Interview with Eric Fourman

Hey kind people. I'm surely a huge fan of ambient and its subgenres music, so I was really happy when I found the amazing Eric Fourman music at his bandcamp. Serious, if you like noise, drone, free improvisation, you do have to check out his work. 

So, I asked him an interview and he was very nice to accept answering questions from an amateur like me. You can read it below:

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1.  Do you make live presentations? If so, how are they?

I do play live, though not very often (mostly due to my busy job schedule), Most of my studio albums are MIDI based, but when I play live, I use almost exclusively, analog synthesizers. 

I usually take 3-4 synths with me and program sounds that fit with each other a few days before. Along with my analog synth obsession, I have a ton of effects pedals and a loop pedal for every synth. So basically I just play a long line (5-6 minutes usually), loop it, move on to the next synth and repeat, until I create this massive wall of sound and just slowly bring it down. Everything is done in a free improvisation style.  Most of the pieces run around 15 minutes, so I usually play two pieces per set. I actually have a few albums that are created this same way.  Namely "No Refills" and "Transparent", both of which give you an idea of my live sound.

2. If it wasn’t the internet, I wouldn’t find your music (honestly, I can walk hours on my street with headphones listening ambient music). You put your releases into free download, can you please comment how you see the internet influence at music?

The internet stopped music from being solely a commodity, which is a very good thing. There no longer exist any barriers to releasing your own music your way. No longer are we stuck listening to what is immediately surrounding us, my influences are no longer stuck to what my friends are listening to and what is fed to me by a label.
Some would argue that this cheapens music, makes it more disposable, but that's crap. Sure now the music world is a lot more fractured now, but it makes finding your niche (both listening and creating) in music that much easier.  I've managed to amass decent fanbase without much promotion, without a single physical release, thanks to the internet.  It would have never happened 15 years ago.

3. Do you know any Brazilian music?

The only Brazillian music I'm really familiar with is through compilations.  If you count people from Brazil (who resides in the US now), I'm a big fan of Ricardo Donoso.  A very good progressive electronic/ambient artist.  Please feel free to recommend me Brazillian artists to check out.

4. What are the musicians (living or dead) that you would like to do a team play?

Mark Hollis of Talk Talk is my hero.  I would love to make music with him.  His music, both solo and with Talk Talk, is utterly beautiful and sounds like it's not of this world.  Other than that, Jason Molina (Songs: Ohia), who recently passed, the emotion he could create with just his voice and a guitar, something I strive to do with my music everyday.  Emeralds would be amazing to improv with.  Those guys are synth gods.

5. Regeneration is a really beautiful mixture of different textures. How do you meld all your influences and put them together?

The obvious influences are things like Emeralds and Tim Hecker.  I strive to create textures like theirs, beautiful, but not obvious and cheesy.  Bordering almost on noise, but never losing "melody" or "tone".  I use quotes because I'm not quite sure how to describe what I'm talking about. 
My less obvious influences are the minimalist greats, like Charlemagne Palestine and Gavin Bryars.  While many of my pieces don't sound minimalist (what sounds like many layers is generally 2 or 3).  Repetition to make every change sound more important is my mantra.  Really though I consider what inspires me to be influence, stuff outside the ambient realm.  There's so many influences I can only list these though.

6. Feedback was released in November and Regeneration in December. Your songwriting process is that fast or you take long time in creative process before you release something at bandcamp?

All of my music is improvisation, so I make albums as inspiration comes. I'll go months without picking up an instrument, then make 3 albums in a month. However, for every album I release, I don't release 10-15 songs.
I make music solely as a release, so I don't really filter out and wait for my most "marketable" albums to put on bandcamp.  Almost all my albums are made quickly because I want to capture how I'm feeling at the time and create my albums based on that feeling.

7. How is the ambient music public at Nashville?

I'm honestly pretty removed from the Nashville music scene. With my work schedule, I don't have much time to go to shows anymore. I know a few people like Sparkling Wide Pressure and my friend Joe Volmer (Clearing (ambient), Party Trash, Police Academy 6).  Outside of that, I don't really think there is much of ambient scene here.  Mostly seems like a lot of garage rock and Jack White copying (White Stripes, he runs a label here in Nashville).

8. Filter is going to be released physically, right? How is this process?

Well everything I create/release is unmastered at this point, so I had to get "Filter" mastered.  One of my best friends, Paul Kintzing (German Error Message), mastered the album for me (evening out the volume, warming it up a bit).  Right now I'm waiting on the art to be finished.  My friend Nic Magee is working on it now and has a rough draft, but hopefully should be done soon.  I already have the CDrs burned and ready to go.  We're going to hand decorate each one and release "Filter" in an edition of 35 or so CDrs.  I plan to sell these at cost and if anyone who reads your magazine is interested I could just charge shipping to send them to Brazil.


9. Once there’s going a lot of end year lists, what were the albums you most liked in 2013?

I really love these New Puritans - "Field of Reeds" (beautiful drifting post-rock in the vein of later Talk Talk), Gunnar Haslam - Mimesiak (and mostly everything on the "L.I.E.S (Long Island Electrical Systems)" label, which releases experimental techno and ambient releases), Lubomyr Melnyk - "Corollaries" (First release in years from Minimalist piano god, folk and piano minimalism mixed perfectly together).  I loved a lot more but those are probably my top releases from this year.

10. Thank you! Please, leave a message to our readers. Really appreciate.

Thanks for listening and (hopefully) enjoying my music!  If you have any questions/comments, feel free to contact me through bandcamp.  http://ericfourman.bandcamp.com  Thanks for the interview!