In one of those moments where great ideas struck, I got the idea of doing interviews with artists from Agos. Both Maria and I want to compliment our label with interesting content, and we couldn’t be more excited to see where this journey will take us.
For our first talk, we met with Kontinum (Jonas Wernicke). He’s an artist with a distinct sound that we love. His EP Fallow Mind left quite an impression on many people. Our fruitful collaboration doesn’t end there, as he’ll be back on Agos with another exceptional EP soon!
Friday, 18th June 2021
On the one hand, there was Maria, I and our dog Medo in our studio in Singapore, and far away in Leipzig was Kontinum, likewise in his studio room. Thanks to Zoom, satellites and technology for making this possible!
V: No, no, I can’t hear you again. What? Oh, yeah, now it’s good. Great to see you! What’s up, bro?
J: Not much, not much, just sitting at home.
V: How are you doing?
J: Pretty good lately. It’s way too hot at the moment. I think we have about 30 degrees outside, and inside my flat should be around 35 to 40 degrees because it’s directly under the roof, yet I’m basically melting away here, hahaha.
V: Shit. In Singapore, it’s the same; it’s been crazy hot in the last few weeks, also difficult to sleep as well. Yeah. So how are you doing, man? What’s up?
J: Right, at the moment, I’m doing pretty good. But this year wasn’t always easy for me. The whole pandemic situation attacked my state of mind pretty hard. But now we have good weather and fewer Covid restrictions. It gets better and better now; I’d say I’m pretty fine, actually. Yeah.
M: What do you listen to lately?
J: Actually, not too much stuff. I only really listen to music when I plan podcasts or doing sets. But when I do, there are two sets. One is from Kia, it’s a Drum and Bass set. It’s my favorite at the moment. And, the other one is from Yan from Prague. This one is a definition for me for good vibes festival music. Actually, later today, I’m going to Prague with some friends and Yan is playing at the event on Saturday. I’m really looking forward to this! It will be my first rave in 18 months or so!
V: What are the things that inspire you in life?
J: In music, most of the inspiration I get is from club events, or festivals, or open sets and stuff like that. But yeah, because I didn’t attend such an event in 19 months, it’s hard to get any inspiration from that. At the moment, I’d say
my modular synthesizer is my biggest inspiration
because I got it very recently, and there’s still a lot of stuff to explore. Every time I get my hands on it, something really, really nice and unexpected comes out of it.
M: What is the most inspiring set you’ve ever heard?
J: It’s from Polar Inertia, the XLR8R podcast. I discovered it four years ago, and it’s still one of my favorite sets.
M: What is the best festival experience you’ve had?
J: I have actually two. The first one was in 2017 at the Freqs Of Nature festival. It’s mainly a psytrance and drum bass festival. But they have a very good techno stage, including most of the hypnotic techno artists. And in 2017, I was wandering around and heading to the main stage. And without knowing who plays there, there was an artist, Current Value; he makes very hard drum and bass and technoid stuff. And he played on a huge, really, really huge function one sound system. I never heard something like this before; it was outstanding. The combination of his music and his performance, and his overall sound quality was just insane.
My second one was one year later, so 2018, at Freqs Of Nature as well. Takaaki Itoh was playing a six-hour closing set at the techno stage on Sunday. All of us already had three or four days in our bones, and yeah, we didn’t get much sleep and stuff like that. We didn’t have any energy anymore, but somehow his set managed to get us dancing for like six hours straight. And I still cannot explain where the energy suddenly came from. It has to be music.
V: Do you watch Netflix, or you’re always on your modular?
J: Haha, I’m usually watching shows, like series and not so many movies. Yeah, my favorite series of all time is probably South Park. Oh, I watched every episode, like eight to ten times. And, yeah, I’m really, really into it. And another show I really enjoy is Black Mirror. I really liked the aesthetics and the message behind it. Once, I got back from a rave, and with my mind already twisted, I watched some Black Mirror. It was very, very intense. I really loved it! But most of the time, I don’t really watch Netflix, I’m more into documentaries and stuff like that, and I also try to avoid watching Netflix and stuff during the day.
M: What are some of the most inspiring albums for you?
J: I think it’s from Pendulum. Hold Your Colour. I think I discovered it about 10 or 11 years ago, and it was my entry to the whole world of electronic music. I was primarily listening to hip hop and rap before that. And somehow, this album got into my hands. I had it on repeat for like two years. Every time I went on the bus or train, I always listened to it.
V: What are some of your favorite labels right now?
J: I think my most favorite label is Semantica. They have a huge and brilliant catalog, and recent releases are always top-notch as well. Besides that, I’m a huge fan of Lowless. Sophian really does a good job there. And then there’s Prologue. It’s the label that had a huge influence on me. Unfortunately, they don’t do any releases anymore.
V: When it comes to food, what’s your favorite dish?
J: I’m not really into food at all; I don’t enjoy the act of eating.
V: Really??? Hahaha, wow!
J: I just eat to nourish myself. Of course, I don’t hate eating. That’s not the case. But I don’t really like cooking. And I don’t really see the point of enjoying food. But if I have to decide, I will probably say, pizza Diavola. That’s something I really like. And one of the few things I can enjoy. But most of the time, my eating is very simple.
M: Is there any unique street food in your city?
J: It’s not very unique. But close to my home, there’s a little food truck, which sells very nice sandwiches. I go there once or twice a week. And it’s always great. And it’s not like the basic Subway. It’s handmade and of excellent quality for the price.
V: Tell me a bit about Leipzig; how is life over there?
J: I think it’s the best town for me to do what I do because it’s not too big. Most of my friends are 10 minutes by foot. So it’s very easy to have spontaneous gatherings and see each other regularly. It’s not like Berlin, where you have to travel like 40 or 50 minutes to reach your friends. And that’s a really, really big advantage.
The local scene is very great as well. It’s not too small, not too big. And especially if you are new in town, there’s still plenty of space in the scene. It’s not like Berlin, where you have to live there, like 10 years and know 1000 people to get something done. It’s far more relaxed and easy here.
V: What is the population there?
J: In terms of population, I think we have about 550,000 people. So not too many people. It never gets boring here. I’m originally from Lubeck. It’s a city in the north of Germany. I lived there for 20 years. And back in 2015, I decided to move to Leipzig; my goal was to make music and get into the local scene and stuff. And yeah, it worked out very well.
V: Nice. Do you have any favorite places to chill in town?
J: Probably my most favorite place is the backyard of a good friend of mine. And it’s not just the backyard. It’s like a huge private park with a beach volleyball set and table tennis with plenty of room. Yeah, we had many nice evenings there. It’s always chill, and we get along pretty well. I think my other favorite place is the area of the Institute of Zukunft. It’s one of the local clubs here. For me, it’s the best club. Also, there are a few abandoned buildings around the area where you can chill.
V: So next, I think, is the all-important gear talk! What is your current setup?
J: I had few synths, but I sold most of them since I found my home in the Modular world. Right now, I only have like, three devices, my Electron Rytm, then the Lyra Eight, for drones and pads and stuff like that. What I really like about the setup, it’s very compact. So it doesn’t need a lot of space. But it’s very high functioning, with so many opportunities. I can record like six voices simultaneously and stuff like that, without the need for big tables with a lot of gear. I need to have it in a compact way where I can reach everything easily.
V: What’s your process for recording modular inside Ableton Live? I assume that’s what you use, right?
J: Yeah, I’ve used Live since the very beginning and never felt the urge to try another DAW out. My approach is basically I record big chunks, like five to seven minutes for each channel. And I do all the modulation by hand during the recording. So when I’m done with it, I don’t basically have to arrange anything anymore because everything is already modulated. And the way I like it. Yeah, that’s probably the biggest advantage you have with a modular system.
V: What is your favorite module?
J: My favorite module at the moment is the 4ms Ensemble Oscillator. It’s basically 16 oscillators in one module. And it’s crazy how much variety of sounds you get from it. I only have it for like, three weeks and only made four or five sessions with it. But I fell instantly in love, because it’s so easy and hands-on, and you can make everything from nice spaces to really large pads. Everything happens in two or three minutes of fiddling.
V: Do you still use some plugins?
J: Yeah, I do, especially for FX stuff. I really love Echoboy from Soundtoys. It’s great for delay. I really like the new Hybrid Reverb from Ableton Live. It pretty much replaced all of my other reverb plugins. I’m mostly using plugins for compression and EQ.
M: Any upcoming producers that you like?
J: Yeah, there are a few. I really like Laima Adelaide. I really like her sound aesthetics. She reminds me of the sound of Prologue, which is still some of my favorite stuff. I really, really like her sound.
There are few others. Reign, for example, he’s pretty good as well and very new to the scene. And of course my mate Vanta. He is a good friend of mine, living few houses away from me. He developed a really nice style already, and we have an EP together that came out for Proselytizing.
M: Is there any artist you dream of doing a collab with?
J: That’s a hard question to answer because I need to know the person before making music with her or him. Of course, there are plenty of artists that I really like their sound, but what if they are complete assholes in life? If that’s the case, then I can’t make music with them. But if I can choose one, I’ll choose Claudio PRC. He’s a master of the genre, and I think that I can learn a lot from him.
V: When it comes to production, some of us always look for tips and stuff. Is there any tip that you think would be interesting to share?
J: Yeah, actually, one thing; your kick might be too loud. Especially if you’re new to the game or you don’t have a good listening environment, you can assume that your kick is always too loud. I think I made this mistake for like three or four years.
M: Are you a cat or a dog person?
J: I’m definitely a cat person. If my place were a bit bigger, I would have gotten one. I hope in the future I can get one.
M: I think I have the last one. Can you describe the most interesting event from a festival?
J: I can try. To be honest, I don’t always remember that much from festivals, haha. But, in 2018, at Freqs Of Nature, they had one big main stage that was open Thursday to Monday. This year was always the same 200 bpm with no breaks, and it was always full. I was impressed. The music was interesting but, at some point, a bit annoying. Our tent was close, and we wanted to chill. We always had this 200 bpm music blasting, haha. It was a very, very intense experience, but also pretty cool in some way.
