Kristoffer Lislegaard

15 Questions

I was recently lucky enough to be featured on Tobias Fischer’s fantastic site Fifteen Questions. This is a website full of excellent interviews with muscians. So here is a repost of my interview. If you want to read the full interview with embedded players etc. you can do so here.

And in any case I recommend you go check out some of the other people who have been interviewed on Fifteen Questions.

Fifteen Questions Interview

When I listen to music, I see shapes, objects and colours. What happens in your body when you’re listening? Do you listen with your eyes open or closed?

I wouldn’t say “yes I have synesthesia” but there is definitely something like that happening. It feels like some sort of resonance in my brain and body. Like I am massaging my neurons and programming my reality. It sounds a little woo woo, but that is how I would describe it. I love to listen with my eyes closed! When I close my eyes without music there are some shapes, patterns and noise. When I do this while listening to music I like I see a whole world in there.

Entering/creating new worlds through music has always exerted a strong pull on me. What do you think you are drawn to most when it comes to listening to and creating music?

(I promise I didn’t read this question before answering the previous one, hehe!)

I resonate a lot with this world building / entering idea. I sometimes think of it as putting my consciousness into the background and “traveling” to my subconscious mind. A sort of communication with myself, or “be my whole self” or something like that. I think a lot of religious experiences might be similar to this (although not religious myself). Quite psychedelic I guess.

So I think I would describe it as looking for something that gives me this feeling of change. Like flowstate. Often (but not always) the most important parts in the music to trigger this is sound design and melody/harmonies or simply atmosphere.

According to scientific studies, we make our deepest and most incisive musical experiences between the ages of 13-16. What did music mean to you at that age and what’s changed since then?

This was the time I started playing music. So I guess my sense of using music as a tool to find my place in the world started here. I picked up the electric guitar, tried to play as fast as possible and ran it through every effect I could find in an endless exploration.

At some point the effects took over and I got bored of “sports guitar”. Now it is almost only effects, hehe! At some point I made a multi sample based guitar instrument. This I use in almost every track! Of course with a lot of effects.

Tell me about one or two of your early pieces that you’re still proud of (or satisfied with) – and why you’re content with them.

My EP Pocket. It would take 10 years before I did another solo release. Especially the track Copy Machine still holds up well. I like how it was made in such a naive way. Guitar into laptop into stereo audio recorder. Press rec on the recorder and do your performance. It is simply made by using 2-3 loopers in Ableton Live that I change the tempo of live as part of the performance to get different pitches. A technique I still enjoy.

The intro is done by putting a contact mic on a sheet music stand and dragging my keys on top of it. On my newest album there is a track called Prism that starts pretty much exactly the same. Maybe that is why I like it and it still feels current. Because it was sort of the pilot to what would come a decade later.

What is your current studio or workspace like? What instruments, tools, equipment, and space do you need to make music?

I have a very nice studio space that I share with Jørgen Skjulstad who runs the label Metronomicon Audio. But really my studio and my instrument is my computer with Ableton Live and Max. That is all I need actually, plus some controllers and some speakers. I have a few (mostly alternative) synthesizers (like Endorphin.es Shuttle system and Shbobo Shnth), some eurorack modules (like Mutable Instruments Clouds and AJH synth mini mod VCO), effect boxes (like Bugbrand PT delay and CrossOver Filter) and a baritone electric guitar.

But I can just as well use Ableton Operator and my sample guitar inside the computer. However the exploration, change and physicality of some of the instruments and effect boxes is nice so I like to implement some hardware as well.

From the earliest sketches to the finished piece, tell me about the creative process for your current release, please.

On my newest album Subsupra most of the tracks started with very rough sketches / jams, many of them on the Ableton Push 3 standalone on the couch, bed or (on one track) in the park.

I tried to not think so much, get some layers going and give myself a few surprises. Some of the tactics for this is the mentioned trick with overdubbing loopers that I change the tempo of while recording so I get interesting octave and timing shifts in the middle of a loop. Add to that effects like freezing delays, long reverbs, granular synthesis (in homemade Max for Live device) and other ways to record without pressing record.

I like to use effects in a way where I feel like me playing the notes is just one part of the music. The second part comes from letting the system I have set up in the machine do its thing and we have a little back and forth with me playing new notes, listening to what comes back and nudge the system in one way or another.

Then I would transfer these jams onto the studio computer and edit, process, sample and overdub. On this album I played around with expectations and norms for how sounds usually are supposed to be presented. For example there are some parts where the background elements are louder in the mix than the lead melody, and some sounds created by using noise reduction software in reverse to output what is usually removed.

What role and importance do rituals have for you, both as an artist and a listener?

I think the music making (and listening) is sort of the ritual itself for me. I like how this mindset makes it possible to be low key and not make a big deal out of it, but still at some point the flowstate takes over and the ritual happens without you thinking about it. Sort of like everyday magic.

Are you acting out parts of your personality in your music which you couldn’t or wouldn’t in your daily life? If so, which are these?

Maybe. But at the same time as a professional artist/musician/insert-something-here my music IS my daily life. It is a way to understand the world, a way to think and a way to express myself. So maybe a way to frame the question for me would be what part of my personality I would lose and miss if I stopped with music. Then I think I would be very off-balance. Outside of music I am able to fulfill the need to joke around and laugh, be kind and warm and to be fascinated and nerd out on things. But I would miss the (in lack of a better word) spiritual part that the music brings to my life. A way to make sense of the big picture, be in tune with nature and do what my soul is telling me to do. Maybe I would have to train myself to be a nightly (as in every night) lucid dreamer!

Late producer SOPHIE said: “You have the possibility […] to generate any texture, and any sound. So why would any musician want to limit themselves?” What’s your take on that?

I think as long as you stay honest with yourself and behave according to your taste everything can go. But on the other hand I can get confused and later realize that it was my ego tricking me.

I also think that people have different strengths and interests. Some like the sound of their instrument and are more interested in arranging, harmony and microtonality f.ex. While some other person almost don’t care what notes are playing and focus almost 100% on sound design. I think both ends of the scale can work.

With that said I feel like my best work includes both of these parameters.

I would also add that a familiar sound can also make the listener feel “home” while always changing textures can keep them on their toes.

Do you feel that your music or your work as an artist needs to have a societal purpose or a responsibility to anyone but yourself?

I almost feel like it can be the other way around. That the work itself deserves a good life instead of being limited to hanging around on my hard drive.

And when I have something that I do feel like this about, sharing it with people is a chance to do something good in the world. Music has been the greatest medicine for my life, and I feel like the world has a great need for positive forces. If I am able to be a small part of this, then that feels very meaningful. So I try to make the best, most heartfelt and honest music I can, and then I try to invite people into it in different ways.

I feel like context can be a great way to give someone the tools to connect with your music even if they are not already familiar with the genre.

I would love to know a little about the feedback you’ve received from listeners or critics about what they thought some of your songs are about or the impact it had on them – have there been “misunderstandings” or did you perhaps even gain new “insights?”

Since I make mostly instrumental music people are very free to interpret it in whatever way they want. So I don’t think I have had much of people misunderstanding them.

I have had people tell me the music got them through dark times, that it has inspired them, given them new ideas and changed their state of mind. Many people, like myself, go through normal life with something that needs to be scratched from time to time or we get unhappy. And many times people have described just this feeling of getting something they maybe even didn’t know they needed. That feels very nice.

Sometimes for me I describe this feeling like going through the world with jigsaw puzzle pieces flying around. Then when the music is just right imagine all of those puzzle pieces lines up perfectly, to the point where you see the picture perfectly! You don’t even see the lines from the edges of the puzzle pieces, you just really REALLY see the picture clearly, but just for a moment. Then it goes back to semi-chaos, hehe!

I could write much more about this, but in general people tell me that the music did something with them, and that this is a positive thing.

Sound, song, and rhythm are all around us, from animal noises to the waves of the ocean. What, if any, are some of the most moving experiences you’ve had with these non-human-made sounds? In how far would you describe them as “musical”?

The music is everywhere in everything if you just listen for it. What makes music music is for me that someone listens to it as music.

When thinking about the musicality of the non-human world it is hard to be able to say anything before mentioning the heart crushing Ted talk by Bernie Krause called The voice of the natural world. 4 minutes into the talk he talks about a forest in the Sierra Nevada before and after cutting down trees with a “selective logging” technique. The company that did this selective logging promised that there would be no environmental impact by doing it this way. Then he plays the audio recordings before and after. Whenever I tell people about this (including right now) it is hard not to cry. The talk is on Youtube. You can go listen to it yourself.

I really REALLY think the world would be a much better place if people were really trained to listen.

On a more positive note I recorded some birds with a recorder that can record at a very high sample rate. This is the audio parallel to a slow motion camera that captures many more frames per second then what we can perceive. So you can slow down the sound afterwards and it still sounds like “real” sound. It doesn’t have that muffled underwater sound.

When I slowed these bird recordings down a little bit they started sounding like different animals. A bit lower they start sounding like monkeys. Eeeeven slower they sound like humans. I haven’t done the math but there is a relationship between the pitch, heart rate and lifespan that all sort of lines up to say that we are pretty much all singing the same songs and living the same life just at different speeds. It is extremely fascinating stuff!

We can surround us with sound every second of the day. The great pianist Glenn Gould even considered this the ultimate delight. How do you see that yourself and what importance does silence hold?

You know how athletes say that the rest is almost as important as the training? That is how I feel about silence. You need it to both rest your ears, rest your brain and as a contrast to sound. If there is no darkness there is no light. If there is no silence, there is no sound. Of course there is no true silence, but I guess there is also no full maximum sound either. So maybe these are just the markers of the scale.

I am extremely fascinated by noise canceling headphones!

Do you feel as though writing or performing a piece of music is inherently different from something like making a great cup of coffee? What do you express through music that you couldn’t or wouldn’t in more ‘mundane’ tasks?

Coffee is such a great example. Because you are only able to really enjoy the finer tastes if you experience a lot of coffee and train your tastebuds. And you have to bother to give it a proper taste. More than one time. That is when you really experience the coffee. Music is the same. I think you can express yourself in lots of different ways. This made me think about the times where I have had a big cup of coffee, then as I am walking to the studio, listening to music, the sun pops out and then I start feeling the caffeine starting to kick in. Ah what a glorious feeling! They are all harmonizing in a way.

Q: What is the biggest shift over the years in how you view yourself as a musician / artist that you can think of?

A: That I have (almost) stopped feeling like I should grow up and become a better “normal” musician. I realize that whenever I am actually really interested in something I can not get it out of my head, and the things I don’t really care about it is hard to make space for up there. I used to feel guilty or less for not being a better traditional musician that has the chops to play this or that tune. Over time I am more and more able to focus on where I want to be and what I want to do artistically and what I need to learn to be able to do that, instead of feeling like I need to learn skills for tasks I am not really interested in.

That’s it!

Thanks for reading. If you want you can now go check out more interviews here.

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