AV ProductionWorld

Meet San Francisco-based Thomas Dimuzio, a fixture in the San Francisco Noise scene.

I’m a composer, musician, sound designer, and audio engineer specializing in the recontextualization of sound, noise and disparate sampled sources into a musical context. I’ve been active as an artist for over twenty years with more than seventy solo and collaborative releases for labels such as RéR Megacorp, Asphodel, RRRecords, Sonoris, Odd Size, and Gench. Live sampling, looping, and signal processing are integral to my performances and improvisation is the basis for most of my studio-created and live compositions. I’ve performed my music across North America and Europe, and frequent collaborators include: Chris Cutler, Dan Burke (Illusion of Safety), Joseph Hammer, Nick Didkovsky, Fred Frith, Due Process, Wobbly, 5UU’s, Negativland, and David Lee Myers (Arcane Device).

How many hats do you wear during the creation process?

Quite a few hats here. I’m primarily an instrumentalist and improvisor, but as a sound designer and engineer, I’ve customized an environment for live performance akin to a real-time musique concrete machine (i.e., a musical instrument capable of live sampling and processing multiple sound sources). Typical sound sources include MIDI-controlled feedback, field recordings, live microphones (on the street or hanging out the window of the concert hall), shortwave radio, circuit-bent toys, electric guitar, other musicians, DJs and combinations of all of the above. I find it liberating to compose and contort sound in real-time, and this environment offers the immediacy of playing a musical instrument with the tonal depth of a symphonic orchestra.

As an audio engineer, I’m forever documenting my performances onstage and in a studio environment. In fact, the majority of my live performances have been captured as recordings and with many showcased as CD and mp3 releases, so the engineering hat is always on. I’m also a mastering engineer with more than one hundred releases by other artists and bands to my credit.

Lastly, as a label proprietor, my imprint Gench serves as a mechanism for releases and has partnered with other labels and distributors such as RéR Megacorp, Asphodel, and Seeland.

What steps do you take alone and when do you open up to collaboration?

I tend to work alone for most of my studio-based compositions, but this is mainly out of convenience as my studio is in my home. For live shows, I love to collaborate with other players and improvisers. I feel that music is at its purest when improvising and playing with others. Magical moments are likely to occur and I thrive on the synergy of group improvisation. Improvisation and the energy derived from spontaneous music creation is at the heart of my work.

Which creation and production tools are indispensable for you? 

For live performance, it’s my sampler and looper, which are the Kurzweil K2600RS and the Looperlative LP1, respectively. Together, and with my custom programming, these two devices make an incredibly powerful combination allowing for real-time sonic exploration and composition. In the studio, I’m using a full-blown ProTools|HD TDM system integrating a 24 channel control surface, 80 inputs and outputs, and the maximum number of DSP cards to comprise an over-the-top powerhouse of a system with ceilings so high that I rarely reach the top. I’ve warped ProTools into a live processing and recording desk that is more about working in real-time through multing and processing/reprocessing signals as opposed to pushing file-based regions around with a mouse. With this real-time approach, ProTools serves as an amazingly powerful and malleable environment to shape and meld compositions as they naturally unfold.

What do you think is integral to your survival –selling your own music, producing other artist’s projects, performance…?

All of the above, yet it’s hard to make reliable money as a fringe artist. I play countless live shows, create remixes, release my own works, run a small label, produce other artists, work as a sound designer, and run a mastering and production studio; yet with all that, I still need to maintain a day job to pay the bills. I guess I prefer the stability of a regular paycheck, and the steady income seems to keep the music pure and uncompromised.

Recently, my mastering work has been a real boon with clients such as Negativland, Fred Frith, Psychic TV/PTV3, Matmos, and a plethora of local bands and projects coming through. I’m glad that the word is finally getting out. I’d also like to get more into scoring for film and picture as my work tends to have a natural cinematic quality. Film scoring is also an area where my work could suddenly become more accessible to a wider audience.

What advice would you share with a new artist starting his/her career?

The tools needed to make incredible music, video, and art have never been so accessible to the masses. You can do just about anything that you can dream up. Just keep those dreams alive and don’t be afraid to dive in and invest the time, energy, and money (or credit debt) needed to build a creative environment to realize your work. It’s not about the big payoff, but rather maintaining your happiness by working on cool and interesting projects, and with fellow artists and musicians that inspire you along the way.

feedback