Second Square To None

Kachanski, Ed Devane, Dubreak - Comb Over by SSTN Noise

The series returns after a short hiatus with an as yet unnamed project consisting of SSTN's Conor "Kachanski" Hinfey, Ed Devane, Dara "Dubreak" Grehan and a rotating cast of machinists including Ronan Dunne and Rory St. John. While all members have been known to make beats , the lads were in noise mode the day this was recorded.

Apologies for the interviewer and one of the interviewees being the same person but it couldn't be avoided...

What are your reasons / motives for making music, and how you arrived at this style?

Ed: Personal satisfaction mainly. Making music is like solving a big puzzle, at times frustrating but more often than not highly rewarding. I love making individual sounds as much as I do combining them into a new structure. When it goes well, playing live gigs or improvising with others is another reason for making music, and at the moment I'm favouring improvisation over computer music. I've been making drones and noise longer than I have beats, so techniques and tricks have built up over the years.

Conor and myself recently set up a studio in a building we're renting, so have been jamming with various people until stupid o'clock several nights a week. Everything is made up on the spot pretty much and the music flows from intense distorted noise grooves to the furthest reaches of mongspace. Great craic not to have to worry about how it would sound in a club, while still having sections that would get people dancing.


Conor: Personal satisfaction would be a main motivator for me but I would also take a lot of motivation from the constant stream of quality new music that's put out each year. There's always a few that make you do a double take and realize things are better than they've ever been. That makes you wanna try harder and do better. In terms of style for this project its great for me personally. The majority of the time I've made music I've made it in the box where every minute detail could and would be picked apart and reconstructed repeatedly until either my head collapsed or (on occasion) I got the piece done.

Recently tho I've had the pleasure of jamming, minus computer, with a rake of different heads. Nothing planned or laid out before, just playing off each other, completely improvised. Compared to how I've worked in the past its very liberating. In terms of the sonic style it's really just a straight blend of our own styles. In terms of how the jams go, it can take a little while for all the elements to present themselves but when they're all there, there's something new there that none of us would come up with individually. That's very satisfying.

What sort of environment it is intended for/what is the intended effect on the listener (if any)?

Ed: For now we're still getting used to the studio and finding better ways to set up gear, but we're doing this project with live performance in mind. Second Square to None events being an obvious place as we can set it up exactly as we want...

Conor: Ideally in a large darkened room with a large sound system with the visuals that I see in my head streaming directly onto a wall for all to see (so as I wouldn't have to go make em.)

What sort of equipment you use (e.g. computer, hardware, home made gear, circuit bent stuff etc.) do you use to make your sounds?

Conor: Machine Drum, Virus Ti, DJ mixer
Dara: Blofeld, MC-303
Ed: Mixer, Ableton, Cycloops sampler, zither, various guitar effects

Any memorable noise-related incidents/ interesting gig anecdotes?

Ed: The gig myself and Fionn "Fyodor" Wallace did in the Joy Gallery as FYED a couple of years ago. Limited table space meant we couldn't soundcheck until we were due to play. Disaster...a faulty power supply essentially knocked out everything in my set up, and something equally as drastic happened with Fionn's gear. The funny thing was that a lot of people didn't realise that we weren't really playing, as sound was coming out of some of the 4 speakers we'd set up. We finally got it all working in the last 8 minutes, then it was time for someone else to go on. Not a highlight of my times with music.

Conor: Had a career highlight last weekend in doing live sound for Crystal Swing and Lily Allen. Best noise gig in years.

Links / upcoming gigs / releases

Currently we don't have a name for this project and apart from this article no web presence. Plans are afoot for gigs and releases and web stuff though.