Disconnected Podcast 002: Deft
Deft serves up a selection of funk, hip hop and a bit of house with a few of his own tunes thrown in for good measure!
So Deft, what’s the with name?
It was from back in my days as a youth when I used to tag. I wasn’t that imaginative with coming up with a ‘cool’ word, so I went through the dictionary, found deft and thought it sounded pretty cool… ha. It’s just stuck since then as I haven’t been able to think of something good to replace it! I’ve wanted to change it for a few years still.
Tell us about yourself away from music…
Well, I graduated from Brighton University in July and since then I’ve been at home helping my family out where I can. I’m working an internship at the moment and I’ve got no money. But it’s all good. I’m seeing what my options are for the future and focusing a bit more on my music before i get into working the 9-5… Not looking forward to that at all.
And what about music, what’s your background?
I studied music at GCSE and studied Digital Music & Sound Art at Uni. I’ve been playing the drums for around 9 years and played the timps and kit in the school orchestra for a little while. I stood in for the drummer of my friends band when I was at school and we did a few gigs, playing stoner doom rock! The band was called Misery Wank, haha. But in between that, I started making arrangements that were just loads of different DnB breaks layered over each other on Fruityloops. Once I started to have an idea of what I was doing with the software and discovered sampling, I went into making grime, hip hop, house, dubstep – just experimenting with different genres and taking what I liked most from each.
What’s your passion in music?
I guess its one of my interests or hobbies that I’ve decided to take seriously. I get a lot of enjoyment and satisfaction from making music, its my creative outlet, that’s turned into my passion. Being able to work with other people and experiment with different sounds. There’s a lot of fulfillment in that for me. It makes me happy which is most important. But I think I generally have a passion for sound, I’d love to do sound design/composition for film or animated film or something along those lines. I’d like to see myself doing that in the long-term.
Who’s been the main influences on your sound?
My brother pointed me in the direction of a lot of bands when we were younger, and after listening to Blink 182 I got into playing drum. When my brother was at Uni, he got me into a lot of hip hop like J5, Nas, Common, The Roots, and gave me a copy of the documentary ‘Scratch’. He also got me into some trip hoppy kind of stuff like Zero 7, Portishead, and Massive Attack, and got me my first pair of decks when I was 16. I’ve got him to thank for getting me into music to be honest. Fh4rom when I started making hip hop, I took influence mainly from Pete Rock, 9th Wonder and DJ Premier – I listened to their instrumentals on loop constantly. More recently its artists like Quantic, the Brainfeeder lot, Floating Points, James Blake, Bonobo, Mosca, SBTRKT, FaltyDL, Onra, Lone… But like, what I hear in funky, house, dubstep, grime, the offbeat/wonky/whatever stuff, hip hop.. its all good!
Can you tell us about the mix, what can we expect?
It’s just some tunes I’ve been listening to a lot recently. You can expect some funk, hip hop, a bit of house, some of my own tunes and The Neptunes – remember when they took over the world – Timbaland, Just Blaze… yeah!
What were your influences when putting it together?
Just the music I’ve been listening to recently, and ‘What Happened To That Boy’… The beat is too much!!
Tell us about your production set up…
For software, I use FL Studio 9 and some extra VST’s. With that, I got a pair of Mackie MR5 monitors, a midi keyboard, I occasionally use my MPD24 for automation and percussion/drums, and some records/bits for sampling. I’m going to make the move to Logic soon still.
What’s in the future Deft?
Who knows? There’s a few things up in the air at the moment release wise, but I’m playing a few gigs in Brighton next month supporting Bullion and Throwing Snow. So I’ve got a few things to keep me busy. Main thing that I need to do is finish some fucking tunes!
For more info check out Deft’s MySpace.
You can also listen to some of his productions on SoundCloud.
Caribou – Sun (Deft’s Nebula Mix) by Deft
Subscribe to the Disconnected Podcast
In order to subscribe you have the following options:
You can also find the podcast by searching for disconnected in the itunes podcast directory. If you need any help or if you have any problems please let us know.
Site by studioname & Edward Lewis
© Disconnected 2010 - 2024
Leave a Reply