A communal deep listening session happens Friday, January 30th at Agora Records’ back warehouse space. Sound by Mobius Acoustics.

Ever quotable, Richard D. James has always been his own most effective mythmaker, a figure who seems to understand that the fastest way to disarm an audience is to speak plainly, mischievously, and without much interest in smoothing the edges. Across interviews, liner notes, message boards, and offhand remarks, he has left behind a parallel body of work that runs alongside the music rather than explaining it, resisting interpretation even as it invites obsessive rereading. Taken together, these fragments sketch a temperament as much as a philosophy.

Join us Friday, January 30th at Agora Records’ back warehouse space for a communal deep listening session of classic albums and EP’s from Aphex Twin’s vast and varied discography, selected by In Sheep’s Clothing’s Bryan Ling, followed by a closing DJ set by the team behind In Sheep’s Clothing. Hi-Fidelity sound by Mobius Acoustics.

Tickets are available now via dice.fm

The listening arc will move in a single, continuous sweep flowing through:

• AFX Analogue Bubblebath Vol. 3
• Selected Ambient Works Volume II
• Xylem Tube EP
• Girl/Boy EP
• Drukqs
• Analord 5
• Windowlicker
• Syro
• Joyrex J4 EP

What follows is Aphex Twin in his own words, unfiltered and largely uncontextualized, moving from craft to mischief to moments of unexpected clarity. All of the quotes are drawn exclusively from the noyzelab archive, specifically “Aphex Twin SYROBONKERS! Interview Part 1,” published Monday, November 3, 2014. We’ve lightly edited for clarity, but since this was an email exchange, have left the uniquely Aphexian approach to communication intact. The full interview is currently available via Archive.org.

On critiquing music while on LSD:

I think doing acid is a bit of a brute force way of getting outside yourself, there are other easier ways but no less difficult to deal with and more intense but without the brutal chemicals in your body. I had an astral projection the first time I did acid [after about 5/6 hours] right outside myself on the ceiling, looked down on my body making a sandwich, such a terrifying experience. I don’t think terrifying is the right word, I don’t think there is a word, I think getting a 2nd one is harder as you have to overcome the fear.

I had a trip on a microdot once around 94ish, it went very weird, long story short, I couldn’t find anything that was good or worthwhile about music, I put on some of my fave records by other people [i get into this state tripping sometimes, .. what am i supposed to do now?[deprogrammed] its pretty scary..and thought oh maybe i would play… like music.. to enjoy?]

I was in quite a desperate/seeking state and they all sounded so bad, the brutal truth, pointless and totally boring, i saw how i kind of invented/made up a fantasy about things i liked, kind of tricking and lying to myself that it was good so i could feel nice&comfy, anyway I thought there must be something good to fucking listen to… and I found it, it was turning my amp and eq up on maximum and I mean maximum and spinning the radio dial backwards and forwards, [it was a nice weighted one], I was totally emotionless when I was doing it [ 🙂 ] and I thought…hmmm yeah thats …kind of alright, then my speakers blew up.

But in the back of my mind now, many years l8r I can choose to remember the feeling of everything anyone ever does creatively is actually terrible, the only comforting thought I can get like that is, well rocks can’t make beats or something, ha, so that’s kind of good, i don’t knw wtf I’m going on about…jeez.

On how to improve your flanger game:

Love the sound qual its 9kHz sampling rate, 8-bit and you could get just over a second in memory, so i used to speed sounds up on tape then sample them into that and slow them down, so even more gritty!
Heres something i did when i was around 15/16 on one.

I did have a tape phlanged version of this, cant find right now, i recommend btw to anyone who has never tried it, try proper tape flanging, cheapest way to do it, buy a double tape boombox/ghetto blaster]
Record whatever you want to flange onto two cassettes or one and then use high speed dubbing to other tape !-)

Then just play both tapes at the same time using the pause buttons to cue em up and then, you might have to take the tape cover off to slow down either cassette to change the flange sound. This is where the flange sound from fx units or plugins originates from! The younger kids who might read this prob dont know that. The effect is surprisingly amazin, it sounds so much richer than a plug in… Especially when the 2 signals cancel each other out and the sounds goes really thick, amazing, try it.

Actually you get flanging in nature, due to sound hitting your ears at slightly different times, you notice it sometimes when you walk up to a big wall and there is a constant noise around like a fan or something. When you go closer or further away from the wall you can change the flange effect. Also while tripping many times, all sound has had an extreme flanged sound to me, so it goes back b4 tape. Im guessing its because sound is flanging to us all the time, because of sound hitting our 2 ears at slightly different times, but our brain deals with it in a way which makes you not realise the flange effect, tripping can expose that mechanism, fascinating! Although ive never started seeing upside down!

On circuit-building:

Havnt built any circuits in 10 years and really want to get back into it and do some more designs again + finish some old ones off and this thing just looks so nice to have in the rack, beckoning you to poke it with components.

I did make and modify a lot of my own equipment, not very well I might add but was proud of a few things, best thing I made was a sampler for a college project, funniest part was that my lecturer didnt know what a sampler was!

It didnt really work properly as I joined all the boards together with loads of hand soldered wires and it just generated too much noise, but it made some super lush odd sounds, I could change the sample rate in real time in record and playback, that was main reason why I wanted to make it.

Also circuit bent a logic analyser + calculators when I was a teen and got some mad fings out of those. Reminds me I used to like tuning my [frequency] scanner into my equipment and picking up odd stuff, its still a top thing not to forget to do …easier than circuit bending and dont have to take any thing apart,..shit i really need to get back into scanners, they r so mental these days.. internet on shortwave etc.

On why his tracks are so intricate and detailed:

[W]hen my recording equip was crap, I used to try and make it even crapper, like use the worst rusty leads, crap cassettes etc etc everything on worst or lo sampling rates, now I use a lot of nicer spec equip, opposite vibe but then I do mix and match, like the idea of loads of layers of recording rates, live instruments, software, hardware, quantised, live etc etc, more depth, keeps me more alert, diff qual equipmnt.

And putting so much detail into traks, I think ive read a few times, people think I make my tracks so detailed to be “arty” or coz im trying really hard, ha, makes me smile, I used to do it originally because id get bored of my tracks so quickly, so I try to put sooo many layers and details into it so that I can never remember in my head when listening, EXACTLY everything that is going to happen, funny thing is I still can remember pretty much everything but decide to listen only to certain layers, so get more from it depending on mood.

Although I think even from my very 1st tracks I had a desire 2 get really into the machines, to make a different world inside one of the boxes, live inside there instead 🙂 Still do it, create worlds tht u can almost live inside…

Another thing I read on ytube about 1 of my traks was “this is art not music”! Ha they meant to be nice but I think this reflects how a lot of people see music these days as some kind of utility that just does expected things, its very, very sad, sad shit., spiritually lowest point of humanity vibes.. But it doesnt mean we all have to think like that…thing is in a better world reality, creative acts would be considered the most important, not who makes the most money or who is good looking. Its why we are here imo, I often say to people who get depressed as I never do, You need to be either loving/caring, creating or learning, then you will be fine.

On the equipment list on the cover of Syro:

i was pretty wary of doing it coz i absolutely dont want to be showin off, one of the reasons i not done it b4 “look at that cunt with xxx£ of equip etc” i guarantee someone will get their calculator out in about 2 mins after readings it, add it all up post it on a forum, the cunt has £ this much stuff etc’
but the equip list was so extensive i thought it just had to b noted.. that is only a small part of it as well even on the tracks never mind the rest of the stash.

I mean on the first 3 tracks on syro, there was probably a ton more outboard but I just couldn’t remem what was used, too many things..neve 1081’s dbx’s etc, ext eq’s … oh and a friggin moog modular for bass on mini pops, forgot bout that, ha, looking at the gear list! i wish i could do it on all future releases, i might but it just takes so much time, i was even going to record every patchbay connection on each track to show how everything was connected together and even include all data from the circlon but then slapped myself around the face got a grip … coz it has all costs i wanted to take it to absolute maximum extreme of info…shame im not that mental …yet..if i didnt have kids i prob would have.

On one of his most unusual processes:

well i think the first thing i remember doing was when i was at a scouts camp about age 11, I got a radio cassette player and put a track on it, then attached it to a long piece of rope and starting swinging it in a circle around me, to also kind of show off to other camp people I suppose…but slowly letting the rope out so the player is in a really big circle, like 10m in diameter, you get an AMAZING doppler effect, people should try this, its so good, you can re amp like this also!

So I was doing this kind of thing from very early age, and had fascination with doppler fx and other acoustic phenomenon since being a kid…