Future sounds at BONED

Toby Ridler, A.K.A. Becoming Real, is one of the most promising young producers around today, giving birth to strange new music that tends to melt faces and scar minds. It also turns out he’s a really nice dude. He answered a few questions of mine in anticipation of his headlining set at BONED, the second Felix Music Night, taking place tonight at Metric (Imperial College Union).

How would you describe your music for readers who might not have heard of you? Eski / Footwurk / House.

In interviews, you seem to refer to Becoming Real in the third person, implying that you as an artist separate yourself from the music you’re producing. Do you have any other current projects, musical or otherwise? Yeah we, there is me and Becoming Real, we ain’t the same person. I’m just the guy that makes the music, he’s the entity. Just doing Becoming Real right now, that’s my main project. I do loads of filming and walking, I have kinda like a team of people who I’m creative with, but musically it’s just me myself and I.

Any plans for a full-length album? Not right now. I’ve pondered it, but I’m busy working on other shit: two EP’s, couple films. Full-length is gonna have to wait.

Do you think that the album just wouldn’t work as a format for Becoming Real?I’ll make it work for me I guess. It’s just a blank CD I gotta fill with music so I’ll just do my own thing, but yeah it certainly ain’t gonna be some 12 track dance compilation. Fuck that. All I know is it’ll be epic.

I really dig the tracks you did with Trim, as his voice and flow really match your music in an interesting way, in a similar way to how Kode9 and Spaceape complement each other. Do you plan on working with Trim again? Trimbal, yeah, maybe in the future. We’ll see. I’m giving the straight up grime ting a rest right now.

Are you interested in working with other vocalists, and not necessarily grime artists? Maybe. I used to think some R’n’B thing would be cool, but seriously, fuck that. I don’t wanna be some guy who’s got some American chick over the top of my stuff. I’m British, my music is informed by what’s around me. I love R’n’B and all that, but really, I ain’t on that bandwagon, if you feel me...

What would be your dream collaboration? You can pick anyone, living or dead. Hmm, I could get Dizzee back on track.

I recently heard your remix of “Kissing You” on The FADER Soundcloud, which is hypnotic and eerily soothing, and really quite different from the more visceral material you play at your live shows. Are you more interested in pushing sonic experimentation than writing songs? Yeah, this a good point. I certainly started off by just pushing sounds and seeing what I could make with my cheap ass equipment, how far could I reach or where could I stretch my equipment and tools to. But nowadays I’m just trying to make otherworldy dance music, music that’s been remembered incorrectly. I want them to be left with something afterwards to make people time travel when they come see me live, I guess... durr.

Your ghost-step has its roots in grime and dubstep, but could you see yourself moving away from dance music altogether? I was never really into dubstep to be honest, grime and footwurk for sure. And I think there’s always been traces of house, more and more that’s coming to the forefront actually... I’m doing my best to make dance music come closer to me, to inject my set of sounds and processes with more swing and that.

I find that there’s a real cinematic quality to your music, in the way it evokes images of dark, desolate back-alleys and seedy city underbellies. What with Trent Reznor’s Oscar for The Social Network soundtrack, the Chemical Brothers’ Hanna soundtrack and the awesome soundtrack Basement Jaxx wrote for Attack The Block, it seems like the soundtrack is becoming an increasingly attractive way of getting your music out there, reaching crowds outside of club nights, whilst remaining an artistically challenging endeavour. Have you ever thought about doing a soundtrack? Yeah man, I’d love to do a soundtrack. I’d like to make a sound track to places in London, or make a soundtrack to my memories of places I’ve been.

What are you listening to these days? Any recommendations? Yeah, the new Anti-G record on Planet Mu is the shit. Seriously awesome. A lot of older stuff on Kompact... Kassem Mosse is pretty good. I’m working on a remix for him right now.

Finally, I’ve heard that you’re quite the samurai movie geek. I would like you to tell us about your favourite samurai movie. Yeah sure. I like ‘The Bride With White Hair’. It’s a bit more comical, but it’s incredibly well edited. Any Akira Kurosawa is a sure fire classic, the texture of his films are so silky... Been watching The Kingdom recently though – the Lars Von Trier series. I’d recomend that also.