Page 19 - BiTS_09_SEPTEMBER_2021

BiTS: I wanted to talk to you about that because it sounds to me as though there are lots of other

instruments on it besides yourself. I can hear a fiddle, for example. Is that you?

HDC: No. Because in these little projects like extra
lockdown things, if you like, I just let my creative, I
don’t know what the word is…I just let rip
whatever and I’ve got some very, very fancy virtual
instruments and stuff that I’ve been collecting. You

have to still sort of play them on a keyboard and
you have to know a lot about things musically. You
can’t just drag and drop things onto it. It’s still a lot
of work, but no, I don’t play the fiddle. I noodled on
a bit of cello about 20 years ago and that’s about

my lot. I’d actually love to start back playing cello
properly, but I don’t think the neighbours would be
too keen on me practising, to be quite honest, but
no, I use these monthly projects as a chance to get
to grips with technology and instrumentation as
well as mixing virtual instruments with live
instruments and making it all sound as real as possible, basically.

BiTS: I have to say from my point of view that it sounds absolutely magical. I really do love it. It’s
terrific stuff. It must take you hours, though.

HDC: Yes. I’d love it to be as simple as like just bringing up a sound and playing it and there you
go, but it’s a lot of work to get something that sounds like a cello to sound like somebody is actually
sat playing a cello is a lot of hours of sort of meticulous work, but luckily I’m quite a perfectionist

when it comes to stuff like that. If I sit and it niggles at me, then I just don’t stand for it. I’ll work
for 12 hours on one part until I’m happy with it and then move on.

BiTS: This is the pair of albums that you invited people to suggest how the second part should go,
is it not?

HDC: Yes, my little experiment for all the guinea pigs.

BiTS: Did you get a lot of responses?

HDC: I got more than I thought, to be quite honest. I thought I might just get a handful and I think

it was close to about 100 people voted in the end, which surprised me. It doesn’t sound like a great
deal, but it is for a response for a Bandcamp throwaway thing and yes, and an overwhelming
majority of people voted for a zombie apocalypse. Say there was about 100, there was only about
four or five people voted against a zombie apocalypse and that just shows you the mindset of the
people that like my music. It was good fun. It was an idea that I had that I was going to run for the

entire year, starting from January to December. I was going to start a story and then I was going to
ask people every month how they wanted the story to progress, like a choose your own adventure
type thing and then in the end, I thought, no. For my sanity [chuckles], that’s going to be too much.

BiTS: [Laughs] Probably very wise of you.

HDC: But I do have plans to do something similar at some point down the line and tie it in with
some other bits and pieces, but I’m always trying to think of something a little bit different to keep