Artist Interviews

Q&A: High Frequency Bandwidth

By CMU Editorial | Published on Wednesday 7 July 2010

High Frequency Bandwidth is the new “electrocosmic hip hop” project from The Orb’s Alex Paterson and acclaimed producer/remixer/engineer Dom Beken, who previously collaborated as 50% of the Transit Kings (along with Guy Pratt and Jimmy Cauty).

Starting out as a drummer in Liverpool, Dom runs a music production company as well as performing in his band Belka & Stelka, and has worked with the likes of David Bowie, Echo And The Bunnymen and Manson, whilst Alex is seen as an electronic pioneer and acid house veteran after his work as The Orb. HFB have just released their debut album ‘Hell, Fire And Brimstone’ via Malicious Damage and are all set to play The Good Ship in London on 8 Jul. Ahead of their gig we spoke to Dom to find out more.

Q1 How did you start out making music?
I really struggled reading sheet music in my piano lessons as a child. I’d read the first few bars then make it up! Later at school I got hold of the music department’s Casio CZ5000, which had an eight-track sequencer, plus a guitar and a four-track cassette machine. From then on figuring out how to write and record music became a bit of an obsession.

Q2 What inspired your latest album?
The beats behind this record have been a bit of an obsession for both of us since day one, and when we worked together on the Transit Kings album things started drifting this way. After that, it was a simple question of looking for a sound that encompassed what we both love the most and makes the most sense of our line-up: a DJ/producer and a musician. Inspiration comes from just waking up every day and looking around yourself. There never seems to be a shortage of questions and possible answers to write about!

Q3 What process do you go through in creating a track?
We don’t have a formula, I think we just start by asking ‘what are you thinking about or feeling today?’ One of us usually already has a sound in our heads, and we’ll begin by having as many ways as possible available in the studio for that to come out and go down, so we can bounce things between us. At some point the clouds part and the shape of things becomes obvious. Then the usual nuts and bolts bit of studio production begins, with the caveat that there’s always scope for a radical or surreal change in direction at any point!

Q4 Which artists influence your work?
I think any artist being honest would have to admit that everything they ever heard is an influence, whether you love it and borrow it, hate it and avoid it, or just can’t help the fact that it has an effect on you, be it music or just sounds you hear around you. However, if you listen to the album, certain specific things float around in there, like the experimental approach of Stones Throw artists such as Oh No and Madlib, film composers like Sergio Leone, other hip hop artists like Prefuse 73 and DJ Shadow, jazz artists like Miles Davis and Thelonius Monk and classical composers Igor Stravinsky, Claude Debussy, Aaron Copeland and Samuel Barber.

Q5 What would you say to someone experiencing your music for the first time?
“Do you like it?”

Q6 What are your ambitions for your latest album, and for the future?
Obviously we’d like a lot of people to hear it, and hopefully buy it! The chance to play it out live to more audiences would be great. But beyond that we are also enjoying the avenues of working with other media such as visual artists, film and video games. We had a great experience with adapting tracks from the album for the PS2 game ‘Shooter’ and are always looking for collaborations with other artists.

MORE>> www.highfrequencybandwidth.com