I need to tell a brief...

I was in London soon after James Blake's...

his sort of, breakthrough hit came through...

And I was talking to my friend, I was like, what an interesting progression,

because he went from doing sort of like

cool, low-profile Dubstep 12 inches...

and then started putting in his voice as kind of a process thing...

and then suddenly it's like this pop territory, so moving from...

a sort of invisibility, an honest producer, into like, and I said it to a journalist friend

and he was like "oh, yeah. He's got a high powered manager"

and "he's very handsome" and he was like, it's a very commercial move

in terms of this progression.

But what I noticed about your work

had this similar, kind of starting off... at least in what reached me...

as being very abstracted, and then slowly ideas, a voice and invisibility...

went into it in a way that didn't feel like it was a commercial move

but rather, it was part of a very, kind of fascinating, artistic trajectory...

and sort of, statement that you were making.

And it wasn't just with one song,

but it was following your sounds for like two years or so.

And so I'm just kind curious about how you think about that; these longer arks...

when people are following your work, and like you said, y'know...

like what is... maybe singing is a very vulnerable thing for you, but...

Yeah, I think that's a really interesting point.

I think there's a lot of factors that went into that

I mean, you know, one of them is just like what I was interested in,

and investigating, kind of like pushed me.

Especially with Chorus a little bit but especially with Home...

having to find that vulnerable place and put myself forward a little bit.

So there's, just some of that, y'know, just like thematically

kind of pushed me in that way, but also...

Y'know, just my own comfort level... I still don't think of myself as a vocalist

or, like a pop singer or anything like that, you know...

that's never really how I've perceived myself.

So it was always just... it's been this kind of evolution of like...

how can I push myself to different places where I'm still...

where I'm uncomfortable but it's still me, where I'm, y'know, challenging myself.

So I think it's partly personal, and I think it's also partly cultural;

I think that the landscape has changed from when I started...

from when Movement came out to today, I feel like people are...

people have shifted their perspective, people are more open to things.

I feel like genres are more smashed together, I feel like...

pop isn't as dirty of a word as it was several years ago.

It's funny, I was at Unsound a couple of weeks ago, when it's like...

everyone was smiling and dancing.

Not that people weren't smiling at Unsound 3 years ago,

but it was definitely more like this kinda thing...

and this year is way more like this kinda thing, and I was like...

I don't know, I just think that attitudes and shifts change

and so that's definitely... y'know...

I'm also responding to my environment in that way.

And, I mean...

Seeing again the Chorus video and the Home video, I was reminded of how

I mean I like them both quite a bit because Chorus, it's....

you're really grappling with this idea of what is contemporary space...

you know, you're inside the home, you're inside the laptop,

there's products floating around, there's no sort of outside world.

And so, to me that links into this idea of

of the laptop being this very intimate instrument

You know, it's like, we are cyborg, like

the Donna Haraway you were referencing.

And there kind is no escape from the wires

and the signals that are permeating us now.

So then the question becomes: what do you... what now, what next?

Yeah, and what kind of ownership do we wanna take over it, or you know

do we as artists wanna be driving the conversation

or do we wanna be on the reactionary side,

where we're constantly like, off of our foot.

I'm like really mangling phrases today...

You know what I'm saying though, but like...

and that's one thing that I find really inspiring about artists

who are also working in areas of digital activism and...

and software development. I know I keep talking about Mat Dryhurst,

but I'm gonna bring it up again...

He just released a piece of software called Saga that's all around...

kind of this idea of self-hosting and artists having their own agency...

of the work that they release online.

So I find that kind of stuff really inspiring and I love it when artists are like...

really kind of awake and aware and interested in kind of...

having some sort of agency in where the conversation is going.

And I feel like, sorry... just on top of that,

I feel like that takes a degree of optimism, I feel like...

like, I love a dystopian artwork and I love like, y'know, post-apocalyptic...

like, course, I love science fiction, we all do.

And I think that there...

I also draw on those aesthetics sometimes but I feel like...

when we're constantly in that kind of negative zone

or in that kind of like fatalistic zone...

I feel like in a way, that kind of is like "whup, well I can't do anything"...

it kinda like, you know, takes the burden of us.

So I feel like we have to pair that with a degree of optimism...

and a degree of, kind of like, forward propelling motion,

so that we can actually have some sort of say in the way that things are going.

Yeah, absolutely.

I was having a conversation about science fiction literature with a friend

and he was just like, it's 95% dystopian, and this wasn't always the case

if you look back to the 60s, people are writing these books are envisioning

a totally different and less grim history.

Our future, and like, what does that mean if our imagination is already

kind of shrunken...

and so, it's of course exciting to think about electronic music,

contemporary art works' role and expending the possibilities.

And I guess that brings me to the question of...

you began with talking about the way in which both the club and the academy

have there sort of unspoken rules, you know, you can't use a 4/4 kick

or you'll be looked down on in the classroom and then maybe in the club...

this idea of like, the concept rule in the club is gonna be like - pleasure principle,

you must dance, you must have fun...

And so, I guess it's... what sort of...

how do you think about navigating those different spaces

creating a work that draws on multiple histories, multiple performing contexts,

how do you negotiate that, in terms of where you're choosing to play,

or how you might take a sort of club or academic set-up

and flip the... sort of the default structures?

I mean, I think a lot of that's just through really good curation.

So, I've worked with a lot of amazing promoters who know that like...

you know I also have aspects of my set that are totally euphoric

and it's kind of even going in a more kind of euphoric direction

as I've expanded to include Mat and Colin in the band.

But, y'know, just...

if promoters know that it's like a time in the night

when people really just need to be slapped in the face with a 4/4,

then there probably not gonna wanna listen to me doing Breathe.

So, like maybe don't put me in that slot.

But I think audiences, also audiences have like, I dunno if this is just...

I don't know if my booking agent and the promoters

but I feel like it's becoming less and less awkward.

are getting better at slotting me or if audiences are evolving

I mean, I've certainly played super awkward concerts...

and I've put myself in all kinds of weird situations.

But I feel like you always kind of learn something from those

and you get something out of it.

I remember we did this one tour where it was like...

everything was perfect and it was really boring,

cos' it was like, we didn't really have to face anything that was like, weird...

and like, not upsetting, but challenging in a way. So I think it's good to constantly

be shifting environments and not get in the rut of like, OK this is my safe-zone

and know that people are gonna need to hear this filter-sweep at this moment,

and that's gonna hit. Y'know, it's like, it's good to challenge yourself

and the audience in that way I think.

Yeah, one thing I... we've been emailing some ideas in preparation for this...

and one of the phrases I loved, you ended it with:

"sometimes it's easier to sing an idea than it is to program it."

Yeah, I was listening to some of your music yesterday...

as I was kind of like preparing this, and...

Jase wrote this really awesome article on auto-tune for free several years ago,

and I was listening to some of the production and some of the tracks

there's this... in a lot of the Middle Eastern music

there's this kind of like, violin sweep that happens often and that was actually...

something I was thinking about when working on a track, an exit.

So Mat and I went to Egypt several years ago

and really got into Nancy Ajram who's like a pop star there.

I just loved this kind of like, super dramatic sweeping violin...

kind of thing, and so I was trying to figure out how to do that with a synth.

And then, I set up a few different patches and processes...

and I was able to just kind of like sing in the idea,

and it was like a thousand times than trying to get...

the glissando with that exact moment. And so...

sometimes it is just like, more immediate to kind of set up a process

and then just sing it out.

It's kind of, to me... I actually misread it when I first saw the quote...

I'm like "sometimes it's easier to sing an idea than it is to say it"

And so... - OK.

which also makes sense in this idea of...

the ways in which a sound can carry so much information in and of itself.

the way a sound carries a politic... - Right

...even at the sort of, the most abstract level or something like that.

Yeah, and this is something I think I've grappled with since the very beginning,

is like: how to make a sound which is inherently abstract from language,

how to make that communicate something

that kind of goes beyond language.

And, like you said, sometimes it can communicate more and then sometimes

it can be so obtuse that it's really...

I've had very specific ideas of things I've wanted to communicate

and then trying to do that with a synthesizer,

I'm like, how do I get this across with this tool?

So yeah, I think it kinda goes both ways.

Sounds are...

super-embedded with all kinds of like cultural and historical...

I guess you could call it baggage, but also you could call it richness.

And so I think the home is one of these examples of like...

it's this wonderful, sort of inversion of the love song, you know, the NSA agent.

But even if I didn't know any of that and I just came to it, you know,

it's like, these ideas of voice, of processing.

You mentioned cutting off the attack and the end-delay and this idea of kind of...

contemporary existence as being endlessly mediated in a way which is...

suddenly beautiful and then suddenly distancing and troubling.

and you're kind of just negotiating that within the song...

and then if you want to start looking at the logos and thinking about Snowden

you can do that as well, or you can just sort of, feel what that might be like

through that song.

Yeah, I mean, I think that's kind of going back to this idea

of pop as a carrier signal, so like, if pop is actually functioning...

and doing its "pop" job, then it is actually kind of immediately visceral and...

maybe likable is the wrong word, but immediately approachable in a way,

that you're getting something out if it...

but I like the idea of it being this carrier signal

and having all of these other messages embedded within it, so if you do wanna

peel back and you do wanna find the other layers, you can.

Yeah.

It was...

seeing the last, I think the last slide with the installation with the animals running

I love that idea.

And partly, it engages... like often sound art, installation art is very dower

it's very dystopic, or at least sort of... like, joy and surprise...

aren't necessarily highly valued within that.

And so, ideas of 'sound-animals' running around the gallery space

was really lovely.

But then you mentioned Turner and specifically this painting...