I recently had a conversation with a teenage relative that
prompted me to "quit" all of my social media. For those that don't
have experience with this, I am describing a process of logging out of social
networking apps and/or deleting them entirely until your thumb, as if by
telekinesis, relogs, reloads and sucks you back into the world of #hashtag and
thumbs up and who-will-take-the-time-to-repost-this-status-update. I began to ponder today's tools and inventions and
what living in a time when literally having the world’s information rapidly
accessible at your fingertips means in relation to our responsibility with
it. I decided to use one of these tools,
Twitter, to seek out an interview with an artist who, other than through his music, had previously been very unreachable to me.
Brian Transeau, better known as BT, is a Grammy-nominated, classically-trained
music producer and self-proclaimed math geek who released his ninth studio album, A Song Across Wires on 8/16. Aside from an accompanying tour, BT has been putting the
work in doing a slew of interviews, large and smaller scale, to self promote. Keeping with the times, he has also been
active on his own with social media, often interacting with his fans and
colleagues via Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
As a fan first, I would say I know a lot about
BT. I've followed his work for over a
decade and, like many of his followers, have had experiences and nursed through many
emotions alongside his catalogue of music.
The latest album, ASAW, was
years in the making. The first single,
"Tomahawk", was released on October 31, 2011. "Must Be the Love", the second
single, produced with Arty and Nadia Ali, was released almost a year later on
September 17, 2012. When stopping in Detroit this time around, I wanted the highlights from BT himself, especially since he would be sharing what would
become a groundbreaking day in his 20+ year career with a show in my
hometown.
Having the opportunity to use social media as a powerful
tool, and the humbleness of BT, I sat down to chat with him before his show at
Elektricity on 8/16. ASAW had officially released
and entered at #1 on the US iTunes Dance Chart and was in the Top 10 in at least 6
other countries just earlier that day.
I was nervous to meet BT. Through his work, he is a source of emotional and sensory stimulus. I felt so honored to be able to
shake hands with someone like him, who has accomplished and pioneered so much.
Stepping in to the green room, I saw that the 3 records I had brought and left on the table were already signed and stacked neatly for pickup. BT commented on how one of them was rare and he hadn't seen it in forever, thanked me for the interview and
expressed his appreciation (the first of many times). We started chatting about Lake Superior and
Michigan's beauty as I finally calmed and we carried on ... as if having a conversation with an
old friend I was just catching up with.
MCB: So, tell us about your day...
BT: It was actually insane! Like, real life crazy. We woke up early. My daughter went with her grandma and grandpa
today. She was working on something and
achieved it and got rewarded with a "grandma and grandpa trip" to New
York. So we all got up early and they
were catching a train at 6am. Even being
early risers, I was expecting to go right back to bed and then I opened my
phone to see what was happening. I was
like OH MY GOD and literally I've charged my phone 4 legit times today. Real life.
We can't keep up with it, it's insanity!
So we woke up with the record entering the iTunes Dance
Chart at #1 in America which has never happened with any of my records in 20
years. Never one time. And then it got up to like 25 on the main
chart today. So all of that is
ridiculously amazing, but the things that were happening with my fans today
were so humbling and powerful that I don't even have words for it. It was just a really emotional day.
MCB: We feel it too, it's kind of weird. I definitely felt this vibe from it all
happening today amongst all of the fans online.
Social media can be weird, I have mixed feelings about it.
BT: I can understand that, I do too.
MCB: I mean in all honesty it's the reason I'm sitting here
talking to you right now, but at the same time,
it could be viewed as detrimental to real social interaction and too
non-personal. On the good side, to be
able to have a global format to exchange with people that you may have never had
the opportunity to do before, and connect on something, not to devalue it, but
something as simple as a record release, feels awesome and is different from
the fan perspective than what we've ever had before. With that said, congratulations on everything
that's happened today.
BT: Thank you so much.
Leading up to this has been sort of crazy too. I did an interview with an amazing writer named Curtis Silver that used to write for Wired. We did a normal interview and he's a great interview-er and asks really thoughtful questions. He's also an excellent writer. So we have this really nice thoughtful
interview and I have a nice rapport with him.
Then he went away to write the piece and posed this thing online saying,
"I want to interview BT's fans."
No one's ever done that before, it was kind of a crazy idea. I saw it and retweeted it, and then a
Facebook thread started and it was literally one of the craziest things that's
ever happened to me in my whole life.
This is God's honest truth, I haven't even read all of it. I'll read like 3 pages of it and it's so extraordinarily emotional that I have to take a break. I have to keep reading it
in pieces. It's so
unbelievable...humbling, it's crazy.
MCB: Hearing these things and the way you are expressing it,
it sounds like this never gets old.
That's nice to know. I'm sure you
do intend to touch people in a certain way, but to hear about it in that
magnitude is probably the best sort of feedback.
BT: It really is
incredible. And one of the hardest
things is, so many of my peers make music so quickly. Especially now, things are so ephemeral. Make it, get it out, make it, get it
out. The turn over rate is extraordinary
with an exponential slope. It's just
going faster and faster. The curve to
success is literally bedroom producer to Main Stage at Ultra in 18 months and
shrinking, seriously. And that's off the
back of two tracks that are good, but the trajectory and the rate of these
things are going so far. And I am this
guy that for 20 years has worked in isolation, alone in a room, making these
things that are meaningful to me. So,
when you hear people say things to me like what I have heard and have been
reading over the last couple days...I can't even, I don't have words for
it.
I watched my mom read that (Silver) piece the other day and
she just burst into tears. It was one of
the most amazing experiences in my life.
I get to watch my mom see that.
My mom is a clinical psychotherapist and she's had this very tangible,
very direct impact on people's lives.
Every Christmas I see stacks of cards from people saying that she's
changed their lives. People that she
hasn't had in therapy for 20 years. I've
always looked up to that about my mom and for her to get to see something like
that in her life, like her son having an impact on people, that circle is
really powerful. Really powerful stuff
going on the last couple days.
MCB: I'd love to know a little bit more about the vocalists selection on the new album, other than yourself. I love the work you've done with JES (Every Other Way, The Light in Things, Letting Go, Tonight) and NadiaAli (Must Be The Love) who are both on the album among a slew of great
talent. Some of these people you've
worked with before and some not. Do you
steer the ship when you choose to work with certain people and how much of the
creative content do you allow them to incorporate into your work?
BT: JES is amazing.
Really amazing. Emma (Hewitt)
(Calling Your Name) I hadn't worked with before and she is really amazing as
well. A friend of mine growing up named
Jon Silver, his dad was the only artist that I grew up around, his name is Jack
Silver. I dedicated my first record,
Ima, to him. He was this kind of
hippe-ish vagabond photographer in a very conservative area, and he said many
amazing things to me. One of the things
he said was, "Hire people whose work you love, and let them be themselves. Let them do what they
do." I think by virtue of the fact
that me having a point of connection with someone that is another artist, and
we decide to work together, there is this expectation in terms of, I do this "thing". There's a thing that I
do. It's emotional, it's very detailed,
there are a lot of descriptors you could give it. And so I think my friends that are vocalists
think, Oh man, I've gotta come with this thing. I try not to put reigns on people, but I
think there's a certain expectation.
It's one of those things where you want to let the person be themself
but curate that so it makes sense contextually with the body of work.
MCB: The
people you've worked with before know your style and have gone through the
experience with you. So following
through, you pick them because you like what they do on their own, and want
them to bring that to the table.
BT: For sure. Someone
like JES, who I've done a bunch of stuff with will come to the house and we're
literally cooking while writing. I swear
to God. Or we're sitting on the back
porch with acoustic guitars hanging out with crickets going and we just
write. When we wrote Every Other Way on
These Hopeful Machines I had my Yamaha classical 6-string gut string guitar,
she had a pad of paper and a pencil, and we sat on the back step of the house
and wrote the melody and a good portion of the lyrics in about 15 minutes. Then we came upstairs where my mom and
daughter and a couple friends were over and sat and played the chorus of that
song while singing for like 3 hours for everybody. Really magical stuff like that happens at the
house so I always love when these collaborations can happen in person. It doesn't always work out like that but it's
wonderful when it does.
MCB: On your house as
your inspirational source. You've been
sharing with us online about your new studio and desk build coming together. It looks to be very reflective of your style
and probably something you are at a point that you needed.
BT: It's beautiful
and it's so exciting to be able to show it to friends. We're not done, we are just starting the
wiring process now, but we do have things roughly laid out. The artist that made my desk is
unbelievable. It's a 200 year old Wormy
Maple tree, naturally felled, it was struck by lightning. It was milled into these inch and a half
slabs and it took the guy a year to build this thing. The first three months he built it out of
cardboard. I sketched proportions of
what I wanted to make and then he never made anything with live edge, which is
the bark of the tree. It has no right
angles in it so its like master master class even for a master
carpenter. The first thing we did was
build it out of cardboard. Then we
changed the measurements. It's made my
body length so I can reach the top of the heads up racks without even doing
anything, it's insane! It took forever
and I've been working on a laptop for a year, but it's starting to feel like it
was worth it.
Tony and Jono from Above & Beyond came to the house
today to visit and come down to the studio.
Tony was like, "You know what Jono, I'm moving to the country...
you guys can stay in the city." I guarantee
you they are going to go back to England and he's going to move to the country. It was cool and exciting to see them that
revved up about it.
MCB: Speaking of JES and Above & Beyond, she had a
really good guest-mix on their ABGT show today.
She did a sick mashup of Iris with Skylarking... I don't know if you
have this yet, but get a hold of it. I'm
sure it was in honor of the great day today.
BT: Yeah I heard that it was awesome. I need to hear that. Wow, that's amazing.
MCB: Lastly, I just want to know your opinion. Do you think it's still important to clarify
with people about the DJ vs. Producer argument? It's an old conversation, but with the DJ Mag
Top 100 going on again this year, which you've expressed is not the
end-all-be-all, but do you think it's still important to inform people. You've said you are not a DJ, you don't DJ
while on stage, is it still important to be a part of that category.
BT: I would have answered you differently to this question before today. Jono and Tony and I had some amazing conversations today. They said to me,
"We don't care about this thing at all, and you
shouldn't either. You are a legend, it
doesn't matter if you are on that list or not.
That can be a springboard for new people that are starting up. You've had such an impact, it doesn't matter
at all."
So before today I would
have said that it's important. The
reason why I've thought it was important is because some of the American
festival promoters look at that as some metric for success. It's the weirdest thing when in actuality a
large portion of that list is paid for, and bought, and that's just the reality
of it. That's the truth. I'm not just saying it to be inflammatory or
anything else. I mean, I know people
that are spending fifty, sixy, seventy-five thousand dollars on
Twitter-sponsored ad campaigns for that and then buying advertising. That is a little disheartening. I think the people that have been around for
a while feel a pressure to be a part of that when in actuality what it's great
for is spring boarding new talent.
MCB: You could even relate it to new fans as well. They might be just getting into the music and
want to check the list and listen to something new.
BT: I'm honestly
conflicted about it. I really
appreciated what (Tony and Jono) were saying to me today. Everything about today has made me feel like
whatever it is you do, you can only be the best at being yourself. Today was like a real reboot day for me that
I'm going to be thinking about 6 months from now. It's made me focus on some different things
in a positive way. I'm just incredibly grateful to my fans and people that have said all the incredible things that
they have said today. It's been an
amazing day.
(An incoming Tweet chime sounds and BT's assitant informs us that
Above & Beyond has just played Skylarking as a nod to BT at their gig at Echostage in
Washington, D.C.)
BT: They are great guys.
It's really rare, guys like them, and like Armin (Van Buuren). They are these super grounded, family guys,
but they have incredible success.
MCB: I think it can
be obvious, even to us who are more on the outside.
If you are into the music and know your stuff you can tell the
difference between who is passionate and probably doesn't have their ego
getting in the way or a superstar status thing.
Through the art I feel that you can kind of tell. I'm not surprised at all that they are great
guys.
(We are now getting the signal for showtime, and I can't believe how quickly time has flown...)
MCB: Do you still get
nervous?
BT: No (he
laughs). Not at all. I wish I did.
I remember when I had piano recitals when I was 6 or 7 being like, holy
crap and freaking out. I am ready to
rage tonight. I've got a lot of energy and I can't wait.
MCB: Well I am
geeked. This is a really special day and
I personally have been waiting for this for months. I'm glad we did this before your set so now I
can put my hair up and dance my ass off.
Rage we did. BT
brought down the house with new instant-classics and old favorites. You could tell that he was on Cloud 9 the
entire night and the fans were right there with him, many singing along with
tracks that had only been heard in their full magnitude just hours before. After the show BT stayed to chat and take
photos with every single person waiting to see him. He thanked me again for the interview and I thought that the most rewarding part of the experience was the unsurprising first-hand confirmation that BT is definitely
one of those rare, super grounded, really great guys.
A Song Across Wires is out now via iTunes, Amazon, Beatport and direct from Armada Music.