(1996-11) Toronto Sun

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Ross
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(1996-11) Toronto Sun

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Toronto Sun November 1996

Interviewer: They are called Future Sound Of London, not the Future Sight Of London. So don't expect to see the British techno duo on stage any time soon. Future Sound Of London, who recently released their third disc, Dead Cities, play only live shows in their studio and broadcast them over the radio.

Garry Cobain: Over the years there's been a lot of pressure on us to become the new Pink Floyd, to play big gatherings of people experiencing a rock 'n' roll scenario very much based around the eyes.

Interviewer: His group is at the forefront of Europe's rapidly expanding ambient techno scene, along with The Orb, Orbital, and The Prodigy.

Garry Cobain: From FSOL's perspective, the eyes have begun to deceive the ears, We're more interested in the way the ears correlate to the heart. Let's cut out the obvious visualization of people on stage. After all, we'd only look like two guys with ironing boards. I do appreciate people like The Prodigy, who do it live very well.

Interviewer: Cobain and co-conspirator Brian Dougans transmit their gigs around the world from their London studio, Earthbeat, using digital phone lines. Last year's brilliant disc ISDN features snippets from their early broadcasts. Cobain calls these performances "sonic radio plays."

Garry Cobain: Radio is not elitist, everybody's got one. That's why FSOL uses it. A live transmission of us playing music is just as boring as a rock 'n' roll gig on radio. So we combine elements from the history of radio, like stories and presenters. I'll do interviews on the radio before a gig, and some of the questions I'll answer straight, some through a voice processor. And for some, I just drop appropriate voice samples taken from films that can say more than I can. FSOL hook into the beauty of modern life by gathering samples from everyday life and working them into their beat-heavy soundscapes. You can live and work and collect sound at the same time. Everybody is a sampler. We all make music using samplers. People sit in front of the TV flicking through crap channels, and over two hours of constant flicking they make their own program. That's sampling.

Interviewer: FSOL also enjoy working with video, but deliberately don't present themselves as the focal point of their band. In their stage-less world, pop stars would be a faceless bunch.

Garry Cobain: I want to create a world that has more feeling, emotion and experience than me. I'm 29; I've experienced a fairly linear life. It is possible these days to create art - let's call it work instead, I don't want to be a pompous bastard - that's deeper than just my own personal experiences. One of the prime ideas behind FSOL was to remove the things that unite the last couple of decades of music - ego, face, visualization of performance - and see if we can create something powerful without it.

Interview by Kieran Grant
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