| Q:Who are you? | |
| I am Mike D, otherwise known as Bombaman | |
| Q: The Beginnings – When did you start making electronic music? | |
| I started making electronic music when i was about 16 or 17, so…more than a decade ago, lol. | |
| Q: What or who inspired you? | |
| Buying LOADS of jungle on vinyl, and being inspired by the sounds I was already playing got me in to the idea of making my own music. I didn’t get too serious in to it until I bought my own CDJ’s, with the intent on playing my own material. Had I not taken that route, I don’t think my output would be what it is today. | |
| Q: How would you describe your style? | |
| I am my own worst critic, so I have no idea. What I do know is that many dj’s want my music, but in the end have a hard time fitting in to their sets because of the unique nature of how it sounds. Often, the only other tracks that go with mine are…mine, hahaha. I think most dj’s aren’t in to the idea of Bombaman tribute sets all the time lol. | |
| Q: How was your grasp of the audio engineering & production at this time? How did you learn producing? Is it all self taught, from the internet and tutorials or mentors and teachers? | |
| A lot of my production stuff is self taught. I got my feet wet years ago with trackers, learning the basics of building a song and what have you. Eventually I went to audio engineering college to learn how to make the ideas sound proper, and to learn how it is the majors get the sound they do. I would say it paid off pretty well, haha. | |
| Q: Tell us about your setup. Are you using mostly software or hardware these days? | |
| All software. Ableton Live 8 with the plug-ins it came with, and my vast library of samples. Nothing else. | |
| Q: What are your five favorite instrument and effect plugins? | |
| Ableton Live 8 Compressor Ableton Live 8 Redux Ableton Live 8 Flanger Ableton Live 8 EQ 3 Ableton Live 8 Mastering Suite audio effect rack (which has a bunch of the above mentioned things in it) |
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| Q: Who are the artists who have influenced you the most right now? | |
| Crookers/LuckyBeard, no question. In fact, the entire LuckyBeard family inspires me. I am a big fan of the weird, Italian sound, and they seem to be big fans of mine lol. | |
| Q: What is your typical work schedule like? | |
| 5am out the door for my office job, 5pm home from my office job. Five days a week. When I get home it’s family time, as I have a wife and two young daughters. If or when I find time to work on music, it’s maybe for an hour or two here and there. Luckily my wife tries to fit my music time in to our ridiculous life schedule so I can be satisfied with my artistic output. | |
| Q: How do you promote your music? Are there any music promotion services you can recommend? | |
| I promote with my loud mouth on Facebook and Soundcloud, for the most part. The LuckyBeard fam has been pretty good about getting the word out lol. I can’t recommend anything. Whatever success I have garnered isn’t cuz I spend all my time talking about myself, I have let the music do that for me. | |
| Q: How do you distribute your music? Are there any digital distribution services that worked for you which you can recommend to our readers? | |
| I got lucky when I first started sending my stuff out, as this was during the time Myspace was really popular. I gained a LOOOAD of high profile contacts simply by sending them messages on Myspace, with a zip file containing a bunch of my music. I have pretty much kept this route steady for the past 6 or so years. Still, to this day i just send emails and messages on Facebook to the people that have stayed in contact with me. | |
| Q: What social media or websites do you use for music promotion | |
| Facebook, Soundcloud…not much else. Mixcloud, i guess, when i remember to use it lol. | |
| Q: Let´s talk about djing and live gigs. Do you remember your first gigs? How were your first experiences with finding and playing gigs. | |
| I think my first gig was at this gross bar in the north of St. Catharines, Ontario…Jumping Jacks, is what it may have been called. It was for a jungle night, like…13 years ago hahaha. I don’t think I was old enough to drink, and I remember my dad coming to pick me up at like, midnight when I was done. St. Catharines isn’t exactly renowned for it’s night life, but that is where I cut my teeth, dj’ing for free for many years before finally moving to Toronto. That is where I finally got off the ground, but not without some hiccups. After a while me and a few friends started throwing our own grimey parties, basically so that we could play the kind of stuff that no one else was playing at the time. Things really took off from there… | |
| Q: Was it complicated finding a booking agency or clubs to play at and how were the first gigs received? What´s it like on tour for you? | |
| I wouldn’t say it’s been complicated getting gigs. I kind of just sat back and took what was coming my way. I am not the type to actively pursue gigs or anything like that. I like to stay at home and watch TV, hehehe. I think my first gigs were received much like my current ones: “What the hell is this guy playing?” is what I feel like most people think, haha. I suppose I have just been pretty lucky to have friends in high places, and have had some damn fine good timing, too. On tour, I “think” I am pretty low key, but the promoters would know better than me. I don’t ask for much, but I tend to get pretty out there with the booze and cause some havoc….pretty sure there’s some terrible videos on Youtube of me “MC’ing” and what have you…I have also been told more than once that I am a huge pain the ass to follow, as I tend to pick really inappropriate “last songs” in my sets, which I guess throws off lots of DJ’s hahahaha. |
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| Q: If you could only take one piece of gear on the road with you besides your laptop, what would it be? | |
| My headphones. Laptop speakers suckkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk | |
| Q: What is your favorite animal? | |
| Cat, but ideally no animals. I have enough going on lol… | |
| Q: What would your personal dream life look like? | |
| A house in the middle of nowhere, with fields of weed and silo’s full of whiskey. No neighbours, no other humans or anything other than my wife and kids. Giant stacks of speakers in every room. Maybe a PS Vita in every room, too. I guess some kind of transport to get my little group of friends out to hang out and act like animals with…I don’t need much 🙂 | |
| Q: And what would be your worst nightmare scenario in life? | |
| Living in Niagara for the rest of my life… 😉 | |
| In a parallel universe Q: If you weren’t a musician, what would you be and why? | |
| Ooooh, probably some other kind of artist, or perhaps a math nerd. | |
| The Future Q: When we interview you in one year, where do you see yourself? | |
| Haha, probably sitting at the same desk, answering similar questions. Dj’ing doesn’t pay ALL the bills lol. | |
| How would you rate this interview? Where the questions good, ok or just terrible? | |
| Good! | |
| Do you have anything to add? | |
| Love for my LuckyBeard fam, i wouldn’t be doing some of the things I have and are still doing if it weren’t for them 🙂 | |
| Soundcloud | |
| http://soundcloud.com/bombaman | |
| http://facebook.com/ |
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