Hi, I'm Gramatik, I release all of my music for free and I'm still able to pay rent. AMA.

Hey Denis. So i respectfully stopped blowing up your facebook wall a while back, but seeing as this is an AMA..... Don't you think its about time you get started on that Star Wars Cantina Remix? I know with the swing of that song and your style it would be a masterpiece! What do you think?

Edit: We both got gold for this. People are already paying for the song to happen!

Haha, I might man, I actually downloaded a .flac of the original, have it on my desktop ready to go. :)

And with that I have to conclude my AMA cause I've smoked 3 fat spliffs reading and answering your questions for the past 5h and I've just realized I'm fucking starving! :) Thank you all so much, this has been truly entertaining and informative, thank you for all the nice words and wishes, I'm truly doing this for you and especially for our children and grandchildren, which will most likely be immortal and will actually have the means, the knowledge and the time to truly change the world. And if my music can provide them with an inspiring soundtrack for their brave journey, then my life had a purpose. :) Love, Denis.

Hey Denis thanks for doing an AMA! Such a huge fan of your music, I don’t think I’ve stopped listening to TOAR since it came out, truly a revolutionary work of art! Anyways, my question for you is what are the chances of a BigGrizmatik song or even an EP? You three are some of my favorite artists and I think I speak for everyone when I say that any type of collab between you guys would be funky as shit!

A Big Grizmatik song will definitely happen at some point, it's just that all of us are so busy with our solo careers right now, it's hard to say when will that happen, but it's pretty much inevitable, like Agent Smith. :)

Hey Gramatik,

I make instruments: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMDtzWxSisc&noredirect=1

Any chance you'd jam out on one of these next time you're in my town?

Dude, those are fucking awesome! I wanna sample that so bad! :) I might take you up on that! :)

How was the drop synth made for "My People"? What are some of your tips for making bass lines powerful?

What are some of GRiZ and your favorite sample libraries for drums?

What have you and grant taught each other about production?

-Marshall McGee

Grant and I were taking turns on the drop, he would sit down for like 30 min and incorporate some of his massive patches, then I would sit down and incorporate some of mine, then we would fuck around and tweak each others patches and voila, the drop. :) There is no exact science for me to make the bass lines powerful, I always just go with my ear, I fuck around with eq's, distortion and compression until something sounds good to me. I make my own kicks and snares by layering whatever I find on the web that I think sounds good. I go 100% by the ear and 0% by the rules.

Holy shit!!! I'm a HUGE fan of your stuff.

Anybody in here who isn't familiar with this man's work has to check out his soundcloud.

https://soundcloud.com/marshallmcgee

I would cream my pants if you did a show with one of these guys. Give me the hook up when you get some dates lined up :D

Listening right now, dope stuff Marshall!

For anyone that's actually wondering how it works, watch this Ted talk. ;) http://www.ted.com/talks/amanda_palmer_the_art_of_asking.html

Hey Denis, I was wondering how your relationship with Derek is since you left PLM. To me it seemed really sudden and I was wondering what made you choose to leave PLM because the ideals of both Lowtemp and PLM seem the same to me. Was it just that you wanted to have your own label? Or are there differences between Lowtemp and PLM that I am not aware of? (Or was it something personal between you and Derek?)

Derek and I had an agreement from the start, I was always gonna drop just 2 projects on PLM and then do my own thing and he was totally down with it. Every true artist wants to be completely independent and be his own boss and Derek and I are very much alike in that regard. We are still homies and I've even opened up for him in Missoula, MT not too long ago.

What's your take on Creative Commons and other less restrictive forms of copyright?

Copyright laws should be abolished for the sake of intellectual evolution of mankind. It's not about individualism, it's about the evolution of life!

Denis is it possible that you will collab with Carmack, Taku, or Flume....Also, 'Heroes' is coming back....yay or nay?

I would LOVE to collab with those 3 dudes cause they are all nothing short of brilliant. And I had no idea Heroes is coming back, that's great news! I really hope they improve on the writing this time around, I loved that show, it sucks the writing got bad towards the end cause of the writers strike. Fingers crossed! :)

Lep pozdrav iz Slovenije! I'm a big slovenian fan, your music really goes with any mood I'm in and it's truly unique. My question is: when will you come to slovenia or near here so me and my friends can come see you live? Do you ever come back to Slovenia?

Ce gre vse po planu bo koncert Julija v Portorozu! Vec o tem kmalu! Lepe pozdrave domov! ;)

State your preference. Blunt, Joint or Gpen.

85% weed, 15% american spirit tobacco, rolled up in reverse with www.ziggipapers.com, preferably while drinking a double espresso. :) #Europeans

Hey Gramatik thanks for doing this AMA. I know you are a supporter of internet freedoms and demonstrate this with the generosity of your music. Do you have any plans to help protect our freedoms on the internet and spread awareness of bills that are trying to take away these rights?

P.S. Big Grizmatik at EF last year was funkalicious hopefully you can make another appearance.

I try to spread awareness about internet freedom issues on my social networks all the time, I follow closely what is happening on http://www.demandprogress.org/ and report to my fan base. RIP Aaron Swartz.

What song would you recommend me to blast max volume in my car.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ

Shoot!!! Totally thought this was at 2PM Central, not 2 Eastern -____-

Hope it's not too late to ask a few questions!!!

So, Denis... you've been a big name on the scene for many years now, and your sound has changed and evolved time and time again. Your first few albums were more minimalistic, acid-ish house-y stuff (I'm bad at defining genres), then you went on to the Street Bangerz/Beatz & Pieces era that had a more chill, hip-hoppy, lowtempo vibe, then onto #digitalfreedom and The Age Of Reason which both had more of a dubsteppy vibe to it. Also mixed in with your more funkadelic works with Exmag.

SO... my question for you is: what sparked the change from genre to genre to genre??

Another question... My family is crazy Slovenian so if I didn't ask this it would more or less be treason. At this point in your life how strong of a connection do you feel to Slovenia? Do you speak Slovenian? I know you occasionally use Slovenian samples in your jams (which is how I discovered your heritage), which I think is really cool.

I'm sure in 45 minutes my brain will explode with dozens of questions I forgot to ask but that does it for now!!

Hvala Denis!!

I've been producing all of those genres since the start actually, I was just releasing different things at different times, sometimes even at the same time. I've always been experimenting with all the genres that I like listening to. Despite what people may think, that is probably the one thing about Gramatik that has always been constant. Experimentation is my idea of fun. :) I was born and raised in Slovenia, I only moved to NYC 3 years ago. I try go back home to Portoroz whenever I have time off from touring. Lepe pozdrave tebi in tvoji druzini! ;)

Hi Gramatik! :)

I'd like to start off and say your work is GOLD. I love every single song you put out there.

I've got a few short questions to start you off!

1.) What DAW do you use? Why do you prefer it over others?

2.) What's your favorite plugin to make/resample your bass?

3.) Where do you find your inspiration?

Thank you in advance for answering these, and I hope to see you at some festivals or shows coming soon.

From Chicago with much love, -Chris

P.S. Stick a tourdate closer to Chicago!! Carbondale is way to far. ):

1. Ableton Live. It just has the best functionality and workflow for me.
2. Massive, Trilogy/Trillian, ABL2, Kontakt...
3. In the idea of making a soundtrack for somebody's life. :)

So im a big supporter of free forms of art (graffiti, street art, electronic music, street instalations, etc)

As an artist who has almost his entire collection of work available for free download on the web, how do you feel about commercialized art forms? What future is there for free works in our current capitalist consumer driven society?

There is nothing wrong with commercialized art forms as long there is no corporate leech in between the artist and the consumer. My man Oats explains it best with his take on the state of the music industry: http://theoatmeal.com/comics/music_industry

Hey Gramatik, I love your tunes it really sets the mood for everything.

Are you going to do any more collaborations with GRiZ?

Definitely more Grizmatik shit coming up! We are hoping to get together and make an EP as soon as time permits!

How do you pay rent? Do you live off the 'name your own price' button on bandcamp and the like? Do you also list all your stuff on publishing sites (non exclusive)?

It's a combination of live shows, licensing, merch, donations, etc. The point is to figure out a way to make money that doesn't involve forcing your fans(regular people with regular jobs) to buy your music if they like it or forcing them to become the so called "cyber criminals".

Hey Denis, I love everything you're doing right now and loved the show you put on in Northampton a few weeks ago.

As a producer, how do you find the line between making a song that is too simple, or thin, versus making a song that is over complicated and crowded? I guess the question is, how do you find a way to make your songs heavy and interesting without making them complex and difficult to listen too?

This is something I feel that a lot of young producers struggle with.

Thanks in advance if you have time to get to my post!

Every producer struggles with this for the rest of his life. :) I don't think I'll ever master this cause my music is so subjective to me I can't really see it like I can see other music. Once you accept that as part of the human condition, you can at least get better at it by settling on a result that annoys you the least. :)

Denis kada dolazis u Hrvatsku :D

Nadam se da uskoro. :) Pozdrav!

1)IF YOU COULD ASK NIKOLA TESLA ONE THING WHAT WOULD IT BE? 2) IF YOU COULD TELL NIKOLA TESLA ONE THING, WHAT WOULD IT BE?

Wow that's a tough one! I guess I would ask him if he would smoke a joint with me and tell him THANK YOU for lighting up the planet and inventing the 20th century. :)

Where do you think you would be today if it weren't for music?

Working a shitty job back in my hometown or dead. :)

I always see you posting c2c songs on your twitter, they are the ones who got me into hip-hop soul electronic music, and I was just wondering what you thought about their album tetra and how it ranks for you?

Amazing crew, amazing album! They are the REAL deal!

Hey Dennis, huge fan of your music. I was so excited to see you at shambhala this year, any reason why you didn't show? Im sure it was out of your control but i hope you can make it next year. Shambhalas a festival you will not forget. Just ask Grant about his time there

I was really bummed I couldn't come and the reason was a bad case of Strep Throat. :/ I will make it up to Shambhala tho!

Who is your favorite Beatle?

John Lennon.

are your songs creative commons, as in would I be able to use your songs on youtube in my videos without copyright infringement?

You can freely use my music for your videos. A simple credit note in the info section will suffice.

Whatup!?!

First, the question: are there any particular instruments or sounds that you're interested in experimenting with and developing into your future music? I feel the genre and your style are so versatile that they lend themselves to ever-growing experimentation.

Also, just wanted to thank you for being awesome! My friend introducing me to the likes of you and Griz and Big Gigantic has been borderline life changing. I love going to shows again and dancing it out (was at the record release of The Age of Reason in NYC which was unreal!).

Keep up the amazing work!

Experimentation is everything to me. I'm always excited to discover any kind of obscure instrument that makes me wanna sample it right there on the spot. :)

What's your favorite soft synth at the moment?

There's so many of them, but I've been fucking around with ABL2 lately, it's a great simulation of Roland TB-303. http://www.audiorealism.se/abl/abl2_announcement.htm

What up Denis, Love everything that you do! What are your thoughts on the Festival scene and the drug culture surrounding it?

I think it's a great way for people to gather and share their love for music and as far as drugs go, there's always going to be people that know how to use them and people that exaggerate and unfortunately there's not much we can really do about it besides saying EVERYTHING IN MODERATION KIDS! :)

Hey Gramatik, I wanna just call you Gramatik if that's OK with you. Huge fan of your music, what do you consider the genre of music that you create? Where do you see music going, I really think that you are one of the most progressive musicians alive, keep it up!! From one soul to another, thank you for the inspiration.

Just for fun, I'd call it Omnigenre. :)

As for your boy Gibbz, are you going to be producing his tracks that he releases from now on?

Gibbz is about to drop and EP entirely produced by himself! He is hands down the most diversely talented human being I've ever met! Watch out!