A century ago composer Erik Satie experimented with incidental music and for decades, the likes of John Cage, Stockhausen, Brian Eno and Steve Reich -- to name but a few -- pushed the boundaries of ambient music and incorporating the power of sounds that occur around us in music.
These non-traditionalists changed the way many think about music and art and even today, while millions of kids plug in their guitars and mime Green Day in the garage, there are musicians working away in studios -- many at home nowadays thanks to technology -- exploring ambient, noise, musique concrete or whatever you want to label it.
Mathias Anderson, a Milwaukee-area musician who works under the name Hollydrift, prefers not to call it anything. And he’d rather let you take what you want from the music on his CDs, the latest of which is 2004’s “Waiting for the Tiller,” released on Seattle’s Parasomnic Records.
The disc has been described as “uneasy listening” and while that can be true, especially at first, repeated listens reveal a musician finding the rhythm, the beauty and the texture in the sounds around us and in atypical approaches to music.
“Waiting for the Tiller” is Anderson’s third disc as Hollydrift, following “In These Days of Merriment” and “This Way to Escape.”
We recently asked Anderson about Hollydrift’s music, how he creates it and what it means to him.
OMC: Can you tell us about Hollydrift and your background?
Mathias Anderson: I started doing music in response to a suggestion by a therapist that I find a creative outlet. That was in 1988. I bought studio equipment and started learning how to record. Once I had done that, I started to write songs. The songs didn’t work. I found that I attained a greater level of expression with the sort of haphazard experiments I did while trying to learn the recording process. So, I embraced sound collage. I released several albums as Joy Before The Storm. I immersed myself in the Cassette Culture and everything was right with the world. Then around 1993, I changed. Or rather my circumstances did. I ran myself creatively empty and chose to stop doing anything artistic. I spent the next seven years drinking and partying and generally making things worse for myself.
At about the time of complete destruction, I met my wife and things started to turn around. To make a long story short, I cleaned up my act and began thinking again. I realized that I wanted to get back into art. I wanted to do audio again but things in that area had massively changed. I had to learn all over again. So, I bought recording equipment-this time a computer, software and some plug-in bundles and went at it.
I chose the name Hollydrift for its non-bad ass connotations. I really wanted to avoid death/gloom/doom with my new work. I found whereas my old work was very sparse and empty, my new work was the converse. I currently have a CD out on Parasomnic Records called “Waiting For The Tiller.” I have a retrospective of the entirety of my work coming out this fall, and I’ll be releasing a new CD soon on the Mannequin Oddio Media label.
OMC: Where do you live and work? Presumably you're one of the few musicians working in your field up there.
MA: I live in downtown Cedarburg with my wife and daughter. I have a studio there, too. Yes, I am the only person doing anything of this sort here, which is fine with me. I’m quite shy and we prefer living in almost complete anonymity. My daughter and I have made inquiries into joining the Art Guild here but haven’t done it yet. She’s a painter and fits in a little better. Otherwise, Cedarburg is a really nice place to live if you want to be creative without the clutter of hip poser wannabes. It’s nice place to be left alone to do your thing ... Anyway, yeah, I’m pretty much an outsider in the outsiders. As a matter of fact, OnMilwaukee is the only local media outlet that has shown any interest in my work.
OMC: How do you work? What's your process? Do you have very clear, distinct ideas when you sit down to write and record or do you see where the inspiration of the moment takes you?
MA: I generally just let the sounds lead the way. I have thousands of found sounds collected on MiniDisc. I just start sifting through what I have. I never really pre-map anything. The experiments come about when I have several sounds I’m working on together.
At root, I try to create atmosphere, a sonic world where things are strange and beautiful in their own way. I try to avoid any references to modern times in my work. Modern music is saturated with the “now.” I like to give voice to the “was.”
To that end, I usually have to build sounds from scratch, opening a blank file, pulling up the gain and running the signal through effects until it begins to take form. Then I have the groundwork to make something old and ancient. However, I can get some usable stuff from the found sounds I have. It just takes a certain sensitivity to the sounds and what the piece I’m working on needs to move forward.
It’s not a whole lot different than songwriting, I suppose. It’s just that I don’t have a set pallet of sounds or frequencies to work with. The sounds I use are hugely antithetic more often than not. Artistically, it takes a great deal of time to even start forming a frame on which to build, to say nothing of actually completing a song.
OMC: For listeners unfamiliar with the kind of music you make, how do you describe it?
MA: A wash of sounds like clouds passing. Sounds come and go, some stick around while others disappear. It’s an extremely difficult sound to describe and I’ve been all over the map since I started Hollydrift in 1999. The best thing you can do is go to Hollydrift.com and listen to what’s posted. The MP3 page has the most recent songs.
OMC: And do you ever explain what to listen for or how to appreciate it (like classical musicians often do) or is that missing the point? Is it meant to me more of a gut response?
MA: I really don’t like to explain anything. After I release a CD, it’s up to the listener to decode what they hear and how it affects them. On occasion, when pressed, I can explain what a song is for me.
But really, that takes all the fun out of it, don’t you think? The listener doesn’t need to be led by the hand. I don’t think art should ever be explained. It seems to me that if an artist is stumbling over themselves explaining their work, they obviously don’t believe their work will speak for itself. It shouldn’t matter how a piece of art was made or with what tools. The fact that it exists should be the only reality.
OMC: Do you perform live? If so, when do you play next in Milwaukee?
MA: I started touring early this summer. After a few gigs, I found out it wasn’t for me. Every horrible thing I predicted would happen came vividly true. The old crystal ball was spot-on. I no longer perform live. I now sort of handle my promotional duties like an author does. I talk about what I do.
OMC: Are you working on new projects now? Can you tell us about them?
MA: I’m making videos for two songs from “Waiting For The Tiller.” I’ve also started an oil abstract that I’ll be working on through the summer. As far as music? Well, I usually let things settle and regenerate over summer. I’ll go back to my studio in the early fall and work through next spring. I never write during the summer.
These non-traditionalists changed the way many think about music and art and even today, while millions of kids plug in their guitars and mime Green Day in the garage, there are musicians working away in studios -- many at home nowadays thanks to technology -- exploring ambient, noise, musique concrete or whatever you want to label it.
Mathias Anderson, a Milwaukee-area musician who works under the name Hollydrift, prefers not to call it anything. And he’d rather let you take what you want from the music on his CDs, the latest of which is 2004’s “Waiting for the Tiller,” released on Seattle’s Parasomnic Records.
The disc has been described as “uneasy listening” and while that can be true, especially at first, repeated listens reveal a musician finding the rhythm, the beauty and the texture in the sounds around us and in atypical approaches to music.
“Waiting for the Tiller” is Anderson’s third disc as Hollydrift, following “In These Days of Merriment” and “This Way to Escape.”
We recently asked Anderson about Hollydrift’s music, how he creates it and what it means to him.
OMC: Can you tell us about Hollydrift and your background?
Mathias Anderson: I started doing music in response to a suggestion by a therapist that I find a creative outlet. That was in 1988. I bought studio equipment and started learning how to record. Once I had done that, I started to write songs. The songs didn’t work. I found that I attained a greater level of expression with the sort of haphazard experiments I did while trying to learn the recording process. So, I embraced sound collage. I released several albums as Joy Before The Storm. I immersed myself in the Cassette Culture and everything was right with the world. Then around 1993, I changed. Or rather my circumstances did. I ran myself creatively empty and chose to stop doing anything artistic. I spent the next seven years drinking and partying and generally making things worse for myself.
At about the time of complete destruction, I met my wife and things started to turn around. To make a long story short, I cleaned up my act and began thinking again. I realized that I wanted to get back into art. I wanted to do audio again but things in that area had massively changed. I had to learn all over again. So, I bought recording equipment-this time a computer, software and some plug-in bundles and went at it.
I chose the name Hollydrift for its non-bad ass connotations. I really wanted to avoid death/gloom/doom with my new work. I found whereas my old work was very sparse and empty, my new work was the converse. I currently have a CD out on Parasomnic Records called “Waiting For The Tiller.” I have a retrospective of the entirety of my work coming out this fall, and I’ll be releasing a new CD soon on the Mannequin Oddio Media label.
OMC: Where do you live and work? Presumably you're one of the few musicians working in your field up there.
MA: I live in downtown Cedarburg with my wife and daughter. I have a studio there, too. Yes, I am the only person doing anything of this sort here, which is fine with me. I’m quite shy and we prefer living in almost complete anonymity. My daughter and I have made inquiries into joining the Art Guild here but haven’t done it yet. She’s a painter and fits in a little better. Otherwise, Cedarburg is a really nice place to live if you want to be creative without the clutter of hip poser wannabes. It’s nice place to be left alone to do your thing ... Anyway, yeah, I’m pretty much an outsider in the outsiders. As a matter of fact, OnMilwaukee is the only local media outlet that has shown any interest in my work.
MA: I generally just let the sounds lead the way. I have thousands of found sounds collected on MiniDisc. I just start sifting through what I have. I never really pre-map anything. The experiments come about when I have several sounds I’m working on together.
At root, I try to create atmosphere, a sonic world where things are strange and beautiful in their own way. I try to avoid any references to modern times in my work. Modern music is saturated with the “now.” I like to give voice to the “was.”
To that end, I usually have to build sounds from scratch, opening a blank file, pulling up the gain and running the signal through effects until it begins to take form. Then I have the groundwork to make something old and ancient. However, I can get some usable stuff from the found sounds I have. It just takes a certain sensitivity to the sounds and what the piece I’m working on needs to move forward.
It’s not a whole lot different than songwriting, I suppose. It’s just that I don’t have a set pallet of sounds or frequencies to work with. The sounds I use are hugely antithetic more often than not. Artistically, it takes a great deal of time to even start forming a frame on which to build, to say nothing of actually completing a song.
OMC: For listeners unfamiliar with the kind of music you make, how do you describe it?
MA: A wash of sounds like clouds passing. Sounds come and go, some stick around while others disappear. It’s an extremely difficult sound to describe and I’ve been all over the map since I started Hollydrift in 1999. The best thing you can do is go to Hollydrift.com and listen to what’s posted. The MP3 page has the most recent songs.
OMC: And do you ever explain what to listen for or how to appreciate it (like classical musicians often do) or is that missing the point? Is it meant to me more of a gut response?
MA: I really don’t like to explain anything. After I release a CD, it’s up to the listener to decode what they hear and how it affects them. On occasion, when pressed, I can explain what a song is for me.
But really, that takes all the fun out of it, don’t you think? The listener doesn’t need to be led by the hand. I don’t think art should ever be explained. It seems to me that if an artist is stumbling over themselves explaining their work, they obviously don’t believe their work will speak for itself. It shouldn’t matter how a piece of art was made or with what tools. The fact that it exists should be the only reality.
OMC: Do you perform live? If so, when do you play next in Milwaukee?
MA: I started touring early this summer. After a few gigs, I found out it wasn’t for me. Every horrible thing I predicted would happen came vividly true. The old crystal ball was spot-on. I no longer perform live. I now sort of handle my promotional duties like an author does. I talk about what I do.
OMC: Are you working on new projects now? Can you tell us about them?
MA: I’m making videos for two songs from “Waiting For The Tiller.” I’ve also started an oil abstract that I’ll be working on through the summer. As far as music? Well, I usually let things settle and regenerate over summer. I’ll go back to my studio in the early fall and work through next spring. I never write during the summer.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
