Interviews

As heavily we are into our releases, as you can tell, we are as much involved and interested in the visual aspect and branding of our Label. Which is why I'd like to introduce to you, William Ghysels a.k.a. Droon, long time friend of Drop The Lime, who's been working closely with us over the past year on various record covers, flyers and even some videos! Check out what William had to say about his work with us and some of his own inspration, and go HERE to see some of what Droon has done for us.


And check out his 3D Sculpture for our T&B 5 Year Anniversary art show!

How/When did you first get involved with Trouble & Bass?
I booked Luca the Lime a few times when we were doing the Breakcore Gives Me Wood parties. I always had this "one big family" feel about the worldwide breakcore scene. Luca and MathHead played at our 16/6/6 show which was our biggest ever. Then he got all house-y, which was cool and which I followed with intent. (I even showed up at a 2006 november weekly, where I had my first and thus far only even Long Island Iced Tea. On the house! Tnx guys!) But all this house stuff was nothing I could use anymore. (My sole foray into booking a house music show was a disaster, ask AC!)   Then, when Luca came to Antwerp in... 2009? We had dinner and 'lil in the flesh hook ups often have this effect of propelling things into motion. Trouble & Bass in an awesome brand, It tingles with honest enthusiasm and energy. I was thrilled when y'all asked me to makes some designs. it's an honor to be a part of it!

    
Whats the story behind your work for the art show? Tell us about the process of your piece.
This 3D printing tech is awesome! I use it at work all the time but, there, my budgets are less constrained, here, i tried to make something as big as possible for as lil $$$ as possible, so that's why it looks all polygon skeletal. The t&b logo is a great form to play with. 

Do you have any inspiration for your own work/or this piece?
Sometimes.. I struggle with that, I'm not a big idea man, more of an executor … I do have ideas, lots, but very few of them are about what to put on a poster or a flyer or a record cover, so usually process leads to results even with minimal inspiration.. :)

 
What are some of your favorite T&B releases? What T&B artist(s) do you most relate with?
I honestly love all of it. The Deathface stuff obviously syncs up best with my personal brainwaves. I rock some Deathface whenever I do the radio show or when I do DJ sets that drift towards that noisy electro-rave edge, which is where I usually try to take it.  The Zombies For Money stuff it great, love tropical vibes. AC's big bass style really gets me bopping. Little Jinder is a freakishly unfair combo of talent and looks. Luca.. I don't know about Luca. Love his DJ sets, but the band and the getup.. when the talent/looks combo hits you from this side of the gender fence it's a bit.. threatening maybe? Also I don't like looking at bands. Can't dance and look at the same time. I don't like looking at DJ's either, but you're not supposed to so that's ok.. Super personal opinion of course, millions of concert goers luckily disagree with me.


Where do you draw inspiration from? Whats your work/thought process like?
There's designers with big bookcases full of TASHEN sublimations they need to look through before getting down, then there's one trick pony's that call that trick a "style". I do neither but kinda both.. Sometimes I find a trick that I play with a couple of times. Like now I run everything through the same colour grading process which I really like.. I use Lightroom, which is made for photographers, to grade my renders.. and there's this low poly 3d style I've used on quite a few T&B projects which I think looks cool.. these are looks inspired less by other artists then by the possibilities you discover in the tools you use. Of course recognizing that random software option as something that's "cool" is influenced by the vast amount of other cool stuff out there. You see some other low poly stuff in furniture design or something and that syncs you to the currents of contemporary culture . It works more that way I think.. OR.. when you try to copy/steal a style or period or theme, which I also do, it always ends up as something truly your own just by doing the work and going through the process. That also works..
 
What projects do you have coming up?
I bought a house and I need to get that 2k11 worthy, double glazing, insulating the roof. Nice rooms for the kids. That's gonna take a few years. I'm sliding down a slippery slope into the bog of suburban life. Less promotions, less gigs, never make new track anymore, less after hours freelance stuff. It's ok. Feels like growing up.


What's your favorite project you've worked on?
My kid. Fun project all the way through! Very engaging.. And "professional"? Tours. Tours are awesome. I did just enough of them so they never became a drudge..  Your days are so packed full of awesome people and sights and food and music. The shows on tour are better then home because your skill at playing gets better and better because you're doing it every other day. The whirlpool of energy in those 3-4-5 weeks is carbon based life compressed into memory diamonds. The best one was probably Japan-Australia in 2007 but the USA tour in 2009 is a close second.



Do you prefer/how often do you work on projects that are music related?
Flyers/posters/covers are great because apart from what text needs to be on it, they allow total creative freedom. Anything, really anything can supplement music in a way that adds meaning to it. You can develop your own styles and interests over the course of several unrelated covers and flyers. I find it very hard to motivate myself to make something truly personal, "a drone original", I always need a client with a deadline. In music related design, that client/deadline yet total freedom combo is gold!  But.. when you hit a dry spell inspiration wise, that's also a curse. Then making some renders of some architect's already drawn up plans is far easier. If you can't get into that baah-fuck-it-let's-go-boom-tsjak vibe and really crank out something that supplements the music nicely and is insane awesome, then sometimes you don't really vibe with what you've made but don't really know how to improve it.  It gets commented on by the "client" in semi productive ways and it gets drawn out and either becomes this lukewarm puddle of compromise, or through frustrating long nights still becomes something nice but maybe not worth all the trouble. That happens. But it's really really up to you as a designer, you can't blame anyone else for failure. Which makes success taste much sweeter.