I discovered “Hoedus” by his first Ep on Reggy Van Oers‘ Telemorph imprint in 2017. The Italian DJ/producer is based in Rome and also owns the “Anekoic Records” label. After inviting him to join the 4th episode of “Affinity” I thought that it would be a good option to find out more about his project, things you can read below…
J: It’s not much known about your project “Hoedus” yet. Can you give an insight about the idea to create this alias, after working on a project called “OWL” ?
H: The answer is pretty simple…I didn’t like my previous alias anymore so I decided to change it. I felt it didn’t belong to me any longer and I wanted to put the past behind me in some way.
J: I’m curious about the way how your music is made, heard rumours that it’s all based on modular gear, is that right ? What’s the main difference to the workflow you can have with DAWs such as Ableton live? Do you perform your music live as well ?
H: I use my modular a lot in my production process to generate percussion and lead sounds. Drums and other sounds are based on samples and VSTs at the moment but I’m planning to buy some analog stuffs in the future. Personally I prefer to use real instruments instead of making sounds from virtual instruments not because I’m a purist or something but just because I find it more easy and inspiring to manipulate the sound “touching” an instrument instead of moving and clicking the mouse through the DAW. My dream is to use the DAW just to record and refine what comes from the hardwares but actually I don’t have a lot of instruments. Hope to make this real in the future. I’m not playing live at the moment but it’s something that I’d like to do. I think sooner or later time will come.
J: Is there anything specific (besides the music itself) that has an influential impact on your music?
H: I think nature in general and my city have a big impact on my music, anyway i get inspired by everything…people, emotions, feelings, other people’s music and so on.
J: Your label Anekoic was found in 2015, can you tell me a bit about it? Seen on Bandcamp that some of the recent releases are available on vinyl there too. How important is a platform like Bandcamp for you regarding the freedom to do what you feel musically? And do you think that Bandcamp made it easier to reach out to the interested people, compared to selling music through the traditional distribution structures?
H: We founded our label with the aim of releasing our music how and when we wanted. Now it’s not just about us, we are planning to release music from people that we know and we appreciate. Bandcamp is a good way to take full control of your label and it really helped small labels to grow but for me both of the channels (bandcamp or distributions) are relevant at the moment.
J: You live in Rome. From the outside it seems to be a good area for musicians (as it’s the residential area of various interesting projects). What’s your actual impression about forward thinking electronic music in Italy in general and the options to present the music to the public (clubs…)?
H: It’s true that in Rome there are a lot of good artists. Unfortunately at the moment there isn’t a real electronic music scene here, club culture is in decline from what i see. I hope in the future things will change.
Joachim Spieth 