Ekoplekz - Nick Edwards - The sound scientist

Nick Edwards is the kind of unsung genius who surprises you when you least expect it. A decade-long career scattered with releases, some significant and others less so, lacking any truly standout peaks, plus a long series of side projects, have led him to build a name that has never quite managed to go beyond pure cult status. Add to that a glimmer of notoriety tied to his hobby as a blogger, a decidedly out-of-the-ordinary character, and a love for a format as anachronistic as the audio cassette, and you have the complete profile of one of the most enigmatic and elusive figures in contemporary experimental electronic music. This year, out of the blue, he came out under his most prolific moniker – Ekoplekz – with an album for none other than Planet Mu, suddenly meeting with a landslide of (well-deserved) praise from the most diverse corners of both audience and critics. We caught up with him via email for one of the most unexpected and unhoped-for interviews of the year.

I wouldn't have expected to see you release on Planet Mu! How did that come about?

Actually, I came close to doing it a few years back, but in the end that record came out on Mordant Music instead. I've been a fan of Mike Paradinas since "Tango 'N Vectif", twenty years ago: even though we only actually met a few years ago, it's as if there had always been a connection between us. Finding out he liked my music was fantastic! He's always kept the door open for me to put out a record on his label, and in the end it happened!

Is there any connection between this album's change of direction and you joining their roster?

There's no deliberate change of direction. I think this record picks up where other Ekoplekz releases left off; the main difference is that Mike helped choose the tracks to use and shape the whole work. I think he did a great job selecting and presenting my music, and he made a decisive contribution by basically offering another pair of ears, a further opinion from a different perspective. That's why I insisted for a long time that his name should stand out in the credits!

To me it actually felt like a record very much in line with Planet Mu's current output. What do you think of their current catalogue?

I can't say I like everything they do. For instance, I'm honestly not a huge fan of footwork. But there's a lot of amazing stuff that Mike and his label have put out over the years, especially in that wonderful melodic-intelligent techno scene that Mike himself came out of. That world has always been a huge influence on me, and I think you can hear a lot of it in "Unfidelty" too.

Looking at what you've released recently under your own name and as Ensemble Skalectrik, I wouldn't have expected to hear you return to dub and melody. How did this comeback come about?

I've spent much of the last couple of years exploring the outer limits of my sound with side-projects like Ensemble Skalectrik and PLKZFX, and on releases under my own name. That said, I always felt that the Ekoplekz sound needed to move back into a more direct, emotional, and in a sense accessible space. The dub and abstract elements will always be part of what I do — don't forget that, among other things, I produced an EP for a techno label ("Westerleigh Works" on Perc Trax, ed.). I've always been close to the techno world, but I've always needed to express myself on my own terms. I've never been, and never will be, interested in making tracks that are simply functional for DJ sets.

Coming back to your connection with Nineties IDM, "Severn Beach" almost feels like a veiled homage to early Autechre. Was that effect intentional?

Yes, absolutely. Going back to what I said earlier, records like Incunabula by Autechre, "Bytes" by Black Dog, "Electro Soma" by B12, and all the other releases in Warp's "Artificial Intelligence" series were essential for me, along with pretty much everything Aphex Twin put out in his early days. And let's not forget that around the same time, Cabaret Voltaire — more spiritual fathers of mine from Sheffield — were working with ambient-techno too: think of their "Plasticity", or Richard H. Kirk's solo work on "Virtual State" (also released on Warp, ed.) or "Intensely Radioactive" (released under the name Sandoz, ed.). Those records were the soundtrack of my life in the mid-Nineties, and their influence will always filter through everything that comes out of my head.

You've always worked with old analog gear, but on this "Unfidelty" your sound seems to have shed some of its age. Was that a conscious choice?

"Unfidelity" was made with the same old machines, and I didn't feel any need to make it sound more modern. If anything, I think it's particularly nostalgic, and I'm sure Mike would agree, since he actually encouraged me to keep its retro character intact. I think the main difference compared to the past is that I dusted off my passion for IDM, which I'd rather suppressed in previous records. But if you say it sounds modern, I'm glad, because I've never tried to shamelessly turn back the clock on my records. I'd like to think my records carry a certain relevance for the moment they come out in, even as they draw on the past: if I've genuinely managed to strike that balance, I couldn't be happier!

No, it's still the same old junk! A bunch of analog drum machines, the non-programmable kind. Creativity doesn't come from programming beats, but from tweaking and altering presets using delay and filters, EQing and modulating. That's actually how artists like Cabaret Voltaire and Harmonia built their rhythms back in the Seventies. On tracks like "Sleng Zen" and "Severn Beach" I also used some string and bass patterns from old Casio keyboards, manipulating them the way I described before, using a technique similar to the one Jamaican producers like Prince Jammy used in the Eighties. And then there's a ton of analog synths, and occasionally electric guitar and bass. So, like I said, the usual stuff!

What role does improvisation play in how you write your music? And in your live performances?

Almost all the tracks come to life from improvised jams, in the form of rhythm tracks. When I find something in that chaos that I really like, I record it to tape so I can shape it with my own hands. Then I overdub some extra parts like melodies and sound effects: most tracks end up sounding very different from the original demos after this process. To give you an example, the title track of "Unfidelty" sounded much cleaner before I kept working on it, over and over, until it took on its final shape. But all of this is done by hand, with no automation at all! I record and mix live, old-school style. I only switch the laptop on at the very end, when I'm working on the final mix or if I need to do some post-production: when that happens I use Audacity, a basic piece of freeware that nonetheless has all the (limited) tools I need.

What's your idea of the avant-garde? Do you think your music falls into that category?

Well, it's a matter of perspective. You and I might think this latest record of mine is, all things considered, a melodic one, but to an average listener it probably sounds like experimental, harsh, even dissonant stuff! I think it all comes down to the intentions of the person making the music — whether you see yourself as an artist or an entertainer, whether you're interested in making popular music that people might enjoy, or something that truly expresses who you are, with no particular concern for broad appeal. For me it's always been, and will always be, the latter, and I think what I do falls much more under the definition of art than of entertainment.

What does the recurring suffix "-plekz" in so many of your titles and project names stand for?

Nothing, really nothing. I just like the effect it has. Not everything I do has some conceptual grounding behind it! (laughs)

What does each of your projects represent for you?

Ekoplekz is the main project, the one that will always be a vehicle for my most fully realized work. With Ensemble Skalectrik and PLKZFX, on the other hand, I try to express less defined and more experimental ideas, some of which could hypothetically resurface in a future Ekoplekz work. eMMplekz is a collaboration with my friend Baron Mordant and is essentially Ekoplekz with his voice added. Ekoclef is another collaboration, with Bass Clef, which has so far produced just one album: for now we prefer to focus mainly on exploring the possibilities of improvising live as a duo.

What do you think of electronic music today?

The same things as always. There's a lot of great music out there, and also a lot of crap. What I really enjoy is seeing how many of my friends and peers are managing to build a solid following. Many of them work in music, others in design and illustration: none of us is making an easy living out of it, but we feel that our moment is now. That inspires me to try to keep reaching higher, and I hope the same happens for them.

Between work and family, a proper tour is basically impossible for me, but I'll try to play the occasional weekend when I can. I don't work with any booking agency, but I'm hoping to confirm a few dates in the coming months. Live, I never try to reproduce the studio records: obviously I keep them as a reference point, but I always try to build something new and fresh, so that everything feels more stimulating and interesting. It comes back to that idea of being an artist rather than an entertainer.

A while back you also "broke through" thanks in part to Gutterbreakz, arguably the first blog to cover post-contemporary electronic music in a broad sense. I haven't heard anything about it in at least 4 years: does it still exist? And what became of your potential career as a blogger-analyst?

It was never really a "career": when this whole music-blog phenomenon started, it simply struck me as interesting and inspired me. I'd never written about music before then, but that medium gave me a way to express my opinions. I certainly didn't expect to gain any real popularity, but there actually was a period, when I was mainly writing about the emerging dubstep scene, when I had a huge number of readers. Still, I never thought of it as a career path, and I never had any ambition to be a music journalist: at the time it was just an interesting medium to explore.

One last curiosity: why do you like the letter K so much?

Who knows? (laughs) More or less the same thing happens with Baron Mordant, who's literally obsessed with the letter M. I just think K has an appealing shape and really helps a word stand out, much like, say, Z. Stick them into a word and somehow it ends up sounding more exciting!

Ride the wave of great music

Add OndaRock to your favorite sources on Google Discover. Don't miss our reviews, milestones and latest news straight in your feed.

Follow on Google