Saturation Mix 003: 22x
MEMCO:
Where are you now?
22x:
I'm in my parents' home, in my brother's old room.
MEMCO:
When did you first make music?
22x:
You know, it's been so long that I kind of don't remember the exact year. I'm going to guess when I was 14 is when I started, which would be like eight years ago now.
MEMCO:
What kind of music were you making?
22x:
At the time, it was basically what everybody would make at 14. Cool trap beats, obviously. But then it was really funny, because I don't think I ever actually went into trap beats.
I think I always in some way ended up making something a lot more like trap EDM in the end.
MEMCO:
Did you have producers or artists at the time that you wanted to emulate?
22x:
Definitely Skrillex. I was around that age. Also the Monstercat label. I still love pretty much everything on Monstercat. Especially some of the more aggressive stuff like Noisestorm or Kuuro.
I was also influenced by YouTubers that I was watching to learn how to make music. There's one YouTuber, Levi Niha. I still remember that I always used to love their videos, and they kind of taught me how to produce as well.
MEMCO:
Is that how you learned to make music, through YouTube?
22x:
Yeah, definitely.
MEMCO:
What's changed in your approach to music and how has what you listen to changed?
22x:
Well, I think I can't separate my location from what I was listening to at the time. I talked about my more electronic influences, but I was also really into violin. I was part of a youth orchestra here in the city that I lived in. We would play a lot of classical Kurdish music, and even more modern stuff.
So in a way, even starting from then, the melodies and the scales I would want to use would be ones that emulated more of a southwest Asian sound. That was something that I never really intentionally thought of, but it was always something that came to me. If anything, I actually would feel bad.
I was like, ‘Oh, this isn't that great,’ because I wasn't hearing it in terms of a more Western standard that I was exposed to. But over time I've become a lot more intentional about loving that kind of music. Maqams basically are what they are basically, those sorts of intonations and melodies and rhythms.
That's what really speaks to me most emotionally because of my background growing up. And I've always wanted to understand why that was the case. And so it's just been slowly, slowly unwrapping and peeling these layers of the music that I'd hear on the radio where I lived, combined with the things that I was intentionally seeking out.
Those kinds of intentional and also subconscious influences, I've kind of combined. I’ve now decided to be more intentional about using maqams and using those kinds of sounds, but combining them with really electronic, digital, abstract sounds. Because to me, the combination of everything that I was exposed to growing up is all something that I don't think you would really hear anyway. And that's just like living two lives, I guess.
MEMCO:
Having not grown up in the US, have you seen a hybridization of influences in what you make?
22x:
I wouldn't really describe it as a hybridization, because I don't think you can really draw a gradient across those two sorts of influences. I think I've found a really niche spot, something that I don't really find anywhere.
I guess something that makes me really sad is that I haven't really met people or encountered the music that actually surrounds it. I feel like I'm making music for that little niche specifically.
MEMCO:
Who is your music for?
22x:
I feel like I'm making it for a younger version of myself that couldn't really process the different opposing influences in my life. I think it's a way for me to sort of build a community in a little corner. And I don't know who's a part of it. But I know that anybody who is, is incredibly welcome.
I have been trying to be more intentional that Kurdishness and a Kurdish aesthetic is incredibly under represented. A lot of the times it's misunderstood as being an Arab, Turkish or Farsi one but it isn't and it's why I feel like I’m trying to find a niche that exists for those cultures that does not for mine. That intersection of international sound system culture and the indigenous forms of community building through music and dance.
The most internationally known Kurdish music has an Arabic singer's name attached to it. Omar Suleiman’s Warne Warne is an example of a halperke song from northern Kurdistan that Omar Suleiman sings parts of in Arabic. While it’s common for singers of a variety of backgrounds to sing and write songs in different languages, I think that it's very telling of an erasure of Kurdish identity in the west that a Syrian Arab singer is heavily associated with that style of music that is uniquely northern Kurdish.
MEMCO:
You majored in aerospace. For that, I'm assuming there's a lot of design involved, and a lot of thinking of the physics of design. How much do you think about the mechanics of sound, or the physicality of music when you're making what you make?
22x:
You know, that's something that I try to not find one-to-one comparisons for, but rather very broad stroke analogs for. So, what I mean by that is that, yeah, there's a lot of structure in aerospace design. But the truth is, it kind of comes down to being a very checklist, yes/no type of process of ‘do this, then do this, then do this, then do this’.
For music, instead, what I try to do is use emotional pillars, and not take them as ‘if this, then that’, but rather as ‘how am I flowing through each one of these gates’? Am I going through them? How long are they? It's kind of a difference between a step versus flowing I guess.
MEMCO:
Your saturation mix. Yes. It was really good. When you're playing music, do you think about the audience?
22x:
I wouldn't say it's necessarily for myself or for the audience, but rather I want to make sure that there's a hub that people can go into if that's what they're interested in. I always just want to create a place, and, you know, if you want to go into it, you can go into it. It also requires knowing that people want to be there, you know? I'm not going to play something knowing that people don't want to enter that space. That makes me feel really uncomfortable because the whole point of what I'm trying to curate is for it to be communal. It's kind of back and forth. I'm pushing it out there, they might be going in there. Basically, it's kind of like playing tennis, but in a more emotional, proud way.
MEMCO:
22x. What is the 22? What is the x?
22x:
22 is my favorite number, always. I just love everything about that number. It feels sleek. It feels cool. It feels suave, but it also feels kind of abstract and kind of ethereal, in a way, to me. And that x is almost kind of to give it more of a sort of digital, virtual, futuristic touch on how I feel about 22.
MEMCO:
Do you have plans to do anything special when you turn 22?
22x:
Of course. I've literally been saying, if me being 22 is not the
greatest year of my life, then I've never lived life. And I like
where my life is headed, and I think by 22, I'll hit it properly.
So, that entire year is going to be, like, my special year. You
know?
MEMCO:
Yes. Okay. Was there anything else you wanted to say?
22x:
There's so much to say, but it would be just so long that I don't know how to properly put it into words. I guess.
Listen to Early Spring, out August 16.
Tracklist:
xen model - pin cycle
hayk karoyi - zuzumaru
syz - ozmogikan
Batu - for spirits
sister zo - emp
ayesha - varanasi
muskila - 92
3phaz - phase 5
jasm chuchani - ahangy paymangay qaiwan
22x - horay_aw
tomo kami - ritmo actual
coen - bodycheck
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