Signal Operator: Infidel Interview #24
First I just want to thank you for participating in this edition of Infidel Interviews. With this interview let's just start with a bit about yourself. Where are you from, how old are you, and how long have you been making music for?
I am from São Paulo, Brazil but moved to Sorocaba 17 years ago. I'm 44 years old and I've been involved with music since I was 17 years old.
How is the music scene is Brazil? Do you find there are lots of musicians who share similar tastes in music? Or is it a struggle to find fellow rivetheads?
The alternative scene has been very weak compared to the 90's. I still know lots of musicians,producers and dj's in the scene and thank God to the Internet which makes a lot easier to stay in contact with all of them. So towards the end of 2015 I decided to release a compilation with all Brazilian Ebm bands and the result was just magnificent, and I got great feedback from that juust the way I wanted to the end the year, you can check out the promotional vídeo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6aUkCxJm3YQ or in my bandcamp https://signal-operator.bandcamp.com/ When you first started making music, was there a particular sound or artistic/musical influence that you would say was your biggest inspiration to start pursuing the creative path yourself? What led you to electronic music, particularly the heavier kinds of it?
Back when i was 16 years old, i wasn’t really into music believe it or no or whatever I’ve heard I didn’t like it. When i went in a trip with a friend of mine he introduced to me Front By Front which it was around late 80’s early 90’s, and just the sounds, the format of the songs just made go above and beyond my imagination. I sat down and started thinking that could be more bands that sounded like that, not exactly like it but with the same style. Then 1992 came and thats when i bought my first synthesizer which it was a Roland W-30 a sampling workstation and i started writing my first songs. then Someone invited me to be in a project called Anti-aircraft and we release in cassette “Mind Builds” and 1994 we broke up. In 1995 we did another project called Organic Insight and also in cassette we released “No Control of Sense” but again I felt the necessity to do my own thing.
In the beginning the bands that really caught my eyes and I was inspired by were Front 242, Leaether Strip, Front Line Assembly, Mentallo & Fixer but then I started to listen to other types od electronic music like Synth Pop, Minimal Wave, Pos Punk, industrial etc…
What genres of music would you consider yourself to be the most active in, or influenced by? What are your thoughts on genres in general? Do you find them creatively helpful as a template to work with? Or do you find them restricting? Or possibly somewhere in between?
Well, for sure EBM and Pós-Punk even though right now EBM is suffering since a lot of bands sound the same, and comparing to the 90’s where they didn’t have the technology that the bands have now they were better in terms of creativity. Talking about Genres is a bit complicated since people have different opinions, and I thinks there are two sides the producer and the listeners
Would you say that your choice to pursue music has changed your life since you started? Would you say that creativity has evolved you spiritually, emotionally, or logically? What are some of the biggest challenges you have had to overcome in your musical career?
Certainly was a watershed something that moved me strongly spiritually and culturally, put my creativity depends on my emotional state can not produce if not well, at the end of 1996 had some problems and I was away from music back in 2008, I had to I reacquainted with new technologies, migrate from Octamed for Ableton Live was something scary, but I see all this technology as
something incredibly positive and fascinating this adaptation was not easy, I am constantly adapting and learning as a musician and person.
What would you say are your favorite themes and topics to write about? What draws you to those themes?
As vezes posso estar assistindo televisão e ver uma matéria e ela desencadear uma ideia, ou posso estar assistindo um filme e um trecho de um discurso novamente dispara algo dentro de mim, situações do cotidiano e tudo que está ao meu redor podem me inspirar, fatos históricos ou nosso passado não distante podem me dar a visão de escrever em forma de protesto ou crítica, sou aficionado por ficção cientifica e tecnologia em geral e elas estão presentes no que eu faço, o lado bom e o mais obscuro do ser humano, existe uma vasta gama de influencias e assuntos que compõem o que eu faço.
Sometimes I could be watching Tv or a movie and take ideas from that
You are involved in a variety of different musical projects, and have actually been involved in the music scene since the early 90's. What has kept you active, and passion reigning strong, in the industrial style of music for so long?
I just like what I do, even in the time I was not producing was consuming music and alternative culture in many ways, this and my passion, my addiction
You have a variety of different projects. How do you separate your creation output for each project?
When I start writing, different Material, different ideas appear, so then i start to separate them. Since I’m constantly writing music my mood changes and therefore its easy to separate the Genres,the crucial part is to organize the time to work on all of them simultaneously since right now my main project is Signal Operator then comes ‘Elementary” which I’ve been working very cautiously, “Memory Flow”and the most intuitive and uncompromised, still in partnership with my friend Joel Roderick Bisson have the Kapital where we make a EBM Old School very simple and straightforward, and Terrorsekt which is a Dark Electro, sometimes Joel invites me to do vocal or assist in the production of their projects.
When you make music are you primarily a hardware or software oriented musician? Or do you do a fusion of both? Do you participate in the analog versus digital debate, vouching for the purity of analog sound? Or do you find it negligent with the advances of technology nowadays?
I am of the time when my sequencer was a Commodore Amiga 500 and some synths, but now with all available technologies and impossible to ignore them there are many excellent VSTS, I'm addicted to synths and always want more, but I'm not a purist in my EBM projects use hardware and software, for my Minimal Wave project use more hardware because they give me the fastest results I need with expected sound.
Other than what you currently produce, what other sorts of genres, instruments, and sounds would you like to use in the future? Are there any people you would like to collaborate with in the future artistically, musically, or socially?
Maybe in the future to do something with lower bpm with a denser atmosphere and a very cold sound any gender specific at least so far only ideas, I have interest in percussion and I'm always adding unusual sounds.
In recent years I have worked with different artists doing remixes was something really challenging at first, more than a retelling of the original work I always try to print my identity and add originality. And logical that I would have the opportunity to work with the bands that influenced me, but now I'm much more interested in bands that develop consistent and original work in the underground universe as Statiqblow, Zex Model, N3VOA, Contaminatted Intelligence, Mangled Meat, High -Functioning Flesh, among many others.
Are live shows an important part of your career? Or are you predominantly a studio musician? If you could play a live show anywhere in the world/do a tour anywhere, where would it be? Is doing live music something that you envision for yourself in the future? If so what are some of the images, themes, or ideas you might have for said future live set?
I believe a lot of the artists want to expose your work live for the fans and I’m no different. I Believe thats important even though right now Im focused in production, but play live in Europe or in USA would be a dreams, for me the ideal way to perform live would be something more visceral and organic with harsh impact of images and messages.
When it comes to non-musical media, what do you find yourself most inspired by, and what about it draws you to it as a source of inspiration?
The human being itself, the past, literature, art, everyday stories, all this affects me as a complex mix of feelings in an introspective way and that result in everything I do.
What do you see in the near, and far, future for your creative output?
Right now my main focus is t finish my Ep, Thank you so much for participating in this episode of Infidel Interview. Any parting words for your fans, or my audience?
I would like to thank the whole Infidel Team for the opportunity to expose my ideas and the way I work, and I hope your audience that reads this interview could become my fans in the future.
You can find Signal Operator on a variety of sites:
https://www.facebook.com/emerson.felix.54
https://soundcloud.com/signal-operator
https://signal-operator.bandcamp.com/
https://soundcloud.com/memory-flow
http://kapital-ebm.bandcamp.com/
https://terrorsekt.bandcamp.com/
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