Thierry David Interview - The Final On Vinyl Podcast

From Paris, France Thierry David explains his process, equipment, and his history of recording in a very interesting conversation!

Keith "MuzikMan" Hannaleck

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Transcript

Speaker 1 0:02

Hello everybody, this is Keith MuzikMan Hannaleck with the Final on Vinyl Podcast. And today, calling in from Paris, France, is Thierry David And I just recently heard his wonderful new album, Six Waves, which will be coming out January 17th of 2025. Welcome aboard Thierry. Well, thank you for coming. I I appreciate it. And it's uh I'm glad there's a nice clear connection for us to discuss things. And um your your new album was uh a great listen. Um electronic, ambient, new age, I would call it for sure. And uh I was able to listen to every track very carefully and um felt it was uh very interesting and um maybe you could talk more about it, you know, how things happened as you were inspired to compose this album and the process you went through. And the one question before you start on that, is there a reason why you would um your last name is in capital letters? Is there a reason for that? Is that something that's been handed down through generations in your lineage, or is that just something you like to do?

Speaker 1:24

No, it's just because uh there is always a confusion, you know, be between uh my first name and last name. And uh David can be a first name. That's why uh my last name is David, and my first name is uh Cherry. Um that's the only reason. But you know, I used I used to spend uh some time at the Berkeley College of Music, and everybody there called me David or Dave, because it was easier to pronounce than uh Cherry. That's why. I don't think Terry is hard to pronounce at all. No, it's not, it doesn't exist in English, Terry. True.

Speaker 1 2:04

That's true, yeah. Well it's glad to hear I'm glad to hear your voice. And um, can you talk a little bit about the album and um some of the processes you went through?

Speaker 2:15

Okay, uh it's a I don't know how to begin with this because it's always for me a long story. Uh it takes me a long uh rather pretty much time, you know, to make an album. Um this one took me at least two years. It sounds a very uh long period for just six tunes, but um I uh I try to to take my time to get more I can from what I feel. And um especially for this one because I uh I work on this album with some new gear, uh especially hardware synthesizer. So it took me uh a bit of time to to get uh used to this uh those uh uh synthesizers. Uh and um well I used to, you know, it's not my first album. I made at least uh 20 or 30 albums before. So um uh this one I I uh now I'm getting a little bit older, so I take my time. Uh I'm not used making music uh during eight hours a day. I just do two, three, four hours a day just to have the feedback and to listen carefully to what I've done the day before or the week before or even the months before, and to um progressively see what's going to happen with the music. Because this um this work is based mainly on sound design at the beginning. You know, I used like many composers, uh I I heard some of your uh podcasts, and uh some guys explained that they began with a sound, and the sound gives you gives you the idea of what you is going to make after. That's that's I'm not composing, you know, knowing exactly. I I have a piano uh I play the piano from since the age of five, but I'm not using the piano uh anymore. I'm I'm using more the uh the computers and synthesizers. Especially to find those sounds and those atmosphere to create uh real uh uh to to help the listener to feel to feel good with my music. It's it's really difficult to to explain exactly, you know, because you never know where the music is going to lead you. And uh so you try to do your best. That's it. Um very well. Very well. It's very you know I do have a question.

Speaker 1 5:14

Uh I had sent an email, but I I don't think anybody uh saw the question I had. Um the the the title track, the sixth wave. Um there's more of a mellowed out sound or the echoing guitar sound. Is that an actual guitar that's produced via the computer or synth, or what exactly is that sound?

Speaker 5:37

It the sound is from a guitar, because we you know with the all the plug-in, so all the plug-in we have, we have very beautiful sounds of guitars. But it's not a guitar. I'm not playing guitar. Um I'm playing the sound with my keyboard, but using the what we call the MPE, which is new MIDI uh uh connection, which allows you to make some glissendo and something, some and to use the the aftertouch of the keyboard to um to give you some to to control for, for example, for guitars, delays, echoes, and things like that. So it's it's it's pretty like a guitarist, but it's not uh David Gilmour's playing, because I'm a fan of a fan of Pink Floyd, you know. So but uh I try to I don't want I don't want to to uh I can't compare it with a key, it's just a sound, but it looks like a sound of a guitar, that's true. But it's played it's played with a keyboard.

unknown 6:39

Yeah.

Speaker 6:40

And it's playing live.

Speaker 1 6:42

You're a pretty cool dude with me if you're a fan of Pink Floyd, that's for sure.

Speaker 6:46

Oh yeah. I I I I love many people, but uh Pink Floyd was maybe the my first uh real contact with modern music when I was uh let's say 14 or something like that. Uh and uh it was because I I I had uh at the time at that time a classical training so and some jazz too, but it was really new, really. And after people like Von Gelis or other people like it.

Speaker 1 7:14

Yeah. Well living growing up living and growing up in Paris, uh what was the accessibility of music uh like Pink Floyd or you know bands coming from the US? Was it easy to get music or was it more difficult?

Speaker 7:30

Oh no, it was easy. It was easy because uh I I remember a friend of my brother, which was a little bit older, uh, had a very uh very good hi-fi system. And it once he he he told me, he phoned me and he said, uh come on, listen, I have I've got a new record. It's it's from people, it's very, very strange. It was Dark Side of the Moon from the Pick Floyd. But I was 14. But it was easy. We have we had especially especially even well, in fact, we had more British uh musicians than American musicians. That's that's what I discovered when I went to Berkeley, it was in the 80s. Then I discovered more the Californian music and all this stuff that we didn't know new uh really in France, like Doobie Brothers or uh uh God Sweet and Tears, uh Carly Simon, uh well uh uh so that's no in the 70s we we have everything. Obviously, Beatles, Rolling Stones, Superchamp, everything, Genesis, you know, all these bands.

Speaker 1 8:43

So you got exposed to everything. What about uh Jean-Michel Jari? I'm sure you're familiar with him.

Speaker 8:50

Sure, sure. It was it was at the same there are two records which were uh really important for me, and uh oxygen from Jean-Michel Jar. That I discovered I was in sp yeah I was in Spain at that time and was it was uh I was in a uh uh in a shop, you know, and there was mus uh music playing, and I hear and hear this, and I say, Oh my god, that's new. And at the same time, the same year, there was a deep uh record from Rick Wakeman, uh, which what which is uh criminal records, I I think. And uh I was I like a keyboard player that I was, I was amazed by its uh genius. For me it's a genius, Rick Wakeman. And yes, and the band yes too. So this these two records were very important for me. Um and and Jean-Michel Jaris can can play some fantastic things that are not from my uh in my opinion, they are not well known because people know more the let's say the disco electro uh things, but he's working with uh he has a f uh fantastic gear and uh he's doing things very uh creative and very uh innovative too at the same time. But it's not the only one. We have we have I have influence from from lots of people. Uh I I was uh a great fan of Michael Jackson, Quintin Jones too. Uh even if I I'm doing now uh electronic ambient because it's you know your tastes are changing over the time and uh it's uh uh yeah you you change and I I I am not doing the same music I used to do 30 years ago, of course. You know, I came with the jazz yeah. I I I I was mainly in the jazz rock scene and and after that in uh uh uh world music also I did some records which were like hybrid world music. I always try to to make a mixture between all styles. But now, since my let's say that's this album and the previous one, uh Slow Motion, uh I was uh I'm more in ambient music and more in the sound, you know, in sound effects and uh the atmosphere. And for example, for this album, I think it's good to, if you can, to hear it with a headphone and to be really emerged in the you can hear it like uh background music, of course, but I think it's better if you can really uh be um uh concentrate and uh well I guess I I feel it this way. I don't know.

Speaker 1 11:51

You know, interesting enough, um Jari recorded oxygen at his home. So he was a true innovator and ahead of his time. And uh I wonder what kind of equipment that he used to do that, to make such an amazing classic album, you know.

Speaker 12:07

You mean the the equipment he had that at that time or now?

Speaker 1 12:11

Yeah, the equipment he had at that time to make oxygen, to be able to make that.

Speaker 12:17

He had like uh who knows I don't know, he had maybe uh uh twenty uh uh synthesizers different. He used I don't know, yeah he has the fair light, but I think the fair light was coming a little bit later, later on. Saint Clavier and Fairlight, which uh the big uh uh big jump in um in electronic music because you can you could uh which is now uh obvious for everybody, you can record in your in your phone, but at that time you uh sampling was new. But he had the all the all the very, very old synthesizers, Oberrime, uh Odyssey, all the mini MOOC, of course, all the MOOC Yamaha too and everything. That's uh that's very uh I remember when I listened to the oxygen the first time, I say, okay, but I would like to do this music, but I don't have the equipment to do it. It's uh I that time I play the piano, you know, drums and piano and a little bass, but that's what that's so I it was very classical. And uh after you can you uh you you can uh build your own studio and uh okay and spend a lot of money to to buy all this equipment. Now it's more easier, you know. We have we are very lucky. We are very lucky now because we can buy a fantastic. I just renew my studio because I was always working with a um classical uh system. And uh now I just have a portable Mac with lots of plug-in, some uh hard gear, uh hardboard hardware, sorry, so hardware uh gear, and uh that is uh well it's it's really uh less cables than before, let's say. Interesting. If you see what I mean.

Speaker 1 14:23

Um do you have a lot of that vintage gear from you know the guys like Wakeman and and uh Keith Emerson, all those early innovators? Uh do you have a a lot of that classic gear yourself?

Speaker 14:38

No, because I I used to change my gear. So sometimes I say I'm um I'm I think I I should have kept all my gear, but uh you know it's a question of uh of uh room and uh I was my home studio is quite uh small. So if I keep all the scenes, uh I can't walk in it. So so I change it. I change I at the beginning I have a Yamad, DX7, uh Rollon and all this stuff, but now I've uh as I just said, I uh uh even the thing the um the computer is small. So it's a Mac, it's a very powerful Mac, but it's a portable one, you know. So uh you it you change you change your your gear, and sometimes it's it's a good thing because it's uh uh a way to go to another kind of music. It's it opens uh uh different uh ways of making music. And especially now, because especially now for keyboard player, because with all this new uh uh controller, you can have uh the impression to play like uh you play a guitar or violin. It's it's really different for us. And so it's very interesting too.

Speaker 1 15:58

I bet it is. And that vintage gear too, like the uh the MOOC that Emerson used. I mean, that took up a whole wall for God's sake. It was so big, right?

Speaker 16:07

Yeah, they're great. They're great. And now you they midify uh all this stuff and all the equipment. Uh the the only antique uh um uh equipment I have is uh Yamaha CP80 piano, which is an electroacoustic piano. But I use it for for uh for fun and I almost never use it in my uh recordings now. Because you have to, it's it should be more complicated than using the the modern keyboards, that's why. Maybe I'm I'm too lazy, I don't know. I don't think so.

Speaker 1 16:50

Do you find now uh that you're older, more experienced, um that you know taking less time and and taking your time in um instead of spending eight hours in the studio and getting like burnt out two or three hours a day, uh that the product that comes out is more of more of a quality than it used to be? Personally, do you think as an artist?

Speaker 17:14

Well, first I think it's really a chance to take your time. So uh because I when I used to work eight hours, ten hours a day, it was because I was very in a hurry, you know, to produce. And I made a lot of music music library, what we call music library in France, you know, which is done for film music and jingles and things like that. So I was working all the day. And uh now I have uh the pleasure to to be able to work to take time, and that's I think it's uh big chance, first, and secondly, that you can uh improve, uh go deeper in the what you want to do. Uh it can be also uh you have to be very careful because if you take too much time, you will never be happy. So you never you have to say, okay, now it's time to finish the album. So sometimes I give me some schedule to be able to finish it. Um but I think really it's a it's a very big advantage to take time, yeah, of course. Because you know when you you when you work music, um uh I'm working alone. I used to work some with some uh musicians like guitarists and percussionists, but when you work alone in your studio and you listen during uh six, seven hours the same uh chords and the same uh things, at the end you don't hear anything. So you have to take a bit um uh feedback, or I don't know how you say that, to to you know to to to to come back the day after and to say, okay, yeah, that's what's not so bad. I will keep on on this and uh dropping what I don't like, you know. It's uh it's very yeah and I I I want to do it this way too because uh yeah, it's uh I because I I I I imagine and I don't know, you never know, but I I would like to play music and to create music as long as as I can. Uh and uh if I don't want to be fed up, you know, with music because I'm doing too much. So that's why I think it's a good way to do it. And I think it's it's it it reflects in the kind of music I'm doing too. Which is more uh uh let's say less stressful than it was maybe before.

Speaker 1 19:47

Well, you know, life situations change too. I'm sure at that time it was uh your uh your bread and butter, you know, you were making money and trying to survive, correct? It's exactly that's correct.

Speaker 20:00

That's correct. So uh when you s now I'm I'm I'm not a millionaire, of course, but I uh I uh can live on from my music. I I have in the profession uh I I did music professionally speaking since almost 40 years now. So I had the I have a uh big catalogue and it is used. I have like I'm lucky enough in it is used and and my uh records are in with the streaming now you you can if you do what you what you have to do, it's uh it's uh it's a good way to live in for for live. And um that's why I can take more time than when when I had to you know to to to get money first, for sure.

unknown 20:47

For sure.

Speaker 1 20:48

Right. Not any different from musicians, you know, people that aren't musicians, you know, you like myself, I just recently retired from the day job and uh you know it took me forty, forty, fifty years to get to this point where everything's paid off and I can you can live off of my uh social security, right? So it takes a long time.

Speaker 21:09

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 21:11

Yeah, I just think a pleasure, Theory. Um you have a great story, and so you're a very wise man, and so there's a lot of good advice in there for your fellow musicians. I hope some of them do listen to this conversation. And I sincerely appreciate your time and your music, and I hope we shall meet again in the future.

Speaker 21:33

Yeah, me too. It was really a pleasure to talk with you and to be able to explain what I feel to to give to people doing music, because it's uh my aim now. It's not just for me. It's just especially for for the listeners. Excellent.

Speaker 1 21:50

Well, you have a great new year and I hope we talk again soon. You take care. Oh okay, you too. Take care. Bye-bye. Bye bye. Bye bye.

unknown 22:00

Mm-hmm.