Q&A: CHARLES MURDOCH

Newcomer Charles Murdoch first turned heads with his own take on the glitchpop sound of fellow Aussie producer Flume on remix of hit track 'Sleepless'. Now with an impressive catalogue of his own productions and with the recent signing to up-and-coming imprint Future Classic, Murdoch has certified himself as one to watch for 2013, as his latest release 'Dekire' demonstrates. 

For anyone who isn't already familiar, can you tell us who you are and what you do?

"Hello, I'm Charles Murdoch from Brisbane Australia. I produce music that I would like to hear and hopefully other people enjoy it too."

How did your journey begin?

"It begun after being through many ups and downs musically and mentally. I've been in bands, as well as producing and DJing since high school, playing all sorts of club shows to parties. I was always getting told to play or to produce this or that. So, about a year ago I started making music I enjoyed and what made me feel like I was in control - giving me freedom to upload and do what i want. So I started uploading my own music to Soundcloud and people started to enjoy it, which is a great feeling for me." 

Your music has quite an orchestral quality to it... do you have a particularly musical background?

"I was taught some music theory throughout school but took away nothing from it. For me, it's all feel and trying to mimic what I hear in the songs I love."

Who would you credit as your greatest inspirations, musically or otherwise?

"James Holden is a big inspiration to me, some of the sounds and textures he creates are mind-blowing. I love the way he builds his tracks and keeps you interested the whole way through. He can twist and distort a melody so aggressively but keep it smooth and beautiful. My friends influence me a lot as well, i sort of have two groups of really good friends. One group listens to guitar indie rock stuff and the other group deep house electronica etc. So them constantly discussing what they like about one artist to the other and what they think works helps me because I can combine ideas and thoughts into my own productions."

How would you describe your sound? Can it be categorised into one genre?

"Not really. I like house, electronica, rock,  ambient, film score stuff and I guess I've tried to incorporate all that stuff into my productions so I can't really categorise my own productions. But I guess I like anything  deep. I hate fucking cheesy simple bullshit."

Tell us a bit about your production. Many of your tunes feature heavily with samples - how do you obtain these, do you create them yourself?

"Most of the samples are snippets off my mum and dad's old vinyl collection and maybe a one word phrase of some crappy acapella off a dodgy download site. I usually don't take big samples because it feels wrong to me, but I guess it's anyone's opinion to think what's a big sample or not. Most of my sounds are prophet 8 and ms20 for the producer nerds out there." 

And how did the involvement with Future Classic come about?

"Future Classic signed another project I'm involved with in a while ago and we've been working with them for a while now. A couple of months ago they posted up a competition with beatport to remix an artist also signed to the label called Flume. I was over in the US holidaying and managed to download the parts for the comp but didn't get around to finishing the remix until i got back (after the competition). So I decided to upload to soundcloud anyway, a couple of days later FC called me up saying "why didn't you enter it!" and you should sign with us! The rest is history. Those dudes have helped me a lot and i'm really stoked they believe in what I'm doing."

Your sound definitely sits on the more chilled, ambient side of things. How does your tune selection for DJ sets compare to your own stuff? What kind of vibe do you aim for?

"When I DJ I mainly like to play deep house with some tempo changes to some more slow beats stuff. I really try to take people on a 'journey' but it's really what the crowd wants at that point in time and what the DJ played before you or who's on after."

And did DJing come before or after you began making tunes?

"DJing came afterwards. I got booked for DJ gigs through my productions but then heavily got into the art of it." 

What do you have in store for the rest of the year?

"The main plan is to get overseas and start touring around. But also trying hard to get another EP out, then album!"

Stream Charles Murdoch's new EP 'Dekire' below.