Forthcoming Pollen Records release featuring Sesped - free track, mix and interview
October 31
Sesped: Growing in Caracas is like living in the jungle; it's all about survival. There is no underground music scene, there is just a couple of friends making music in this genre (electronic music). This genre is not supported here, maybe a couple of shows per year, but are rare shows. There a couple of party with house music, kuduro and stuff like that.
You used to be in a band; tell me about that, and how you came from that to making the kind of music you do now?
I played the guitar in a post rock band called Retrovertigo. It was good, we got a record out on a french label around 2005 but did not do much.
Since I was like 10 years old I listened to Michael Jackson and stuff like that, then American hip hop, a lot of Latin hip hop and some Spanish hip hop bands like Violadores del Verso, 7 Notas 7 Colores and Frank T, so I kind of have rap music in my blood, but it was not easy to make that music by myself that young.
What do you think are some of your influences? As well as hip hop and electronica I hear traces of boogie, r’n’b and even skweee in some of your tunes.
I like boogie music and r'n'b; I like what I feel when I listen to the bass, the keyboards and voices. I think they really feel what they sing. But I still don't like too much voices in my music, because I don't like to tell people what to feel or imagine when they listen to it. I use voices as instruments.
Your songs have a lot of character in that they sound very alive and ‘human’, while still feeling very machine based. How do you achieve that?
Yes, they feel human because when I'm making music I dont care about rules to make music, fuck that, I'm human and I play like im playing live, I'm a band that plays a lot of intruments with two hands on a keyboard at the same time.
You often describe your music as “lo fi”; can you explain this? Is it something that comes naturally through your method of production? Why is it important to you to try and make things sound crackly and rough?
It comes naturally sometimes and sometimes I work on it, I make my music sound like that because it reminds me when I was younger and doesn't sound perfect, like in real life. The new technology makes you feel like a machine with no feelings, everything so perfect is not cool. I would like my music to sound like a cassette because thats how I started to listen music back in 1983.
You recently remixed Cardopusher on Tigerbeat6; how did the link with him happen? I find the way his music has evolved over the years really interesting.
We are brothers. He is the older one.
Wow, I didn't know that. Finally, what music is exciting you at the moment, and what else is coming out of Caracas or Venezuela that we should know about?
I have been listening a lot Balam Acab and Holy Other. From Caracas, Drafter and Jimmy Flamante make good abstract hip hop.
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