HOBO: DON’T FENCE ME IN

Technology and Richie Hawtin have been two hugely influential forces in the life of Sarnia-based techno producer Joel Boychuk.

As Hobo, he now records for Hawtin’s M_nus label, but just 10 years ago, Boychuk was still in elementary school, busy having his mind blown by Kraftwerk’s 1981 opus, Computer World.

 “I was a rebellious computer nerd who was looking for anything that was different and, musically, that was it,” the 24-year-old Boychuk recalls in a still-reverential tone. “Four months later, I had Napstered everything from old Cybertron to then-new Perlon records.”

Though there is a dearth of electronic music culture in Sarnia itself, the city borders Michigan, with Detroit — the birthplace of techno — only an hour away. Boychuk listened religiously to Motor City radio host Chuck Horn and fell for the music of Detroit techno greats Juan Atkins and Jeff Mills, as well as Windsor’s Hawtin and his Plastikman debut, 1993’s Sheet One.

A focused teen, Boychuk worked multiple jobs to buy DJ gear and production software. By 2000, he was constantly playing with sound. Three years later, he and high school friend Adam Young began recording “slow, weird, horror-type stuff” under the name of Tractile.

Boychuk was still in high school when Tractile’s eight-song demo made its way into the hands of Richie Hawtin.

“Every track was so different that it was actually kind of directionless,” Boychuk admits. “It was after we started talking with Rich that we really began to focus.

“The bottom line is that he knows this industry better than anybody else,” says the producer of his mentor. “Whatever Rich says is extremely valuable info. I go back to the very first email he sent us — a really encouraging, long email that blew our minds to even be getting — and it was a run down on all eight tracks of what he liked and some constructive criticism. In one sentence, he can change the way you produce.”

No doubt Boychuk had thought he’d made it when Tractile’s Silent Movie EP was officially released on M_nus early in 2007. He promptly decided that the duo should move to the techno capital of Berlin. Although Tractile did land some gigs, the move was a bust; the two were far from established artists and not a disciplined duo.

“That’s where Tractile fell apart, to be honest,” says Boychuk. “There wasn’t a lot of work going on. Berlin is the only city where a weekend can become a year.”

In March of last year, Boychuk returned to Sarnia, desperate to focus and record. Within his first week back, the producer retreated to a yurt in Pinery Provincial Park where he lived, fasted and had a creative outpouring.

“I wrote the entire Hobo EP and about a hundred other tracks there,” says Boychuk. 

“In seven days, I did two things: write music and wander around. It was the most surreal experience I’ve had in years. When you go somewhere that’s full of possibility and you don’t have any expectations, you can be blown away. That’s exactly what happened.”

Hobo’s December 2008 debut EP, From A to B, as well as his many other tracks available digitally via M_nus, show incredible growth in Boychuk’s production. Gone are the horror-movie overtones and showy effects.

As Hobo, Boychuck is producing rich, subtle and solid techno tunes, his confidence allowing him to flow from ambient to tech house and bass-heavy electrotech. He’s on his own path, at work on a follow-up EP and other digital singles for M_nus (expect to hear examples on fellow Hawtin associate Magda’s Fabric49 mix, due out in November), and is set to play a string of live dates in Europe soon after Saturday’s Toronto show.

Boychuk looks forward to performing his solo material for audiences. The music is largely aimed at the dancefloor and should allow the producer to shake the “minimal techno” tag that seems to be lazily applied to most M_nus artists.

“I think there’s one person making minimal techno these days and that’s JPLS,” Boychuk fervently insists. “He’s another M_nus guy and he’s got an album coming out soon that is the best minimal techno I’ve ever heard — maybe some of the only minimal techno I’ve ever heard.

“Other than him, really, there’s nothing minimal about what anyone does any more. I think it should be ‘bongo’ techno. There’s been a lot of that.”