ég fann þessa grein á netinu, og ég sé ekki betur en að þetta sé orðrétt sama viðtal og var forsíðuefni undirtóna fyrir stuttu. ég á þetta blað ekki lengur svo ég get ekki verið 100% viss.. hvað er málið?

http://www.xlr8r.com/issue/55/aphextwin/


TWIN INFINITIES

More often than not, Richard James wants it all and usually gets it—his way. Although his latest album, Drukqs, has arrived amidst a flurry of fan anticipation and curiousity, James sees it simply as a way to fund his other radical song-making endeavors. Alongside hometown mates and musical mischief-makers like Luke Vibert (Wagon Christ) and Tom Jenkinson (Squarepusher), the London-based Cornwall, UK native has sacrificed very little on his road to noteriety and respect. Like other counter-culture artists before him from the Situationist era through to punk, James has trod the road less traveled, all the while convincing people that it was Route 66, the Autobahn or the M1. He now finds himself both a cult figure for legions of aspiring electronic musicians and fans (unbeknownst to most major label heads), and an anti-hero who’d rather not be bothered with all the hype. Since the man they call Aphex Twin is known to raise more questions than he’ll answer, we’re thankful to Heiko from Germany’s Groove Magazine for bringing the following very candid interview to our pages. It took place at Nettuno, a cheap Italian restaurant on the first floor of the Elephant & Castle shopping center, south London on September 1, 2001.

words: Heiko Hoffmann
images: David Weissberg & Bezemer

WEB EXCLUSIVE!
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PART ONE: PLAYED OUT

You still live in an old bank building around the corner from here, don’t you?

Yeah, it’s a really good area. I really like it. It’s very un-trendy down here, which is why I moved here. There are no young people at all—and I never get recognized. I think I’ve been recognized twice in five years.

I’ve heard that the Ministry Of Sound club is a neighbor of yours.

Yes, and if the queue is long enough it goes all the way to my house. Sometimes [my friends and] I throw water balloons [from the roof] on the people that stand there. It’s wicked because nobody knows where they’re coming from—it’s dark [on the roof] and you can hide easily. I’ve also got really good video footage of my friends in those teddybear things I used to have. They just walked across to the queue in these costumes and were harassing people.

Last night you DJed at a party at [London’s 150-year-old] Victoria & Albert [decorative arts] museum. Your set sounded like a history lesson in breakbeats from the last ten years, ranging from happy hardcore to jungle to drum & bass, and finally your own tracks.

I wanted to play really trashy rave music because [the event] was in a museum. The obvious thing would have been to play really classy music, but I thought it would be funnier to play something trashy.

Do you play different sets for different occasions?

I’ve been doing lots of different sets, although I haven’t been doing any ambient or weird sets for ages. I do lots of stuff with my laptop, and that can really mean anything. [My sets are] usually a mishmash of live [material off laptop] and DJing. But no one knows I’m playing live because I never actually say it. If you say you’re playing live then it’s more like a gig, and people just go and stand and stare at you. But if you say you’re DJing then everyone dances and gets into it.

Last year your music was played along with a video by Chris Cunningham at the Royal Academy in London. You DJed at the Victoria & Albert museum, and in October “Prichard G. Jams” is scheduled to play at the Barbican Museum as part of a Stockhausen festival. Do you enjoy having your music played in such traditionally highbrow places?

I’m not making a conscious decision to play in these places. I’d rather play in a shit club any day. I’m doing this Stockhausen thing because it will probably be his last gig, and I actually just wanted to get tickets. He’s played live a few times recently, but only new things, and I don’t really like them. But this time he’s playing his first three electronic pieces. Some musicians who started out in really dodgy places and have been underground all their lives all of a sudden play only in [high-end London concert venues like] the South Bank and stuff like that. I think that’s just wrong.

You’re also known to play in the living rooms of other peoples’ houses.

Yeah, I’ve played in peoples‘ houses. Last month we got an email from this bloke who said, "My grandmother’s died and I inherited lots of money.' [It sounded cool], so we went over [there] in a massive tour bus. Those are actually my favorite gigs: a mixture of mates and a random number of people from the street. I’m also playing at a wedding reception soon, and just recently this girl asked me if I would like to play at her graduation party. I said, “Yeah, totally!”

Would you also play at this restaurant if they’d ask you?

Definitely.



PART TWO: TAKING DRUKQS

Why are you releasing your new double album, Drukqs on Warp?

Eh, that’s quite a good question. I’m sort of contractually obliged to release it with them. I’ve got no problem with [Warp] at all, so it’s not a big deal. At the same time, Squarepusher and I are starting up our own label. I released a single of acid mixes recently (“2 Remixes by AFX”).

Is this new label a Rephlex sublabel?

No, it’s just me and Tom, but Rephlex are going to help with some bits and bobs. But mainly Tom and I will run it.

Is the name Aphex Twin important to you?

It is, really. I could just use other names, but I wanted to use Aphex Twin and do like very experimental stuff. There are lots of people who are going to buy my [Aphex Twin] album who are not really into my stuff at all, I reckon. And I’m quite into the idea of them buying something very experimental.

You’ve said in the past that you don’t care about how many records you sell.

Well, with this one I want to sell as many as possible. It will be the last promoted thing I do for Warp. I just want to rinse it for the last one basically. Not in terms of music, but in terms of promotion.

Yet you won’t release a single, there will be no video, you won’t have photos of you taken, you’re only giving three interviews worldwide and you’re not going on tour. Is that what you mean by “promotion”?

[Laughs] I’ve made a few compromises. With the CD, it’s just in a normal [jewel] case and it’s gonna be really cheap. If it was up to me, I’d do it in a really nicely designed digi-pack. But it would cost more and [I’d] lose lots of money. Also, if it would be up to me, I wouldn’t do any interviews at all. I wouldn’t do any promotional gigs. To me, doing a little bit is as much effort as I’m going to make.

Why do you compromise at all?

Because it’s the last [album]. For my next one, I won’t have to do anything. So I just might as well do a little bit of work. I reckon that with this album I’ll have reached a maximum audience that I’d be happy with. I think I will have exposed myself to enough people. That’ll be enough for me. Then I can afford not to do any promotion for [a few] years.

You chose not to put your face on the cover of your records this time.

Yeah, and it’s totally on purpose. And I haven’t done any more videos, and it’s not my fault that they keep playing the same videos over and over again on MTV or whereever. I don’t like to be forced down peoples’ throats the way other famous people are. I don’t want to walk into a shop and [have] people go “Oh no, not that fucking twat!”

Why is the album coming out now, five years after your last album, Richard D. James?

[Laughs] The reason is that I lost one of those mp3 players, and I had 282 unreleased tracks of mine on it and 80 unreleased Squarepusher tracks. I left it on a plane. I was with [Rephlex owner] Grant [Wilson-Claridge] on a flight to Scotland to do a gig about four months ago. I’d had the mp3s for like six months, and he was laughing at me, saying, “Are you going to lose that?” And I said, “I’m never going to lose this!” And then five minutes later I left it on the plane.

Didn’t you have a copy of the music on your hard disc?

I have copies. I think I would‘ve committed suicide if I’d lost the masters. Since then, I’ve been keeping my eyes peeled on the internet. I thought that they would appear somewhere in about five seconds. I had written “Aphex Twin—Unreleased Tracks” on it! [Laughs] If they had put the tracks on the internet I’d be round their house—wherever it would be in the world—and get my fucking things back. But probably an air stewardess nicked it off the plane, they were probably into Bryan Adams or something like that. If they’d heard it, they would’ve probably just deleted it. If a fan had got it, I wouldn’t mind at all. It’d be a very nice present for someone to get it. I’d like that as long as they wouldn’t put it on the internet and destroy my earnings for like the next ten years. I told Tom very quickly, but I think he didn’t listen to what I said. So that’s why I wanted to put out as many tracks as possible as soon as possible. I was gonna stick out four CDs but it would’ve just been overkill and too much work.

So the only real reason why you are putting an album out now is because you wanted to officially release as many tracks as possible before they get around unofficially?

Yeah, pretty much. It’s kind of like an mp3 album, really. I don’t reckon that many people will do it, but the way I listen to music now is that I buy a CD, put it on the computer and just take the tracks I want anyway. I’d hope that people would do the same with this CD….



To read the rest of the seven-part Aphex Twin interview, buy XLR8R Magazine at your nearest newsstand or subscribe!