The liquid world reached us.
In an increasingly accelerated musical landscape, where songs seem to be consumed as quickly as they are forgotten, RUVENRUVEN emerges with a proposal that questions that immediacy and inhabits it from within. After years of working as a producer for other artists, the musician takes an intimate and risky leap towards his solo career. Now, his new EP, Liquidis a critical reflection on the way in which we consume art today: fast, fleeting and, many times, disposable.
Indie Rocks! Magazine: Let's start this talk by talking about your jump to solo artist coming from producing different artists.
RUVENRUVEN: I, in fact, did… let's say that, despite having produced for other artists, at the same time I had also been composing for myself and making songs, ideas, and, well, what happens with the courage, with the… yes, to release them, to publish them, and also everything that that entails. The exposure that comes with being the face of a project and also pouring yourself sentimentally into something you are going to write and create.
Despite having produced for other artists, I had never turned to composing and, rather, releasing my songs, because it was something I had done—composing for myself—but I had never decided to: come on, let's release it. And it seemed like a challenge and an emotional risk that I wanted to face. Like saying: okay, let's see how I can do this. And if I'm capable of doing it, because maybe I wasn't. So, while I was studying a master's degree in production at Berklee, at a music university, well I said: this is the perfect time to force myself to do this and see what happens. And, well, the truth is that I was very happy because something came out that I was very happy and proud of. And I was able to measure success in “I like what came out” and, well, there, really, at that moment.
GO!: At the same time that you are making your own music, you are also judging yourself with the mind of a producer. How are you doing with that fusion of having these two perspectives in your mind when creating?
A: It is quite complicated to know what phase you are in. Because really, being producer, Like I compose while I'm producing and I produce while I'm composing.
So, the two roles start to overlap and I have had to learn to be quite stoic and be able to say: okay, I'm in the composition phase. I'm not just going to take a piano, voice or guitar and voice; I'm not going to get too involved with how it sounds or what synth I'm going to put on, but I'm simply making the body of the song. And then in the production phase, that's when I judge the song.
And I have also learned – because I have made mistakes when making songs and, let's say, that I have messed up in the process – that it is very good for me to separate them in time. Say: okay, well I compose the song and I'm not going to produce it for a month. And so, like, in some way, I am a different person from the person who composed it and I can judge that person a little, or that artist or that song, from an outside that is not 100% outside, but hey, I try.
GO!: When you started this solo project you were already coming from a lot of genres in which you had worked, how did you know how to define which musical genre to move towards?
A: Let's see, I was really lucky to, in Valencia, be working with artists who were very close to what I like to do, they were projects in which I could express a little, as a producer, the genres that I liked to compose and do. So, when I bring out the project, it's really a bit of a hangover from all that and, well, going back to your question, I realized that I wanted to keep throwing it out there. Let's also say with the freedom that it is my own project and that I can take it to the places I want, that in the end the beautiful thing is that, since I don't have anyone telling me what the theme should be, I can do a little bit what I want. It's kind of like a laboratory, so it's fun.
GO!: And how self-demanding you are, because in this same train of thought of “you only have yourself” it must be complex.
A: Yes, well look, I kind of think I haven't learned how to do it yet. It's like, until I know it's one hundred percent, in my opinion, I'm not able to let it go. It's like: “no, that's it, but there's a little noise here, I have to mix it again.” I have to fix it. So, like at that point, it's true that maybe I haven't matured enough yet, but I have learned to mature a little bit — and also that it fits or relates to the motif of the new EP that's coming out now, which is called Liquid— is not measuring the success of things with the digital impact it may have.
Because when I released the first album I was very overwhelmed and it became very difficult for me, very heavy, to have to be there so attentive to the reactions and for the success of the song to be measured by that. And so, with this EP, I have learned that I should mentally position myself more to measure success with “I am happy with the project”, “I think it has turned out something artistically beautiful or not”, and, if so, then be satisfied.
GO!: In contrast, what differences were there between your music since Plastic Boy And what things did you see now in this new material?
A: The first thing I did was… I became very obsessed with it… in the end, as I told you, it is a kind of laboratory in which I test things that I can later apply to other projects or other productions. So every project I've done so far, what I've done is become obsessed with something and try to exploit it to the fullest. Find particular sounds.
The first was the glitch digital and the overexploitation of resources software. And that was in Plastic Boy. And this second EP —and also as a consequence of the speech I was telling you about trying to relax in terms of the reactions and all this— I decided to do something that was much more acoustic, more natural and that, despite being a bit the style that I had been doing in Plastic Boyhad more of a room sound; how to investigate reverbsthe sounds a little more natural, let's say.
GO!: And now getting into the topic of this new material, tell us about the concept behind Liquid and Bauman's philosophy that the same material takes up.
A: Well, this was… I didn't handle emotionally managing the hangover from the first album very well and, after that, I kept making songs that had nothing to do with each other and it was like: well, I'm making songs. And I came across again Baumannwith a book Bauman; I was with a friend, with Robin Madridand he told me: “I'm just re-reading this and such.” I said: come on, I'm going to read it again.
And I became dazzled by this again and I began to realize that, in reality, I could create a kind of relationship between what is liquid love or the liquid life of which Baumann It talks about what had happened to me within the distribution of music and the reaction it could have.
And, well, the idea occurred to me to lower that concept a little to the musical context and try to denounce it – not in a way like a teacher or wanting to teach something – but from a personal perspective of how I had felt and how I saw that it could be related to all this.
And it was like saying: well, in the end I upload a song that is a feeling from a day or a certain moment and it ends up converted into a code of ones and zeros, a code, an ISRC, along with three billion more codes of the same type. And it seems like the way we consume art and music right now is kind of very fast-paced. It's like: I'm tired, I've heard it once, I'm tired, I need another one.
And, well, that's where the whole idea goes a little: suddenly, creating a product called Liquidtry to make the simile between a song and a juice that they sell in the supermarket and that is, well, a thousand flavors and mega addictive.
GO!: It seems that music is becoming a very disposable product when, at the time, with the object—the record as an object—you had to go through a whole process to consume it. Now, well, it also has to do with the democratization of music, with accessibility: it is easier to listen to music, but there are also some risks that advance along with modernity and that have to do with what is disposable.
A: Completely. I mean, the idea is in that simile and it's not that it's either good or bad: other formats come out, other things come out and, as you say, this way of consuming music also allows many artists to be in the spotlight in some way and to be able to get our stuff out and publish it in a simpler or more realistic way. As if not, perhaps at another time it would not have been possible.
In other words, it is not only something bad, it is simply like: there is good and there is bad. And on the bad side, there is all this risk of falling. And one thing, for example, that surprises me a lot is that the way of composing songs has changed a lot, what the objective is of how a song should be and such. And in that new formula there are incredible things and there are things that begin to be perhaps a little repetitive, of wear and tear and sporadic consumption, and that can be a little unhealthy for some artists.
GO!: To close this interview, with what message do you invite the entire band who is going to read this note to listen to your new music?
A: Well, nothing, I would like you to stop, for this EP to help you take a break and listen to five songs at once that I have made from the heart and that talk about very personal things, and that come in a ready, easy and direct package for consumption.
Listen to the new RUVENRUVEN here:
