Sonic Router

SR Mix #83: Dropping Gems [Dropping Gems]

Posted in Sonic Router Mixes   

Perhaps it’s the sometimes constant mist in the Pacific Northwest of America or possibly its the large amount of forests and mountains, but whatever it is that surrounds them, the Dropping Gems crew all seem to share a love for hazy atmospherics and crinkling drums producing the kind of music that can border on ambience and g funk simultaneously. The collective of Brownbear, Citymouth, Digifid, DJAO, Ghost Feet, Gumar and His Magical Midi Band, Bone Rock, and Rap Class have banded together for the past couple years to present their shared musicial vision through live shows, releases, and podcasts.

This like-minded affinity for sounds was recently demonstrated beautifully on the stellar Gem Drops compilation, released to benefit the American Cancer Society. A startling and cohesive compilation, featuring Dropping Gems artists as well as friends like Devonwho, Shigeto, and Anenon, presented with a pastel loaded abstract cover by Robert Pellicer, the compilation is 21 tracks deep and presents a textural beat heavy collection of some of the best names in underground US electronic production right now. Equal parts hip-hop, jazz, ambient, electronic, classic downtempo and funk; the breadth is astonishing.

In the wake of Gem Drops, a compilation that creeps up on your listening habits, Dropping Gems have stayed busy, hosting friends such as Groundislava and yuk for shows in Seattle and Portland, as well as releasing the new Holodecker EP by crew member Citymouth. With all this activity going on, we knew it was a good time to talk to the crew and find out just where all this creativity comes from. The collective’s General Manager and curator of Gem Drops Aaron Meola graciously provided the low down…

Sonic Router: Dropping Gems looks like a tight-knit group of musicians. Can you tell me a bit about your members and how you came together?

Aaron Meola: Most of us met in Olympia, Washington while attending The Evergreen State College about 4 years ago. A lot of my friends were up to interesting stuff musically, but there wasn’t much organization or cohesiveness behind it all. About a year ago I started promoting and managing Dropping Gems, which was actually originally started by Gumar and Rap Class as an interview blog. Besides myself, the Portland crew consists of Brownbear, Bone Rock, Citymouth, Gumar, and Rap Class with DJAO holding down Seattle and Ghost Feet in Olympia. Most of us live on the same block, we have potlucks and hang out pretty much everyday. Really we’re all just homies first, with a similar interest in music. 


Can you talk about your goals for Dropping Gems and what sets you apart?

One of the big things that sets us apart is the friendship and support structure we have amongst each other. We’re always sharing projects and asking each other for feedback, we’re really a strong community. My most immediate goals are to get the next batch of releases ready to go and keep expanding the audience to it’s full potential. We’re all just trying to grow creatively and keep figuring out ways to keep it interesting and innovative. 


Do you think that the relative remoteness of the Pacific Northwest fosters this kind of community of like-minded individuals?

Not necessarily, I don’t consider the Pacific Northwest that remote. I do think we’ve all been influenced by temperate rain forests and the Cascade Mountains though. We’re actually blessed to be very close to other communities of artists on the West Coast. It would require a lot more time, money, and frustration to make this happen in South Dakota. 


You also seem to have friends of similar disposition all over the world. How does that normally come about? Shows? Collaborations?

I’m not sure that there’s any typical way to describe how we make connections, because each one ends up being different. What’s clear is that we try to be as sensitive as possible to what’s happening in our area of music, we track what we respond to, and if it makes sense then something happens. It takes a tremendous amount of effort, logistically, but finding the energy to make it happen usually isn’t that difficult.

I will say that the Internet has also facilitated in the networking process immensely. There’s pockets of people all over the world who are into this stuff, and together it all adds up to a lot of listeners, but geographically we’re pretty spread out. When we put out the Gem Drops compilation I was amazed that about half of all downloads were coming from over-seas. 


Since you just mentioned it, the Gem Drops compilation was where I first found your collective. What was the inspiration for this project? Why did you choose to benefit the American Cancer Society?

A good friend of ours beat cancer for the 2nd time and he had the idea of doing a benefit show for cancer research. I worked with him and we put together a show last November with Mono/Poly headlining. I had been thinking about curating a compilation for a few months prior to that, and after the show went well I decided to stick with the theme and make Gem Drops a benefit project as well. I didn’t see the project as a means to make money, and I figured this way we could do something unique as well as support a good cause.

Tell me a little about your experience putting together the compilation. There is a large amount of people on the compilation that fall outside your normal crew. How did you select the artists and tracks?

I contacted a handful of artists whose music I really enjoy that I thought would be interested in the project. Although there are a handful of tempos and styles on Gem Drops, I feel like all the artists have a similar ethos when it comes to creating music. I’m incredibly grateful to all the artists for letting us use their really amazing tracks on the compilation. It means a lot to me that all these artists trusted me with their creations, and I think it turned out really well. 


Any notable tracks you’d like to talk about?

I think all the tracks from Gem Drops are notable, but I am very pleased that Devon’s track “Brushmetal” was recently named the #4 MP3 of the year so far on XLR8R. 


Instrumental beats have had a long history. What do you think sets the current crop of beatmakers, including the Dropping Gems crew, apart from previous incarnations?

I think experimentation and (especially) eclecticism are at an all time high now, whereas ten or twenty years ago things were a little more compartmentalized. That observation may or may not ring true for listeners older than I, but I know that at the moment we’re in the middle of an era where inspiration can come from literally anywhere, where artists of strikingly different styles are being grouped together without overwhelming discrepancy.

As we begin to look past the constraints of genre, we start to see a new wave of “beatmakers” (and I use the term very loosely) emerge representing a highly uninhibited exploration of idioms and new combinations of forms. We’re really beginning to see that long history get put to use! As techniques evolve and the possibilities of sound become ever more limitless, we find an entire movement devoted to finding new ways of combining legacy with the vanguard. Tape compression and field recordings are becoming as much of a staple as a sampler and a crate of records; it’s no longer enough to just have a hot loop and some beefy drums. Horizontal complexity in composition is now standard, and we are currently blessed to have a worldwide movement of young musicians dedicated to exploring just that.

What do you think the appeal is? Where do you see this music going?

‘Future’ is an adjective I apply to the electronic music I look for, with the intent of trying to pin down a sensibility. In the literal sense, it means that music that evokes the future in a number of ways, usually in terms of society, communication, perception, or technology generally, informed by science (or speculative) fiction of every type.

Lately, though, I’ve come to realize that ‘future’ does the exact same work that the labels ‘progressive’ and ‘fusion’ do for certain kinds of rock or jazz (respectively) from the 1970s. The idea is to reach for higher planes and new worlds, and that requires drawing on the best of everything you’re exposed to, driven by knowledge and respect and a certain kind of unconscious reverent channeling. The last thing we need these days is to be orthodox.

What does the future look like for Dropping Gems? Next releases on the horizon?

We’d really like to tour soon, West Coast and beyond. Our next release will be an EP for the newest members of the crew, Ghost Feet. After that we have a maxi-single from Gumar and His Magical Midi Band, and EP’s from DJAO and Brownbear due out this summer. Citymouth and Ghost Feet full lengths are in the works as well.

What can you tell me about the mix you’ve prepared for us?

Hopefully everything we’ve talked about in this interview can also be wordlessly felt by listening to it. All but two of the tracks are from Dropping Gems family members. There’s a new tune from de facto member and roommate The Great Mundane, as well as a track Matthewdavid made while staying here for a show I put together a few months back. Most of the material contained here is unreleased, and some of it was made exclusively for this mix. It was curated by myself and mixed by The Great Mundane.

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DOWNLOAD: Dropping Gems – Sonic Router Mix #83

Tracklist:

1. Citymouth – Singlecycles
2. Brownbear – Pretty Mouth
3. Bone Rock – Chalmers
4. DJAO – Towards The Sun w/ Gumar
5. Brownbear – Empty Jars
6. Brownbear – Wings
7. Bone Rock – First Light
8. Gumar and His Magical Midi Band – Sliding Down Rainbows (Sumsun Remix)
9. DJAO – Pacific City
10. Ghost Feet – Top Papez
11. The Great Mundane – Mustache
12. DJAO – Underbrush
13. Citymouth – Neighborhoodcults
14. Ghost Feet – Bog
15. Hobbes – Telepathic Grasshopper Twins ft. Citymouth
16. Matthewdavid – Dropping Gems
17. Gumar and His Magical Midi Band – Through The Clouds

Words: Keith Pishnery // Download Gem Drops over at Dropping Gems bandcamp