Andreilien 'Ergot Curry' Interview

Andreilien aka Andrei Olenev first emerged as Heyoka on the San Francisco underground glitch/bass scene in 2006. By 2009, he was touring extensively and quickly became a staple sound in the rapidly growing bass music scene of North America. With a constantly evolving, original style, he stands out amongst bass music producers as one who keeps the vibe going strong while always venturing to explore new realms of sonic experience.

Ergot Curry is his first full length album under the name Andreilien. Neuro-bass music with glitches and funk pays equal homage to blues, andreilienanimation jazz, calypso and Asian garage music, as much as it does to drum & bass, dub and glitch hop.

Playing live sets of his own original tracks, his music has been described as a journey through fractal soundscapes and alternate realms, riding the waves of fat glitch beats and earth rumbling sub bass. His production quality continues to elevate and surprise even the most sophisticated ears, with his use of found sound, analog modular synthesis, custom NI Reaktor synths, and a variety of plugins. Ergot Curry is a journey into a land of fractal sound.

What are the first three words that come to mind when asked to describe the overall sound of “Ergot Curry”?

Dynamicistic, poignentially, magneticallism.

How long did it take to produce the album, and what was going on in your life and/or inspiring you as you created it?

I’ve pretty much been working on it for two years, but the majority of the album was done over the last year. The initial tunes I was working on in the first year mainly got dropped from the album. As I’ve been working on it, my musical interests and production styles have been changing, which is why the album is pretty eclectic. It took me a long time because after my last EPs I was a bit bored with what I was working on and really wanted to explore different types of sounds and different ways of producing. So, I spent a lot of time just geeking out on new things until something would inspire me, and then I would build a track around that. After the whole thing was pretty much done, I went over each track to try to add embellishments and make each track sound more consistent together. As for what was going on in my life, it’s hard to say. I live out in the woods, hermiting out in my studio. And, I play shows most weekends. That’s about it.

How’s it been going, touring with the new music?

It has been good. For my dance tunes, playing them out is usually part of my production process. As I play them out, there are parts I generally like more, and parts of tunes that I tend to skip over. That gives me an idea of things to change in my tunes. I also like to always have a handful of new tracks each time I revisit a city, so I try to constantly be working on new tunes for my sets.

Can you tell us about the creation process of the “Ginectigazoinc” music video?

The fractal video for “Ginectigazoinc” is actually something I rendered a couple years ago and set to a different track from my last EP. The rendering took so long that the EP was already several months old by the time the video was done, so I decided to save it for something else. The intro clip with the alien girls shattering my name is new though. I wanna do some more stuff like that. For years I’ve been planning on developing an audio visual live set. I already have a template set up to do it, using Max for live patches that run Resolume off of Ableton. So, I could basically play my set exactly how I do now, and each audio clip and effect would trigger corresponding video clips and effects. The main thing that has kept me from getting it ready is just that I don’t have nearly enough material rendered for a full set. 3D fractal rendering and 3D rendering in general takes a very long time to render, and I just don’t have the computer power necessary to really get it together, but I’m still planning on getting it going in the near future.

Do you set a specific intention or direction when you sit down to make music?

Usually not. I don’t have a very formulaic production routine. Most of my tunes come about from me experimenting until something develops that inspires me. Sometimes I have a general idea or theme for a tune I would like to go for, or a melody in my head or something like that, but more often than not I have no set intention for what I’m working on.

Can you tell us about the songs on this album, if any of them have special meaning or stories behind them, or were there any you had a lot of fun making in particular?

The songs are pretty eclectic. Stylistically, they are mostly pretty dubby and glitchy. They have various energy levels from ambient/downtempo to really wacky drum and bass The ones that I had the most fun with were probably the ones where I drifted the most from my normal production process. “Ginectigazink” and “Fried with Benefits” were probably some of the funnest ones to make, because they both kind of accidentally came about through playing around with different sound ideas with no real track in mind. “Fried with Benefits” is a bit ravey for my style, but it just kind of developed like that. I decided to just go for it, and had a lot of fun with it in the process.

What are your plans for what’s next?

I’m working a lot on new methods of sound design and want to make a more experimental album. I’ve been programming instruments in Reaktor and building a collection of Reaktor maps to try to get a platform for a new direction in my sound palate. I’m working on some stuff right now that is kind of unusual, that I’m pretty excited to develop. As for shows I plan to continue touring often. And, like I mentioned earlier, I’m hoping to incorporate my visuals in my live sets in the the near future.