Spoonbill - Awareness Through Music
Regen is a non-for-profit organisation raising environmental awareness through education and tree-planting and cultural events. Their music off-shoot, Regen Records, is releasing a CD called Treecreation and are launching it with a boat cruise. 3D’s Wolfgang Dittrich spoke with Spoonbill, one of the many DJs performing on the day.
In a fast paced world like ours, where does your love for down-tempo music come from-
Life for me has a varied pace, sometimes it’s erratic with everything happening at once, and at other times it’s quite relaxed and laid back. I thrive off differing experiences and situations and so try to reflect that love of the fluctuation between intensity and mellowness in my compositions. Down-tempo music definitely aids its listener in breathing in life without flapping your arms about! It can facilitate escapism from a hectic lifestyle.
You work a lot with live musicians. Do you mainly build your sound on those live samples or do have a different approach for every song-
I work with a bunch of great musicians from all over. It’s a fluid process and always a stack of fun. I usually have musos play over a stripped back groove and then edit and rearrange snippets of the recording much like sampling. But it’s more suitable than sampling something random as the recording is controlled and played specifically for that track. So a given Spoonytune is made from snippets of live studio recording and foley recordings, synthesised and manipulated material and sound bytes.
You’re playing the Regen Records Boat Cruise on 6 December. Does your sound as DJ resemble your own music a lot or do you like to experiment-
I perform my own tunes live so it’s not strictly DJing. Live I craft an on-the-fly reconstruction of my compositions, which is always different, spiced with new sounds and snippets to keep it fresh and exciting!
Regen Records is dedicated to sustainability and the environment – you’re obviously an environmentally aware individual; what’s your take on the state of the world and its environment right now, are you feeling positive about the future-
My long-term view has been this: The time will come that our species will become extinct – surely- And maybe this is not something to be scared or threatened by. But maybe this can be viewed as a true positive for our Earth, as it will hopefully be given the chance to restabalise itself. This may seem like a defeatist attitude, but it’s not… it’s truly hopeful for the long-term. But I definitely believe that we should try our damndest to create a ‘best-friend’ reciprocal relationship with our planet! Hopefully we will be able to create a conscious shift in attitude and practice and co-exist for a seriously long time!
Do you find environmental and activist themes inspire or infiltrate your music-
For sure! I surround myself in this world. Rather than utilising literal or negative connotations, I like to inspire and evoke a sense of fun with my music, and thus it’s not an obvious ‘this is track is about…’ utilisation of this inspiration.
What’s next on the horizon for Spoonbill-
I’m currently in the process of finalising and collating my third album. It spans the last 16 months of work, including tracks made in studios in Melbourne, Byron, Dublin, Paris, Berlin and in BC Canada. This will be released early ’09, followed by a national tour and then the annual northern hemisphere migration to share the Spoonytunes!
WHO: Spoonbill
WHAT: Plays Regen Records Boat Cruise, departing Opera House
WHEN: Saturday 6 December
MORE: myspace.com/spoonbillsound