Name: Isaac Kniveton aka Keplrr
Nationality: British
Occupation: Producer, DJ
Current release: Keplrr's debut LP Petra is out via Control Freak.
Recommendations: Fallen Angels: Great film with a great soundtrack.
Kangding Ray - Stabil: An amazing album that I’ve recently found again after not listening to it for years.

If you enjoyed this Keplrr interview and would like to stay up to date with his music, visit him on Instagram, and Soundcloud.



When did you start writing/producing/playing music and what or who were your early passions and influences? What was it about music and/or sound that drew you to it?

I guess I started in music at secondary school.

We had logic on the computers and like most 90s babies got into dubstep as a teenager. Me and my classmates used to spend our time trying to make wobbles and badly recreating beats we’d heard on UKF. Luckily we had music tech teacher who smoked a lot of weed and let us free on the Macs, every so often telling us what an LFO or envelope was.

After that, I forgot about music for a few years but eventually got into deep house and garage when I started going out and wanted to have a go at making it again.

When I listen to music, I see shapes, objects and colours. What happens in your body when you're listening and how does it influence your approach to creativity?

I think with all of the music I make I am looking to recreate that rushing feeling when you hear a song you love. All of my hair stands up on end and that influx of dopamine takes over.

As I’ve got (a little bit) older that rush has come for increasingly strange places - most recently Edward playing a wiggy Jeff Mills side project in fabric.

[Read our Jeff Mills interview]

How would you describe your development as an artist in terms of interests and challenges, searching for a personal voice, as well as breakthroughs?

I find writing music increasingly infuriating. It used to be really easy to just press songs out but I guess in much the same way as it taking more to get that listening gratification, it takes more to be satisfied with my writing.

That’s where the album was different and felt quite special, it really flowed, I didn’t have to work to write it and it was the most fun I’ve had writing in years.

Tell me a bit about your sense of identity and how it influences both your preferences as a listener and your creativity as an artist, please.

I’m not sure to be honest, this one stumped me a bit. Whilst I’m sure my identity and creativity are deeply entangled my music has always been about escapism and I’m not sure that I consider my subjectivity when writing.

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

It's gonna sound silly but my key approach is always - Is it good? I think so often I come across music / art that is technically incredible but actually not that enjoyable to consume.

I think that’s where minimalism really shines for me. Its core concept is how can we make something good with the least amount of stuff. I love that idea, I try to implement it always.

How would you describe your views on topics like originality and innovation versus perfection and timelessness in music? Are you interested in a “music of the future” or “continuing a tradition”?

Probably a bit of both, I love the context in which genres come to be, and it’s important to hold in mind when writing so I can use it as a tool / inspiration. Equally, though, I don’t need to make a house track because Frankie Knuckles already did it better than I ever could.

I think that’s why dance music is so exciting at the moment. From Thailand to New York people are creating new spins on old music or every so often coming up with something you’ve never heard before.

Over the course of your development, what have been your most important instruments and tools - and what are the most promising strategies for working with them?

This is gonna be a pretty boring answer but DAWs are pretty much all I need. I’ve used and own some really lovely synths / drum machines / gear but if I’m honest improving my workflow on Ableton has made a bigger difference then any Dave Smith could.

Although maybe there’s a ceiling to that and I will be shouting about gear in 4 years time.

Take us through a day in your life, from a possible morning routine through to your work, please.

At the moment not too much as I am between jobs. Get up, go for a cycle, run some errands and sort out anything that needs to be sorted in the afternoon, then either friends or music in the evening.

I wish I could focus on music in the day but I’ve never really managed it.

Could you describe your creative process on the basis of a piece, live performance or album that's particularly dear to you, please?

With Petra (my first album) I started writing to make another EP. I had no idea how many tracks it would be or who I would release it with, I just wanted to create a sound universe that a number of tracks could be born out of.

I started writing tracks with similar sound design and vibe. I always do this when writing an EP. Generally, none of these initial tracks make it through to the final release but it gives me a collection of sounds, ideas and motives that I can collage into a release. I find this way of working means I can create more cohesive work and probably stems back to dragging and dropping loops when I first started writing in school.

After that, I sit on it for a few months, making small changes every so often. Then when I can’t listen to it anymore, I mix it and ship it off to mastering. This approach is really time-consuming and means I have a lot of unfinished music but I love the results. There is a complexity that I don’t think I could otherwise create.

Listening can be both a solitary and a communal activity. Likewise, creating music can be private or collaborative. Can you talk about your preferences in this regard and how these constellations influence creative results?

If you had asked me this a year ago I would say I write alone and always alone. I found it really difficult to write with people, I think because I wanted control of the whole situation.

However, I recently wrote a track with Joe aka Human Resources and thoroughly enjoyed it. We did it remotely as he is Bristol based. It kind of felt like starting a track over and over again. Messing around with some ideas and as soon as I got stuck sending them off again. 10/10 would do it again, but maybe that’s just Joe?

DJing and listening though, I have always, and continue to love in a group. I wrote my dissertation on the changes to people when consuming music / art in a group as opposed to alone. I am very interested in the herd mentality that comes from group creation and consumption of art.

How do your work and your creativity relate to the world and what is the role of music in society?

The obvious one is entertainment but I think more than that I’ve used music for emotional expression.

Both listening and creating have been great mechanisms for me to access and express how I’m feeling. It would be great to see this more widely discussed … maybe it is and I just missed it.

Art can be a way of dealing with the big topics in life: Life, loss, death, love, pain, and many more. In which way and on which occasions has music – both your own or that of others - contributed to your understanding of these questions?

It’s almost as though I knew what your next question would be. I guess see above.

What I would add is that the literal topics in the lyrics have never really touched the sides for me. I don’t know if it's dyslexia or what, but I’ve never got emo about the message, more the actual sound and music have set me off.

How do you see the connection between music and science and what can these two fields reveal about each other?  

I guess music is maths if you boil it down, but maybe that’s taking the question too literally.

Science has always been a big source of influence to me, you can probably guess from the name I write music under. I think science fiction and dance music need to be interlinked more closely …

2001 with Goldie’s “Timeless” over the top is a killer combo.

Creativity can reach many different corners of our lives. 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?

This goes back to what I was saying earlier about music being escapism. For me, it’s escapism in its truest form, you can be in your bedroom, on your own, in the middle of the night, feeling really powerful emotions because you're messing around with a laptop.

The whole thing is bizarre but incredible. It’s just not comparable to mundane tasks.

Music is vibration in the air, captured by our ear drums. From your perspective as a creator and listener, do you have an explanation how it able to transmit such diverse and potentially deep messages?

I often think about this and haven’t been able to come up with an answer. I like to think - what is it about an acid line that can deeply affect a crowd of people?

I can’t see an evolutionary advantage to it beyond potential bonding and social interaction. But then if it is socialising, why doesn’t classical music or Adele send make people dance in a dark room for 14 hours?

I don’t really know the answer to this question but it's a good one.