PABLO BOLIVAR (live) and NOAH PRED (live)
with DJ Eric Downer @ Get Thoughtless. Sat, May 9. Drake Underground, 1150 Queen W. $5.
It’s common knowledge that the music industry has been forced to do a serious rethink. Record labels have had to reimagine themselves, artists are adjusting to the reality that they’re unlikely to earn a living from the release of CDs and music distributors of all sizes are struggling to stand on solid ground. The only certainty seems to be that those who forcefully resist change are sinking the fastest.
On the flip, people embracing change are blazing new trails. Just two years ago, for example, digital labels were emerging as an alternative release model, but strived to be seen as legitimate.
Toronto techno label Thoughtless Music was one of the first local digital-only imprints to launch in a serious way. Nineteen months in, they’ve already amassed an impressive catalogue of 23 solid titles.
“There are quite a few pros [to being a digital label],” says producer and Thoughtless label manager Noah Pred, writing by email following a gig in Portland.
“For starters: super-quick turnaround keeping releases fresh; the ability to take risks on lesser-known artists; creative freedom and the ability to truly reach a global market. The only significant con at this point is the slowly eroding notion that a label has to release [its music] in physical formats to be considered relevant, but we’re doing our part to convince people otherwise.”
Dig into the Thoughtless titles and you’ll discover a wide range of tech sounds — from dubby techno to percussive tech-house, club bumpers to adventurous IDM, jazz to dubstep — created by established and emerging producers from around the country and the globe.
A welcome new addition to their roster is Barcelona’s Pablo Bolivar, who recently retouched Zero to Zero’s “Hungertruck” for Thoughtless 021. Now Pred and crew are presenting Bolivar in his first Toronto appearance. It’s easy to hear why; the two producers share a sonic aesthetic that’s warm, complex and adventurous.
“Pablo’s music incorporates a rare balance of creative sound design, juicy low end, melodic components and enticing grooves,” raves Pred. “He merges my favourite elements of techno and house into music that’s both futuristic and soulful.”
The 27-year-old Bolivar, however, describes his own style as “deep, warm, strange, but real.
“I’m always looking for emotion, melancholic melodies, speaking bass — music that transmits feeling,” he writes. “I don’t enjoy only percussive music without melodies; it’s too cold for me.”
Bolivar’s sound may have become increasingly precise during his 12 years of producing electronic music, but cold it is not. Over the course of a dozen EPs and two LPs — including 2007’s dub-tinged Brotherhood, produced by Bolivar and Aphro Sainz as the ambient project Pulshar — he has learned how to impart emotion, making even his most experimental works easily accessible. This has allowed Bolivar to delve deeply into both ambient and dancefloor productions.
Bolivar’s debut solo album, 2006’s Anjanas, showcased both of these impulses. Like much of his work, the album was inspired by nature.
“I was born in a little town in the north of Spain, surrounded by forests and animals, so it’s part of me and my education,” says Bolivar. “For Anjanas, I recorded the lambs near my house, like a wild atmosphere. I always try to explain a fable in my works — sometimes they’re more human, sometimes more sci-fi futuristic.”
As he prepares for his first North American tour, Bolivar also confides that he’s launching AvantRoots, a new label, he’s currently completing a remix for Juana Molina and has another solo disc, Recall, due in June.
“It’s my new baby and I am really happy,” he writes excitedly, having just visited the warehouse where the CDs have arrived. “It’s a tale of sci-fi and emotions, with ambient, house and deep tunes.”
Noah Pred also has a new album to showcase during his live PA at Saturday’s Thoughtless event. Blind Alignments is Pred’s most accomplished and sinuous full-length to date, complete with beefed-up grooves, deep-house leanings and strong arrangements.
“My previous albums were all heavily conceptual,” says Pred. “I made a conscious effort this time to avoid hemming myself in with rigid conceptual constructs. This was more focused on just doing what I felt; trying to channel the original impulse without over-thinking it; just letting the music take its natural course.”