Name: Oscar de Jong
Nationality: Dutch
Occupation: Producer
Current release: Oscar produced WAAN's full-length debut Echo Echo, out now via Sonar Kollektiv.

[Read our Waan interview about improvisation]
[Read our Waan interview about collaboration]

If you enjoyed this interview with Oscar de Jong and would like to stay up to date with his music, visit the official homepage of Kraak & Smaak.



What was your first studio like?

That must have been around 1996.

In the centre of it all was an Atari ST with one of the first versions of cubase. I had a Roland jp-8000, a Nord lead, a Fender Rhodes and an EMU 6400 sampler and everything was connected through MIDI.

Back then it wasn’t that hard to find the coolest jazz and funk records to sample from so that’s just what I did 24/7 really. Digging records and sampling was pretty much my life back then.

How and for what reasons has your set-up evolved over the years and what are currently some of the most important pieces of gear for you?

My EMU sampler was at the centre of everything for a long time as you can hear on a lot of our (kraak & smaak) records.

But as time passed and I and got to know musicians and also bought lots of instruments myself, I dug deeper into the whole recording game so that kinda took over the sampling game over the years.

Currently I have a very nice upright piano, a Roland Jupiter 8, Roland Juno 6, a Wurlitzer, fender rhodes, clavinet, minimoog, a couple of guitars and basses etc.etc.

[Read our feature on the Roland Juno-60]
[Read our feature on the Roland Juno-106]
[Read our Stephan Bodzin production feature about why "Arturia's Minimoog Made me Cry."]

I also share very nice live room with Bart Wirtz.

Some see instruments and equipment as far less important than actual creativity, others feel they go hand in hand. What's your take on that?

The eternal question. I definitely think they go hand in hand.

Of course everything starts out with being inspired and being creative. The famous John Lennon quote “I’m an artist, and if you give me a tuba, I’ll bring something out of it” is still very relevant I think.

But then again, my creativity can be very much triggered by machines. So many times I find myself in the studio with no inspiration at all and then when I fiddle around with a new instrument or even just a new plugin, then that could at times really inspire me. So yeah …

A studio can be as minimal as a laptop with headphones and as expansive as a multi-room recording facility. Which studio situation do you personally prefer – and why?

Personally I prefer a studio with some analog instruments just because I like to play around with more than just a computer and a midi keyboard.

But at the same time a few of the best producers I know work on a laptop, a headphone and a midi keyboard. So who am I to judge …

From traditional keyboards to microtonal ones, from re-configured instruments (like drums or guitars) to customised devices, what are your preferred controllers and interfaces? What role does the tactile element play in your production process?

For me today it’s still just traditional instruments. But in mixing / production I always try to experiment.

In the light of picking your tools, 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”?

In my opinion, if we strive for perfection and timelessness in art and music, we should at all times be original and be innovative. So I don’t see the “versus” here to be honest.

Most music we still listen to after, let’s say, 50 years, was very innovative and cutting edge at the time it was recorded.

Most would regard recording tools like microphones and mixing desks as different in kind from instruments like keyboards, guitars, drums and samplers. Where do you stand on this?

I think that’s just bullshit.  

One could be as creative in the mixing process as in the recording process I think.

A good example to prove the opposite would be King Tubby (or any dub master for that matter), who approached a mixing desk and fx as instruments.

How would you describe the relationship between technology and creativity for your work? Using a recent piece as an example, how do you work with your production tools to achieve specific artistic results?

For me, technology should not only simply help us achieving our goals but also inspire to do things you wouldn’t think of beforehand, by experimenting with the machines themselves.

The Man-Machine relationship is a very interesting one. Most revolutions in music and changes in sound simply happened due to new innovations in music technology, right? The electric guitar. Multitrack recording. Drumcomputers. Synthesizers.

Within a digital working environment, it is possible to compile huge archives of ideas for later use. Tell me a bit about your strategies of building such an archive and how you put these ideas and sketches to use.

Well I’m not the type of producer that is consistently administrating everything, making my own sound banks and stuff like that. I do, however, make templates of certain parts of songs (such as beats and percussion) if I think they come in handy at some point.

How do you retain an element of surprise for your own work – are there technologies which are particularly useful in this regard?

Always keep an element of surprise in the process and try to keep yourself out of the comfort zone.

Telling that to myself now really haha ...

Production tools can already suggest compositional ideas on their own. How much of your music is based on concepts and ideas you had before entering the studio, how much of it is triggered by equipment, software and apps?

It often happens that I have something in my head or made a small composition on my home piano. But usually I just go with the flow in the studio, triggered by whatever comes along.

Have there been technologies which have profoundly changed or even questioned the way you make music?

Without the technology of sampling I don’t think I would ever had considered a career in music.

To some, the advent of AI and 'intelligent' composing tools offers potential for machines to contribute to the creative process. Do you feel as though technology can develop a form of creativity itself? Is there possibly a sense of co-authorship between yourself and your tools?

As things develop right now I don’t see how this can be avoided. And I think it’s really interesting.