DFA Records Boss James Murphy at the Red Bull Music Academy Session Vienna
The Red Bull Music Academy is a quite cool thing and besides giving young musicians and producers the chance to get a once in your lifetime opportunity to attend a 2-weeks all-star music production camp in a cool city, they also do some talk sessions with interesting figures in the music industry.
This time it was James Murphy, also known as the LCD Soundsystem Mastermind, DFA Records Boss and besides that, great Musician and Producer. So obviously he had a lot to tell.
The coolest part was actually that he came across as a total down to earth guy with really honest opinions and the same anxieties everybody else is bothered on a daily basis too.
Heinz Reich from FM4 played the host for the talk session and did a very good job with interesting questions.
To give you a bit of an insight, here are some loose vague quotes (might not be 100% accurate, but you get the hang of it). Because of course I didn’t take notes there :)
“You cannot live with humans, but you also can’t kill them” as an explanation that he doesn’t like to be around too many people and get stressed out sometimes at social events.
" You don’t kneed the best equipment to make a good record"
A question from the audience was: “What would you say, how much money do I need to make a good record?” and Murphys answer: “Zero Dollars”. Of course that’s not entirely true, but what he meant was that you can use some cheap ass equipment or even toys to record, if your music is good and true.
“If somebody gives me his music to listen to, I have to tell him that I cannot listen to it now, with him in the room. I really have to listen to it all by myself. It is also the same when I hear one of my songs somewhere, I have to leave the room. It got a bit better over the years but still it is a strange feeling to see the reactions in the faces of the people to your own music”
“Music is moving slower than ever, the whole timespan of the existence of the Beatles is the same as the time between a Radiohead album release”.
“There is too much music in general to be able to follow it”
Some Norwegian journalist asked Murphy a few days ago in Oslo, what he thinks might be the future of electronic dance music. His answer was “I have no idea”. And he told us that: “if they ask a 44 year old guy what the future of electronic dance music is, there must be something wrong”.
Besides these very interesting insights to his mind, it also came out what a technical nerd he is, when it comes to music production equipment and music in general. But still it was very motivating and inspiring for every musician and music lover to hear his stories and just his take on certain things. In a way it is very comforting and calming to see a guy who “made it” just telling you that the most important thing is that “you are the best person in the whole wide world to make YOUR MUSIC” and stick to that. Prince might be the best person to make Prince music, but you are the best person to make your music. That was the ultimate take home message for me.
At the end of the session it was time for questions from the audience. For me this was almost the best part to get a glimpse into the mind of James Murphy, because after a few seconds of silence he just said: “You don’t have to ask questions, there is no pressure. I really know what it is like when somebody just tells you, now it’s time for questions and you are not quite prepared for it and get a bit uncomfortable.”
So to sum up this talk session. It was funny, interesting and a very good way to get to know the person behind the Superstar James Murphy.
And here is one lecture session from 2013 - New York. When I see some recording of the Vienna session I will add it here (but I didn’t see any cameras at the session so I guess there will be none). Here’s also an interview with James Murphy about failure.