Walking it's darkened corridors
Sand Snowman
m[m]: Tell us a bit about the origins of Sand Snowman? Where did the name come from?
Sand Well, for the past five years or so the music, sounds, paintings and ideas I have been producing seem to have formed into an identity of sorts, one that is somehow autonomous and independent from my everyday reality. The name arrived rather in the manner of most of my musical ideas; unbidden, origins unknown!
m[m]: Is this your first musically project?
Sand This is my first serious project (that is, with material released). Over the years I've been (usually casually) involved with a few bands, none of which lasted more than a gig or two.
m[m]: The project seems mainly yourself- I take it you does everything i.e. write, play and record everything your self?. (expect of course the female vocals)
Sand Yes, that's me plucking, blowing, bashing, scraping and strumming away
m[m]: What made you decide to use female vocals heavily in the project and not your own voice? And tell us a bit about the female singers you’ve used?
Sand Firstly, I have an extremely limited voice (to put it mildly), and it's highly important to me that the vocals, as with the instrumentation, convey the true feeling of the music. I tend to prefer female vocals, especially those with seductive siren, or ethereal elfin qualities. I tend to avoid the dry, "intimate" vocal sound employed by lots of singer/songwriter artists (which has a human, almost confessional quality, and which lots of people can immediately identify with, as it appears that the singer is directly addressing them). I aim instead for a diffused, "distant" sound (which is to some extent depersonalized but hopefully gives the impression of eavesdropping on angels, or half remembering a dream)
Sand Moonswift is my Girlfriend and sometime musical collaborator (I'm working with her at the moment on some seriously abstract guitar/bass excursions). Her vocals are ideal for my music (her own music is gorgeous and should be presentable soon). When I started work on "I'm Not Here" (Autumn 2006) I advertised for female vocalists, as I wanted to use several voices to give the tracks the sense of being different "chapters". Thus I met Jo Lepine and Nyx. Jo is a fine folk singer who is currently working with the Owl Service. Nyx is a multi talented New Yorker who provided her own vocal melodies and lyrics for "The Lamb", "Blue Eyed deVille" and "The Lantern". An actor friend called Jerome also contributed some splendid brooding vocals to "Twilight of the Dogs" and "Harvest and the Stars"
m[m]: All of you albums are adorned with creepy, tripped-out and sinister surreal artwork- do you do this your self?
Sand Yes, they are based on paintings of mine. I'm keen that the inner and outer atmospherics suit each other!
m[m]: The painting of the eerier stone building/ house on the front cover of your last release The Twilight Game is very fitting indeed- is this out of imagination or a real place? And do you think you put more artwork in upcoming releasers?
Sand The stone building is based on an old church near where I live (in East London), a building of haunting, desolate beauty. For me it has an evocative power, or sense of suggestion, that I desire to translate into music. I'm forever finding parallels between the aural and visual worlds (the "inner resonance" caused by visual or aural sensations are probably interchangeable).
Sand The painting is an elaboration on this (the sylph- like figure maybe personifying the ethereal quality of the scene and music). I would like to include more artwork but, for the moment, there are practical concerns (especially those of limited funds for the printing of complex sleeves)
m[m]: The Twilight game, like I'm not here(your first release?) starts off fairly balanced and normal in it’s feeling(through very eerier) but slowly & surely becomes more twisted, sinister and nightmarishly psychedelic. Almost if your telling an audio story that becomes more unnerving and terrorifying- do you script albums? And is there a story behind The Twilight Game?
Sand Actually, "I'm Not Here" is my second album, but I agree; they do stray into somewhat more beguiling territory!
It is definitely my intention that each album is in the form of a journey, and in the case of "The Twilight Game" & "I'm Not Here" there is a sense of an inward spiral, taking the listener closer to the heart of the work (or, more ambitiously, closer to the centre of themselves/their "shadow" selves, bringing to light hidden or just hitherto unknown aspects of their psyches).
Sand I get a very definite sense of the structure of an album, and the manner in which it should unfold. The sequencing of tracks (where they are placed) is in many ways as important as the tracks themselves. I pay as much attention to the whole as the parts. There isn't a story as such behind "The Twilight Game", but I think there's an implied "program", or journey. For me it has its own significance, but I leave it open to the listener's interpretation.
m[m]: You clearly have a real love of the gothic imagery, horror ect- what would you say has been the some of the biggest influence on this large side of your sound?
Sand Well, I admit to being a Romantic, and being drawn to the brooding, shadowy and perhaps unsettling. I'm not sure about horror; to me it's very much an acknowledgment and expression of the uncomfortable aspects of our psyches, so that the musical journey is a sort of catharsis. One of my central concerns is the expression of the mysterious, peripheral, half-imagined aspects of being, thus largely eschewing the more tangible, material "realities" of life. Suffice to say mine isn't music you listen to in preparation for a night out, unless that night out is in the heart of a forest or on the edge of jagged, storm- tossed cliffs!
Sand Also I should say that I'm heavily influenced by a lot of early 20th century music, such as Debussy, Scriabin, Schoenberg and Bartok, where conventional tonality and structures are eroded and new forms, sounds and sensations are made manifest (to me, at least). What I mean to say is that I don't find "advanced" harmony disconcerting, but I concur that there's very little light heartedness in my work!
m[m]: Have you ever been approached to do any soundtrack work? And are there any films/ books you’d like to have sound tracked?
Sand No, at least not yet. I'd have love to have scored Bergman's "The Seventh Seal"
m[m]: why would you like to score Bergman's "The Seventh Seal" & what appeals to you about the film?
Sand Firstly, I think it's a stunningly beautiful film. the imagery, characters and motifs (chess, minstrels, and a knight who has lost faith) are, to me, inspiring and poignant. I love how Bergman employs light (a soft light for the minstrel's family, suggesting the eternally innocent and hopeful. A rather harsh light for the devil and the troubled knight, signifying despair and doubt).
The film seems to inhabit the same twilit dimension as so much of my music (if I can be so bold!) and is for me a visual example to what I often try to achieve aurally
m[m]: Obsessive Creatures(your second release?) is quite different from your other two releasers been vocal less and featuring longer shifting tracks that have an almost soundtrack feel in places- is this something you’d like to investigate in the future?
Sand "Obsessive Creatures" is the first album and, I think for this reason, is more sprawling and (for me) slightly less focused than the other two. This was me stretching out, playing with sound, time and structures, in many ways finding my voice (by keeping my mouth shut). It contains the seeds of many ideas that manifested on the other two (and will be continued on the next one). I see all my work as siblings, and "Obsessive Creatures" is the sort of elder brother, building foundations, aurally expansive, and experimentally braking ground (and bearing the brunt) for it's more delicate, refined siblings
m[m]: Have every played live or every wanted to perform live?
Sand Actually I played an improvised set last month with Andrew Rowe (The Slate Pipe Banjo Draggers) and Alex Monk (Archslider) which I really enjoyed. Moonswift and I are putting together a set of sorts for early summer. I have, at the moment, no plans to play "my" material live as I just don't think I could do it justice, but in the future....
m[m]: You mentioned an improvised set live from last month- was this recorded
and if so any plans to release it? And what did it sound like?
Sand I'm afraid it wasn't (to my knowledge, at least) recorded. The line up was; me on acoustic guitar (doing my usual repetitive eerie thing), Alex on electric guitar and laptop, and Andy on very strange vocals (I don't know how to describe them!), laptop and miscellaneous odd toy instruments. The set could perhaps best be described as "psychedelic space folk electro- neurotic compulsive disorder".
Last autumn we three recorded a series of rambling improvisations, which at some stage will be edited and hopefully released on Andy's Mandolin records here
m[m]: You seemly fairly prolific – have you got anything else you’re working on at present & if so how much is it like to The Twilight Game material?
Sand I think it was Noel Coward who said that work is more fun than fun. I am utterly, if happily, obsessed with my work, so am probably comparatively prolific. I'm working on an album at the moment (tentatively entitled "Neurotic Zoo"), which I hope to have completed by summer. By the way, if any female vocalists are out there, get in touch. I have an insatiable appetite for voices (the curse of the non singer...)
The first and last tracks from "The Twilight Game" might give you an indication of its current sound, but its early days yet. I'd imagine it will bear some of the hallmarks of its three siblings but have its own distinct, and distinctly odd, personality. Watch this space
Thanks to sand for his time and efforts with the interview and supplying the pictures. The Twilight Game is out on Woven Wheat Whispers check it here and Sand Snowman’s my space is just here