BassSteppa
Minos DarkBox
Reg.: Jan 2007
Location: circles of hell
Posts: 6081 |
 Artist Interview - Current Value
When working on the Reel Machines ADpak we contacted Tim Eliot, also known as Current Value, to help us create some beats and presets. Tim ended up creating a full set of beats with matching presets and also made the very cool Reel Machines theme song. We here at XLN are old fans of Current Value and when we heard his recent album "2012 - The Day Of Silence" features heavy Addictive Drums and Reel Machines use we knew we had to pick his brain.
Tell us a little bit about your background, how you started and how you've got to where you're at right now.
- I had a classical piano education of 16 years starting at the age of 6, which helped me alot in terms of reading notes and understanding music when I got into making electronic music. It all started very simple - with a Casio keyboard in the early nineties that I got for Christmas. From that time on I spend every penny I had on musical equipment - back in the days consisting of a Akai S01 Sampler and an Atari 1040 ST with Notator Alpha.
As Specs became better and better and prices went down a bit I built up a small home recording studio with more samplers, a Kawai K5000 additive Synth and a couple of other nice tools. I was addicted to Techno music inspired by the former radioshow "Rave Satellite" with Marusha. In the late nineties I played out tunes on Kiss FM every two weeks where I met my later distributer and Don-Q Records head Thorsten Birk. Shortly before that I started with Drum'n'Bass. In 1998 I had my first release on Don-Q being followed by a couple of more on Position Chrome where I later on had my first Album "Frequency Hunt" released.
I had a few more albums and releases within the following years and started doing liveshows as well. In 2004 I attended the SAE for a year where I got my Audio Engineering Diploma. In late 2005 I kind of got "catapulted" into the top league of drum'n'bass producers when the head of Freak Recordings Dylan Hilsley became aware of me and asked me for tunes on his label. Many more releases followed on labels like Tech Itch, Freak, Trouble On Vinyl, Evol Intent, Algorythm, Soothsayer, Barcode etc. From that time on I have continuosly been gigging regularly up to a couple of times a month.
Many people who listen to your music are likely wondering "how on earth is he creating this stuff?" so how ARE you doing it, how do you tweak the sounds?
- I've always gone my own way in the approach of making music, instead of going a straight or regular way. Because I've always wanted to dig deeper into the matter of creating sounds. And one of the rules have always been: "Do it from scratch" with every new tune. Create sounds instead of using ready made sounds. That gives you alot of skills and you'll know what to do to get what you want. It might even enable you to get the same sounds using different equipment as it always comes down to the same blueprint of the sound.
How much time do you usually spend on a song?
- A couple of hours to up to a few days - depending on how much time I give myself to finish it - and I'm tight with that 
What is the most time consuming in your workflow?
- It is quite balanced - creating / tweaking sounds , arrangement and mixing/mastering.
Describe the setup you're using in the studio and what you use Live.
- I nowadays work everywhere on laptop, mbox and headphones and In Ears of which I have quite a selection as you may know:
Sony MDR-CD3000, Ultrasone Pro 2900, Grado RS1, Monster Turbine Pro Mile Davis Tribute, Monster Turbines Pro Copper, Shure SE535, etc. - just to mention a few.
As for music programs I mostly use Ableton Live, FL Studio and Reason. For Live I use Ableton Live and an iPad with touchOSC and Osculator (mac) or Pure Data with dsmidiwifi / midiyoke (Windows).
How was your experience of producing content for Reel Machines?
- Nice as always with Addictive Drums: Easy to handle sounds that sound very realistic but with all the tweaking options in AD.
Tell us a little bit about the coming Current Value album, what inspired you and what's the theme?
- The new album "Back To The Machine" works with a different concept: This time I went 99% modular using the Nord modular G2 for nearly everything: Bass/lines, Beatz (oh yes!!!), and Pads/Bleeps.
It is not a "No" to real drums or AD or classical synths! As said before: What's driving me most in making music is: "What are you actually up to" or "What do I do to get what I want". It was as well as with "2012 - The Day Of Silence" where I used Addictive Drums more or less dedicated to a certain way of making music.
Where can you listen to the album and where can you buy the album?
- For all info regarding that please go to
What would you like XLN Audio to do as the the next product in line?
- I would linke to see you do a modular drum module providing all high quality options you already have in Addictive Drums possibly providing synthesis / resynthesis opportunities.
What's next for you now?
- Next is definitely Dubstep which I admittedly am quite fond off. I am especially into the harder technoid side of it and have quite a few tunes upcoming on Subsistenz / Subtrakt.
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20-12-2010 - 17:05
