When British producer, sound engineer, and musician Gareth Jones got a job on a radio station, more precisely on the BBC, he was interested in music recording technology. Back in time, there were no laptops or computers. BBC radio in England in the 80s claimed a lifelong love of radio, with a lot of really interesting, diverse music that young people could hear only on the radio. Gareth was also a big fan of classical music, and while working on BBC channels of classical music, he worked on popular music too. He learned something about microphones and music-mix tables. At the time, Depeche Mode was trying to make album number three, only to include the great music producer Alan Wilder on the third album, as Fokk was an electronic musician and Depeche Mode wanted to define the genre at the time, aka electro-pop in the UK. “I didn’t think it was really cool, I was more interested in things that weren’t so much on the radio. I just thought it was a pop band, I didn’t want to be involved. “But there was a connection to Mute Records. Depeche Mode liked the studio and (Gareth Jones) producer and sound engineer.
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Jones worked extensively in Germany, with German bands there including the Palais Schaumburg, Ideal, and Einstürzende Neubauten. His connection with the German music industry became
very important when he was invited to record Depeche Mode’s third album and finish the album in Berlin. The real “studio mix” took place in Berlin, which was Gareth’s introduction to the famous period of being in Berlin of all the important names of today’s alternative scene from Depeche Mode to Nick Cave (The Birthday Party). Daniel Miller producer from Mute Records worked in the same Hansa Studio. He then recorded The Birthday Party, the first post-punk band of Nick Cave and Mick Harvey, in the well-known Berlin’s Hansa studio, so producers Gareth and Daniel started working on the legendary albums Depeche Mode and The Birthday Party. A strong bond was formed when Daniel Miller mixed his first album in that studio. Berlin lasted nine years for Gareth Jones. One essential thing about working with Depeche Mode was the use of machines and computers, which was new at the time. It was a more accessible use of technology in creating interesting versions of songs. Gareth used guitar amps and synthesizers to record in an innovative way, which became recognizable enough during that period. A special connection, for example, was created on the album “Black Celebration” by Depeche Mode, on which Gareth Jones and Daniel Miller worked for a very long time. It is said that in the end, they went completely crazy-, and that the tension and energy is still felt on that album. Gareth Jones has also worked with German Blixa Bargel, the ex-guitarist of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, with Blixa’s Einstürzende Neubauten and Diamand Galas.
Gareth Jones is a musician, music producer, sound mixer, and painter, a pioneer of sound engineering that he has included in his process of a new technology of “sampler” (sound samples). Jones uses digital tools with analog recording techniques and synthesizers from the 80’s. Well-known in electronic music circles, Gareth has produced five albums for electro-pop pioneer Depeche Mode and six albums for synth-pop superstar Erasure, as well as several titles for Wire, Einsturzende Neubauten, Diamanda Galas. The list is huge, Bomb The Bass, Bronski Beat, Depeche Mode, Devo, Embrace, Erasure, The Futureheads, Garbage, Goldfrapp, Interpol, John Fokk, Madness, MGMT, New Order, Nick Cave, Orbital, Skunk Anansie, Sheep on Drugs etc.… Trained on the BBC, Jones began work with the new wave of the 80s in London and with the first music industry scene, including early singles for the British band Madness and John Fokk. Moving to Berlin in 1983, he worked at the legendary Hansa Studio for 10 years recording and mixing Depeche Mode, Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds, and The Birthday Party. He also worked with German filmmaker Wim Wenders etc … Sky TV in the UK recently commissioned a documentary about Hansa Studio, where several interviews were conducted with Gareth Jones. His production room is now housed in Strongroom Studio in London. While today, Jones is a frequent lecturer at the universities in Europe. His latest music projects include ElectroGenetic, Nous Alpha, Spiritual Friendship, and Sunroof.
I asked Gareth in an interview to tell me about great work and the process of intuition and this is what I have got.
“I listen to my inner voice, I feel that it is very important, and that is intuition. You know, nurturing creativity is extremely important. I recorded a record with my friend Daniel (Miller) Mute Records. We call it improvisations of electronic music “on top”. It is an LP of electronic improvisations, where the computer is not used at all. Computers only recorded, while the tape recorder was a central place in our work. And yes, we have our electronic, musical instruments in front of us, on the computer, and we listen to each other. And so for 40 years as long as we’ve been friends, we’ve been making electronic music for 40 years, focusing on experience, in one, one-hour piece, which is pretty magical. And I guess it’s all about listening to each other. And it’s all about intuition. Because that’s what we bring to an improvisation session. And that’s pretty wonderful. And one of the approaches we used during the making of that music record was that we were reserved towards that piece at the beginning of the process. Our approach is based on experience, friendship, and intuition. After the first version, we don’t listen to what we did for a few months, only to meet again a few months later, and together we make an improvisation on the first version of the music record, which we just record and let it stand again. So then we make another version and leave it to review again later … And then when we have a collection of versions of the composition, maybe 5,6,7,8 versions, then we just listen to it-, and try to make some judgment about it, and if we feel that this is what we want, it becomes a finished product. In the beginning, everything was based only on intuition and without a final assessment. I feel that two approaches are important for achieving balance when creating a musical record, our art. I feel that it is certain that if I judge too early, in the end, I will have to work more on the composition. This kind of music is not good. So, I have to negotiate with my own “self-critic” and respond to my intuition or my inner voice to my own creative child within me or whatever it is in a person. It helps me to negotiate with the critic inside me in my attempts and to ask that critic of mine to leave the room, that is, my brain for a while. So I could only punch music. I believe that as a practice, it is our responsibility to create, not so much to condemn what we create-, and to go through the creative process responsibly. To actually use our bodies in some realization. To realize a picture, a piece of music, whatever the question. And then that what we do is not as important as the fact that we are going through the process of making that musical harmony. Sometimes it seems to me that what I do is not my thing-, and that creativity comes from some higher power, from another place, from another dimension. And that’s why the “inner critic” doesn’t help me. Because if I have critics, because art is (non) competitive, my “inner critic” becomes very strong and eventually excludes me. I would do something that I would think about well. This may not be as good as the music made by Kraftwerk or this is not as good as what Blixa did or this is not as good as you know, whoever makes an ingenious piece of music. Knowing such a crisis of self-criticism, I would simply close. And that’s not helpful. I don’t think of any of us when we are in the process of trying to work on an original music record. It is very important that we just do the job, and then maybe say it later. “Well, in relation to this chapter, I may be right or this part, I don’t have to share it with anyone, or I can just leave it at this stage and I would like to share it with the world.” I have the same process in my head, with my pictures. The answer is not to be so happy. So, I have to put the pictures in my head on one side, leave them there for two or three days, then go back and look again and go again. “Oh, actually, maybe there’s something adorable in this picture.”
“It’s the same with music. Somehow I have to negotiate with the critic in me. That critic is not present when I am intuitive because I want to go back to what I said about intuition. So I feel that intuition is extremely important in the creative process of maintaining, listening to the inner voice, cultivating the “flame” of creativity, daily appearance at work, from what is really important.”
Gareth Jones’ new album “Electrogenetic” can be purchased via small London music production, Aggromonkey Records, and is seen as a life observation and death written in a special musical language. Check it out www.vaughngeorge.com/product-page/gareth-jones-electrogenetic-vinyl-record