Track By Track: Hatti Vatti – Szum
The evolution of Polish electronics is arguably one of the most interesting spells in recent musical history. The country has amassed a reputation for reimagination and individuality in it's perception of electronic music as a genre and its linear origin. Many of those active within electronic music in the country have a deeply rooted knowledge of Poland's history and thus use it to influence their own sound.
Hatti Vatti is an underground hero amongst an intricate scene. A musican with fine tact and attention to detail. His latest album "Szum" is due to be released on Friday. It seemed apt to have him talk us through. See below…
MATH
Colour: Orange
Season: Spring
Inspiration: The main beat was made on a funny Yamaha DD-8 toy-drum machine, which I think it's a instrument for kids.
Setting: I wanted to use very unnatural machinery rhythms, strange guitar melodies, very thin sample slicing to keep the nervous atmosphere of late 90s / early 00s electronic music with something of a hip-hop vibe.
HIKIKOMORI
Colour: Rotten green
Season: Twin Peaks, Season 2
Inspiration: My personal tribute to shoegaze music and records such as ‘EVOL’ by Sonic Youth.
Setting: The track was recorded in Iceland at Árni Grétar / Futuregrapher's flat and E7 Studios in Reykjavík, where I used some old school synths and beat machines.
WARSZAWA
Colour: Pink
Season: Spring
Inspiration: Amen Break. I see that track as a bridge between my jazz and jungle fascinations.
Setting: This is a track about Warsaw. I think it's my longest ever, as well as the first 4×4 tune I've ever made. I wanted to record an organic track with very open form – to give a space for all themes, phrases, synths and samples. Then, at the end of the track you can hear a sample from a crazy animation called ‘Materia’ from 1962, a short movie about the threat and fear of nuclear weapons.
HAIKU
Colour: Gold
Season: Summer
Inspiration: Krystyna Prońko, Teresa Haremza, SBB
Setting: Together with Noon, we had a chance to play with the legendary SBB (Silesian Blues Band) during a huge stadium concert in Cracow last year. It's more or less the same vibe of a tune we performed with them. The most Polish track, the main loop is taken from Witold Giersz's ‘Gwiazda’ movie.
LAI
Colour: Velvet as fuck
Season: No season, you're dead
Inspiration: Polish Radio Experimental Studio, Blade Runner, Dean Blunt.
Setting: It's a composition about death.
RUINS
Colour: Unknown
Season: Fall
Inspiration: Eleni, Papa Dance and early dubstep / late UK Garage. It could be also called ‘Synthesis, Part 2’.
Setting: Main loop was recorded at Analogia.pl studio in my hometown Gdańsk, on instruments owned by Maciej Polak of Pin Park.
HERO/IN
Colour: Green
Season: Spring
Inspiration: Phil Spector, Phil Collins' drum break, Ray Manzarek, Robert Brylewski / Armia's ‘Legenda’ LP and the first Vex'd album.
Setting: I think it's the first positive tune I've ever done!
KINO
Colour: Brown
Season: Too short to describe
Inspiration: Japanese melodica player Masa Matsuda.
Setting: This interlude is based on a sample of Yamaha GX, an analog polyphonic synthesiser resembling an organ.
HALO
Season: Winter
Inspiration: 170 bpm, Jamaican dancehall, Hanna Banaszak, My Bloody Valentine, Warp and some footwork tunes.
Setting: Original version of a tune that was recorded together with my friend René Zieger (a photographer from Berlin, his photo is the cover pic of my ‘Worship Nothing’ LP) as a joke-tune called ‘Pilastor’ / ‘Taxi und Schnaps;, at his flat in Schöneberg.
SEI
Colour: Gold
Season: Spring
Inspirtation: UK garage, late 90s R&B, Zdzisława Sośnicka and Stefan Schabenbeck's animation ‘Inwazja’.
Setting: Hihats that are not really hihats; it's a short vocal sample.
Unsafe
Colour: White
Season: Winter
Inspiration: African music, Grouper, Ścianka and Laboratorium
Setting: A sketch of this tune was recorded on a school piano via my iPhone during a free day in a local cultural center in Sisimiut, Greenland. Later, I utilised a lot of sounds from the Roland CR-68 rhythm machine and Nord Stage keys.
CANCELED
Colour: Red
Season: Fall
Inspiration: Chicago footwork, ‘Test Drive 1’ computer game I used to play around 1992, Polish Jazz records.
Setting: It's a canceled version of a regular party tune, from which I removed most of the beats and refilled the space with samples and synths, in a kind of experimental form – deconstruction and recording a tune with hihats and snares but without a kick drum.
WERK
Colour: Red
Season: Spring
Inspiration: Geinoh Yamashirogumi, Księżyc, Kwant – TV EDU, ‘Cinemode’ LP by Michał Urbaniak, ‘Kytytsi’ by Svitlana Nianio.
Setting: This track was created for my live performance at Pegaz on National Polish TV, and I liked it so much that I decide to put it on the album. It's another machinery-sounding tune but this time with unique Slavic influences.
Buy the release HERE.
