The Future
What’s coming from you in the future, after the album?
First up after the LP will be a library I’ve completed for a Hollywood filmscore company, called Liquid Cinema. That will be my first step into more focused work for film and television. That’s something I’m focusing on more and more right now. After that will be the launch of my new label, Auxiliary. There’s a bunch of remixes out later this year also, but I’ll announce them nearer the time and as they are confirmed 100%.
Any plans to work with labels outside of NonPlus+, Exit and related labels?
I’m happy to continue working with NonPlus+ and focusing my other efforts on my own new imprint.
You also had your own label, Covert Ops. Why did you start that label, what’s it for, and will you continue with it into the future?
I started the label with the goal of pushing atmospheric drum & bass back in 2000. It had a good run with nine years of what I’d like to think was top quality material, but it finished after the Astral Traveller LP was released, which was March 2009. It was time to move on, and I felt if I was going to do a label again, it would be completely different in its sound and approach to Covert Operations, that it should be separate entity altogether. This is why I decided to end it.
You also have your Intex Systems alias. What separates the output under that name from your ASC music? Do you have any other aliases or names that you work under? Is there anything forthcoming from Intex Systems?
The Intex Systems project started because of an LP I was originally going to do for Offshore, which I eventually put out myself on Covert Operations, called Research & Development. At the time, I wanted to separate anything dnb and non-dnb, so I setup the name Intex Systems – which in case anyone was wondering, was the name of the computer terminals in the old Amiga game, Alien Breed. Things changed a bit though, as Offshore asked me to start doing weird experimental stuff, also at dnb tempo, but not exclusively to that tempo, under the name, which I agreed to. A bunch of stuff came out on Offshore under that name, and eventually, I decided to just use the name solely for my dubstep productions on Hotflush, Vaccine & Dubline. Around the time I got disillusioned with where dubstep was heading, around about the end of 2007, I decided to stop writing under the Intex Systems name, even though an EP of unreleased dubstep tracks under the name eventually saw a release on Covert in early 2009.
Other aliases I have recorded under include the ongoing Mindspan name, which I use for my dub and ambient techno projects, and Solar Empire, which was an old drum & bass project I did with Ezeekil. There’s also another alias I use for other stuff, but I’ve kept it secret and probably will continue to do so!
What’s your absolute favourite thing that you’ve done so far, and why?
That’s a tough question to answer, so I’ll give a few answers:
Single track: “Defiant To The End” (from Sci-Files Volume 6, COVNTD016): This was a piece on the ill-fated Sci-Files series I did on Covert Operations. I say ill-fated, as they only ever ended up as an MP3 release, because of distribution problems I was having at the time, but the series deserved so much more than that. Mood wise, it’s probably my favourite tune I’ve done to date. I can listen to it on repeat for ages, and often do sometimes.
Album: Nothing Is Certain: I think it’s the sum of its parts. Every track means something to me, and there are no fillers on it in my mind. It’s the pinnacle of my recording career so far.
Nothing Is Certain is out on July 12th on NonPlus+ Records, and the album sampler (NONPLUS006) is out now on NonPlus+. ASC is also releasing the single “Starkwood” on NonPlus+-related Autonomic Records later this summer.
