Chachi Jones

“I first got into it through the noise community in Sacramento and Davis, California,” says Chachi. “I saw a couple artists using circuit-bent instruments and I talked to them after their shows. My interest wasn’t in using them in a purely experimental way, like many other people were. For me, it was the DJ-like impulse to find new sounds and sample new material that other people didn’t have, to have that stash of secret weapons I could use in my music.”

Though he currently tweaks in Ableton Live, Chachi recorded DD primarily with circuit-bent samples and software instruments customized in Native Instruments Reaktor and sequenced in Steinberg Cubase SE. SoundMaker editing software, one of the first music programs Chachi learned, was another important tool: “I used that program to do really detailed editing and effecting on the drums, maybe to a fault. I wanted this album to be the one where I go out with guns blazing, creating really detailed panning and weird stuff, so that every measure of drums does something nuanced and bizarre. When people are listening carefully, I want them to be able to pick up on the crafting and the editing.

“I recorded in real time in Reaktor using the Recorder Box feature,” Chachi continues. “There were a few [Reaktor] instruments that were my go-to beat-makers, and they’d have simple step sequencers in them, so I could arrange patterns. Then I’d mostly use the knobs on my little [M-Audio] Oxygen 8 keyboard to truncate samples and cue in stuttering and gliding effects while I recorded. I’d have 12-minute, uncompressed audio files of beat-mangling jams that I knew were perfectly at 180 bpm, or whatever. Then I’d bring those into Cubase, clean them up, chop them up, and arrange them in some other form.”

For all Chachi’s effort, DD is meticulous, nuanced, and expressive. Listen closely and explore this delightful Daydream.