Pitchfork Interview - Subtle - very inspiring

[bandbajao]

Inspiring interview with Subtle. A van crash left their keyboardist Dax Pierson a quadriplegic, and he now composes on Ableton Live

Pitchfork: So you're back in Oakland now?

Doseone: I am back in Oakland. And it's great, man. I hang out with Dax all the time. [For Hero: For Fool's] "Return of the Vein", which is "Cut Yell" on Yell & Ice-- that's all Dax, pretty much. He pretty much made that whole piece out of existing files, using Ableton Live. And he's fucking killing it. He is writing in MIDI notes, man. Exactly how Dax plays. He is hearing his sensibility. So he looks up and he's like, "Man, you know what? You've gotta put 'keyboard player' back on all the descriptions of what I do in this band!" 'Cause he's doing it.

Pitchfork: So his recovery is going well? Can he use his hands?

Doseone: No. Absolutely not. There's no change in motion. Dax is full-on quad. He can still twitch his thumb a little, [but] there's no more hope gifts. It's all hope that Dax has to conjure, at this point. He works hard for his days.

Pitchfork: But he can use Ableton Live.

Doseone: Well, yeah, man, it's fucking amazing. It's hard to describe, very easy to understand when you see it, but he has these braces that have cut-in-half pencils on them, and he types with them and uses this mouse that has single, double, triple-click and right-click all in separate buttons. So he basically cruises, dude, he's as quick as me. And he's just killing it. The hardest thing for him is that his day is completely regimented, with physical therapy in the morning, his alarm goes off four times a day and he has to take eleven pills the size of a pinkie toe, or even bigger than that. And then he has to be in bed at certain times, up at certain times, because of doctor's appointments, and he has to schedule his fun-- which he's actually resoundingly good at. He's having the most scheduled fun I've ever seen anyone have.

So basically, that's his hindrance at this point. It's just finding the honest-to-God just-spaced-out, just-focused-enough time to make music. Which is like a witching hour. Sometimes it's two a.m., sometimes two p.m. So he's working with that.

Full interview here