They were the frontrunners of the ‘90s’ big beat genre, and their music subsequently found ubiquity on many an early 21st century action movie or high-octane video game soundtrack. The Crystal Method stand tall among the most beloved electronic acts of the 1990s.
Originally a duo (Ken Jordan and Scott Kirkland) the outfit began their music-making journey after meeting each other while working at the same grocery store.
Their platinum debut, Vegas came in 1996, and was packed with intense, irresistible beat-angled cuts such as Keep Hope Alive and Busy Child.
Its critical success led to the pair attracting multiple high profile collaborators for their ensuing follow-ups - and even a Grammy nom for 2009’s sublime Divided by Night.
It’s that album that this interview - conducted by Computer Music magazine back in 2009 - orbits, “We think that it’s our best record yet,” Ken Jordan told us. He was also giddy about the possibilities of the then-new iPhone for music-making purposes; “Both Scott and I are also big iPhone fans, so that’s like having a small computer with you all of the time”.
Ken would eventually retire from music, and step away from The Crystal Method in 2017, leaving Scott Kirkland as the act’s sole member up until this present day.
But back in ‘09, this interview finds Jordan - who started working with Scott via a cumbersome hardware set-up - a firm half of a duo that were increasingly getting into the software mindset as a new decade loomed…
The Crystal Method - The Computer Music Interview (2009)
The Crystal Method - The Computer Music Interview (2009)
We catch up with one of the most successful electronic acts in America, to discuss software, success and… Bill Withers?
Ken Jordan and Scott Kirkland, aka The Crystal Method, have managed – through sheer brute force and determination, combined with some stonking tunes – to infiltrate the world of underground electronic music as well as more mainstream media.
In addition to being highly respected in the hotly-contested dance arena, the band’s music has appeared in a ton of films, TV programs, adverts and videogames, much of it licensed from the four albums that they’ve recorded since they got together more than 15 years ago.
Both the band’s studio work and their infamous Community Service albums have regularly scored Billboard chart success, and their debut album, Vegas, is now a platinum seller and one of the most successful electronic albums ever to come out of the US. Vegas’ impact was such that the band’s second and third albums (Tweekend and Legion Of Boom) attracted several high-profile guest vocalists and musicians.
Their fourth, Divided By Night, was recently released to rave reviews and also featured a wide variety of big-name guests, including She Wants Revenge singer Justin Warfield, New Order bassist Peter Hook, Metric front-woman Emily Haines and former Hole/Peaches drummer Samantha Maloney.
“We think that it’s our best record yet,” says TCM’s Ken Jordan. “It’s also the first LP that we recorded at our awesome new Crystalwerks studio, which we spent a number of years building, so we were especially excited to get in there. We wanted to step up the songwriting, experiment with more melody and musicality, and include more collaborations. It was somewhat of a long process – the songs grew and changed in a number of ways. But we really enjoyed the process of working with all of the great artists on the album – we’re proud of what we achieved.”
Crystalwerks is the latest chapter in TCM’s somewhat bizarre studio history. Way back when the band started in the mid 90s, their first tracks were recorded in a small bunker that was allegedly built in California during the Cuban missile crisis, aptly called The Bomb Shelter. Even these cramped conditions made for a more sophisticated experience compared to Ken’s first setup, as he recalls…
“I started in the late 80s with a Mac, plus a single synth and sampler – an Ensoniq ESQ-1 and Mirage respectively.” It was a primitive setup, to say the least, so it’s a good job Ken didn’t really have any artistic aspirations until years later. In fact, he eventually chose a quite different musical path: DJing at his college radio station. Then, in the early 90s, he almost accidentally stumbled back into the world of music production…
“At the time, I just really loved music,” he recalls, “but a couple of bands asked me to go in the studio with them and I just fell in love with the process of recording and production. I started learning everything I could and began producing dance music on my own. When I later met Scott, we pooled our gear and talents.”
It was to be the start of a long and successful career – the duo’s intense sound won them fans across the globe. As well as being big sellers in the dance scene, the band have contributed tracks to many videogames and TV shows, including the theme tune to Bones and the intro music to Splinter Cell. Their music has formed the backbone to several TV ads (including Mazda and Gap) and they also produced the soundtrack to the movie London. So even if you don’t think you know The Crystal Method sound, there’s every chance that you’ll have at least one of their tracks lodged somewhere in your brain. How have the band managed to garner so much success with their music across such varied media?
“Most of the time, it’s the music from our albums that gets licensed,” Ken explains.
“Something about the music we make has struck a chord with advertisers, music supervisors and other people in that world. We think about the places that we license our music to, but we also understand that people learn about and experience new music in a variety of ways and from a variety of places. From the beginning, we understood the power that having a song in a commercial would have for exposing our music to new people. What we did do was say ‘yes’ where maybe others wouldn’t.
“We’ve created music specifically for certain projects as well,” he continues. “That’s obviously a bit more involved, and a more creative process than just licensing your music, but like creating a compelling remix or making an interesting album, it’s something that we approach as a fun challenge – making the mood of the music fit the visuals or the ideas that we’re provided with. They’re all different projects, but also fun.”
One of the most unusual of these was for Nike, where The Crystal Method composed a 45-minute piece of music specifically designed for people who were working out. We told you they were versatile!
The Crystal Methodology
We do, however, want to know about The Crystal Method ‘sound’, if there is such a definable thing. If you can imagine the high-energy electronic music that rocks its way through a certain type of movie trailer – only better, of course – you’ve pretty much nailed it. An LA-based DJ once described it as dance music that rocks or rock music that you can dance to, which paints an even clearer picture. It’s definitely not typical of European dance music – it’s very obviously from the other side of the pond. So how does a Crystal Method track typically come together"
“We write better music if the melody or song elements come first,” Ken says. “Most people assume that we always start with the drums, but we prefer to get something musical going on first. Scott is much more the composer and musician, and I lean towards being the producer and engineer. We have been working together for so many years now that we’ve got it down to a science and we’re able to complement each other very well… on most days, anyway!
“There aren’t really any tricks – just hard work and a love of making our music,” Ken continues. “We do a couple of things that help us get our sound. We try to put all our drum tracks in the same ‘room’. All drum tracks go to the same bus, which receives stereo compression and other effects. We also use a lot of distortion effects on synths and basses – well, on a lot of things, actually – particularly old stompboxes or cool plug-ins like Ohmicide from Ohm Force. That effect really is awesome – it delivers some of the sickest distortion I’ve ever heard.”
“I also love the L3-LL Multimaximizer from Waves,” he adds, while on the subject of effects. “The L3 Limiter can focus on certain frequencies, so it helps make everything sound better. We also use the Waves SSL stereo bus compressor on lots of our mixes, too.”
Crystalwerks
At the heart of TCM’s new Crystalwerks studio is an Apple Mac Pro running Pro Tools|HD. The band also run several virtual instruments, and they have plenty of new and vintage hardware synths patched into their system.
“We used to shy away from virtual synths,” Ken reveals, “but they’re so good now – they work every time and you don’t have to keep taking them to shop for repairs. We really like the Jupiter-8V from Arturia, Absynth 4 from Native Instruments and G-Force’s impOSCar."
And while the band clearly have and use a lot of hardware alongside their software, they’ve also got separate virtual setups on their laptops, so that they can work anywhere and any time.
“Laptops are so fast now, it’s crazy,” Ken enthuses. “I love it – I always travel with a laptop. It allows us to be on the road, but continue to work whenever we want. Both Scott and I are also big iPhone fans, so that’s like having a small computer with you all of the time, too.”
However, with all of this technology comes a whole new set of problems, as Ken reveals…
“Crashes and the constant updating! We have a very intricate system of backing up our data at our studio. The systems have to run like clockwork to keep everything safe.”
So is there anything else in the world of software that the guys think could be made better or else newly developed?
“Better tape saturation emulation,” says Ken. “I haven’t really heard a great one…"
Ultimately though, Ken firmly believes that it’s important not to put too much emphasis on the technology behind the creative process, but instead to concentrate on the human element…
“The computer is really just a glorified recorder,” he opines. “You still have to write good music and have talent. I think we would still basically make the same records without computers. But one of the biggest changes has been in storage and the price of storage.
One gigabyte used to be huge, and now one terabyte is not enough. The cost and size of data storage has revolutionised our whole working process. We used to record different takes to a DAT tape, then sample the DAT – it was a long and tedious pain in the ass. Now we can record all day to Pro Tools tracks and never worry about running out of hard drive space, plus you can easily move from song to song and bring everything back exactly the way you left it.”
And how have the band changed their live approach? Do they try and replicate their studio setup on the road?
“We do,” Ken replies. “It’s pretty complicated: two MacBook Pros, both running Pro Tools – one acts as a slave, locked with the word clock and MIDI time code. There’s so much that can go wrong with our setup, but we are getting the system down pretty well.”
On the production front, what advice does Ken have after spending 15 years at the cutting edge of technology?
“Master the gear that you already have,” he says, “and don’t worry about buying all of the latest stuff. Develop a unique sound and own it. We’ve remixed songs from many different genres, and the end result is always something new and different, but we always try to basically make a good Crystal Method track – although it will feature some of the key elements of the track that we’re remixing. Creating a good remix can be just as much of a process or a challenge as creating a brand new track – you’re often basically building something new from the ground up.”
Gazing into the Crystal ball
The Crystal Method clearly have the power and clout to attract some of the best musicians in the world to work on their records, so who is it that they really admire out there?
“Radiohead,” says Ken. “I remember when I first heard Creep and it totally blew my mind. I love the way they perfectly blend pop, rock, alternative and electronic. They never stop amazing me and I absolutely love seeing them live – one of my favourite concerts of all time was seeing them at The Hollywood Bowl, for example. But one of the people we’ve always wanted to work with is Bill Withers, as we’ve always loved his voice, his songwriting, his style – and we hear that he can still sing! We tried getting in touch with him again when we were putting this album together, but it didn’t end up working out. Some day, though!”
The Crystal Method have so many different fingers in so many different pies that they surely have some great advice for people who aren’t making money from selling music any more.
“Well,” says Ken, “artists will have to just concentrate on making money in all of the other areas of the industry, like shows, merchandise, licensing their music and so on. The job has changed somewhat, or certain aspects of it have, but you just have to keep moving on.”
And as for actually making music, Ken’s message is clear…
“Be passionate,” he says. “Master your gear and your sound, and always work hard.”
Ken and Scott will obviously have to follow their own advice over the next few months, with their massively busy schedule coming up…
“We have more touring to support the new album, Divided By Night,” reveals Ken. “We’re out on the road in the US and are looking forward to hitting Europe shortly. We’ve never played some of these great festivals before and that will be very exciting, especially since we haven’t brought the live show to those parts in quite a while. Beyond that, we’ve just shot a new video for our song Come Back Clean that should be making its way out in September, along with an awesome remix from Kaskade. And after all that’s finished, it’s time for surfing on the beach in Costa Rica!”
Additional: The technology explosion
In the 15-plus years that The Crystal Method have been together, advances in music technology have obviously been enormous. But how does Ken see the wider impact of technology on music as a whole?
“I’ve always thought that wider access to music production tools is a great thing. Money should never be the reason that good art is not made. On the down side, however, there’s also lots of crappy music being made.
“The internet is also obviously a wonderful thing,” he adds. “It’s amazing how much the music industry has changed in such a short space of time. We are always interested in the new platforms that enable us to connect with our fans, so we have MySpace and Facebook pages, plus a Twitter account. Sometimes it’s a lot to keep up with, but in the end, interacting with your fans is what it’s all about.”
This interview was originally published in issue 144 of Computer Music in September 2009
You must confirm your public display name before commenting
Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name.
Selected Ambient Shirts: Aphex Twin just dropped a 191-track playlist for sportswear brand Supreme (and there’s a rare Aphex treat buried in there too)
“I’d be running from the studio to other speakers in the house, basically going insane trying to get mixes to sound correct”: Ezra Collective’s Joe Armon-Jones on why he created his Aquarii Studios and his dub-influenced mixing technique
