Don’t get the wrong idea here. There’s Bibio’s Stephen Wilkinson halfway between a glower and a look of deep disappointment at you from the top of the page. You’re already thinking ‘moody bastard’. You’re thinking, ‘electronica nob’. You’re thinking wrong.
Bibio’s ‘Ambivalence Avenue’ is this year’s finest release on Warp Records, and one of the year’s most unexpected, sumptuous delights. Taking the sepia-toned crackle of Boards of Canada and lucky-bag approach of Four Tet, the album is pregnant with nature, history, and ethereal memory, richer than honeycomb, and equally as sticky.
You’re playing as part of a Warp anniversary celebration gig with Plaid and Clark. As part of the newer generation of Warp acts how important has the label’s history and output been on the formation of your own musical identity?
Well, for me, Warp puts out music that usually feels like off-shoots from genres. For example, there’s evidence of hip hop, techno, jungle, drum n bass, indie, folk, soul etc. in the Warp catalogue, but it’s seldom straight; all of those styles seem to be twisted into something more unique with each of its artist’s output. It’s rarely generic, if ever. Perhaps it’s an island, but not some pretentious one where the rest of the industry is shouldered out, Warp seems to be happy to expand, not afraid to fly its flag, isn’t some snobby underground label. My music tends to shift and jump in style/genre, but my identity, hopefully, is always present. I fell in love with Warp about 13 years ago, and it always seemed like a label who seeks artists with something unique, personal and memorable. I like to think that my presence on Warp means I fit in there somehow. It’s a real achievement for me.
The most recurring criticism of Warp has been a perceived dilution of its identity with the inclusion of stuff like Maximo Park and Grizzly Bear, and other non-electronic artists on its roster. What’s your thinking on this?
Bollocks. Utter bollocks. It’s not Warp who decided upon that identity, it’s kids who are clinging onto the IDM scene, a term which I, and no doubt many other people kind of cringe at. I don’t see why there has to be this possessive greediness in that one should approve of an entire label’s roster, I just say pick what you like and enjoy it, stop whining about what Steve Beckett should be doing, or who he should be choosing, 20 years later and look at it… he must be doing something right.
How do you feel about the current state of electronica, broad as that is? What challenges do you think it faces?
I don’t care about it. I don’t care about the idea that electronica is some kind of culture which needs conserving or defending. I don’t care about scenes, I care about music as a whole. The only thing I like about scenes is the kind of slow process and the communal nature of people bouncing ideas off each other and leading to this refined evolved style. But really, music is music, some of it’s made with computers, some of it is made with guitars, some of it is made with whistles, bagpipes, sitars, voices, radios, light bulbs, drawing pins, bird song, radiators…
Bibio’s music in particular shows how electronic music can be soulful – does ever-developing technology enable or discourage more humanness in electronic music, do you think?
How can electronic music be anything but human? It’s purely human. This idea that a singer belting it out in a gospel choir is more human or soulful than music made on a laptop is a kind of misinterpretation of ‘humanness’ and ‘soulfulness’ in my opinion. Technology has been used for centuries by people in order to express themselves, or just ‘played with’ out of sheer wonder and curiosity, to hear or see what it can do. This is surely an expression somehow of the soul, just in the same way that a bursting flower bud is the expression of the cosmos. In fact, music, via any medium or technology, is an expression of the cosmos through the aperture we call ‘the human being’. Going back to your question, I think there’s more and more technology pouring out which is trying to make things easier and quicker, but music isn’t about that, it’s not a race, it’s not about getting the job done quicker so you can put the kettle on and sit down and watch TV. You can have too much gear, and you can waste too much time reading and deciding on what to get. If you’re musical, or if you truly care, you will use anything to make music, but if you just have to have that up-to-date version of whatever otherwise you can’t work, then you have to question your creativity, perhaps. What I don’t like about technology, particularly software, is the way people allow it to dictate to them how they should make music, so lo and behold… there are tons of generic artists. But then again, if you are having fun… fuck it, it’s all good, generic or not. Not everything in life has to be epic.
