While listening to the first track, “Beep Beep,” on your latest record, To Blue From Grey In May, I was reminded of the many flowers growing in our meadow. They flourished in spring and continue to grow new variants of native blooms that excite the local pollinators, dancing and swaying as they approach the fabulous buffet of multicolored delights. They are considerate of each other, taking care not to block others’ ambitions to consume the tastiest nectar. I can hear them gently alerting each other while on their quest to bring nutrients back to their hives, pocketing a small portion of the tasty delights as they search. A few nearly collide with each other, but they don’t stay and quibble as two angry drivers would in traffic. No. They merely brush by each other, too keen to reach the next irresistible flower.
That’s my interpretation of the fabulous introduction to your record. I’m curious: how do you interpret your own music, and do you envision how others will interpret the music you make when shaping your own creative process or output?
That’s a wonderful interpretation and I think that’s the real strength of instrumental music, everyone hears something different, everyone builds their own imagery and that’s the beauty of it. Funny that you mentioned drivers, because when I was creating this piece, I actually imagined the variety of city traffic with all its sounds, the colors of the cars, the pedestrians, the flow of movement, the blinking lights. Each one adds something unique to the bigger picture of a busy city. But I generally prefer not to describe or explain my music too much. I want each listener to interpret it in their own way. Still I’ll admit that I’m always under the influence of something when I create. Since this album was written in the spring, I was inspired by nature waking up from a long winter’s sleep, by the new colors and scents.
I appreciate the evolving repetitions throughout each piece on this record. I’m reminded of my listening experience with Miles Davis’s On The Corner or the grooves from any Candido record; however, your take is more laid back and entrancing. I hear motifs that underpin the structure of the record, yet they shift and shimmer as if I’m watching fish swim in a pond on a rainy day. There’s a psychedelic nature to the sounds on the record. I often lose track of how long each piece has been playing or how the progression and sounds have changed into the subtle variations playing at any given time. Time feels endless, especially on tracks like “Eureka,” whose joyful gait helps erase all negative emotions, if only in that moment.
Can you tell me more about the recording process behind these sounds and progressions? What emotional state are you keen to evoke from the listener and why?
That’s great to hear. What you wrote shows that, in a way, I reached what I was aiming for with this album, that feeling of timelessness. Repetition in music has fascinated me for a long time, that’s where I find a certain quiet beauty. When a musical phrase repeats, the listener can sink deeper into the sound, focus on a single moment, notice the small details, almost like looking at the music through a magnifying glass. Repetitive motifs also seem to interact with the brain in an interesting way because the listener starts to add their own accents and reconstruct it in their mind. That’s something I’ve always admired in the work of composers like Terry Riley, Jon Gibson, Steve Reich and Raymond Scott. The recording process itself was very engaging. Layering different patterns over each other kept changing the picture completely, and there was always an element of spontaneity and discovery in that.
The songs on To Blue have a joyful, wondrous melodic feel. I’m inspired to accomplish anything (if not too much!) while listening to the chirping mellotron and keys on “Sunshine Came Roughly Through Ma Window Today.” You’ve accomplished a great deal, playing several styles of jazz and funk; however, I’m curious to hear your take on “Lounge” or “Exotica” music. I’ve read several articles that portray you as a leading voice in the “Garage Rock” revival. Perhaps the oddest categorization of your art, to me, is “Lounge” or “Exotica” music. I always pictured Lounge or Exotica as an attempt to replicate music from one culture and turn that into something that’s more palatable for other non-”exotic” audiences. In the process, it dilutes the elements of that style until they lose all original spice and flavor that made them special to begin with. I don’t feel that’s true with your music, though, as I hear an authenticity and, while listenable, the music isn’t watered down into something more palatable but instead is an intricate piece of art that demands a closer listen from its audience. With that context, how do you see yourself as a musician, and what are your favorite stylistic leanings while producing new tracks?
I suspect that when someone uses terms like lounge, exotica or easy listening to describe my music, they’re probably referring to what they perceive as inspiration from the sounds of the ’50s and ’60s, music with strong melodies and a rhythmic layer reminiscent of Martin Denny, Dick Hyman and others. In a way that’s not entirely wrong, since those genres do inspire me to some extent. For example, percussion plays a big role on this album, which might explain why such associations appear. But I tend to take genres and labels lightly because over time they blur and mutate. Their borders are never fixed. As for the genres that inspire me, there are countless ones. I don’t limit myself to a single style and since the range of influences in my music is pretty wide, it often confuses those trying to categorize what I do. I’m inspired by all kinds of music: from raw garage rock to classical minimalism, from jazz to soul, from The Beach Boys to The Velvet Underground. I see myself as a musician who is lucky to be able to work without boundaries, limited only by my imagination, technical skills and laziness 😀
Thank you for your time! Last question: if your listeners could take away anything from listening to your music, what would you like that to be?
I think of my music as a kind of diary that I keep. Each album is connected to a certain period of time, a certain place, somewhere I or my thoughts were doing the recording. This album as I mentioned earlier was made in the spring. And spring in Estonia is, in a way, a second winter. It’s not as bright or sunny as it might be further south in Europe, but it always carries a feeling of hope, a sense that warmth and life are on their way. Hope is something that every person who lives in Estonia knows well, we live in that state of waiting for more than half the year, and it’s what helps us get through the long, dark months. So optimism isn’t really a choice, but a necessity. If my music helps someone escape from everyday troubles, even just for a moment, if it brings a small sense of wonder and hope, that’s more than enough for me.