Name: Jake Parry (AKA unperson)
Nationality: British
Occupation: producer/sound artist
Current Release: Spiritual™ on Ooh Sounds
Recommendations: The Art of Noise: Destruction of Music by Futurist Machines - A collection of Futurist music manifestos by Luigi Russulo, Balilla Pratella, F.T. Marinetti - in summary these writing highlight the importance of rejecting traditionalism and embracing change / Warnock, it’s a TV Movie which captures a bit of the northern sensibility, humour and compassion.

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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?

There are so many different ways to listen, it’s something I am pretty interested in. As someone who does a lot of sound design, I sometimes have to force myself to not actively try and deconstruct what's going on and just let my brain zone out.

I think, like most people of my generation, I can be guilty of passive listening, flicking through tracks on the internet. Finding time to really listen deeply can be tricky. But it’s extremely important and rewarding to do so for anyone. For me, it's a form of escapism.

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 sometimes wish I could get back a bit of the curious naiveté I had when I first started making music with a computer. Don’t get me wrong, most of the music I made for the first few years of composing this way was absolute trash. But it was an incredibly fun process. Not knowing how things work can be so interesting and generate unique ideas.

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

That period for me was a transition from being into guitar music and bands to getting into hip-hop and electronic music. I was never very good at guitar, never really practiced and was more interested in making weird sounds with pedals. Hip-hop just kind of opened up a whole new sonic world that was pretty magical. Then at the later end of this period I got into sound-system music.

I’m still into all of these things. I guess what’s changed since then is that I’ve studied composition and production and so now I think I’m always trying to make something new, where I don’t know exactly what it’s going to be. Whereas before it was all about imitating the things I loved.

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

Without doubt, the computer. It’s funny, it can often be referred to negatively even in electronic music. Like analogue hardware is super cool but computers are extremely intelligent, why wouldn’t you want to work with something so clever with so much potential?
Maybe people think it takes away a human element to music, similar to how people are a bit scared by AI in compositional context. I’d rather just embrace it.

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

It can be so many different things but fundamentally my motivation is to communicate ideas, thoughts and feelings that I have that I would have no idea how to express otherwise. That can be from me wanting to express a particular concept or just wanting to make people dance.

I’m also really interested in sound and perception and how I can create sound material that brings up specific associations. It's fun to play with this.

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?

There can be a big pressure in electronic music to have your own personal/signature sound. Starting out, I definitely felt the need to do this. But pretty recently I have come to the understanding that it can be a real hindrance on being creative.

I want to have freedom, I don’t want to be thinking about whether something I’m making is similar to what I’ve made before. I want to feel able to switch things up.

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”?

They are musical if we listen to them as such. Natural sounds are part of a great continuous composition to paraphrase R. Murray Schafer. I love to listen to water in all its forms, rain, rivers etc. But I also love industrial/man-made sounds. In the right space/mood I can sit and listen to the sound of engines all day, nothing makes me more relaxed.

Again, machine sounds can get a bad rap, often referred to as noise in a negative way. But noise is also musical and interesting.

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?

It depends on my mood but generally I think the most interesting music is dynamic and moves between all these parameters as a continuum. I was listening to rain sounds the other day and accidentally turned the volume up to full and terrified myself. But it's cool how a sound that usually makes me relaxed can also make me scared just by being at a different volume. Dynamics are a really interesting perceptual parameter.

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?

I like to try and find relationships between different sounds and textures. I make music kind of like someone might make a collage, ripping things up and sticking things together until they assemble to form something new. But I do like to change up my approaches to generating sound, trying new tools and techniques, that’s what keeps it interesting. 

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?

Spiritual™ was pretty unique in terms of process as it was made in a studio, originally as an 8-channel work. It involved research before any sound was made. Then once I’d established what kind of sounds I wanted to create I had long sessions of just making sound, without any notion of structure. I had hours of material, then I wrote and recorded the voice-over and the final part was to stitch it all together and spatialise everything. Most of the time I’m in my bedroom in headphones, messing around with sounds without any idea of what’s going to come of it. So, this was pretty different.  

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

I think when that happens it can be really cool but no I don’t really ever work like that. I do a lot of trial and error and I think error can also be really interesting. Especially with electronic music, when technology fails it mirrors part of the human experience and makes us feel closer to it. Surface noise, vinyl crackle, digital feedback, it all tells a story. Nothing is perfect and the notion of perfection is pretty boring.

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?

It depends on what sort of thing I am making. The last release is a project born out of me wanting to get across how I feel about a specific subject. But a lot of the time I make music as just a means of escapism. We can definitely discover new ways of thinking through listening.

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?

It all depends on the context I guess. I think if making a great cup of coffee is going to make you or someone else feel a certain way, then maybe it’s equally as valuable. But you’re probably more limited by what you can express than you are with sound. The main inherent difference is in the fact that with such ‘mundane’ tasks you know pretty much exactly what the final outcome is. With creating music, the outcome changes over the process of creation.

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?

Maybe some Sheffield United football chants, I’ve been going to matches since I was a kid. Most of the lyrical content of the chants don’t make much sense now, let alone when I was young but they still always fill me with a unique sense of emotion and pride.

It's weird growing up around a lot of people who struggle to show how they’re feeling but come together on a Saturday and express love and compassion in the form of song. It's kind of special in that way.

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

I guess generally the proliferation of more DIY, community projects that don’t have rely on brands or companies for facilities and resources but can also afford to help artists make a living. There are so many good people out there who just want to make and help others make interesting things but are all entirely limited by social and economic policy. It’s hard not to be deflated by it but actually when you see so many people doing cool things in the face of these circumstances it gives you some hope.