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Your name might not be too familiar to some readers – can you sum up who you are and a bit about your style?
I'm Dave aka Boy 8-Bit. I've been producing music "professionally" (i.e. it has been getting released) for about 5 years, though I have only recently gained larger exposure from my remixes of the Black Ghosts an unofficial re-edit of a Burial and a release on Diplo's Mad Decent label. I make Housey electro with a melodic influence. Or "Soft Electro" as someone on a forum once wrote. Though in todays environment of noisy tunes its not that hard to be soft!
There seems to be an onslaught at the moment of ‘blog house’ influenced tracks, combining elements of electro, techno, breaks and French house in its productions. Do you find yourself glued to the blogs late at night to check out new music?
Not really, to be honest the quality has fallen off quite badly.. A few years ago you could find all sorts of quality stuff, but now its getting increasingly hard. I now rely on friends making tracks and sending them to me, checking beatport for good stuff , old fashioned promo packages in the post or just making tracks myself. Most of the artists who were doing the rounds a few years ago have come good, so they fall into the promo's in the post category :)
The name Boy 8 Bit comes from a love of early computer technology. What was your preferred machine growing up, for work or play?
The name comes from the fact I used an Amiga to make music in my youth, its used 8-Bit samples... I was young etc etc. Not just a love of old computers...It was before my first flyer, the promoter rang me up and asked what my name was.. I thought of it on the spot and he had to double check what I meant... I didnt realise - all those years ago that there would be a huge 8-Bit revival, leading to me being wrongly associated with the 8-Bit scene! To answer your question though, I was a commodore boy. The 64 and Amiga range being the ones for me.... I started producing on the amiga along with various other things. It was a fun platform.
You’re quite well known for your use of Fruity as your production package. What is it that makes you stick with this program, given there are some that could be considered ‘more advanced’ available?
I don't find them anymore advanced, I just prefer the way of working in FL-Studio, it suits the type of music I want to make and has lots of tools that mean I can be creative without having to download loads of extra plugins etc etc. I'm lazy, and I like to get ideas down quickly as I have a short attention span and FL-Studio has the tools to let me do it. Apart from a few bread and butter FX (Reverb / Delay / Compression) and a couple of extra VST's, 90% of my stuff is done completely with stock FL-Studio. If I wanted to track a band or something, then yeah I'd probably use Pro-Tools or Logic... But for electronic music, FL-Studio. Thing is, once you start making records and meet other producers, no one actually cares what you use... That sort of talk is left to the people who have dropped out of music college, have never made more than 1:20 seconds worth of music in their life and think they have the right to tell people what they should or shouldnt be using... Mainly on forums.
Can you give us a run down of any big tunes we can expect to hear troubling The End’s soundsystem?
Depends what time I'm going on! I'm not one to go on early and bang out all the big tunes before everyone else. I always try and slip in a Stephan Bodzin tune as he's the best producer ever.. A few new bits by my friends Crookers. A fair few new bits by myself. I always try and slip in a Switch mix too. He consistently makes records I love. I also have some new Touche material, but I'll hold off on that seeing as he is playing too! We'll see. But I definitely see this as a chance to try out some bottom heavy stuff.
You seem to be fairly into your films from what I’ve read – given your love of Wu Xia, have you ever seen a film called Zu – Warriors From The Magic Mountain? I think it might be up your street…..any hidden jems you would recommend we all dig out to watch?
I recently had my DVD collection stolen, it wasn't vast by any means - about 150, but it kinda put a dampener on my movie collecting. I couldn't face having to shell out on things I previously had. I like my Wu Xia, but I'm definitely more on the commercial end of it. As for a recommendation, I really liked Wong Kar Wei's 'Ashes of time' - I'm not sure if its strictly in that genre, but its great - but don't go in expecting all out action. Its more of a love story. It also stars Tony Leung who is awesome.
And finally…..is there anything you’d rather be doing right now?
Playing live on stage with my own Heavy Metal band 'Wyngspann' - I need a drummer, a second guitarist, a bass player and a vocalist. Contact me through myspace. Thanks...
More info - http://www.myspace.com/boy8bit
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