As a Basshead, when Lorin Ashton speaks I listen. Whether it be tweets, Facebook updates, or interviews, he always has my ear. So naturally when he sat down with Rolling Stone to talk “EDM” I was like a thirsty kid at the free refill stations at EDC.
My first reaction was, “Rolling Stone? Hmmm interesting.” Bassheads know that Lorin is averse to big name, big money types of institutions for reasons he has specified in various interviews. As anticipated the questions were broad, sweeping, and I would even go so far as to say generic. Luckily Lorin is extremely well-spoken, so he was able to respond in depth to these tedious questions.
The first section of the interview deals with the sound system that Lorin drags along with him everywhere. If I remember correctly the entire show takes up five tractor trailers. After seeing him at Red Rocks this past weekend, this question piqued my curiosity. The closest I was from the stage was maybe ten rows up and the bass was so loud and full I couldn’t speak. The words seemed to stick in my throat, not that it would’ve made a difference to say them because of the volume. Lorin speaks to this issue saying,
“That said, the feeling (his favorite physical sensation on stage) is really the solar plexus. You can feel bass in your legs and you can feel bass in your throat or your ears, and that’s not a good feeling. It’s when it’s nice and just like punchy and full in your chest. I just love knowing that it’s thick. I don’t actually like it to be too loud. Sometimes you’re on a system and you’re amazed at the fact that you feel like it’s an earthquake, but, out in the crowd, I want it to sound like you’re in a truck, and like a nice truck with a nice system.”
Next the interviewer goes into a historical direction, trying to draw some of Lorin’s opinions about the past. He asks about “the heaviest riff of all time”, to which Nectar curtly responded with,
“I think every question and every answer in that vein has to do too much with historical context to hold relevance after that moment’s past us.”
After getting historical, the interview transitions us into the present. The questions regard the current state of the scene which Nectar is forced to address for what must be the hundredth time, but puts it in terms of his new album. The question is about “the pinnacle we have reached” and he responds,
“Well, you know, every time I master the record it takes months to do it and I’m comparing all this new music to my previous music and making sure that its as loud and heavy or heavier … and consistently getting heavier and heavier…I do like going deep and that’s what Noise vs Beauty is about. It’s like, you’re asking about the noise, but the beauty is a huge aspect of it. It’s almost like if music is the message, noise is the vessel that carries the message. The two can really fuse together, they can oppose, because noise can be hectic and annoying and screechy, haunting, frightening. Beauty can be calming, loving, ethereal, enchanting, inspiring, but the two can come together in these combinations that are worth theming a record over.”
The following questions seek to further our understanding of Lorin’s massive undertaking in the form of an album by asking, “Why even release a record? Like why bother?” Here we get a new view into what it is that Bassnectar does when he isn’t on tour for 10 months out of the year, and adjusting to what we consider “normal life.” He explains,
“I was constantly being like, “Damn this is so different.” I mean I tried a couple new techniques. One was creating music without drums or bass. After I got songs together that sounded like Bassnectar songs to my ears, I remixed them as only acoustic guitar, piano and my vocals. My terrible vocals just holding a vocal melody. I took those interpretations of my songs and I sent them to MCs, vocalists, singer-songwriters, indie bands, and started working on these new personalities with these other people and collaborated with over 50 people, many of whom didn’t end up being on the record — like Busta Rhymes, Azealia Banks, Cool Kids, none of them are on the record. All of them rock, love them all. But it wasn’t about the profiles for me.”
He goes on to reveal an interesting tidbit, he wrote many of the lyrics on the album. I was unaware that Lorin was a lyricist, but apparently if you give the man enough time he can do anything. He says,
“I wrote over half the lyrics on the record, I had a say in every vocal performance and I got it to sound just the way I wanted it to sound.”
The final section of the interview wraps up these thrilling questions by touching on the always popular “What do you think about other DJs in the scene?” topic. Lorin addresses these as he has before saying,
“There are impostors in every genre. There are bad artists in every genre. EDM is so easy to critique because most of the biggest and most successful artists are the phoniest…Then there’s all the credibility that exists, all the underground artists who are truly gifted and Mozarts. A guy like Kaskade is so fucking smart and so deep and so real that I can’t necessarily critique EDM because there’s a guy like Kaskade who totally deserves everything he’s ever gotten. It’s the phonies and that mass marketed dynamic of culture that I’m revolted by, whether it’s EDM or pop music or fashion or whatever.”
Although I have critiqued the questions that were asked during this interview, hearing anything directly from Nectar is always welcome. He addressed the new album and brought to light some really interesting new information. His comments are consistently insightful, honest, and a pleasure to read. As he says in the interview, many of the biggest names in Electronic Music are the phoniest, yet he manages to keep his head on straight and focused on his message.
This interview also allowed us a look into what Lorin was trying to accomplish with Noise vs. Beauty. If you’ve listened to his music or seen him live, you know that there is a dichotomy of crazy, thrashing wildness of a song like “Wildstyle Method” and beautiful, melodic symphony of a track like “Breathless“. This contrast of going from full-throttle to serenity is signature Bassnectar, and I’m excited to experience an entire album of Lorin exploring the emotional, physical, and mental response of this NSVB theme.
Bassnectar has currently released two tracks from the upcoming record, “You & Me” featuring W Darling and “Now” featuring Rye Rye. You can listen below for some true Noise vs Beauty.
Share On
