Name: Boban Ristevski
Nationality: North Macedonian
Occupation: Music producer and DJ
Current release: Boban Ristevsk, as Lefterna, teams up with Toni Dimitrov aka Sound_00 for Collab 58m, out now via Histamine Tapes.
Recommendations: I can recommend the album Late Afternoon Tapes by the Italian artist Fabio Orsi, which was released the previous year by the label Attenuation Circuit and it really blew me away.
And also, the book Art and physics by the author Leonard Shlain, which I'll mention later in this interview.

If you enjoyed this Boban Ristevski interview and would like to stay up to date with his music, visit his official homepage. He is also on Facebook, bandcamp, and Soundcloud.



When I listen to music, I see shapes, objects and colours. What happens in your body when you're listening? Do you listen with your eyes open or closed?

I listen to the music with my eyes open and sometimes I agree with you that it also happens to me too to see shapes, objects and colours, especially when I’m listening to some kind of experimental sound or music, specially drone, for example.

But mostly I want to catch the moment when I’m listening to that kind of music, in order to define the style better.

What were your very first steps in music like - and how do you rate gains made through experience versus the naiveté of those first steps?

I’d say the key period for me regarding my experience with music was when I was involved in a local alternative music station Kanal 103, where I had a show and played a lot of the then new experimental music on the radio.

That somehow shaped my music taste and set the coordinates for what happened afterwards - meaning that I managed to release around 250 to 300 music releases in different formats, for the past 15 years approximately.

According to scientific studies, we make our deepest and most incisive musical experiences between the ages of 13-16. What did music meant to you at that age and what’s changed since then?

At around that age I was a bit without much focus (listening to everything, really, from George Michael to Oasis), so I was a bit all over the place.

It was later that I decided that I would focus on experimental sound and music and I got especially interested in drone / ambient and noise.

Over the course of your development, what have been your most important instruments and tools and how have they shaped your perspective on music?

I can say that my approach to sound making consists of radically experimenting with sounds and effects and also through the use of field recordings.

I’ve changed a few music programs for that, but most recently I’ve stuck totally with the program Ableton.

What, would you say, are the key ideas behind your approach to music and what motivates you to create?

I’ve set to make music mostly when I’ve had an idea about what I wanted to achieve, i.e. what sound I want to make.

I’ve done a few more noisy releases, one of them is total harsh noise. But most of them are variations of drone and dark / deep / abstract ambient.

Paul Simon said “the way that I listen to my own records is not for the chords or the lyrics - my first impression is of the overall sound.” What's your own take on that and how would you define your personal sound?

I can agree that I’m focused on the overall sound. My personal sound is experimental drone. Since I work as a librarian (at the local city library in Skopje / North Macedonia), I have a chance to explore and to go a bit deeper into literature, too, and I’ve read a lot of the esoteric and occult authors from those fields.

So I can say that that also influenced my music, too. I believe in the connection between music and spirituality.

Sound, song, and rhythm are all around us, from animal noises to the waves of the ocean. What, if any, are some of the most moving experiences you've had with these non-human-made sounds? In how far would you describe them as “musical”?

I’ve had a chance to use field recordings and to treat them with effects, when I’ve made some of my music releases. So, I can say, that they are musical.

It’s, of course, quite commonplace that experimental artists today are using a lot of different and various field recordings in their music.

From very deep/high/loud/quiet sounds to very long/short/simple/complex compositions - are there extremes in music you feel drawn to and what response do they elicit?

I’m totally into the extremes, specially in experimental music. I like to listen to and I’ve also made sound that ranges from one extreme to the other. From very quiet, to the loudest.

From symphonies and traditional verse/chorus-songs to linear techno tracks and free jazz, there are myriads ways to structure a piece of music. Which approaches work best for you – and why?

My approach to music making is based mostly on improvisation, even when I make ambient music, I’m just experimenting and improvising with the sounds and effects.

But even when I make improvisations using those sounds and with that approach, it also happens that sometimes hints or sparkles of a compositional structure appear during the process.

Could you describe your creative process on the basis of one of your pieces, live performances or albums that's particularly dear to you, please?

I don’t have a special ritual for making music. I just set myself in the mood to expess myself creatively with sound and that’s it.

Sometimes, science and art converge in unexpected ways. Do you conduct “experiments” or make use of scientific insights when you're making music?

I’m just reading an interesting book, recently – ‘ Art and physics ‘ by the author Leonard Shlain. It covers a lot of those topics, regarding the connections between art and science.

A lot of the music in the drone style is also influenced by some of the esoteric traditions. So that works best for me.

How does the way you make music reflect the way you live your life? Can we learn lessons about life by understanding music on a deeper level?

Yes, of course. Listening to and making experimental music can widen someone’s perception of reality or it can be an influence on someone to have a deeper approach to understanding reality.

Do you feel as though writing or performing a piece of music is inherently different from something like making a great cup of coffee? What do you express through music that you couldn't or wouldn't in more 'mundane' tasks?

Someone might want to express emotions with the sound (or with the lyrics) or also someone may be interested only in the sound itself.

I believe that in my case it’s the combination of both approaches that intrigues me most and I’m trying to combine them.

Every time I listen to "Albedo 0.39" by Vangelis, I choke up. But the lyrics are made up of nothing but numbers and values. Do you, too, have a song or piece of music that affects you in a way that you can't explain?

I can say that I’m totally impressed and mind blown by the album The Endless Not by Throbbing Gristle.



It is an influence on what I’ve done with music and it has the right combination of experimentation, variation, mystery, lyrics, composition, the occult influences and so on.

If you could make a wish for the future – what are developments in music you would like to see and hear?

I guess drone music somehow became drowned out today. So I’m just wondering what the next big hype in experimental music and sound will be.