DeepChord Doesn’t Care About Your Fancy New Synthesizer

DeepChord’s Rod Modell is as prolific as he is versatile. From his early experiments with ambient music and tape loops to the wildly successful Echospace collaboration with Steven Hitchell, his music often returns to themes of space, dimension, and reverberation. Originally releasing as a duo, his initial string of 12″ dub techno records quickly elevated DeepChord to cult status among staunch enthusiasts. Modell has continued to produce independently under the same moniker, and the fervor is easy to understand: not only are the records unique and exceedingly textural, but unlike most of the genre’s figureheads—he’s from Detroit.

In recent years, however, you’d be more likely to find him scanning late night AM radio static than working the knobs of a drum machine or Roland Space Echo. His last three solo albums, Hash-Bar Loops (2011), Sommer (2012) and 20 Electrostatic Soundfields (2013) gradually float away from dub techno’s dancefloor roots and find him further exploring the worlds of field recordings, crackling drones and the common atmospheres they share with his numerous less-than-sonic influences like photography, weather, and metaphysics. DeepChord is making a rare New York appearance to perform a live set at the Unsound edition of Mutual Dreaming tonight, Friday April 4, so we figured we’d get to know a bit more about him before we catch him live in Brooklyn.

THUMP: You grew up in Detroit, but for many years you’ve been living farther north in Port Huron, MI. Do you find inspiration in these less dense surroundings?
DeepChord: For the past four to five years, I’ve been spending about one-third of the year in the Netherlands. This is my favorite place to live—I feel more at home there than in Michigan. I’ve been to numerous EU cities and Amsterdam is the only place I had a genuine connection with a city. It was an eerie connection, like I lived there before in a previous life or something. I intuitively knew where things were. I also own a home in Michigan about a 90-minute drive north of Detroit. It’s quite serene—near the water. I can hear the waves on the beach all summer long when the windows are open, and most views from the home are looking at Canada. I’m actually more inspired by environment than other music. I’m less inspired by music than anything, I suppose. I would say architecture, environment, weather, metaphysical elements, and cinema are all bigger influences. I think music is stagnating lately, and I haven’t really heard a lot of interesting stuff recently. Consequently, about all I listen to anymore is stuff from the 1950s and 1960s like Andy Williams, Bobby Vinton, and Percy Faith—maybe some Angelo Badalamenti. And field recordings.

What made you decide to study photography in art school? Is it still a major part of your life?
My grandmother bought me a cheap camera for my fifth birthday and then for my seventh birthday bought me a more advanced SLR camera. She understood the importance of supporting creative development. In high school all I cared about was photography, so art school for photography was the obvious direction for me. It’s still a vital source of expression, but I don’t really pursue it for a career anymore. I did for years and had some interesting times, but found that when doing it as a career, it was difficult to do on my terms. There was generally someone telling you exactly what they wanted and how they wanted it. When you deviated, you were knocked back into line. I couldn’t work like that. I do what I want and if people like it—great. If not, I don’t lose any sleep over it. So it’s extremely important to me, but as a personal form of expression.

One can’t help notice a deep sense of texture and mood in the photos you’ve used for your music releases. How strongly do you associate the atmospheres in your photos with those in your music? Is that a conscious link?
Definitely. Sometimes I have an image in mind when making the music. Other times I finish some music and search for photography that conveys what I had in my head when making the music. It’s definitely a conscious link.

Can you elaborate on the early days of your career in the 80s? What types of music were you into back then?
The mid-1980s were very formidable years for my musical development. It’s when I discovered there was a universe of sounds miles away from mainstream music and I became aware of the importance of sound ­design presiding over song­ construction. We have too many good songs, but not enough good sound design and the proliferation of repackaged 1970s synthesizer technology isn’t helping things much. I started exploring industrial music like Coil/Psychic TV, SPK, The Hafler Trio, Zbigniew Karkowski and ClockDVA/T.A.G.C., but eventually found more solace in the psychotropic sounds that ambient offered. Like the music on Kim Cascone’s Silent label or more mellow Muslimgauze stuff or Rapoon.

Was 1996’s Waveform Transmission collaboration your first electronic music endeavor?
I was making electronic music for 10 years before this release, but this was the one that made me realize that maybe other people would like what I’m doing. I bought a Prophet 5 used in about 1986 for $350 in mint condition. Everyone was trading them in for DX7’s and Ensoniq Mirages, so you could get them for dirt­ cheap back then. My friend Chris [Troy] was a fellow synth ­buff and we were working on strange soundscape stuff in the mid-­90s. A friend got wind of what we were doing and asked us to be on her college radio station program doing a live performance, so we hauled the gear down to the station and went for it. After the broadcast, there were numerous calls about the music by people who were interested in it. I thought this was interesting, and sent a cassette demo of the session to Silent Records. Kim [Cascone] called me five days later and wanted to release it. Prior to this, I never considered releasing anything and originally wasn’t sure if I wanted to, but the idea that others may derive some enjoyment from my sounds persuaded me to explore options. At some point, an artist feels an obligation to share his or her work. Art is intended to influence society in some way or another. I thought, What good is this if a horde a massive collection of DATs that never get shared? For better or worse, I put it out there.

DeepChord was originally a duo with Mike Schommer. How did you two meet, and conceive of the project?
I was originally friends with Mike’s sister. Her and I are the same age and we graduated from high school together. Mike was a few years younger and was interested in pursuing electronic music. He approached me about helping him sort out gear-buying options. One thing led to another and we discovered some common ground, so we started experimenting on stuff together. Some demos were sent to Rich Hawtin back then and he was extremely interested. We met with him a few times and discussed releasing material on his +8 label, but in the interim +8 was dissolved. We just decided to set up a label and release it ourselves. Mike wanted to call it Output, but it was taken. I suggested DeepChord.

What does DeepChord mean?
It was a term that I coined years before to describe a certain sound in dance music records. Like the chord sound in “Demons” by Rhythmatic or “The Message” by Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five. Eventually, Rich [Hawtin] and Clark Warner set up M-NUS Records and told us we were welcome to be part of the M_nus family. Even though we had the utmost respect for them, we already had DC up and running and decided to see it through for better or worse. Eventually, Mike needed to spend more time with other obligations, so I was doing DC alone and DeepChord became my artist name rather than a label or group. Mike was involved until about 2001, but for the past 13 years it’s been only me.

In recent years you’ve been delving further into more textural, soundscape­-driven territory in addition to incorporating field recordings into your music. How do you capture these field recordings? Are you still pursuing this method as a means of creation?
I started making field recordings with a Crown S.A.S.S. microphone and a Tascam DA­P1 DAT machine in the mid-1990s. Over the years I started trying different recording setups: DPA 4060’s, Pearl MS2CL, Sennheiser MKH418s, various binaural mics like the Soundman OKM II Studio and various recorders. Recently, I’ve been favoring cheap recorders with built-in mics, like the Sony PCM­D50. I rarely carry bigger setups anymore becuase these new recorders are getting so good and I think I get better recordings with small stealthy equipment. It’s kind of like Instagram photos—sometimes those little lo-­fi pictures are remarkably beautiful.

Some years ago you mentioned strictly using hardware for production. Is this still the caseor have you begun to utilize software at all?
One thing that’s often misunderstood about my use of hardware is that it was never a conscientious decision to use hardware over software. I just wanted to make music and I used what I had. Around The Coldest Season (2007) I didn’t even have a laptop. I was sequencing with an old Akai ASQ­10, Linn 9000 or Studio 440. People assume that I chose hardware over software, but in actuality I built my studio in the late 1980s and was using the only tools that I owned. I’m a firm believer in using what you have. Recently, I’ve started exploring software a little. I still have yet to generate a synth­ sound on a record with software, but I love it for processing sounds, mixing and sequencing. Live sets necessitated learning my way around a laptop also. It would be impossible to haul hardware around to do live sets. The costs would be prohibitive and I wouldn’t want to. This stuff is very old and delicate. I have a pair of Sequential Circuits Prophet VS synths and the last time I had one fixed at Wine Country Sequential in California, Dave there warned me that next time he may not be able to fix it again. He told me parts are scarce, so this stuff is certainly not something I care to bang around the world in flight cases. A laptop is a nice container to carry the sessions from your studio out into the real world, but I don’t think many people care anymore anyway. Ninety-nine percent of the people just wanted to be immersed in the sounds and atmospheres. I remember hauling a truckload of stuff out and thinking during the set, No one even notices or cares.

What pieces are central to your current setup? Are you dependent on any particular synth or drum machine?
I really don’t like to perpetuate the myth that any particular gear matters. Just dive in and put a setup together and roll with it. I’m not dependent on any gear. I can throw out everything I have and get a few new pieces tomorrow and pick up where I left off. I’m into vintage FX processors more than synths, but in the end, I won’t allow myself to succumb to any degree of dependency on gear. In the end I learned the music comes from within, not from any specific gear. Honestly, I’d rather talk about the latest episode of Here Comes Honey Boo Boo than synthesizers. After 30 years of playing with them, it’s become so boring and I think synth development is going backwards. It’s one of the only hi-­tech markets where the current products are worse than a decade or two ago. The last interesting synth made was the Hartmann Neuron. In the end, they are just tools. Could you imagine if there was a great carpenter and all people ever asked him about was what hammer he used instead of about his final work? It would be absurd. But that’s kind of what many people do with musicians. We put too much emphasis on this stuff.

Can you speak about any future projects or collaborations? Any new musical directions you’re seeking out?
There are a few collaborations in the works. They will materialize eventually. Steve and I are always toying with new material. There are numerous tracks that are 85% done that we need to wrap up—I don’t rush it. I have interesting ideas about future directions, but it seems impossible to predetermine this. Things unfold as they will no matter what I planned to do or how I planned to make it sound. I think you just have to be a receptive conduit for any creative energy floating around—absorb it and see where it takes you. Trying to predetermine a new direction usually disrupts the natural flow of things.

Catch DeepChord tonight, Friday April 4 at Cameo Gallery for the special Unsound edition of Mutual Dreaming. Buy tickets here.

Patrick Russell is a Detroit-bred, Brooklyn-based DJ & producer – @ptrckrssll