A creative process might sound easy but often it leads to paths and ways beyond our imagination. We had a chat with “Only Drugs” about music being the only drug and a trip in the literal sense of meaning and everything in between.
Enjoy the read.
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Let’s get things kicked off. Tell us a little about your name. How did that come together?
The 2 words just sound good together. And it’s easy to remember. It looks like like it arose questions immediately. I believe questions are a good start for conversations. There is a plan to cut the name as O.D. soon. But maybe not.
Sometimes the name comes with some troubles. Social networks decline to publish our stuff or techno promoters are seriously afraid to have our name on a party schedule … funny enough. But to be precise, even though it sounds cliché: “Music is my only drug.”.
I am personally just trying to switch on the power and see what’s happening next.
You need to understand, O.D. isn’t a duo or a band as you know it. This is a creative collective. I’m just sending music and visual starting points that connect me with the artists. These can be people working with video and sound, synth-makers and others which I invite to join the common TRIP. Some I don’t even know in person. So, in the end, we usually get something sudden and strange but mostly bright. I am personally just trying to switch on the power and see what’s happening next. I hope all of this makes sense and is more clear to all of the readers. It’s an Only Drugs universe.
What inspired the move from being a physicist to now an artist?
My degree reminds me of years spent in education. I was doing research in the field of heat physics – heat flows, quantum mechanics, radiation heat transfer etc. All amazing things. But I quickly understood that bass guitar exсited me much more. I played for a pop band back in tile and got a hot radio single and had a contract with a major outlet on the horizon. So, physics did not happen at all eventually.
Tell us a little about what goes into your artwork, or rather your thought process behind visuals of your work?
Usually, we have something we need to arrange as a visual part – artwork, for socials, video for Youtube or a shot for Instagram. So, I make some kind of skeleton of ideas and send these to my brilliant colleagues. They get brushes or paints or knives or laptops and we look at it together to see what will happen next. Usually, something wild happens from the beginning, and we need to continue from there. I personally can’t draw at all, but I know how to connect the right people to reach my creative goals.
These amazing artists Barandash where responsible for the album art and Psymuline for first video “Interface” and recent “Owl Party”. Highly recommend checking out their work.
Despite the late and legendary Robert Miles and Miles Davis being your inspiration for your debut LP, what or who would you say is your main inspiration for your work?
My smartphone is the main inspiration, to be honest. In many of my journeys, I record a lot of rhythms and melodic ideas just by voice and multiple surrounding noises and sounds from various ambient situations. Sure, all that stuff becomes good fuel for new and upcoming compositions. As the backbone of synth-lines or samples or layers or just small colours etc. So, I just need to dive into warehouse files and inspiration will come. The problem is that these are huge massive files that contain much more ideas that I can use in my workflow, even together with my colleagues. In my case, the process from the initial piece of idea-record to a well prepared ready track is a scary long deal.
If we talk about music, I listen to almost everything. Death and Charlie XCX next to each other in my playlist (and both are quite good indeed). Trying to go deep into classic music lately.
What does the remainder of this year have installed for Only Drugs?
Still working on feedback from the latest Only Drugs EP “Owl Party”. For example, I am doing this i-view. Need to say I’ve got pleasure from collaborating with Skey, Deepkey and Aurolab who all made an amazing piece of work with remixes for the EP. All diverse and peculiar. Need to say, despite to be connected for quite a long time with the guys (more than 10 years with Skey for example), I’ve never met them in real life. probably because we all live in different cities. But I’m sure we’ll have a beer o’clock moment in the near future and make something great again.
Any more releases that are on the way?
Our brand new full-length album number 2 is the main goal for now. If the debut self-named LP Only Drugs was assembled from old demos and pieces (some of them waited for about 10 years to be cleaned and polished), the new album will contain absolutely new stuff. In general, it is ready (and I’ve already had a listen) but looks like we need to re-do everything again. That’s the normal process for me and the guys. Just to get the full picture, looking closely and then cut everything with a big knife and draw the picture again. Final destination is unclear at this stage. It will be a quite strange LP, I promise.
In the meantime, we already launched works for a video from the new album’s single! It’ll be super bright again.
I won’t lie, after reading your overview of your “Owl Party” I was a little confused but a lot more interested, haha. You mention light psychedelic stuff and mobile lab researches. Could you give us a little more clarity?
If you’ve watched the “Breaking Bad” sitcom, I guess such statements really can evoke some kind of pictures.
But all much easier. In all my frequent travels I carry a laptop full of VSTS’es, headphones & a soundcard to be able to immediately fix something genius coming from my head. So, that mobile stuff doesn’t work. To do something in music I need to be in good mood, it must be silent and I need to be in my home studio. But all good with intelligent psychedelics that we exactly use in our music and art (in safe doses).
Do you incorporate psychedelics in your creating process?
Bicycle riding via dead villages of Karelia. This is quite psychedelic on itself and quite good for the creative process. That’s what I’m doing with the guys when we have a time.
Dope – no. It was quite saturated, but that part of my life has long passed (need to have extra interview somehow to explain all that). Now it’s rather an obstacle for the creative process in my case. I feel much more inspiration from the view of my home studio. By the way, look at the logo of my label to see what I mean about that the view I am talking about.
What would you say is the overall message that you want to deliver in your audio-visual projects?
TRIP is the message. But what I’m mean with this is that baked (or half baked) tracks I usually test on a wide range of sources going from a HiFi-set to vintage shit speakers. And the main point is called “park-test”. I put on headphones, start the track and go to the park. If it sounds good with and I feel some kind of soul resonances, then everything is in good place and things really are starting to feel like being ready. So Only Drugs is music for a trip in the literal sense of meaning to get out and take a walk.
Thank you!