Neu Halls: ‘It’s Not Like I’m Alone, Hunched Over A Laptop In The Dark’

It’s nearing 9pm, sat outside the Shacklewell Arms - Dalston’s current ‘hip-but-with-a-terrible-soundsystem’ pub-come-gig venue. One of London most ambitious producers, Halls, tells us how he’s “quite nervous” about the forthcoming gig later that evening - his EP launch for latest release ‘Fragile’ - but does so with an incredible calmness.

If he is still plagued with those feelings of uncertainty akin to when first starting out, he manages to mask it utmost convincingly, as over the half hour he speaks to us at length on how this new short-player “feels old” to him and how his eyes are firmly focused on what’s coming next, which by the sounds of it seemingly involves some big, big things. Don’t expect Halls’ live set to remain a man hunched over a laptop for much longer…

Your music has this hypnotic, nocturnal feel to it - do you normally create your songs by staying up late and getting into a trance-like state?
Well, I do often create music at night because of where I make it, it’s all done at home at the moment. But I do feel more creative at night, I guess. I kind of see it as that I have this long stretch to make things. Whereas in the day there seems to be more of an urgency, so you rush things. It’s probably because there’s more distractions during the daytime and my house is currently quite a nocturnal place, with people generally in the middle of strange sleeping patterns. So it’s also not like I’m ever completely alone, hunched over a laptop screen in the dark. I’ll get down to the whole technical side of things during the day, but it’s the early hours where my creative side gets to work. Sometimes this leads to some very sober mornings where I wake and realise that I’ve perhaps wasted hours on something that I thought was worthwhile when under the influence of being delirious and sleep-deprived.

You mention that there’s never any time you can find for yourself, do you find it better to be creative when you finally achieve some sense of solitude?
Well, I don’t work well with other people. Before I started on my own, I thought the only way to make music was to be in a band. It’s not that I don’t get on with others, I just find it hard to get things across when it comes to artistic matters. I guess I can be quite a megalomaniac, wanting to do everything myself. So naturally this led to the choice to do things by myself.

I guess it’s then go that we’ve progressed to this stage and extent that home studio software and equipment is so readily available and accessible.
Of course, yes. Even just forty years ago, it was possible but not exactly inexpensive back then. Now if you have a laptop, you can produce almost everything. But then again I’m far from content just using that, I’d like to try out different things. I’d obviously like to have as much of a ruling hand on things as possible, but I’m far from an expert so it’s not like I’m staunchly adamant on it being home and self-produced. But you can’t be really be taught the creative process, that’s something that comes from yourself.

The lead track from your new EP ‘Fragile’ features a Sigur Ros sample, and the entire EP has a lot of samples of more traditional instrumentation - pianos, organs and the like - do you use sampling from things that you can’t yourself physically achieve?
Oh, you gave the game away. But yeah, I used to work a lot with samples. That was my old way of working, I’d find a sample and fit everything in around it. But it comes to a point where it becomes a monotonous thing to do and tracks would get so formulaic. There are hundreds of files on my computer where it was just a sample and a beat that didn’t lead anywhere, so I decided to just leave them there. So now I try to stay clear of doing that. But with ‘Fragile’ in particular, I think it fits as I had been thinking of using a nice organ like that. I could physically get one at that point so the only other option was to sample. I thought of perhaps replacing it later on, but I just couldn’t find anything that tops it.

You’ve always had subtle hints at grandeur, the opening track of your first EP ‘Chakra Drums’, as well as ‘Rise’, could so easily sit alongside some of these tracks, but you’ve moved away from the other more synth-led elements. What reasoning was their behind such a dramatic shift with this EP? Everything’s quite majestic-sounding, this must have been a conscious decision on the direction you wanted your music to go.
I’m glad that’s what it seems, but it was never a conscious decision. It just kind of came about like that really. All the grand elements have just come out of my sub-conscious, I guess.

Are you thinking of using more traditional instruments to go with your new sound?
Well, I’ve been really looking into getting a piano. I have actually found the perfect one. I really want to record with it, but the people haven’t got back to me yet. I don’t want to give too much away but a lot has been written already since this EP was created, and a lot of different instruments have been experimented with. This EP is very old to me, there’s stuff on it from a long time ago.

That seems to be indicative of this juxtaposition in music, especially electronic music, during these modern times - that music can be written and produced so quickly and instantaneously, but the industry is still stuck in their old ways of things taking months to finally be released.
It’s frustrating, because I do want to get things out there. But ‘Fragile’ being my first physical release, even just purely for me to have something to hold that I created is great. With the majority of electronic output, you don’t have anything tangible to show for it so it can feel quite hollow.
This EP has gone through several incarnations. Well, it’s actually consisted of four wholly different tracks in the past. It’s been in a lot of different forms. I actually finished writing a ‘Fragiles’ EP that is completely unrecognisable from this. But there were a few label delays and because I’ve been moving on so rapidly I had started writing these tracks and decided to just scrap the others altogether.

I guess it’s a good thing that this gap between creation and release still exists then, in one way, because you’re given the time to reflect on the quality of output.
Yeah. Some producers just rush things or drop them on the instantly, and there becomes this shitstream of disposable music. At the time of recording or finishing anything, I’m always happy for things to go out into the public domain but looking back it’s actually good for me to have a clear path and focus on everything more vividly.

You don’t seem like the most extroverted person, and so you don’t seem like the most comfortable frontman but your vocals are becoming more prominent. On tracks like ‘Cave Days’ they sound a bit hidden in comparison to this new EP, where they come to the fore a bit more. Are you gaining in confidence now in terms of your voice?
I think I feel more confident in general, not only because of the feedback I’ve been receiving but also when starting out you don’t really know exactly what you’re aiming for or towards. But having a clearer idea makes you more focused and driven. In terms of confidence in my vocal ability, I never saw myself as a singer at all - but over time I’ve gotten used to my voice and my range so I feel more comfortable now to use it as an instrument definitely.

You have a live drummer in your gig set-up now, is this something you’re looking forward to moving towards in the future?
Well, I brought Ian in just before Binnacle festival. We wanted this element of layering so that it wasn’t just him playing and so it would compliment each other. The idea of this for the live show has cast a whole new light on these tracks. ‘Fade To White’, off the new EP, in particular just sounds absolutely incredible. The finale of that track live is absolutely insane, I just couldn’t have thought of that myself. I’m going to ask Ian to get involved with with the recording of the new tracks, I think he’d be happy to do it. This is new ground for me as I’ve never done it before but some of the tracks I’ve already written are just screaming out for having these amazing drums on them.

So what next after this EP launch and this EP?
I think I’m done with EPs, for now anyway. I want to focus on something a bit bigger - not in terms of style but also in scale. There’s only so much an EP can be because of its limits and restrictions, I feel. It’s nice to have these little fragments and bundles, but I don’t think it ever compares to a full-length album that has been truly thought out and everything works together. That’s something I want to aim for.



Halls’ ‘Fragile’ EP is out now via The Sounds Of Sweet Nothing. You can listen before you buy above.