I definitely know when certain algorithms produce certain effects, and tweaking certain algorithms in certain ways produces certain effects, and there are things you have to learn by trial and error, you can't... you couldn't possibly anticipate it sitting there in your studio. You know, you just have to go out there and try it.

I really like using generative systems in a live context, because you can set the degree of inputs to be whatever you want, because you design the system. If you want to make it really really hard to come out with something good, you can do, but you can have it so that you click one switch and the whole thing spirals off into a state that you can predict, but the way that it spirals off you can't predict. I quite like the random elements, it's like when we were djing when I was a kid and we'd get really really busy. Djing these days in clubs is pretty much a straight up affair, unless someone is really making a point about juxtaposing different kinds of music against each other, but I think with algorithms you can go to town in terms of tweaking, really basic things. I mean, recently the club stuff I think they're just getting into tracks that are a vibe, you know. Just ten minutes of a constant environment off in space, or whatever. Quite techno, really, I suppose. I suppose I just been getting bored with all this pop music. All these people want to do tracks that are like three seconds of one sound and three seconds of another sound. It's like, that's easy, you know. (laughs)

AR - Has an audience ever pissed you off?

SB - Yeah, lots. Fucking hell. Esp. in the early days. Felt like we were asking a little too much of people in the early days, a lot of the time. Yeah, fuck.

AR - Ever taken revenge?

SB - That's really fucking easy and childish. Um, I think it depends really, if it's actually giving someone a visceral rush, then it doesn't make any difference what you do. I think it just has to have a fucking effect. But I think if you're just doing it to annoy people and that's the only reason you're doing it, it's.. there's nothing contextual about what you're doing and if you don't find what you're doing to be entertaining then you've got fucking problems, you know what I mean?

I wouldn't go out there and deliberately wind people up and ignore my own taste in the process. I think one thing is just to play to yourself. If they're really pissing you off, then you just get as self-indulgent as possible, you know, that's what we do. I mean, whether they get pissed off with it or not doesn't matter beyond that point cause they're already pissed off with you, you know what I mean? I think if they don't like what you're doing the best thing to do is do it even more, but not to suddenly start making really loud, irritating noises is just a bit pointless, really. You know you're already in a position of power up there, no reason to be fucking Adolf Hitler, you know what I mean?

AR - Studio vs live process in making and performing music?

SB - I don't think it's ever going to be exclusively different, I mean, there are obviously elements of stuff that we've been working on at the time that end up.. you're relying on your own toolset, what was a menu of objects becomes a menu of little patches, and because you're constantly integrating things you've used in other systems that we've built, yeah, we can basically take things we've built around the album and develop them for live use, so a lot of the variables become user input instead of, say, an arrangement, if you like. Usually within the system we'll build something that controls a set of variables that makes the track progress in a certain way. We don't use any random processes when we're doing stuff, the whole thing is controlled, I guess. You just start the algorithm and then it just runs and it always does the same thing, so a lot of the time we'll take.. recombine and swap bits around with patches and create new things, then strip out variables and put in MIDI controls so that we can do it in realtime. A lot of what we do in the studio is realtime, but in a live situation you've got no choice but to make the whole thing that way, you know. I think the more things you can do on stage, the better, you know?

AR - Sound is growing more and more chaotic -- to run away from imitators?

SB - No, it's not a race, man, you shouldn't think about it like that, that's not the way it is. We're basically just about making things that are new and putting them into the world, and if people are copying the stuff that we used to do, then that's the way it is, you know. I think it's always been like that, really. But, yeah, that's cool. I'm not particularly conscious of what other people are doing when we're doing stuff, I think our stuff would sound like... I think we'd still be making Tri Repetae if we listened to that kind of music, you know what I mean?

AR - Chiastic Slide vs Tri Repetae, how did you get from TR to CS?

SB - Yeah, I don't know what it was, really. Did a lot of mushrooms that year (laughs). It might have something to do with that, maybe. No idea, really, couldn't say. We had a lot going on in our heads; yeah, a lot of realizations took place, you know, so. But that kind of happens a lot, you know, I think the less sort of methodical and contrived you are the more that happens.

AR - Any progress on a Gescom project?

SB - Gescom stuff going on. It's just whenever we get stuff together with our mates, really. We don't ever really plan projects, you know what I mean? Just kind of an ongoing thing, really. So, yeah a few things. Yeah, done quite a bit of material now. Most of it sort of goes between ourselves and our mates, you know, and gets played on the radio and stuff, occasional dj sets. Most of it's just music we made for us lot to listen to and we sort of release bits of it occasionally cause, oh I don't know, me mate's got a label (laughs) blah, blah, blah (laughs)...

AR - Thanks for doing this inteview.

SB - Yeah, so you're really into live programs, then?

AR - Yes. Lots of electronic musicians seem to be heading in this direction. University of Aberwrystwth in Wales working on DNA to music sequencing. Lots of groups exploring natural processes in music...

SB - It has to be something that you love, you know what I mean? No point in DNA sequences... It's kind of conceptually quite interesting but it might sound crap, and you know, if we thought it sounded crap then we wouldn't pursue it. We wouldn't say, "Well, like let's continue this project because it has to be a representation of a DNA sequence," because then you'd be sort of denying your own taste and I think taste is all that can define you in making something.

AR - It's just an example of a source of material...

SB - If you really like the way it sounds, then... It's such a slim chance of that being the case, and I think... you wouldn't be in control of the numbers, you'd be a slave to a number set that isn't anything to do with you. It might be that you really like that number sequence, but I don't think there's a great chance of that happening, not compared say to algorithms, where if you just keep increasing one number then another number changes and creates a nice curve, and you might really like that curve. But I don't think a DNA sequence is going to generate any really nice curves, I think it's just a set of switches, isn't it? I mean, it'll appear almost like a random sequence, so, I can't see it being that aesthetically pleasing.

AR - Different organisms with same proteins but each with different sequences, take a musical comparison of sequences.

SB - I think it'd just annoy me though, because I couldn't change the numbers. I don't think I could work that way. I couldn't work like that. Nah, I'm into extrapolating data but I think that you have to create it in the first place. You can't just start with somebody else's data, it's like, we're not MIDI files, if we're gonna do that.

AR - Evolution is creating new sequences all the time.

SB - Yeah, but why should we be observers? Do you know what I mean?

AR - So your goal is to create evolving systems of your own?

SB - Well, yeah, I mean there's no point in just being an observer of a system.. yeah, I mean it depends on how you define an evolving system, I mean. If it's something that always different every time you use it, then yeah, we are. But I don't think we're necessarily like biotechnicians, you know. And I also don't see the point in just playing the role of the observer, I mean if we were gonna make music using DNA sequences, it'd be really boring. I mean, we might as well become photographers, you know. I mean, what're you doing? You're just reiterating something that already exists, and, alright fair enough, it's beautiful. But you're not responsible for that.

AR - It's just one example...

SB - No, no, if you throw a rock in a pool you're responsible for the ripples. So using the ripples for information would be quite nice. But if you... and also, you'd be responsible for that, because of the angle of the rock going into the pool, and the shape of the rock, and the depth of the water would all be influencing the way the ripples worked, and you'd be wholly responsible for the ripples.

If you just take something that exists from an independent interaction, then you're essentially sampling, which is like photography and like a lot of other things, uh, which is not quite as interesting to me personally, though I do see there is a great forum for exploration, for communication or sort of comment within those areas. I don't think these are necessarily as interesting to us as those of synthesis. I think we're more interested in synthesis, really, generally.

AR - Electronic music seems to be hitting technical boundaries and examining natural processes...

SB - I think natural processes will inevitably going to be a part of whatever system you use, I mean, without electrodynamic properties we wouldn't have *any* of the systems, any of the systems used to make music, period. I mean, in terms of the sort of music we make, I think it's there inevitably anyway. I think, the trick is to be aware of what you like within that, just the same way it is with everything. Probably all it comes down to is taste, that's the only thing you can say is constantly there and is constantly feeding what you're doing, and it's the only thing you can possibly lay claim to.

AR - So no meaning, just taste.

SB - It's all about taste, completely about taste. Yeah, 100%. Totally.

AR - Thanks again for doing this interview and sorry about music journalism being an annoyance.

SB - Nah, it isn't, man. I think it's just generally, it's really hard for a journalist to do his job, where we're concerned, because we make it really difficult for him. And so therefore, they don't know what questions to ask 'cause they're expecting us to be difficult, you know what I mean, we don't make it easy for ourselves. We just look like we're having a good time all the time when we're doing interviews, and then its much easier for the next journalist to come along and say "they're nice guys". But it's kind of weird. You feel like you should be honest, to a point, I mean, yeah, why not just play the game and bullshit and keep everyone entertained. But I don't know, it's kind of like being a conjurer or something. I'd rather not.