An interview with Andrew McKenzie of The Hafler Trio

(BKr) shall we do part 3 before i fall over?
(AMM) sure
(BKr) (this is part 3 - about Andrew himself)
(AMM) 6 ft 1 1/2
(AMM) blue eyes

<KAA> Is this a first for you in terms of an interview or have you done interviews with anyone else the past ten years?

<AMM> I have done about three interview in the last 10 years. Again, not many people ask. So you could say it is pretty much exclusive. I did something by mail for a Turkish chap a while ago. I have no idea if it was ever published. And also some stuff in Lithuania.

<BKr> What makes you do music? What keeps you going, what gives you the inspiration?

<AMM> I don't really see it as music, really, to be honest. It's research. I'm finding things out about myself and other things by doing it. They're more places I can go, or states of mind. Because I see sound as being more direct than visual. Visual reprentation is precisely that - it refers to something else. Sound is just sound (to me, anyway). It's more direct. It's easier to be "transported" by shutting your eyes and listening than it is to look at something on a screen or on a wall (to me anyway). The ears are very "inclusive" and much more critical than the eye. The ears filter far less. The eye is always involved in something "outside", the ears refer to internals.

<BKr> Your aural works are quite personal, what is it you find in sound that does "it" for you?

<AMM> I decided a long time ago that I had to put myself into the experiments, and to do that I had to do it honestly. You hear with all of you. you see with just you eyes. The only thing that is more powerful is smell. This all might stem from me being partially blind in one eye, mind you.

<BKr> So you work on the senses?

<AMM> Yes, I want to find out what makes me tick. That "sound mirror" isn't for nothing, you know =)

<BKr> Explain?

<AMM> It's a rather arcane idea, based on something written by Kenneth Grant. Because all parts of the human bodies have resonant frequncies, they can effectively be "mirrored" by sound. So one can, at the same time one is affecting any one of those parts of the person, hold up a mirror to the process. But the analogy falls down here, because there is no separation of the sound and it's effect. It's also because I like to use "sympathetic magic" within what I do. As I said earlier, like the belief that taking a photograph takes part of the soul, so does a recording, which is another form of the same technique. And mixing these things together has a certain effect, or can have.
Now I use the sounds of myself or "what I know" exclusively, and if I make something happen within that situation, it has a chance of happening "out there" (not that there is an "out there"). Private rituals conducted in public with RESONANCE. Those vibrations spread out just like sound does itself, and those vibrations in turn affect those "bodies" or "ideas" that are in sympathy with that frequency.

<BKr> To what extent are your works personal and what is "just" experiments?

<AMM> What's not an experiment? It all is =) .. I can know nothing else except myself, therefore it's all personal, too. If I can even know myself =)
But I think the original intention of "art" was to make things happen, and I go along with that as much as possible. Like cave paintings of people catching animals: intended, we suppose, so that the chances of them getting that in "real life" increased, and so it is with me. I discover something about myself that should be dealt with, and I do that in minature in the work. And hopefully, the influence of that spreads outwards to the regions it should.

<BKr> You have lived here, there and approximately everywhere. What is in your opinion the nicest place in the world?

<AMM> hehehehehehehe .. what a question. Iceland, for me physically. I get sick everywhere else and put on weight like mad. The people though......and the other crap one has to put up with. Lithuania for the people (especially the women =) .. but there are nice people everywhere, of course.

<BKr> What does performing live do for you, is it like something that attracts you?

<AMM> Well, it's a position of risk, and that's interesting to experiment with. On a record, you have it the way you want it. Live, you can use the fact that everything might go wrong to make certain observations about yourself. I'd like to do more of it, but I need "unusual" circumstances. Playing live at some bar is pointless, for me and the audience. Nothing will happen. But if the expectations of both parties aren't there, then there are some real possibilities.

<BKr> Unusual, like Annie?

<AMM> That was a great example, which I should explain. Every night, people would come to see what they thought was a porn show. People of all walks. People, in the main, who would never normally come to hear or buy my stuff. And every night, their lives would be changed by her show. and in part, by my soundtrack to her ritual. 70 year old couples were going to go home and experiment with sex for the first time in YEARS, and would buy the CD. Women would feel strong, and the men would have had a lesson or 20. REAL changes were being made to CORE experiences and attitudes in these people's lives. It made me SO proud and happy to be a part of that. Their expectations had been cast aside, and they were ready for anything. THAT is what art is supposed to do, to me. To open you up and remove the barriers that stop the "stuff" from coming through, where you are "taken" by the experience and your life is never the same again afterwards. And ever since then, I have been trying to get to something like that stage for myself, and maybe for others, although I have no control over that, really, with varying degrees of sucess. But that's all part of the experiment. So that's part of why I do it, if you like.

<KAA> Any offspring in your life? Any thoughts about that?

<AMM> I have three kids, two who live in the north of Holland, and one that lives in Iceland. Part of me doing what I do is to compensate for not seeing them. A lot of the care and attention I put into my records, by rights, is theirs. I identified that many years ago.

<KAA> Do they know what you do in terms of your music creations?

<AMM> Not as far as I know. Maybe my Son, who's 12 now, knows.

<BKr> Do you use your music to "escape" from the outside world?

<AMM> No, I don't think there is one =) .. but it keeps me busy =) .. It is more to create a more personal *inner* world. I'm just muddling along the best I can. What more is there? I find that as I get older I know less and less, and I'm very happy about that.

<BKr> So apart from music, what keeps you busy?

<AMM> Well, as you know, I sit and twiddle with computers for worthy causes all day, at the moment. And investigate, erm, "other matters" hehehehehehe. But I'm definitely, as these various projects draw to some sort of conclusion, going back to Hafleric activities. I have some work to do yet =)

<BKr> You have done a few programming tasks for different people, what DO you like to program / play with when in front of your machine?

<AMM> I like different languages, and making connections between different processes. Like being able to edit sounds in a graphic programme, have it sent as midi to a web browser, saved as a file, turned into.....(cont. pg 94)

<KAA> If you had a free ticket to fly anywhere in the world on January 1, 2000 would you use it?

<AMM> Probably Russia. They know what it's like to have chaos in their country, where nearly nothing works. If anyone's prepared, they are. I also have a thing about Russian women. Ahem.

<BKr> Let me fire off a few names and let you elaborate on them, first being Jon Wozencroft.

<AMM> I started Touch with him, after meeting him in Virgin Records in Newcastle where I worked. He was trying to blag free copies of interesting records. We became friends and set up Touch. He's now a lecturer at the Royal College of Art in London. Wrote two books on/with Neville Brody. He is a pretty important designer in his own right, in a quiet way.

<BKr> Touch was / is your label. What exactly did you do with it? I mean, it was more than just music.

<AMM> Well, the idea was that one had all these xeroxed fanzines, which looked crappy. So we thought that it would be interesting to present this "culture" (ugh) in glossy coffee table format. Worked far too well =). It was everything that we found interesting. Manifestoes, music, literature, visual art, typography, whatever.
Now of course, one should have important artists represented by fanzines. Badly put together, really cheaply, but with loads of ENTHUSIASM. Everything now is such a "high standard of standardness". Everyone has a computer and a DTP programme, and a copy of Photoshop. And look where it gets us? Unreadable contentless magazines.
Anyway, Touch turned into a record company, more or less, and I left, as I'm not interested in running a record company.

<BKr> Even though you say audio is much more important to you than visuals, you have (or have had people) put quite some effort into the presentation of your music. Isn't that a bit contradictory?

<AMM> No contradiction at all. The pill must be sugared. The magician gestures with one hand, while reaching around his back for the real object.

<BKr> Who makes your artwork?

<AMM> I do all of it now. Jon has done a lot, but in some cases that's just re-doing my original, as he's a perfectionist. He did most of the early/mid ones.

<BKr> If there was *one* person you encountered on your life journey that influenced you to get where you are now, who would that be?

<AMM> Gah. There's too many. Gurdjieff, Willem De Ridder, Annie Sprinkle. But there's such a patchwork of people and events I can't separate them.

<BKr> Theres the next name for you right there, Willem De Ridder. Who is he?

<AMM> Genius. The man is a genius. A true one. He was part of the FLUXUS art movement, but basically he's a story teller. I did a record with him that shows THAT off. He showed me many things that were the tools that got me though a very long and bad period. Like "problem". The word problem comes from the Greek "problemas" (or similar) and means "that which is right in front of your nose", which certainly puts any "problems" you have in perpective. Not judging. I knew that from Zen, but he showed me how, practically.

<BKr> Will you be making Hafler Trio records in ten years? In twenty?

<AMM> I don't know if they'll be records. I'm already dissatisfied with the medium. People don't listen to records like they did. When I started buying records, it was a major event in my life. Now, it has to be something more than just the sound. It has to be something more. But I haven't got to what it is, quite yet. The sugar on the pill has to be a bit sweeter.

<KAA> What about video?

<AMM> Too passive, really. Nothing wrong with it, but it's not really for me. Too "cool" a medium.

<BKr> I saw a quote going "The Hafler Trio is Andrew McKenzie and everybody who are around - and nice".

<AMM> That's right =). At the mo, Bo is part of the h3o, to all intents and purposes, as is this channel.

<BKr> Would you work with anybody who are nice even though you are not into their music?

<AMM> PREFERABLY if they aren't into the music. Much more chance of having something interesting happen, like the Ukranian dancer that I hired to dance at the Lithuanian concert, for example. The less expectations, the better.

<BKr> Tell us about Nadia.

<AMM> I was playing in Lithuania, and out of the blue, asked one of the organisers if they knew any dancers (I'm boring to watch, especially when twiddling knobs). A dancer was gotten, and did her "I'm a tree, and all my branches are waving in the wind" routine, which everyone loved. I was the hit of the Kaunas jazz festival =)
So in Vilnius, where I was to play a few days later, I thought I'd try the same trick. I met with a Ukranian "exotic" dancer. She couldn't speak English or Lithuanian. I had a friend who could speak Russian, but he doesn't speak english very well. I speak German, and the dancer, Nadia, had spent six months in Switzerland, and had a bit of Swiss German, which is pretty different to regular. So we went to a bar, and had an absurd conversation where I tried to explain what I wanted, and what I was doing. As I said, I'm not good at explaining it in ANY language. She sounded intrigued and we went to my hotel so she could hear something (she is AMAZINGLY beautiful, by the way). Anyhoo, she thought the stuff was great.
I had her sit in the audience, pretending to be a normal memeber of that audience. And about 15 mins from the end, she got up and did her stuff. No-one, from the moment she stood up heard a single sound I made.
Now the point is this: She had NO exposure to anything even vaguely approaching what I do, and yet, she threw herself into it with such amazing enthusiasm that it was just gorgeous. Something REALLY happened there that night, something extraordinary. I had no idea what she was going to do, and neither she, I. At the same time, the audience had their expectations totally shattered, but in a way that showed them that something "else" was possible. So more of that sort of thing, I'd like =)

<KAA> Well you didnt tell us what she did.

<AMM> She danced! As exotic dancers do! She removed most of her clothes, and generally "interpreted" the sound. She wore black and white stuff to fit in with the slides I was projecting over her, so sometimes she disappeared, mysteriously, which was a very nice effect.

<KAA> What was the last book you read / last film you saw that you enjoyed?

<AMM> I'm old fashioned with films. I see some, but I'm not that impressed. One of my faves is "The Conversation", but how old is that?

<BKr> Next name up: William Bennett .. did you know each other beyond making music?

<AMM> Well, I wrote to him for ages, and then he invited me to be in Whitehouse for the first ever live gig. The other member was Steven Stapleton, of NWW, which is when I first met him. It turned out that the tapes of rare interesting records I had been getting from William were recordings made from Steve's incredible collection, Which, at that time, literally took your breath away. Cro-Magnon, Alvin Lucier, Faust...

<BKr> What music do you listen to?

<AMM> For the last few weeks it's been a sort of "all our yesterdays" trip. IF I listen to music, which is rare, I have some people I come back to again and again. I can't ever get sick of Morton Feldman. Or Kraftwerk. Or Alvin Lucier, actually. Other people I like, but I have splurges and then don't listen to them for years afterwards.

<BKr> What would you like to do in the future, music wise as well as otherwise?

<AMM> I'd like to get to know my kids. I'd like to get back to my "craft" - I have to build up the "muscles" again. And this may sound sloppy, but i don't care. I'd like to be loved =) .. i don't care that it sounds sloppy. I'd like to think that I have another relationship to look forward to, but it's not going to happen while I'm typing in this bunker, now is it? I have to some work on my health. I'm dropping to bits. I think I have some good records or whatever left to do.

<KAA> Dance is a good way to firm up.

<AMM> Me? Dance? I think not. Tai Chi is more my line. I used to do Aikido, Kendo and Iado, but those days have gone =)

<BKr> Andrew, you have something you want to add?

<AMM> I'd like to say "A THIRD PART OF YOUR BRAIN. DO YOU KNOW WHERE IT IS?". And I'd like to thank my lovely bot assistants, I owe it all to them.

<BKr> Andrew, i want to thank you on behalf of Last Sigh for taking your time for this interview. It has been great indeed, and i hope that it will gain you a few more followers.

This interview is Copyright (C) 1999 Bo Krogsgaard and Andrew McKenzie.
Last Sigh have been granted rights to publish it for the December 1999 issue.

Part Three - Andrew McKenzie