Northern Wind _ Interview With Ida Matsdotter

Is that something you will integrate into your label?

I am starting out with my own music and if it goes well then I will connect it to other artists that I know. I have some people already that I know I want to work with. I will follow my own taste. It’s my label.

I have been a DJ since 2006, which I feel for me is a long time. I started making music before and then I started to mix afterwards. Making this music really had to wait for a long time, ‘till about 2010 when I really started to learn how to properly produce. I remember when I started I was sitting out on this bench by a lake, and you know you see the trees and you see this reflection in the lake. And you see like a sound wave shhhh. You know, you have seen it??

…………………..(silence)…..

Yes……. and then I thought that’s it. I have to really start making music now. So I started then for 3 years. Really intensely making music. Doing nothing else. Sitting in the dark nights also just making music. So this label of mine finally started to come out. I was looking for a name, and to me at least setting up a label is still a really big thing. So I had to look deeply for the name of it. But then it came ;Nordanvind, which means the wind blowing from the north. A fresh and cold wind. It will wake you up.

The late nights bring a lot of poetry and emotions, myths and strange ideas. It’s a lot of fun, dancing, raving and being creative. But it also takes skill and dedication. It’s hard, its soft, its hate and love. It is like a story. I want to release everything on vinyl because I believe that vinyl make it more valuable. They bring value to the music. You respect the music and you are connected to the music. Of course you will be able to download them, but I think it is very important to actually buy music nowadays. Because the artists are working so hard, and if you just sit and only consume,  downloading and downloading, then the artists will be suffering from this and that is why I believe I should release on vinyl. Vinyl is for collectors. That will bring a value to the music collectors and the culture.

It is nice to hear that opening up a label is regarded as a big thing. The ease of setting up a label in today’s environment seems to devalue the dedication and thought behind opening up a label.

For me it had to grow for a long time. I am really sensitive about this aspect of it. This is also why I thought I have to wait to release my stuff because I didn’t think I was good enough. Constantly fixing and polishing. I want to be proud of myself and my music. This is going to be part of my life and my future and will be what I stand for. And I don’t want to rush things and have deadlines. I want to be free. It’s very Nordic, for me. It’s like a Saga. I grew up in the Countryside, in the middle of the forest. There is a lot of layers and things I like to put in my music and one of my main inspiration sources is the Swedish forest and nature. But it can also be also very clubby, since I love techno and I love club sounds and house. Like a techno forest. Understand?

Yes…..

I’m not very easy to control. I can’t control myself. I often start out with having one great inspiration and I start experimenting with a sound. Then it grows. Sometimes I’ll put into recordings the wind, or any noise. I also play the piano and I have a lot of instruments at home and I use them to make sounds for the music. For example you can just sit on a piano and go crazy and record that. I love the equaliser. All equalisers can destroy sounds. Destroy everything and make frequencies. I often use too much vst’s so that my program crashes hehe. It’s so fun with vsts, especially to see how many you can use on one project before it crashes.

I went to school and I learnt how to record a perfect sound in the perfect surroundings and you have all the frequencies from what you can hear. They always said you shouldn’t destroy the sound and you should use this microphone and get the “correct” sound. You know what I mean? I like that but I also love to destroy all the recordings, because in the end it is all about frequencies. And you can just equalise, put reverbs, effects and just destroy. Why not?!

Is the EQ your most destructive tool?

Yes definitely. I use it both ways. I have been taught to make music in this “perfect” way, but I wouldn’t say it was perfect. I know how to produce music in the correct acoustic environment, but because I know this, it means I can do whatever I want. If I want to destroy something or if I want to record something into a microphone. I also sing. Sometimes I will talk too close to the microphone, so there is distortion. Because I know about this stuff, there shouldn’t be any rules. It is all about frequencies and how you put them together then you can do whatever you want. Both ways sounds great, just depends on how you do it.

Compare it to acid house. Playing with a TB303 that other musicians felt was not so great because it couldn’t simulate bass sounds correctly. It started a whole new revolution in music and a new scene. Amazing.. and now the TB303 is really expensive.