Interview With George Clanton

Got to catch up with the amazing musician, producer, record label founder and living legend, George Clanton! Also known by the monikers Mirror Kisses, ESPRIT 空想, and Kid's Garden, George established his independent record label 100% Electronica in 2015, which he runs with his partner Neggy Gemmy. He also puts on one hell of a show and even throws his own festivals. As a DIY artist/label/publisher myself I was excited to learn about his process of balancing it all!

Below, George talks about touring, running a label, go-to gear and more.

As part of SH5.

Without further ado...

George Clanton by Synth History.

Synth History: When did music start to interest you?

George Clanton: Straight away. My parents were very interested in music. They love music; they love dancing with each other and stuff like that. I guess I took that for granted until the past 10 years, I realized maybe not everybody grew up that way. They weren’t musicians, but they knew musicians’ names and the history of it all. They had records when they were younger. Michael Jackson was imprinted on me at a very young age—as it was designed to do. I was born in ’88, so just as my brain was really solidifying, there was Michael Jackson everywhere with Dangerous and Free Willy.

Synth History: Do you remember any of the other early records that your parents had?

George Clanton: It was mostly oldies. There was an oldies radio station called Oldies 93, which is out of North Carolina somewhere.

Synth History: Is that where you grew up?

George Clanton: I grew up in southern Virginia, but the nearest restaurant might be in North Carolina. It’s on the border. All the local TV and radio was often coming out of the closest city, which would have been Greensboro, about 40 minutes away. That’s probably where the radio station was based at the time, in the early ’90s. Those songs have stayed with me—so that’s why I cite that. Then, when I was a little bit older, alternative rock got on my radar, when I was six or seven.

Synth History: Any specific bands?

George Clanton: It all happened at once. The records from between ’95 and ’97 kind of blend together, but I remember our first CDs were Bush and Smashing Pumpkins, and I guess Nirvana was on the radio a lot. That was never my favorite, but that kind of stuff. And then Oasis, that would have been ’95. I bought that [Oasis] CD as a seven-year-old—whoa. That ended up being a huge influence on me, although when I was seven, I just listened to “Wonderwall” and “Champagne Supernova.” Later on I discovered the whole album [(What’s The Story) Morning Glory?]. And then the second Seal album with “Kiss from a Rose” on it, actually. That’s not alternative rock, but I bought that CD when I was seven.

Synth History: I recently put on a Seal greatest-hits album randomly on a long drive and was like, “Wow, yes, the production on these songs are cool!” “Crazy” is really good song.

George Clanton: Now he does a lot of standards, and my parents love his soul record where he’s doing the Isley Brothers and stuff, but his first three albums—maybe his first four—he wrote all those songs. He spent many years on them, and the first three were produced by Trevor Horn. It’s really high-level stuff.

Synth History: How old were you when you started to make your own music? Can you tell me about that?

George Clanton: The first thing I did was a songwriting competition in third grade. I don’t know how old you are in third grade, but I wrote a song for that, and I won in my school, which meant a whole lot to me. It was just me and one other person—she was a fifth grader, though—so in my small world, that was a big deal. Then I went to the regional competition and lost to someone much more sophisticated.

To be honest, I had a tape recorder and I would hum songs into it. I wouldn’t sing anything specific; I’d just go “la-la-la.” Evidence-wise, the furthest back I could go would be third grade, but that composition showed interest in trying to make and record stuff.

Synth History: When did you start making music as George Clanton and putting it out?

George Clanton: The idea of making music for myself goes back really far. MTV Music Generator, a video game for PlayStation, was huge for me when I was in fifth or sixth grade. You could compose music by mixing loops together. There’s a loop bank, and you arrange them—it’s like Apple Loops, but on PlayStation. I considered that to be real music. And what I’m doing now is no more sophisticated than that, really. That’s kind of how I make music today.

There was an interim where I didn’t make music that way, and now I really do make music a lot by taking pre-existing loops and messing with them, then writing a song on top of it. It’s come full circle. Back then I was making techno music that way. I didn’t consider it “real,” but now that I make a living doing the exact same thing, I consider that making music, down to the video game.

Synth History: Can you tell me about 100% Electronica and what led you to start the label?

George Clanton: That happened at the same time as me dropping my monikers and going as George Clanton in 2015. I knew I was going to name the album 100% Electronica, and I liked the name. It’s sufficiently tongue-in-cheek to represent everything.

I was obsessed with getting a label. I thought that’s what you had to do. I moved to New York, played showcases, sent my music to Ghostly International. A friend of mine said, offhandedly, “You should just make your own label.” He didn’t even really mean it. Later he was like, “Why don’t you try to sign to something?” I said, “It was your idea to make the label in the first place!” Once I did it, I went full on.

I had some immediate success with selling vinyl records because, at that time, in my circle, no one had made any records. In this internet-music circle, post-blog era, nobody was making records. The only people making records were signed artists. It’s expensive. If you’ve never had $3,000 in your life, how are you going to pay $3,000 to press a batch of records? So I found that if I split it up and went to a little shop for part one, another for part two, another for part three, I could make it work. I had a $1,000 credit limit on my first credit card. I spent that on the most expensive step, and then for the other two, instead of having artwork on my first album, it was just a 17”x11” sheet of paper, which cost like 15 cents. I folded the bottom five inches over on the back, so the front is a little bit too narrow. The folded insert saved me a good $2 per record. Then I sold out all of those records. I took that money, and a band I really liked out of Australia called Surfing had a record that was already three or four years old. I was like, “Hey, what if we did the same thing for your record?” Now I had more money, profit from my record, and we did a proper pressing. That sold out immediately. I never spent money from the label on myself for a long time. I kept reinvesting it into other artists.

Synth History: Is running a label hard to do while also being an artist?

George Clanton: Yes, it’s very hard. In many ways, maybe I shouldn’t have done it at all. But there’s something entrepreneurial about me. It’s a negative sometimes. People say you’re either a great artist or great at business. I think I’m good at both. Some would argue—and I’ve always argued—that’s the key to my success. But with more perspective, I wonder if I wouldn’t have been better off spending 100% of my energy making music exclusively. Every time I make more music, it’s the number-one injection of success. I’ve done the craziest stuff outside my music with the label—the festival the label puts on, the VR live stream at the festival, various things over the years. None of those have moved the needle as much as me making new music.

In hindsight, the best thing I could have done for the label would be to raise my profile and let that filter out. But that’s just not my nature. If I have other things to do, I get sick of doing the same thing. Sitting down and recording can be monotonous. It’s like macro ADD in life. I’ll devote myself to major, life-consuming projects, and in the middle of that I’ll devote myself to another life-consuming project. Months and years go by.

Synth History: I feel that way sometimes. I make music and also have my own label where I press vinyls. Sometimes I wish I was just signed so I could just focus on music.

George Clanton: It’s a personality thing. If I signed to a label, maybe I’d be less happy. There’s creative control, too.

Synth History: Do you have any go-to equipment, and what program do you use?

George Clanton: The process has changed a lot over the years. Right now and for the past few years, my favorite piece of software is called Spectrasonics Stylus RMX, it’s discontinued. I use Logic Pro. Stylus is basically a loop player for REX files and REX2 files, and it comes with its own library. People say you can just drag REX files into Ableton—Ableton has a loop browser—so a lot would argue Stylus is unnecessary, but I’ve been using it for so long, over 10 years. It used to be just a piece of the puzzle; now I can’t live without it.

Over the years I’ve collected every sample CD released in REX format. REX is the native file format of ReCycle. ReCycle is a Reason Studios product. It’s old and works by slicing audio based on transients. Now any DAW can do that, but the convenience of having it already done—and there’s some spiritual thing about getting sample CDs that foundational musicians for me used.

I have one that’s on Jagged Little Pill. Digging through my sample CDs, I found the sample [Alanis Morissette] used for the first song on Jagged Little Pill. I used it as the basis for my song “Justify Your Life.”

I didn’t set out to do that, but there was something about it. I want to live in that childhood time and pick my own route from the music I liked when I was younger, instead of witnessing everything that happened in history, which I have no control of. If I was writing history, I’d take this sound and make Jagged Little Pill the most important album in the world instead of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. What if Seal and Alanis Morissette and 311 were the top three albums of all time on the world’s top 50,000? When I hear these old sounds, it helps me feel like my music’s epic because Alanis is epic to me. It goes back to something in my reptilian mind when my brain wasn’t fully developed. I could have written any song over that. I can’t reuse the drum beat over and over, but I get inspired. That’s one example of how digging through old sample CDs inspires me.

I was up until four last night. I hit on something unexpectedly and wanted to see it through. I found two or three samples in my collection that went together really well, and Stylus lets you do that in three seconds. I don’t have to put the CD in a sampler and cut it up—everything’s already cut up. Here’s a drum beat, here’s a bass line, here’s a musical part, here’s a flute solo. I can randomize the flute solo, adjust a slider, reverse certain sections, and next thing you know, I have something that sounds like a song in 15 seconds. If it hits me, I have a hook. Then I build a song around those three elements and the hook, and flesh it out. That’s my process.

Synth History: You’re very prolific and always working on stuff, whether it’s your label, fests or personal music - what advice would you give to younger artists who are just starting out and might be afraid to put themselves out there - maybe something you’d say to those who worry nothing will happen if they put their music out?

George Clanton: Do you think people are afraid?

Synth History: I think so. In all creative fields. Filmmakers writing a short, but they’re reluctant to see it through because there’s just so much stuff out there already.

George Clanton: I’d say: make music the way you like to do it, but find something else to do for money—because it’s never going to happen for you. If you have to ask that question, it’s never going to happen. The competition is so strong. But lots of people get lucky, so you might as well put it out. If you want to get discovered... this is one of the most complicated questions you can ask me because I have so much to say. I think there are two types of artists. There are artists who make music like they’re making cake: they have the ingredients, make it, and then try to get people to buy it. Then there are musicians where the music comes to them and flows through them: they just have to do it. Of course I’m going to say that’s me. That’s how I operate, except in collaboration. That’s something I don’t like about collaboration—you have to push and work through it: “What are we gonna do? What’s our goal?”

But when I’m making music, I never think about the goal. If I just sit down and go through the process, it’s very much–I understand this sounds pretentious–if you print this, include that I know it sounds pretentious—

It’s like Zen. It’s like meditating. Bill Gates says he gets his best ideas washing dishes—he’s not a hero of mine; it just comes to mind. In a lot of my work I’m not thinking. I’m just going through presets and loops and existing in it. I’m not trying to do anything, and then I get hit by a spiritual “aha.”

The opposite is people who hear a song on SoundCloud; a micro-culture of people copying and people looking for more music like it. But that’s about as interesting to me as going on Amazon, finding a product with a high markup, getting your own made in China, and selling it. 

Especially in LA, there are so many people in that methodical product-production mode. There are countless YouTube videos with ring lights: “Here’s how you write a bassline. Take your chords, pick random notes, delete the rest. Put a bass patch on that. Lower it two octaves. How to write a bridge. Awesome trick I learned from another YouTuber.” You can watch a Deadmau5 masterclass and make something inspired by that. But ultimately, people doing that are making music for reasons that don’t interest me. “Inspired” is overused and it doesn’t have much meaning, but I understand what people mean by “uninspired” now. Most modern music I hear, you can tell someone sat in a room being like, “I’m going to write a song; it’s gonna sound like this. I’ve heard the new Clairo album; now I’m going to do my version.”

There’s no divine inspiration. It’s boring. The best music transcends what you can teach in a YouTube video.

The short answer is: if someone is asking that question they shouldn’t be making music. I’m fighting not to go on another tangent. If somebody doesn’t inherently have the drive to create, maybe they shouldn’t be making music. That’s step one. But your question presumes they’ve already made some music. I’ll say, you have to put the music out there. But if you’re too nervous, you aren’t going to make it. You have to be the kind of person that people tell to stop and get a job; it’s tearing your life apart and ruining relationships—but you can’t stop working. Keep doing it. Even if it sucks, if you’re that dedicated, you’ll get discovered as a savant. There are so many people in the world; there’s going to be an audience. Viper released hundreds of albums and nobody knew who he was then people discovered him. He’s not rich, but even if you make “bad” music, people will find something to like, and eventually you’ll be your own thing.

You just have to stay out of jail. Good luck with that.

Synth History: How important do you think touring and live shows are for musicians?

George Clanton:I think it’s really important. Touring is too hard when you’re just starting out, and I don’t think touring is important if no one knows who you are. What I would have told myself early on: move to a major metropolitan area, probably New York, and then perform all the time. Meet as many people as you can. If you’re introverted, get drunk, get out of your comfort zone, meet people, be genuinely interested in what they’re doing, become inspired by that, and play out as often as you can. I think that’s the secret. Live shows are really important at the earliest stages when no one is going to see you. That’s how I got discovered. I had a really good live show when no one had ever heard of me. If I had an opportunity to play in front of people who didn’t know me, I could win them over. Opening for someone isn’t as important to your career. Going on tour with someone and opening at mid-level shows doesn’t give you the return on investment for the misery you go through. Maybe a young person would have fun touring; as an old person, it’s grueling for me. It would take a lot for me to open for someone. I did it with TV Girl in Europe, but beyond that it would have to be something I really, really wanted to do, because I don’t think it helps my career that much. I’m headlining in Europe in two weeks, and I’ll be lucky to break even. I regret it. I wish I could cancel the whole thing—and you can print that. I wish I could cancel it. It’s going to be so hard. I don’t know why I keep going back to Europe when I could just do two more weeks in the United States, which is so easy to tour. I have more people who will come to see me in the middle of nowhere in the US than in London. At the other end of the spectrum, touring is extremely important when you’re the headliner. To make money and buy a house and to show your ultimate presentation of who you are as an artist. Your album is there forever, but people can’t go back in time and see The Beatles. 

Check out George's music and100% Electronica here.

Interview + photos by Danz.