Mindchatter is Bryce Connolly, a producer/songwriter from NYC. He has released his debut single ‘Trippy’ in January this year and has continued to go from strength to strength. He will be joining Polo & Pan for part of their US tour this Fall.
We caught up with him for some mindchatter….
Tell us about your earliest musical memory?
I started making beats and remixes when I was about 16 years old but I played drums even earlier than that.
At what point in your life did you have that moment where you said to yourself “This is it. This is the type of music I want to create?”
I saw Stimming at a club called Flash in DC and was blown away by how much emotion there is in his production and I remember thinking to myself “THIS plus lyrics will be the future of music.” 3 years later I haven’t changed my mind.
Please list some of the most influential albums on your creative outlook and output:
For me, there’s no one or two defining inspirations so I’m just gonna rapid fire a bunch: Stimming, LCD Soundsystem, Gorillaz, Bonobo, Jamie XX, A Tribe Called Quest, Kanye West, Led Zeppelin, Flume, Nicolas Jaar, Monsters of Folk, etc.
What key pieces of gear/software are you using to define your sound?
I produce in Logic and don’t have a whole lot of hardware just a midi keyboard, Alesis Sample Pad and an APC for performing live. I record my vocals on an SM58 which is a stage mic or sometimes I just use the built-in microphone on my MacBook. My laptop is filled with every plugin you can imagine. Soundtoys, Fabfilter, d16, u-he, Arturia… all the classics. I’m pretty in the box mainly because it’s cheaper and portable but once I get some money I want to start building a proper analogue synth collection
What inspires you outside of music? What do you turn to when the creative well runs a little low?
Books and movies mainly. If I didn’t read Kurt Vonnegut, Alan Watts, David Foster Wallace and watch Charlie Kaufman movies I don’t know what I’d be writing about. I also play a lot of Chess… constantly on chess.com
What is your opinion on the ever-spreading sub-genre vine? Are there too many? Do you think there’ s perhaps a sub-genre that doesn’t get the attention it deserves?
I’ve always been pretty ignorant when it comes to genre. I can barely decipher tech-house from techno and I know there are a million other labels that I’m unfamiliar with. I think genre is slowly becoming a thing of the past. Soon people will stop obsessing about categorizing music and just listen to it. I’m a firm believer in Louis Armstrong’s claim “there are two kinds of music, the good and the bad.”
Studio work and music creation or performing and interacting with a live audience, what do you prefer?
Ask me again in 2 weeks when I perform for the first time. Its hard to imagine I’ll prefer it to the creative process but even just from rehearsal, I’m starting to think that becoming a better performer makes for a better writer and vice versa. Theres a kind of yin and yang. Whats the point of making all this music if you can’t share it with peopl
Any new or upcoming artists on your radar? Who shouldn’t the world sleep on?
Lesser known than me is a narrow category but some artists I’ve recently discovered are Greentea Peng, Joanna Sternberg, Bakar, Augustine.
What can we expect from you in the near future? Any upcoming projects or gigs in the pipeline that you would like to tell us about?
I’m about to open up for Polo & Pan for 5 dates in September which I could not be more excited about. Beyond that I expect to hear a lot more music in the near and far future.
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