Interview: An On Bast's undying passion for sound with her new album 'Tender Perceptions'

Making a more than welcome return to Awesome Soundwave this November is the prolific - An On Bast. An On Bast’s undying passion for sound and its limitless potential is something that has always fascinated us, her pure connection with her music has to be considered as extremely special. 

On November 10th, her “Tender Perceptions” album will see the light of day, marking a return to our label after several vital releases already in our catalogue. On Tuesday 7 November, you will also be able to join An On Bast and us for a LISTENING PARTY ahead of the release date, allowing you to interact with and ask her questions about the music and her processes. 

Image credit: Paweł Brudło

Hi An On Bast, welcome back aboard the ASW ship! How was summer ‘23 for you? We can not wait to release your second album with us in November.

Hello again! Summer time was full of fantastic gigs, amazing events, joyful crowds and sunny vibes. I love this time of the year. My album “Tender Perceptions” comes out on November 10th, I am very much looking forward to it. It is always a very special moment when it all comes together and the music can be out and finally interact with listeners.

Tell us a bit about the “Tender Perceptions” LP, what were the original ideas behind the body of work, and its title? Your ideas are always so fascinating to us.

On my musical path, as well as in life, I am always fascinated and searching for what is invisible - sounds as different waves are a very good example and language for this type of exploration of reality, especially when it is combined with emotions. Throughout the creative process, I attach great importance to emotions, because so much of understanding "what is" and "how something is” happens beyond words. All it takes is some attention and tender perception for a better, deeper and broader understanding to emerge than a moment ago. So we can say that the tunes on this album are my philosophical considerations without intersubjective communication (without the use of words).

Did you set out to make a certain vibe, and atmospheres with the album for us? Or was the music made first and placement came last.

First objective for me is always my actual field of interest at the moment, fascination and personal research which is non-musical. Then I express myself through sound design, composing timbres, then lines, phrases, the whole arrangement of story which comes out after I process it within myself. With Awesome Soundwave my goal is to tell this story through dance music, built around grooves and melodies. I created this material just for ASW following my natural way.

We understand there is a special story around one track in particular “Climb The Tree”, can you tell our audience a bit more about this?

It was October 2022. I felt so much honour and happiness to be invited by Carl Cox to perform at Wembley at his super special event - his album release party with several other Awesome Soundwave artists.

I feel the urge to make music when I'm happy, when I have an "aha" moment, when I experience strong emotions - I have to express them with sounds. So that was the moment: I wrote the main melodic motif a few days before my flight to London, on the tennis courts, before one of my matches. I got there too early, I had a laptop with Ableton and I couldn't help but create melodies to express my joy of upcoming special experiences that were going to happen. The notes were coming quickly to my mind. Later that day, I put the recorded samples into the Octatrack sampler.

A few days later I improvised with them at the Ovo Wembley Arena. It was an unforgettable event. A few months later, I produced the actual song, which I titled "Climb The Tree" - to capture and depict the pure happiness, carefreeness and delight of these magical moments that we are given to experience.

What a night that was! A fond memory of all us here at ASW, and an incredible night of music. Any particular nights, and events you have taken part in recently which is a fond memory for you?

A truly epic night and also a very profound experience in terms of live performances. Yes, well I love performing, there is great joy in all the beautiful energy that builds in the moment with creating live sounds when I am on stage with my machines. I remember all my performances, there were many wonderful ones in the summer, to mention Audioriver Festival and Habitat Festival. Recently Trick or Beat was amazing - a one-day festival in my city of Wrocław, taking place in the unique building of the Centennial Hall. Great atmosphere, beautiful stage, visuals, great audience.

How is your live set up looking at the moment? Anything you are looking to add in the coming months?

My setup is fully hardware-based, which means I don't use a computer with a DAW, only electronic instruments of my choice. Now they are: Custom Modular Synthesizer, Sampler, Looper, Polyphonic Synthesizer, Mixer with Effects, Analog Saturation and Filters. I just finished programming my machines for a new live performance, I added some melodic samples, loops that I had recorded to the songs that appear on the album, so that I could improvise on the motifs so that the song would be recognizable to the audience, but at the same time created differently each time live, currently on stage.

Following my live performance philosophy, I am building an instrument environment with the goal of having complete control over every single sound made live, to be able to do whatever I want with each sound: so first I will be able to create it, create a sequence of notes or triggers, fill them with timbres, modulate all the parameters I can think of, of course also to have basic operations at hand, such as turning on and off. However, I love playing synthesizer keyboards, so I often improvise melodies by playing another polyphonic synthesizer on top of all the above. I also record and loop it in my looper - to have my hands free and be able to touch other machines.

Apart from this probably technical description, what I actually build, control and arrange is the energy of music, certain emotions and vibrations that I consciously want to share with the audience / create the best possible connection with people.

No doubt you have more music being released into the wild, can you let us know what else you are working on/have coming up?

I'm happy that we recently joined creative forces with Marc Romboy in his studio. We're still working out some of the details, but we can't wait to share what we've cooked.

There's a lot more, but I can't say much… Also next year will definitely be the time for my album with non-dance music, which will be released by the Cologne label Modularfield. For now I’m looking forward to starting to perform with material from ‘Tender Perceptions’.

Thanks for always being a superstar and an absolute pleasure to work with!

Thank you, you guys are awesome!

▶ ‘TENDER PERCEPTIONS’ by An On Bast will drop on Friday 10 November 2023. Get it here.