Originally from the small city of Thunder Bay, Ontario, Tom Probizanski has begun to establish himself in the electronic music genre by the alias of Zanski, having become renowned for several noteworthy remixes of prolific tunes as well as striking mashups. A versatile producer with a distinctive, and unique sound that can be described as an electrifying coalescence of the funk and classic disco genres, Zanski often makes use of live instruments and vinyl sampling to take his tracks to the next level.
Although he continually demonstrates his proficiency with remixing, this Canadian producer has also caught the attention of the scene with his stunning original tunes. Just last month Zanski released his Saturnine EP (full stream above), which is comprised of four outstanding tracks that are all very representative of his signature style. By the sounds of it, there is no question that Zanski is one of the dance music scene’s most promising acts, and will definitely be one to watch in the near future.
We were fortunate to have had the chance to ask Zanski a few questions about his rich musical background, as well as his own personal inspirations. Check out the interview below and stream the exclusive guest mix he did for our weekly RaverRaftingRadio show last week.
Support the Saturnine EP via Beatport or Bandcamp.
1. You play various live instruments, can you tell us more about how you got involved playing those, and how your musical background has had an effect on your productions?
“I got started playing guitar at a young age with my other siblings; we all took beginner guitar lessons. It was fun but it never really gave a massive basis to my writing style, and i actually ended up not really playing for a few years. Over the past 3 years i ended up picking up various instruments and am moderately proficient at most of them (piano, guitar, bass, vocals, etc) but most of the time i just screw around until the sound in my head is equated through trial and error.
As for my musical background, i grew up in a musically diverse household. My dad definitely is one of my biggest contributors to my musical groundings. As a teenager we went to a massive amount of shows, as well as just listened to music all day. Seeing and hearing a diverse selection of artists over the years helped shape my musical taste to not be grounded in one genre, but instead be spread among multiple styles.”
2. When did you start listening to electronic music? What prompted you to start producing in the first place?
“Around the time when youtube was exploding with ‘dubstep’ remixes of popular songs. I had my first car around then and went around with the bass boosted to the max, just cruising listening to random remixes. I didn’t really get into the actual electronic scene until a few years later when i decided to try making electronic music.
Its actually a funny story of how i got into producing. I used to mess around in Garageband, screwing with loops and crappy stock synths and whatever. At one point, a friend of mine had a rap project that needed to be ‘produced’ and asked if i could do it. At that point, i blatantly lied and told him that i could do it 100%.
Not wanting to tarnish my reputation, i got Logic 9 and learned it in and out over a period of a week, leading up until i was supposed to ‘produce’ the rap song. The song turned out blatantly mediocre (its small town rap, what are you going to do haha) but after that i never really put down Logic, and just kept messing with it and started to make my own productions. That was about 3 years ago.”
3. You provided the vocals for new remix of Stardust’s “Music Sounds Better With You”, how long have you been singing? Is there someone or something that inspired you to get so invested in different forms of music?
I’ve always been singing, but never really been comfortable calling myself a vocalist, even though it had been a childhood dream of mine. My mom and dad are excellent singers, and I always hoped that they would pass that on to me somehow. I did some singing during high school, and like most kids had a bad acoustic project, but i was never really happy with the way anything turned out. I kept my vocals on the back-burner for most of my production career up until recently.
A few months before i started the Stardust remix, my dad found an old lyric book of mine hidden away in a random drawer. It reminded me of a whole side of my musicianship that i felt i was neglecting, no matter how i felt about it in the past. So, I buckled down and tried recording myself again, and i really liked the results, and now have plans to incorporate more vocals into some original work.”
4. Your music, and especially your newest EP, Saturnine, is an interesting and funky conglomeration of genres and styles. Are there any artists (electronic or non-electronic) that have particularly influenced your sound?
“Most of my influence comes from non electronic acts. I’ve traditionally taken influence from a lot of classic Funk acts (James Brown, Kool & The Gang, Billy Preston, The Whispers, etc) and newer ones (D’angelo), but also try to blend styles from a lot of other music i listen to. Most of the time you would catch me listening to stuff like Post-Hardcore (La Dispute, Touche Amore, Pianos Become The Teeth) and Rap/Hip-Hop (Death Grips, Kendrick Lamar, D-Pryde, Tyler, Rae Sremmurd).
As for electronic acts, artists like Lemaitre, SebastiAn, Justice, Porter Robinson, The Noisy Freaks, and Uppermost are my main influences. I love how they all have their unique spin on the ‘Heavy Funky Electro’ sort of thing.”
5. Who would your dream collaboration be with?
“Probably Lemaitre. Or producing for Kanye.”
6. Where do you see yourself in 5 years?
“I really don’t know. I can see myself taking multiple routes with my music, and productions as a whole. Either way, i can’t wait to see what the future holds.”
Connect with Zanski
https://soundcloud.com/zanski
http://www.facebook.com/zanskimusic
https://twitter.com/ZanskiMusic
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