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Gui Boratto - Dancing About Architecture
12 August 2008 07:30:46
Gui Boratto - Dancing About Architecture
 
 
There's a classic aphorism that's constantly thrown about by music journalists, a quote by a certain Elvis Costello no less: Writing about music is like dancing about architecture.
Hmmm, it's sort of witty in a superficial kind of way and seems to infer that the relationship between words and music is arbitrary, fragile, misplaced --- whatever. But perhaps it is too cute by half. For if one delves into the nuances of contemporary music, the structures, the rhythms, the timecodes and the relationships between different instruments, one can perhaps ascertain that music and architecture aren't so disparate after all. A case in point is today's interview subject, South American techno producer Gui Boratto.
 
Boratto's debut long player Chromophobia, released on the canonical Cologne minimal techno label Kompakt, achieved critical acclaim that transcended esoteric techno circles and made several year end best of lists at tastemaking blogs/publications such as Pitchfork and the now sadly defunct Stylus.
My first exchange with Boratto explicates his compact (with a c') approach to electronic music. Music is space. "I'm an architect and I treat music like I see architecture", the former architect declares. He then elaborates with an analogy that I don't quiet grasp as he compares music and architecture via the former's apparent simplicity, by its lack of hierarchy only harmony.
 
 I'm an architect and I treat music like I see architecture

Stepping back momentarily and our dialogue shifts to how Boratto's work fits - or indeed doesn't fit - within the parameters that he is constantly placed through tags such as minimal'. I'm a musician, and I always think about melodies and harmonies, he says. These days, most of the electronic music scene is really cold. I prefer my old references of the 80s. While it is too reductive to stereotype every vinyl released by Kompakt as falling in to the minimal techno genre, there is no doubt that, at least prior to certain recent releases like Supermayer's Save The World, the label was not renowned for a diverse pastiche of sounds. And Boratto is quick to distance himself from all things minimal'. I'm not a minimal guy... never was he admits.
 
I think minimal is really boring. I like dry' productions but I think the minimal sound is really dead… I didn't like the period from 1995 till 2005. People were too worried about getting the dancefloor pumping and forgot the feeling, the sensibility. Then techno just started to slow down the BPM and the creativity was reborn. I think Kompakt, Warp and Mute among others contributed to force people to think and feel a little bit more.

Indeed the success of Chromophobia was indebted to pioneers such as Ricardo Villalobos and Michael Mayer not so much stylistically but rather because of the way such figures have reconfigured nightclub mores and made such releases possible. Boratto and Mayer in particular have forged a strong relationship since Mayer signed Boratto to Kompakt. I sent Kompakt a CD with my tracks Arquiplago' and Simetria' on it. Michael just loved it and we decided to release our first 12. Neither of these cuts was included on the Chromophobia though.
 
"Chromophobia is an album I did without trying to be something", Gui explains. "You can see many styles on it - actually this mixture is my style." Not only was the album a conglomerate of styles but these styles can be linked to a diversity, and perhaps even a relaxed and distanced approached to the creation of music, as evidenced by Gui's own wife contributing vocals to a number of tracks.
 
"I have a home studio so sometimes, after a party for example, my wife would say to me, Gui, let's put some vocals on this track you're doing'. That's what happened on Beautiful Life', or others tracks like It's Majik' or Eurasia'. It's just a little fun. I know many professional vocalists, but they would never sounds so naive like my wife does. She's not a singer, never was, never will..."

Boratto's latest mix Addicted, rated compilation of the month by dance music figureheads such as Mixmag and Deep Impressions, again throws us into a discussion of where Boratto sits in comparison to his fellow Kompakt artists. How can Gui claim to stand apart from the minimal techno genre when Addicted features the likes of Minilogue, Dusty Kid, and Martinez. But from what I have gleaned from this interview (and I must admit past interviews as well Gui was not at his most forthcoming in this recent encounter) Boratto's pejorative connotation with minimal' seems to derive from encounters with electronic releases ostensibly devoid of soul and feeling and heavy on formulaic and predictable programming. Furthermore, in the case of Addicted, it is more the way that it is constructed, the layering, the approach, the dare I say architecture of the mix that makes it so damn compelling.
 
"I'm not a DJ, but it was an opportunity to showcase what I like to hear on the dancefloor", he says, far too modestly considering he has just embarked on a US tour alongside Michael Mayer. But perhaps for Boratto discussing his own work is tautological, frivolous, an overly conceptual burden akin to dancing about architecture.

Chris Honnery

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