"We're all tired papas, for sure. I have live shows coming up, Beatport promotion, spoke with Front 242 the past couple of days - we'll start working on another album together, and am very psyched about that one! - then there's a project with a cello player I work with that needs mastering, and I'm releasing a few synth modules that I designed in the next couple of months: I hand-build every single one during my 'quiet' time. And, yes, I try to do this all while still having a day gig (I still remember when techno paid all the bills), and taking care of sick kids. Not enough hours in the day, mate."
So appraised Steve Stoll in a conversation we had late last year, when we were comparing notes about who was the busiest dad. Steve won, hands-down, though I like to think I gave him a minor run for his money.
And I'm betting that Trevor Wilkes, the esteemed head honcho behind Fun in the Murky, can also currently relate with the recent birth of his wee tacker.
Personally, I've been a huge fan of Stoll's since around 1995 - we're talking The Blunted Boy Wonder himself, one of techno's finest luminaries, a man who's cut records for NovaMute, Proper N.Y.C., Harthouse, Synewave, Djax-Up-Beats, and Mike Dearborn's Majesty Recordings - and we've been spasmodically in contact since then, mostly in order to do interviews for the Australian and Japanese press.
More recently we liaised to talk shop and organize a remix of 'Robota', the track I did with Toshiyuki Yasuda last year through Hypnotic Room.
His reconsideration of the track completely walloped us. This is unadulterated techno by someone who knows how to do the minimal thing, then combine that knack with Toshiyuki Yasuda's vocal line. I'd say he's hit the next plateau techno-wise.
"This is the original style of N.Y.C. minimalism - not a fashion statement, but a dissection of the original true-to-the-proper form," Stoll declared of the mix.
So, with the remix being collaboratively released through Hypnotic Room's techno sister label, Elektrax, and IF? Records, on 9 June 2009, it somehow seemed appropriate to cue-up another chat with one of the pioneers of contemporary IDM.
Everything starts somewhere, of course, and thus it is with Steve Stoll, although his 'humble' beginnings in the techno genre are a little different from the usual line towed by DJ/producers.
"I was a drummer and still am," he reports.
"I have a beautiful acoustic drum kit in one corner of my studio that I still try to play every day to keep my head straight. I became interested in electronic production in the late '80s while drumming for the Chicago based Wax Trax! label." While there, Steve worked on albums by Sister Machine Gun, amongst others. "I always combined acoustic with electronic, and I became intrigued by minimalist techniques at that same time," he muses.
For a man who's subsequently been hard at it for all the 1990s and most of this decade, it would be interesting to note what exactly keeps him motivated hitting the two-decade mark.
"It's really never ending," Steve says. "I do hit stagnant points where the motivation is not there - I hate repeating myself or a proven process, and always search for the new inspiration. I have always taken chances and will always continue to do so. Art should take risks or not exist, in my opinion."
It's this open-minded approach that would appear to hallmark Stoll's relationship with music and the people he works with. "I enjoy working with anyone that has a different take on music. I'm a student of all styles of music, and I feel that to be a true musician you need an open heart and mind."
In previous years, the producer has worked under alter-egos like The Blunted Boy Wonder, Acid Farm and Cobalt, but this side-stepping trend appears to be one that he's since relinquished.
"I'm always Steve Stoll [now]," he affirms, "However, my labels do have some variety. I have a new album on Dutch imprint, Databloem, with cello player Jeff Green, which I'm very proud of - cello and laptop together at last! I also have an experimental sub-label of Proper N.Y.C. called Locate, and it's through this that I'll release my next project. The next CD is based on circuits/oscillators that I have hand-built myself, and the entire project is composed with these very limited sound sources. I guess, in short, I'm always exploring musically - but in the end I am always me."
Which leads, more recently, to Stoll's involvement with IF? and Sydney label Elektrax Music, run by DJ Hi-Shock. The mutual collaboration has had easy beginnings, according to Steve. "Mutual respect and understanding of each others' work. I was asked to remix a killer track and could not refuse." Which leaves me kind of chuffed in completely new ways.
But in 2009 the topic of conversation on more people's lips has been the impact of the digital download phenomenon - both positive and negative - and the obvious effects on its vinyl predecessor.
"God, I miss vinyl, but we do not live in those days any longer," Stoll suggests. "I think we have a lot more music being released now, but I do miss the physical aspect of the 'product'. I don't even know where to buy vinyl these days... sad but true. I understand the frustration behind this, but the reality is the technology of vinyl is terribly outdated, and that is coming from someone who earned a good living pressing vinyl. I do not think that the physical medium of releasing music is done, far from it, but to me wax is over. Digital downloads are cheap - no overheads - and immediate. You can download on demand."
Stoll understands the swinging pressures and wildly disparate sales that digital download has created for record labels, as he's also run his own since 1994: the vital Proper N.Y.C. label that has featured himself, Cari Lekebusch, DJ Hyperactive and Fred Giannelli. So how does running a label in 2009 compare with running one in 1999?
"180 degrees different from the '90s," he says. "I don't use pressing plants and distributors anymore, I don't speak in person or via phone. Everything is e-mail. I miss the direct interaction with other humans. I miss the buzz of my fax machine in the A.M., I miss reading reviews that are printed on paper, in actual magazines. I am not sure I like where we are at, but I accept that change is necessary."
So where, exactly, would Stoll like to take his music from here?
"I want to make people think, not just dance."
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