1). Who is Q-Burns Abstract Message and where did the name come from? What do
you do?

• Q-BAM is I, your friendly neighborhood frantic funky monkey DJ who often makes wild noises on top of repetitive beats through electronic toil and mystery.
• The name is a combination of the old radio term “cue burn,” which is the sound a vinyl record makes as it gets scratchy and unplayable at the cue point, and a popular video game character (and not the popular American DMC champ DJ).

2). Tell us more about your musical journey? What lead to you taking that route than
anything else?

• One of the first albums I was given as a child was Beach Boys’ Pet Sounds which I loved, listened to, became fascinated and obsessed with, and then eventually studied. This led to discovering other “producer” albums later in my early teens, like Who’s Afraid Of The Art Of Noise? And Fear Of Music and more obvious statements like Dark Side Of The Moon. Most of my 14 year old friends wanted to be guitar heroes. I wanted a Solid State Logic mixing desk and a Fairlight sampler.

3). You’ve been in the music scene for more than a minute. What does music mean to
you?

• Well, it’s all I know how to do, from a working standpoint. And from a relationship standpoint, it’s my first love.

4). How did you get into the whole music scene? The music scene is looked at as
being very glamorous. As an insider; is the dance music scene as glamorous as most
people tend to think it is?
• I worked my way into the scene through quite a bit of sacrifice and stubbornness. Those two can be a winning, though also challenging, combination.
• I get messages all of the time from new DJs wanting to know the secret to instantly making a name for themselves in the scene. This can sometimes be off-putting as it took me over a decade to get to the point of having steady gigs and any records released, and some of those years involved unintentional character-builders like living in a house with no electricity so I could save money for records. There are some instant champions, sure, but generally their reign is brief. The glamour is probably there for some, and I saw a touch of it back in the ‘electronica’ heyday, but I think I prefer rolling around in the mud. I believe it keeps my music relevant and makes it sound better rather than what might happen if I became out of touch with the dancers.

5). Which genre of music do you specialise in and which is your personal favourite?
How do you source the music you play?

• I’m a house music DJ which, for me, means I can play things ranging from Marvin Gaye and Dinosaur L to Art Of Tones and Yam Who. I’m really into a natural funk in tracks, rather than the ‘forced’ one which you unfortunately hear quite often these days. I like things a bit more musical rather than tracky, though there are some tracky cuts that have a load of musical power. I like music that “makes sense” rather than sounding like a bunch of bits thrown together without much thought. I’m not really into what I call “temporary music,” which are tunes that might sound good on the dance floor right now due to trendy production techniques and flavor-of-the-month sounds but will be in the dustbin in six months’ time. This sounds like I’m quite picky and critical but I’m still astonished by music every day and constantly hear tracks that I absolutely love.
• I’m always looking for music, whether it be in the bins of cool record shops like Black Pancakes in San Francisco (http://www.blackpancakerecords.com/) or previewing digital goodies on Juno Download (which I’m actually doing while writing this answer!).

6). How do you manage being a producer and DJ? Do you still find the time to relax?
• I often have to force myself to relax. There’s a bit of danger in doing what I love for a living in that I tend to work all of the time, from my waking hour to bed time. It’s a bit of a struggle to pay the bills doing this, and I could certainly have a life with a lot more relaxation and less stress doing something else, but I’m possessed by these musical demons. No escape.
• As far as managing producing and DJ’ing at once, it all sort of blurs together. The only real difference is DJ gigs sometimes give me no choice but to relax, in the form of chilling on a long airplane flight.

7). You’re a traveller of note. You recently came back from South America. How was
the trip? What is the biggest event you’ve ever performed at? What would be your
ultimate performance and where?

• To paraphrase real noted traveler Henry Rollins, any place I haven’t been only exists to taunt me. Thus my ultimate gig would really be to just play somewhere that I haven’t been yet. I love the adventure, the surprise, and the challenge of gauging dance floors in different cities and countries. South America was fantastic, as it always is. I think South America is my favorite continent to visit and play … I always make amazing friends and have life-affirming gigs each time I venture to the south. This time I visited and played throughout Chile and Brazil for a few weeks. I have a photo gallery of my travels here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/qburns/sets/72157624480887712/
• I’m not sure what my largest gig would be. I did some tours with The Chemical Brothers and Fatboy Slim in the late 90’s and those were some pretty huge crowds. Honestly, the gigs with the most people are often not the best gigs or the ones I remember.

8). Give us a breakdown a day or night in the life of Q-Burns Abstract Message? What’s the preparation like, leading up to an event, and what happens afterwards? What kind of diet you eat
to maintain?

• Generally I wake up quite early in the morning (never later than 8 AM, sometimes as early as 6 AM) and after brewing a pot of thick coffee I get to work. This can involve the studio, running my two labels (EIGHT-TRACKS and Eighth Dimension), managing my promotions company (8DPromo), or just general e-mail answering and Q-BAM tasks. With maybe a couple breaks in the day I usually work until about 7 PM. This often takes place seven days a week unless I’m on the road. Again, not very glamorous, but my workaholic nature likes the pace.
• If I have a gig coming up then leading up to it I’m going through music (I try to add at least 8 songs, per gig, to my set before each one, and take out the same amount, to keep the sets somewhat fresh and interesting). I play CDs now, but I treat them just like vinyl 12”s, so this means burning a CD for each song and printing the cover art to go on each CD sleeve. Then, of course, the usual stuff like checking itineraries, packing, reserving seats on the flight, figuring out who’s driving me to the airport, and so on.
• I try to keep a healthy diet, especially on the road. I generally don’t eat meat (though I have a well-known weakness for raw fish) and make an effort to eat natural foods and loads of vegetables. I don’t step foot in chain restaurants partly for health and mostly because they bore me. When I travel I try to eat the food that is a specialty of the region I’m in, as everyone should.

9). Is the music industry your only source of income. Are there any other ventures that
you are involved in?

• It’s my only source of income, yes. A side aspect of the Eighth Dimension record label is a licensing arm which represents a number of artists (myself included) for film and television licensing. That part is probably plays the biggest role in keeping me afloat most of the time.

10). What about time with family and friends – How do you manage that?

• After 7 PM, if there are no gigs, my work day usually ends and I’m free to hang with the friends and fam. Of course I can occasionally allow myself a day or two off for visiting family or going away on beach trips, but only after working overtime on the days leading up.

11). Given your insight into what’s fresh on the music scene, what do you think the
trend for new year will be? Has the economic climate affected your pocket? What are
you thoughts on file sharing? Does it affect your pocket?

• I stopped predicting trends a long time ago. I never get it right. I usually end up just revealing what I’d like to see happen rather than what might actually happen. That said, I do like the trend of beats and tracks getting a bit more organic and strict guidelines to a 125+ tempo no longer being followed in DJ sets. I’d like to see this continue.
• The economic climate has most definitely affected my pocket. I don’t know anyone who can’t say the same.
• I don’t really concern myself too much with file sharing as long as it’s done obviously out of respect and with a love for the music. It bugs me when 320 kbps MP3s of a full EP anonymously go up on Rapidshare the week it’s been released, but I find a discerning music blog posting a 192 of a track along with a recommendation or review a bit complimentary.
• I’m really not sure of sharing’s effect on sales, and I’m certainly not convinced. Losses due to the Internet may be offset by its potential for inexpensive, creative promotion and the hitting of an incredible number of ears. Though there was more money coming in back in the vinyl 12” days I wasn’t necessarily making more as the costs of manufacture and promotion were so high. I’m also not sure if I’d still be involved in the music industry if it continued to work like it did fifteen years ago. I think I’d become way too jaded and frustrated. The way things are now are unpredictable and just plain fun. It keeps me creative and intensely interested.

12). Let’s be real… How many groupies does Q-Burns get?

• Not too many. Back when I used to play in an experimental rock band I used to be greeted after gigs by geeky guys with glasses asking me about my vintage guitar pedals. Things haven’t changed that much.

13). Have you had any awkward moments with fans? Have you performed at an event
that made you go ”WTF???”

• There are quite a few so I’ll give you the first one that comes to mind. Over a decade ago I was booked to play a street party in Berlin and the promoter paired me up with various breakdancing crews, including one from NYC that featured members of the original Rock Steady Crew. Of course, I didn’t know this ahead of time so the musical selections I packed weren’t exactly spot on, but I made it work and it ended up being pretty damn cool. There was a tall German guy who spun around on his head non-stop for like five minutes during one of my tunes. The top of the dude’s head was one big round callus.

14). Did you always know you’d end up where you are today? Do you have any
qualifications under your belt for any studies you may have completed or still busy
with?

• I studied Radio/Television Production in college but it was just an excuse to get me in front of some sort of mixing desk. I do have my degree but I never quite had the aspiration to go into that field. I knew I’d always be involved in music production in some way because, as above, it’s all I know how to do. There never really was a “Plan B.”

15). What’s in store from Q-Burns Abstract Message? What aspirations do you have?

• I’m just finishing my next EP which will be titled “Dark Roots.” I’ve got a bevy of remixes to finish in the next month and am putting together quite the busy release schedule for EIGHT-TRACKS and Eighth Dimension Records involving many artists who aren’t me. I’m hoping to finally get through the seemingly ill-fated third Q-Burns Abstract Message album within sixth months, or it just might end up being an endless series of EPs. I haven’t decided yet. As for aspirations, I would like to do more production for other artists and bands. I’ve done some production work for a couple of South American bands and it would be great to do more in that continent. This would also give me more excuses to travel back down to South America. Ulterior motives are everywhere.

16). Do you like to work alone or to collaborate? What would be your ultimate
collaboration?

• I prefer to work alone. My creative process is quite private and involves a lot of instinctual techniques that don’t really lend themselves to collaboration. I’ve collaborated with others before and in a few cases it worked out great but in most it just slowed things down. The most important thing for me in the studio is for the time it takes for an idea in my head to come out of the speakers to be as short as possible. Anything that slows this down, whether it be another person or faulty gear or a broken air conditioner or whatever just gets me frustrated. That said, I dig working with great vocalists who can also write, funky flute players, and bass guitarists who can perform really fast disco runs.

17). Who do you regard (aside from yourself ) as a producer or performer that’s
making strides in the industry?

• I’m a little out of touch with who’s who at the moment (blame my insular work schedule) but I do really like what my friends Sleazy McQueen and Atnarko are doing, and their profiles are rising thanks to their efforts and quality releases.
• I tend to respect musicians and producers with big ambition, meaning that they are creating for more than their circle of friends or their particular scene. In house music (and I’m sure in every other genre scene) you see a lot of DJs who act like they are more famous than Kanye because they had a track in the Beatport top 20 and got to play out of town last weekend. That’s good and fine but they don’t realize their music suffers without a bit of humility. If one thinks they’ve hit a certain level, and all their friends are telling them how great they are, then there’s no impetus to push their music to be innovative or any different from what their friends are already hearing. I think one should always be trying to achieve attention outside of their sub-genre’s scene and circle of fan-friends. Consistently taking musical chances and ambitiously moving forward as an artist is the best (and most enjoyable) way to do so.

18). How may budding producers or DJs get in touch with you should they be
interested in working with you?

• I’m more than happy to be contacted via my web site: http://www.q-burnsabstractmessage.com/qb/contact-q-burns/ … either I, or someone claiming not to be me, will soon respond!

19). In terms of the music you make, are there certain music programs you use? What
is the secret to the sound you make?

• I’ve been a big fan of Logic Audio for over a decade. It just gets better and better, especially in terms of sound quality. I also like FXpansion’s Guru for my drums, and the entire range of Togu Audio Line’s free plug-ins. In terms of software or plug-ins, I’m not one of those people who has to have the latest thing and has thousands loaded up in a computer. I use the same dozen (or less) plug-ins in everything as I feel I can get superior and unique sounds out of them from years of getting to really know the few I use inside and out. I also still mix in the analog realm, through an old 24 channel mixing desk, and record into a Korg MR-1000 1-Bit DSD Recorder. I also use loads of outboard analog effect boxes and rusty guitar pedals. My Roland Chorus Echo tape delay is a constant force in my production. I think all of these elements, based on a couple decades of studio building and pruning, are the “secret to my sound” in that my set up is completely my own.

20). Who is your favourite Power Ranger?
• I’m too old for this question. My early childhood was spent collecting the first wave of Star Wars toys and, before that, this Evel Knieval doll that you would wind up and it would jump over things on a little motorcycle. I don’t know anything about Power Rangers.

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