I’m glad to be here again. The last time was awesome and I got totally wasted. This time it’s different because I’m sober. I have been clean for almost a year and I admit it is hard, but I feel that it is all going better. I perceive everything that surrounds me completely different.
How’s the European tour going? Have people welcomed your Latin soul with open arms?
So far it’s fantastic! The concerts are sold out and people are having a great time. Everyone who appears feels incredible blessing to be cleansed by Almighty Bass, Latin Bass, Bermuda Triangle Bass and Alien Bass. All Bass powers gather in one place to create a real overload in the system.
On this tour you are promoting your last work – „Draculo”. The EP from last year is, as always, a hilarious and bizarre production, but also in some way coherent piece. Does the fact that you released your last longplay more than 7 years ago indicate that you will now release music this way – through EPs and singles?
In fact, I have accumulated thousands of songs. What comes out as a single is the label’s decision. The songs they choose are really the tip of the iceberg. Every day I wake up and create something, no matter what it is – noise, bass, breakcore, hip-hop, trap, dubstep, no way. In fact, everything that sounds cosmic and weird. As for the release of LPs, I am currently working on three. One of them is Booty Metal, another…
What is Booty Metal?
Booty Metal is Booty Metal.. You can exactly deduce the meaning from the name. I will probably release it next year. The next upcoming album will be the glitch-dubstep project, followed by electro rhythms from Miami. I can’t say exactly when it comes out, because it depends on many factors. However, the Booty Metal album is coming and will be epic. You will hear something from this material today, and the whole set is really heavy. There will be some new things, although new only for people. On 'Draculo’ there are a lot of things that I recorded many years ago. The music is timeless and I like working on material that previously seemed to me uesless. 10 years pass, and these ideas suddenly become perfect for what I want to create.
My latest song is a single with a member of the legendary hip-hop squad 2 Live Crew – Brother Marquis. It’s a totally twisted piece and I want to release it as soon as possible. Several so-called „Safe pieces” , meaning songs that labels want to release as singles, are waiting for publication. Well, the already mentioned Booty Metal is quite a fresh thing that I get excited about and which I want to seriously promote. In some tracks there will be a live guitar, in others it will seem like there is one. Generally it will be a shambles, I want you to listen to it and say „fuck, this is fuckin heavy!”. It’s a new metal quality, it’s Booty Metal.
Don’t you happen to come to the label with the material and they just say that they don’t understand your vision and refuse to release the album?
It happens, but I have long been associated with labels that know what I mean and know what can expect from me. It happens that they ask for something more suitable for a single.
I have to ask you about papaya, which is a frequent prop in your music videos, at concerts and even on your Instagram. Why is this fruit so important to you?
PAPAYITAAAAA! Well, Cubans call papaya the same way they call female sex organ. When you cut it in half you’ll know exactly why. Papaya is therefore a tasty and healthy fruit as well as a symbol of life. The word itself is very strong , like 'mother’. It is a real blessing to be able to grow your own 'trees of life’ in Miami, just as I do in the garden behind the house.
The last time you played in Warsaw, a couple asked you to marry them and bless them. Do such situations often occur at concerts?
It happens once in a while. This is not a fixed point of the performance, but I have already blessed many people on such occasions as weddings or graduation. Any occasion is perfect to hold a ceremony and purify yourself through the papaya and power of the Bermuda Triangle.
In your career you have worked with many great artists from very different worlds. Which of the collaborations do you think was the most interesting or the strangest?
I think that as one of them I have to mention cooperation with BlowFly. Mainly due to the fact that I possess full unreleased CD with him and he is dead. Awfully weird feeling. Similarly, collaboration with Thomas 'Quebrus’, a brilliant artist from France – we have a joint unreleased EP, and he recently passed. This release is expected to soon see the light of day, I hope in the coming months. For both BlowFly and Quebrus, I had to finish some of the elements myself and this was an unusual feeling. Sometimes I felt their ghosts haunt me and help me complete the work. Cooperation with someone from the other world is the strangest creative process imaginable. It all overwhelmed me especially when I was working on the last song from EP. Thomas sent me his part of the song just before his death. His label wants to release it as a goodbye, and give all the money to the family, the children he orphaned.
These stories are unpleasant and unusual, but if I think about it for a moment, all of my cooperations have been not normal. The album with Venetian Snares has been ready for a long time, 10 pieces and none has ever been released. I don’t understand any of this. I have the impression that it turned into a joke or a challenge – how long will we last without publishing it? Many times I asked that we should finally publish it, but nothing happens …
So one of the albums is suspended due to no fault of mine, the EP with Quebrus will soon come out, with BlowFly I feel that the right moment must come so that I can finish and release it. I still have a CD with Doormouse from which a few singles have already come out, so it is likely that we will release all the material this way. What we have created with Venetian Snares is seriously sick and unearthly, I really hope that you will ever hear it.
The number of collaborations you participate in is impressive from the very beginning of your career. You supported the gothic legend – Skinny Puppy, who later invited you to co-create two albums. How did this happen?
It’s nice that you mentioned it, because I’m working on another CD with cEvin Key from Skinny Puppy among other projects. We are about halfway and I feel that it will be something extraordinary. The Skinny Puppy tour is ancient history – I played with them for the first time over 15 years ago and it happened because I have known cEvin for a long time. He is a brilliant collaborator and musician – constantly seeking perfection and breaking barriers, like a master of sounds. I adore him. He invited me to the studio with Skinny Puppy to create some sounds for 'Mythmaker’ and 'Greater Wrong of the Right’. It was an incredible adventure. My task as support on joint tours was to confuse their fans. They wanted my performance to be like a hammer that would break the stiff gothic wall under the stage. I did a strange, dirty job on the stage, but it really earned me a lot of fans. Most people approached me after the concert with big eyes and asked, „Who the fuck are you?” and then they bought the whole merch. On the last tour together, I felt like a god of black metal – I practically shouted all the time over distorted electronics, and people loved it.
Maybe it’s time for another tour, where you will present Booty Metal to their fans?
Oh, that would be something! I will definitely go on tour with material from Booty Metal – I want a girl and a guy with big asses to be on stage, who will shake them all the time to the electronic chaos.
The last time you performed in Warsaw there was your companion – Mr. Dinosaur with you on stage. Do you prefer to perform alone or with company?
I like both, but when my friends are on stage with me, fantastic energy is released. Ange, meaning Mr. Dinosaur, comes from Brussels and was also with me on this tour, but he couldn’t be in Warsaw today. I would love to have him here today, but on the other hand I have the impression that when I play alone and the whole attention is focused on me, I try harder and give 200% of my potential. Today I definitely want to dance, so you can count on it.
Recently, the legendary Scooter played in Warsaw. Some time ago you have created your own version of their first hit 'Hyper Hyper’ with Modeselektor a few years ago. Are you their fan and are they just as popular overseas as in Europe?
I love them! However, in the 1990s, what ruled in Europe did not exist in the United States at all. Few people even knew about their existence. For me it is perfect, funny, even candy rave music [begins to sing 'I’m Raving’]. Brilliant to hear that fashion for them is still going on.
So we know a lot about your plans, strange experiences and dreams. However, I’m still not sure who you are. You have Cuban, German and Indian blood; you were born in the 3rd point of the Bermuda Triangle, you conquered space and went back to the time of dinosaurs. Are you human at all?
[sinister laughter] Good question! I was brought to life in the Bermuda Triangle as a result of black magic practices. Although I am bleeding, not many people know what the color of my blood is. My parents were Cubans, but from two different regions – native Cubans and Indians, but my grandpa was German. It all made up a rather explosive mix – me.
In addition to being an unusual musician and a being born of the mystical powers of the galaxy, you are also a father. Is your son also brought up in the cult of papaya and the Bermuda Triangle?
Yes, of course. This does not mean that we do not do mundane things, such as trips to Disney World. However, he knows everything about my 'world’ because he lives in it every day. Just like me, he has his medallion with a triangle, which he sometimes wants to wear, and sometimes not. On one hand, he is a totally ordinary, happy child, on the other, he likes the abnormal music I create. He is aware of what I do and wants to participate. It seems to me that all these quirks are completely normal to him – he sees me in the costumes virtually all the time. Well, unless I’m in my pants or I’m picking papayas naked in the garden. For him this is everyday life. I totally love parenting, I would like to have ten children. However, I’m still looking for the right alien for this purpose. So if any free alien is reading this interview – call me!
If we would like to create a soup that tastes like your music, what ingredients would we have to add to it?
To create such a complex palette of flavors we would have to throw everything into the pot. Literally everything. All creatures, flavors, particles, atoms that are in the galaxy. When it comes to sounds and tones, I try to make sure that this soup contains elements that no one has ever created or heard of. I want to create something that has never been heard before, or combine something that has never been combined before or obtained in a given way. This is my main goal of creation. It requires many trials and searches. The new technology enables the creation of sounds that previously could not be obtained by playing live instruments. Computers are much more accurate and allow you to create sequences in an automated way. However, if a computer does something for us, it is not so attractive – everyone can do it with the right equipment.
author: Łukasz Rudzki