Martin Luther King Chavez Dosh is a long, evocative name, but it fits the man who can play many instruments and wear many hats. As the drummer for Fog and Lateduster or on his own as a solo artist since 2002, Dosh has carved out a nice space for himself in electronic music and even hip-hop. As one of many sonic laborers in Minnesota's still-underrated music scene, he's mastered the art of the densely layered instrumental that manages to escape easy classification. His work fits in so many different places, which is probably why he's worked with artists as different as Atmosphere and Andrew Bird.
this audio or video is no longer availableDosh's recently released fourth full-length Wolves and Wishes shows off his talent for soundtracking, as he leaps from piano to drums and parts outward to create a dizzying stack of high-speed songs that sound so crystalline that one worries they might crash into other. Listening Post caught up with Dosh about Wolves, why the Twin Cities deserve more love, and why tech has saved him but the internet still confuses him.
Wired.com Listening Post: So, what are you calling this strange musical mixture?
Dosh: I would probably describe the sound as "polyrhythmic hypermelodic drone," or something silly like that.
LP: Nice. What gear are you using?
Dosh: The gear is relatively minimal. My four most-used instruments are Fender Rhodes, Korg EX-800 Synth Module, Dr.Sample SP-303, and an Akai Headrush pedal, all of which I use to compose the basic structures of my songs. I track all the drums to two-inch tape, before transferring it to Pro Tools. I do most of my edits at home or at Ben Durrant’s Crazy Beast Studio, also in Pro Tools. Once the basic form is figured out, I bring in other musicians to contribute textures that I can’t get on my own: guitars, horns and strings. Those textures are generally improvised over my forms, giving me plenty of material to pick through, re-sample and organize into the song.
LP: This disc really gallops. What's with the frenetic backbeats?
Dosh: The past few years, I’ve been really getting into composing lines on the EX-800, which I use mostly to multi-track sequences. For some reason, they sound best to me when they are fast. Of course, that also makes it difficult to learn how to play them on the Rhodes or piano, but that’s part of the fun. Just looking at the SP-303, the average BPM would probably be 120. I think I like those faster tempos because they are easier to subdivide: A melody in halftime can sit very nicely over the top. There’s also something about playing live drums over these sequences that I just can’t get enough of. These tempos keeps me on my toes when I’m playing live. Almost out of control, but not quite.
LP: This disc seems to be as into the guitar as the drums. That counterposes nicely with your atmospherics.
this audio or video is no longer available**this audio or video is no longer availableDosh: I play a few of the guitar parts on the record, but I leave most of the work to guys like Jeremy Ylvisaker and Andrew Broder, who actually know what they are doing. For Ylvis’s parts, he ran his guitar through an old reverb tank and then into a tiny solid-state amp. Broder pretty much just played straight up, with some distortion, into my Traynor tube amp. He came up with that awesome hook on "If You Want To, You Have To." Bryan Olson played guitar on the last few tunes, closely following the sequenced parts and echoing the piano melodies.
LP: Talk about the Twin Cities. Do you think its musical legacy is underrated?
Dosh: I guess I do feel like it is. Obviously, we get credit for the stuff that came out of the '80s, but there have been so many great bands and artists around since I moved back here in 1997, that it would take a while to list them all. Perhaps because I’ve played in a lot of different bands, I tend to see all the different scenes here as being interconnected. I see my own music as a kind of extension of the early '00s electronic scene here. My experiences in the bands Fog and Lateduster, seeing others like Poor Line Condition and Tiki Obmar, plus all of the improv electronic stuff that was happening almost nightly at the Clown Lounge and the Dinkytowner really helped me focus on finding a sound that was unique. When everybody else’s work is really good, really good ceases to cut it. You have to be really good and different.
LP: I think time will tell the full story of Minny's gifts.
Dosh: A lot of the music that happened here in those years was archived, so perhaps someday, somebody will sort it all out and present it to the world in a coherent way. Regardless, I wouldn’t want to live anywhere else.
LP: How has digital tech changed the way you work?
Dosh: My entire live show is built upon the use of multiple loop pedals, so without that technology, I wouldn’t be able to perform. People keep telling me to get Ableton, but I’m pretty set in my ways.
LP: How about the internet?
Dosh: The greatest thing about the internet, as far as artistry goes, is how easy it has made it to collaborate. Working with Pro Tools and trading files with other artists is a pretty amazing development, for me anyway. The idea that I could collaborate on a song with someone from Japan or Norway with such ease blows my mind.
LP: OK, now for the bad news.
Dosh: One of the things that drives me crazy about the internet, and digitized music in general, is the proliferation of MP3s. I think they sound horrible. I would rather hear AM radio in mono than listen to MP3s. I would hate to bear that in mind when mixing a record, like, "How is this going to sound as an MP3?" But I suppose maybe I’ll have to from here on out. And figuring out how to get paid is tough. Certainly, kids burning CDs and illegally downloading my music has been good for me, as far as me reaching more people, and it's not like I’m making that much more than nothing from iTunes. But there does seem to be an underlying feeling these days of, "Where is this whole thing going?" It seems like the only real way to make any money is to tour and sell LPs and CDs at shows, but I’m fine with it. Performing this music in front of other humans is the greatest job I could have ever imagined.
Photo: Cameron Wittig
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