Tychomusic

As with the name and the imagery associated with this project, I want things to be open-ended. I want to create a framework for people to project their own ideas and meanings onto. These things have meaning to me personally, but they are what you make them. At least that's how I want it to be. At the core, the dots were a way to remove all names from the posters and covers. Typefaces are loaded with meaning; they imply a time period, evoke ideas of brands, they define too much. I wanted a recognizable symbol that encapsulated the idea of Tycho and ISO50 as a holistic audio / visual project but which didn't imply anything about it. I wanted a kind of glyph that could have come from any time. I don't want there to be an intrinsic meaning to the dot symbol, defining that is best left to the individual I think.

I can tell you one thing, it is not braille and was not derived from braille, as some have posited. My dad was an engineer in the 60s when they were still using computers with punch cards for programming so those things were always laying around the house so as a kid I would collect them and obsess over their meaning. I felt like I had some alien manuscript or something.

Thanks for asking that. Full disclosure mode here: I have always wanted to maintain tight control of my social media presence as I want anything that goes through those channels to be in my own voice. But with this intense year of recording and preparing for the release and tours, I had to offload some of the posting duties. Mostly just the promotional stuff, I still do all the personal stuff.

So that being said, I woke up the other morning to see that post and how it was worded. I did not author that post and personally do not agree with that sentiment. I deleted the post shortly thereafter. The people I work with are great and have only the best intentions, but this was an instance where we didn't agree completely on a subject and unfortunately that made it's way into a public forum. I agree wholeheartedly with the idea of sharing music and ideas freely, it's why I have a career in music.

That being said, I'm not Trent Reznor, and Ghostly isn't a major label. We struggle to make these records with our own money. We have bills and financial obligations like everyone else. So would I prefer people purchase the music? Absolutely, it ensures that we can continue to do what we do without compromise. Do I care if people download it "illegally", no. I'm just grateful to have an audience.

That's so hard to pinpoint. I obviously have stylistic influences like Boards of Canada and Ulrich Schnauss. But I think of inspiration as the reason I am driven to create. I guess I've just always had this overwhelming desire to translate a vision and I've always felt hindered by my own abilities and resources. So I guess it's like an ongoing challenge, to overcome yourself and try to make the images and sounds in your head real.

It's strange, I've found myself listening to less and less music over the years. I think after working on music all day silence is a nice break. That being said, if I recall I was listening to a lot of Dauwd and Midlake. I don't think it had a huge impact on this record. I think we had a pretty clear concept going in and stuck with that. After the record was done and I had more time to listen to music I got really into Atoms for Peace and Garden's & Villa.

It's a generalized thing but it is exacerbated by performances. I would say I have a very mild case but the profession I chose tends to amplify your weaknesses so it has really been a bigger issue in the last few years.

I think performing live has really helped me with the social anxiety component, which used to be my biggest issue. It was kind of like, if I can stand in front of all these people then talking to someone face to face shouldn't be a big deal. As far as performance anxiety, I used to shake so bad on stage I couldn't play the keyboard. I got over that just be exposure and repetition. I tried meds for a while but that was a dead end as I just felt like it was masking the root of the problem. Exercise seems to be the key for me. Unfortunately the first thing to go during times of high stress and anxiety is free time, and so it's hard to stay on top of a workout regimen.