Matom – Love Mistakes

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Matom – Love Mistakes

Some records are birthed through countless months or even years of studio hard yaka; drafts, followed by re-drafts, an eternal process of searching for that money shot musical moment.  Then there are albums that simply pour out of the collective minds of its creators – more of a stream of consciousness and musical expressions that strategic beat creation.
 
For best friends and long time collaborators Matt Edwards (aka Radio Slave) and Thomas Gandey (aka Cagedbaby and producer). Matom began as a one off project to create an hour of music to celebrate the iconic Hansa recording studios in Berlin, a space that’s seen everyone from David Bowie and Iggy Pop to Tangerine Dream and Brian Eno. 
 
Says Edwards “The initial music was loosely based around the recording of David Bowie’s ‘Low’ and the works of Iggy Pop and I wanted to create these soundscapes that would allow Thomas to improvise and we managed to come up with seven songs in two days.”
 
From this auspicious beginning the project continued to pick up pace and the pair soon performed in Warsaw alongside revered Kosmiche figurehead Manuel Gottsching and a few months later at the Name festival in Lille, France.
 
Splitting time between Gandey’s home and studio outside Bordeaux and Edward’s studio in Kreuzberg, Berlin, the pair continued to create. The duo adopted a free-flow approach to production, with Gandey talking warmly about creating sounds for the Matom Project.  They’d cook together, eat fine food, and then sit down to work on the music together.
 
Gandey describes Edwards as the “master of minimal”, building up the soundscapes and beats before Thomas filled out the compositions with various keyboards from his collection including a Fender Rhodes, Moog Voyager, Clavia Nords, Roland Drum Machines and live percussion and finally another collaborator Paul Sandrone would improvise on guitar at the final stages of production.
 
The entire essence of Matom’s sounds is based around live takes and recorded snippets of conversations and ambiences from their tours, with no MIDI or samples so when they joined the line up for the Pyramids of Mars label showcase at Berghain’s Kantine it was a seamless transition from studio to stage.  Their last gig was once again for the Red Bull Music Academy in Miami WMC 2014 to perform the finished album for the people who first inspired and supported the project.
 
And so Matom’s ‘Love Mistakes’ is signed sealed and delivered, a work Gandey describes as “a culmination of our combined skills and reflecting its contrasting environments, a dualism between the cosmic serenity of the vineyards in his south of France retreat and the gritty urban cityscapes of Berlin’s bohemia.”
 
A brief track by Track breakdown by Matom’s Thomas Gandey
 
1. Crossroads – The album opens with Crossroads, which sets the scene, a beatless dystopian ambient soundscape featuring Rhodes.
 
2. Experiment 1 Variation 3 – As the name suggest we had a lot of tracks to choose from, this one based around one of the original improvised Piano sessions we recorded in Bordeaux.  Cuban Piano backs a driving drum, and one of the most fun to play live.
 
3. Hansa – Named after the primary inspiration for the project. This is a paradise travelogue, written on Rhodes, a percussive playground.
 
4. Warsaw – Named and written for our 2nd live performance, very much inspired by Berlin and cruising along the rivers.
 
5. Zazu – Another meditative ambient work, inspired by early Concrete musique and tribal percussion and mostly reversed, modular synthesis and sequencers back the Rhodes.
 
6. Piano 2 Variation 4 – Piece for Solo Piano using live looping, building and diminishing, an ideal club tool
 
7. Experiment 7 Variation 2 – Middle Eastern Piano heavily delayed with string swells.
 
8. Love Mistakes – The title track of the album, electronic pads, Rhodes and broken groove.