Soundwave Synchronicity: Dopplereffekt Breaks It Down
From Detroit’s Dataphysix Engineering lab all the way to Madrid’s dusky techno temple, the mysterious electronic music unit known as Dopplereffekt makes a rare live appearance during the Academy on November 24 at Specka. Heinrich Mueller of the crew talks about their philosophy of “techno” in the truest sense of the word.
On Motion In Sound
I play around, experiment with different linguistic things — just a momentary phrase to see how it works. There’s no plan or connection, it’s all an experiment. If the music data fits the concept, it’s applied here. It all depends on what the song turns out to be, what project it’s connected to. Scientifically, it represents changing soundwaves. Their motion is socially connected to the observer. It’s simplicity, trying to have some sophistication with simplicity. I think it is a very spontaneous situation: how you feel in that moment is documented in the soundwave. Everything in the process is spontaneous most of the time, [though] sometimes it emerges from a planned concept. Nowadays, I try to work more in the frame with a plan and a concept.
On Magic
I don’t think any instrument or any era will produce magic. My philosophy is, you can take any instrument, no matter which era it came from, and if you apply it creatively, you can get an interesting song. You have some technology that has a better sound than others, but generally speaking, there is no set of classic devices to get a certain sound. You can use all machines from all eras to get a unique song. I think ergonomics plays an important role, how you can manipulate things, and how quickly you can manipulate those things. Because in the creative process, you want to be able to synchronise, you don’t want any of them to be out of sync. So when you want to get to a certain sound you should not have to access multiple pages, multiple menus, you can get to something readily. The producer should be able to realise ideas — shouldn’t have to have a delay in finding the idea he wants — and apply it. Inspiration is not about tuning strings to get to an idea.
On Spreading The Word
Thanks to developments in internet and communications technology, those traditional methods of trying to popularise or draw attention to your sound or what you are doing have been made easier. Various sites have people trying to expose their sound. The traditional ways of presenting music have dramatically changed. The disadvantage is the saturation point — you have many people doing it, and most of the time it’s low quality. On these sites you find underdeveloped ideas. The advantage of these communication developments however, is that they provide forward motion to music.
