Skye (Terminal Sound System)
SPB: Your use of effects in Dust Songs reveals a quite out of the box thinking from your part. Can you describe the process of applying effects to your music? Does it happen as you are recording or in the mixing stage? Can you also give us some of your favorite effects? Can be software or hardware.
Skye: The way I look at it, I don't so much apply effects to my music as work with effects, instruments, sounds and processes as an integral part of the composition/production/mixing/realisation process. I guess that's kind of a long-winded way of saying that rather than 1) recording a performance, then 2) effecting/treating and mixing it, with Dust Songs in particular all those steps are rolled into one. The treatment and performance are all part of the one process.
I've always been that way, starting with pushing my guitar and cheap drum machine through ridiculous chains of fx pedals, a long time ago, much to the annoyance of my friends.
I have a few favourite effects:
-My Roland RE-201 Space Echo has been with me for over half my life. I bought it (used, I'm not that old!) shortly out of high school. They were cheap and plentiful back then - it actually died a few weeks later and the shop swapped it for another they had lying about.
-Sherman Filterbank - just a crazy, completely idiosyncratic device. Capable of so much more than its trademark facemelt. In the "box" - I built my own plugin to simulate screwed up analogue tape - that's all over the album (as well as real tape, cassettes in this case). Also, the Waves SSL channel strip was quite instrumental in shaping certain tones.
