Sophia Saze – Self

The Brooklyn-based artist and Dusk & Haze boss talks us through the creation of her continuous cassette album

Kingdoms, 2019

Born in Tbilisi, Georgia, but now based in Brooklyn, Sophia Saze has a diverse musical background. She’s a keyboard player with classical training, turned electronic producer and DJ with releases under her belt under an assortment of aliases. Her nuanced techno creations under her own name have seen her land on labels such as Get Physical and Ghostly International, as well as Dusk & Haze, the label she founded herself in late 2017.

This month she launches her debut album, Self, as a cassette release on Kingdoms, the new label launched last year by New York underground mainstay Francis Harris. Presented as two 30 minute sides of continuous music, the album blends beat-driven

pieces with ambient sections and atmospheric interludes, making heavy use of found sounds and real world recordings captured by Sophia herself.

FM caught up with Saze in her Brooklyn studio to dig into the making of the first side of the release.

Tell us about the concept of the record...

“The record is split into two parts, being released on cassette. Each part is roughly 30 minutes. I chose this format because the album has a sort of lost tape feel to it.

“I chose to do the album as a one hour piece with no breaks, because I feel that the element of patience is a lost commodity in our musical generation. So the idea was, if you’re not able to sit through the whole thing and absorb the entirety of it and its whole essence, you’re not going into it with the right mindset.”

How do you approach creating tracks?

“My production process really varies depending on the style of the project I’m creating. I don’t really have a formulaic method of working. I’ve had various aliases over the years, and I always try to allow the music to dictate the method and approach that I’m going to take. I guess I’m more known for producing techno, but while I love the genre, producing it for many years it can become a bit linear and stagnant. My background is actually in classical music and for this record, stylistically, I wanted to stray a little off-kilter and incorporate techniques I’ve aggregated over the course of many years.

“I typically jam for a few hours before diving into any project. I’m a keyboard player, so a lot of that time consists of me playing piano for a few hours to generate some hooks I’m vibing with. I’ll then build the rest of the instruments around that. The harmonic personality of a track comes first for me, then it all comes to life with the rhythm section.

“The way I sketched this record was a series of live jams over the course of two days. Then I spent a few months cleaning up the files and reshaping all of the sounds.”

What’s your studio setup like?

“My gear setup is quite limited, I’m a believer in efficiency in workspaces and building a gear collection slowly over time, so I only really buy what I know I’ll use. I’ve been in so many fancy studios filled with expensive gear where little to none is used. I also much prefer working on sound design myself. It’s the quality of the final output that matters. I prefer to be completely in control of constructing the sounds, rather than relying on a machine and searching for hours to get the right output.

“I don’t think it really matters what software you use; I work in Logic, I enjoy that environment, but it’s all the same language, just a different dialect.”

How were the more percussive parts of the tracks created?

“Some of the beat parts are samples I’ve deconstructed, and others are field recordings I’ve sampled myself. I layered about eight different percussive channels to get the right effect. I know it’s sort of frowned upon to have so many channels, but for this type of project where the pieces are shifting every 30 seconds or so I like this method. I basically just effect everything uniquely. I often mesh two of the same layers together and just EQ them differently to give it a sort of dynamic range. Combined it can sound a lot more powerful. Another thing is that, while there’s a lot of layers, all of them are chopped and faded so the percussion parts can weave into one another and avoid sounding stacked.”

How did you make the tracks work as one continuous piece?

“I used a lot of interludes in the composition, mostly around 15 to

“I chose to do the album as a one hour piece with no breaks, as the element of patience is a lost commodity in our musical generation. So the idea was, if you’re not able to sit through the whole thing and absorb the entirety of it, you’re not going into it with the right mindset.”

30 seconds, generally to allow the songs room to breath in between one another. Naturally your ears will become tired after listening to a piece for an hour. They’re generally just a series of field recordings that I’ve layered together.

“The last thing I did was embed a bunch of short, reversed vocals throughout the record. The idea there was to sort of have subliminal messaging embed throughout. Although you’re not really hearing or understanding what’s being said, I find sometimes adding vocal effects like that can have a really strong impact because the tone sort of speaks for itself.”

How did you approach mixing all these disparate parts?

“One final thing I used in the mixing process was an EQ analyser. I used this to regulate all the levels and work backwards to balance all the sessions. Francis Harris, who is releasing this record on his label Kingdoms put me on to a really good one – the WavesPAZ Analyzer. I like to use the principle of ‘cut narrow, boost wide’ when I’m mixing. It really depends on the layer that’s being EQ’d, but generally so many frequencies are inaudible anyway, so you may as well cut out any unnecessary noise and save yourself from muddying up the mix and having things take up more space than they actually need to.”