Amid the chaos that is THE ENTERTAINMENT, Neurobit’s “Completely Puzzled” offers a respite in the form of a propulsive, twinkling gem of a track. Immersive without being ponderous, “Completely Puzzled” refreshes and excites.
Below, see Neurobit’s answers to our questions about the track, music-making, and his approach to sound.
1) Tell us a bit about your contribution to The Entertainment. Is it typical of your music? Are there any sounds/processes/elements in it that you haven’t included before? Were you trying to go for any specific listener reaction?
Neurobit is one of my music projects and the main focus of this project is improvised music generated by video game consoles. So a lot of my tracks have an 8 bit feel to them which makes the sound very recognisable. For me Neurobit tracks feel like landscapes. And that’s what I also had in mind while recording my track for this compilation.
2) Are you better off in your music than you are walking around in life?
That’s a good question haha. I think, since making music is a full time job now, I think I’m probably good at both. But I feel one goes with the other. My music is a reflection of how I feel and my response to the world around me. But what I record also reflects back on who I am and how I feel. The type of sound I respond to and how I treat that sound usually reflects my mood or what I’m feeling at that specific moment.
3) What is noise? What role does “noise” have in your work?
Noise for me is like bringing sound to it’s radical conclusion. There is something pure about it. It can create a lot of energy into a track and noise can makes a track much more intense even when done subtle. In Neurobit tracks I use noise a lot in the form of resonance to go along with melodic long tones to get bit of a feeling like a storm is rushing by. I used that a lot when I released “Maison De Verre Sur Le Chantier” in 2012. Over the years I lost a bit of interest in using noise just as it is. Nowadays I’m much more focussed on the combination of noise elements with melodic sounds when recording Neurobit tracks.
4) Did you intentionally want to make something the listener could only speculate about, rather than be certain of?
Let me put it this way. I always put a thought, idea or feeling behind my tracks. I’m not a very big proponent of creating something and letting the public decide what it is. It’s the same type of discussion that you have within abstract visual art. I always want to know what the idea of the artist was. If anyone can decide what it is they’re seeing than it becomes irrelevant to me in a way. I like it when artists have specific ideas behind their work. That doesn’t mean that the listener needs to be certain of everything, but it is important to me to be able to point them into the right
direction.
5) What’s next for Neurobit? Anything you want to tell people about?
There’s is very exciting news for my Neurobit project. I will be releasing a new 12inch very soon.
The test pressings are already done. It will be released by the Dutch label Vrijstaete. http://vrystaete.nl/muziek.html
Last month I also released a new digital Neurobit EP on the Spanish label Lowtoy which can be downloaded for free:
http://www.lowtoy.com/portfolio/neurobit-retro-spectrum-analyzer/
My other projects Former Descent and Rioteer are still going strong as well. As Former Descent I will release a collab album on vinyl later this year. And as Rioteer new breakcore tracks as well as a hardcore ep are ready to be released this year.
Thanks, Neurobit! We look forward to checking out all the sounds you have in store for us. Keep on doing the thing.
-Derek Tibs (CEO, Immigrant Breast Nest)