Extasis AKA Allan Susoeff, Jr Interview - The Final on Vinyl Podcast

I had a lot of fun on this interview with Allan! Great sense of humour and some good information about his music and plans as he moves forward.

Transcript

Speaker 2 0:02

Hi everybody, this is Keith MuzikMan Hannaleck with the Final on Vinyl Podcast . And we have Allan Susoeff, Jr, who is Extasis. No matter how hard I try. Well, you know, Extasis. Ecstasis. Okay, so let's talk about what we have going on here with you. Um, I just listened to your uh recent track release, uh Naval Chakra, and it's 528 Hertz. So what we got going on here is music and and science merging. And uh do you want to talk a little bit about that? You know, how you got to where you are today making this type of music and um you know, maybe talk a little bit.

Speaker 1 0:56

I think we mentioned offline when we were talking on on the you know on email or something like that. I uh years ago, well, this all started back in 2012. I got a divorce and decided to just do a bunch of changes in my life, but I guess around 14 or 15, I started taking courses with Dr. Joe Dispenser, who I'm sure you've heard of, everybody's heard of Dr. Joe, and got really interested in the science behind metaphysics. So ended up getting both a master's and a PhD in metaphysical science, and that's kind of what led into all the music changing so much. Um, you know, we have clinical evidence that binaural beats are helpful for your brain. We have clinical evidence that sulfasia, I don't even know if I'm saying that right either, uh, frequencies are good for your body. Um, you know, how do we measure that? God only knows. But there's plenty of clinical people feel better when they're hearing these frequencies and bineural beats and whatnot. So I just started incorporating that into my music and it seems to be working. Excellent. So when do you expect to be releasing the full album? Um, well, I was told I did this backwards. My idea was to release these these kind of radio ready four minute or so, three and a half to four and a half minute songs all throughout for all seven chakras. Um and then release an album with the extended versions, you know, anywhere from say 12 to 15 minutes, something that could really be used for for a longer meditation. Um as soon as that was done. I'm figuring before the first of the year. I mean, I've got heart chakra nearly done now. That's gonna be the next release.

Speaker 2 2:45

I see. So track by track as we go here.

Speaker 1 2:47

Okay. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. And then, like I said, the extended versions as an album afterwards.

Speaker 2:54

I see.

Speaker 1 2:55

Got it.

Speaker 2 2:56

So this could be two different versions of the tracks. You hear the tracks first is like uh an intro, and then you're gonna release the full album and full tracks, which would be um several more minutes of of music and sound and so forth.

Speaker 1 3:10

Exactly. Exactly. I mean, because you know, you can't really put a uh a 15-minute song out on a radio station and expect anybody to to to put it out there and play it, you know.

Speaker 3:22

Right.

Speaker 2 3:24

So it's it's interesting how I met you and I just recently um interviewed Stephen Halpern and covered his uh recent release. He's doing the same thing as well. Oh my god, he goes way back, doesn't he?

Speaker 1 3:40

Yeah, him and Chuck Wilde both. Uh just uh the when I've got writers blocked, those are the guys I listen to, you know.

Speaker 2 3:49

Is that right? You listen to their music and then things happen for you.

Speaker 3:54

Interesting.

Speaker 2 3:56

So what was it like for you growing up? What did you listen to, and uh how did you get involved into making music?

Speaker 1 4:04

Well, I think I mean t if you want to talk from teenage forward, I mean I I did the typical I'm gonna be a rock and roll star and played rock and roll piano in in many bands. Um actually, I shouldn't say this when it's gonna be on a radio thing and really public, but I actually started at seven years old on accordion of all things. Oh, I'm a organ for now. Urkel ruined that for everybody. At 14, I figured out really quick I wasn't gonna get a lot of dates playing a squeeze box. So, you know, I went to piano and um did all kinds of bands, you know, just throughout my life. And like I said, I just had a big shift around 2012. That's I mean, I was still in the midst of it, to be honest with you. Uh uh, and there's been there's been other shifts within that shift. Back in 2019, I had a heart attack, and I woke up from the surgery with a completely new understanding of music. But yeah, I've been doing music my whole life. Um uh I also just wanted to learn more about the business. I even did sound and lights for other bands, like big bands. Like uh, oh, I've been I've worked with like Crystal Gale, Restless Heart, Molly Hatchet, uh Winger. Um wow. Just doing doing sound and lights. I mean, I wasn't playing in the bands doing sound and light stuff. So I've I've while I'm new to this genre, I guess I'm not really new to the business.

Speaker 2 5:30

Right, you've been on different levels of it, so you've been around for a while. Do you have a vinyl collection of your own that you turn to every once in a while and spend? Or I'm sorry, say that again. Do you have a vinyl collection, vinyl LPs that you that you have that you like to listen to?

Speaker 1 5:48

No, I got rid of all of those many, many years ago. Uh uh back when I was in college, we lived in a house that was in the floodplain, and my senior year the house flooded. We had three feet of water, and and and all my vinyl was sitting in the bottom shelves because it's heavy. And so, yeah, it all got inundated, and so I ended up getting rid of it. I understand the vinyl is coming back though. My daughter brags on that all the time. She's collecting albums and even coming back strong from the 80s and 90s. Um, very strong over the past two, three years.

Speaker 2 6:26

Actually, last year outsold all of the formats.

Speaker 6:32

Did it really? That's been it to me. Yeah. Yeah. Um, if you start buying, I'm just warning you, it's very addictive.

Speaker 1 6:43

Well, and it was back when I was a kid. Like I said, I I had you know, probably like a lot of guys my age, just put them in milk crates, and I ha I must have had ten or fifteen milk crates full of of albums back in the day, you know.

Speaker 6:58

Right? Yeah, I got I got quite a few myself.

Speaker 2 7:03

So playing piano is one thing that you did, and then you gravitated towards synths and all that equipment. What do you use for equipment to create your music besides piano?

Speaker 1 7:15

Um well boy, everything. Um I've got a a really gor I've my girlfriend, if you will, is a five foot eight inch shimmel gram piano that sits in my living room named Charlotte. Um so usually songs will start there, because I'll just be on the piano fooling around and and just kind of download. Um but where I actually record things is on a Studio Logic uh 88, and I use Cubase. I primarily primarily use uh either Omnisphere or East West Quantum Leap Sounds VSTs, because it just uh both of those companies come up with some really incredible thick sounding VSTs. So look really love both of them. Um so I guess kind of a combination of a of a MIDI keyboard that I've got in a studio and then and then my grand piano in the living room.

Speaker 8:16

I see.

Speaker 1 8:17

Did you say Schimmel? Shimmel, yes.

Speaker 2 8:22

You know, I gotta I gotta say this. I just had a thought when you said that. It's something like um your old Jewish grandmother would say, Don't pay a schimmel, you know, something like that. That's the first thing that came into my mind.

Speaker 1 8:35

Well, it's it's a it's a German-made piano. I know that's it's you know, I actually went in to buy a Steinway. And I had played on Shimmels when I was younger and always loved just the touch of that piano. And I was looking for a lower-end Steinweg, couldn't afford a lot. I wasn't gonna spend $70,000 or $80, $90,000 on a piano. But I saw that shimmel in there and went, I said, you guys have a shimmel. He goes, Yeah, you want it? He goes, we can't sell it. Nobody in the South knows about them. Everybody wants a Steinwick. I said, that's a great piano. I said, nah, don't worry about it. I can't afford it. He goes, I'll bet you can. We had not been able to sell it. I'll make you a deal. And I I went home with the shimmel.

Speaker 2 9:20

Nice. It's always nice getting a deal. So Steinways cost $90,000, or probably more now, right?

Speaker 1 9:27

Well, I mean, you could spend it anywhere from $20,000 on up on the Steinway, I'm sure. They've got different models, but um the same thing with any grand piano. I mean, you know, you can buy uh an upright of a particular brand for probably under $10,000, and then the sky's the limit on the higher end pianos. Yeah, the pianos are expensive.

Speaker 9:50

Wow.

Speaker 2 9:52

So tell me, what are you listening to these days besides creating music all the time? Um I know you said you like Chuck Wise.

Speaker 1 10:01

Yeah, I listen to everything. Like I said, uh Chuck and Steve said uh their older stuff, like when Chuck first started doing the uh uh The Liquid Mind, like one, two, three, four, and five. I love that older stuff. The same thing with Steve's stuff like from the 80s and 90s. Um big fan of David Arkinstone, if you know who that is.

Speaker 2 10:25

Um or uh I uh I covered his latest album and interviewed him as well. Oh yeah.

Speaker 1 10:30

Yeah, I got it. So meditation-wise, I like stuff like that. Um but you know, I'm I'm always gonna love the Doobie Brothers and and the 70s and 80s, and you know the Eagles and all the 70s and 80s rock. That's kind of where I came up. Um I try to go on the Dave Cause Smooth Jazz Cruise every year because I love smooth jazz. So it I mean it varies. Uh I it's easier to tell you what I don't like. I really don't care for really loud Screamo death metal. Me either. Because all all the songs sound the same. You know, and the same thing with the really heavy-duty rappy hip-hop, again, because to me all those songs sound the same.

Speaker 2 11:12

True. Yeah, I I'm with you 100% on both accounts there. That's for sure. And I have a wide range of interest in in listening experiences going on constantly. You know, I'm I'm open to hearing just about anything, but those are two things that I kind of cringe at.

Speaker 1 11:29

Yeah, it it is and I mean I I I'll get I get it as an art form. I just like I said, it's not my thing. Heck man, I I uh I even support our local Arkansas Symphony Orchestra. I like the classic stuff. I don't know much about it, but I sure like listening to it.

Speaker 11:44

Oh, you're in Arkansas? Yeah. Yes, sir? Oh, I didn't know that. Is it hot there? Oh god. Like London Broil.

Speaker 1 11:54

Oh God. Humid? Yeah. And if it's gonna be this hot and humid, we should have a saltwater beach really close and we don't, you know? And you gotta travel a little ways to get to that. Yeah, exactly. About ten hours minimum.

Speaker 12:09

So so what do you think?

Speaker 2 12:12

Like, what are the two top things that you know motivates you to make music and be creative?

Speaker 1 12:22

Um, it's a whole lot cheaper than seeing a therapist every day and being locked in a rubber room. That's for starters. I don't know what I'd do if I couldn't do music. Um And you know, and I'm 60 years old, okay, and I've had a heart attack. Survived that. Um survived a bunch of stuff. Um and so I don't know, it just the the two top things are kind of the same thing. It's it I think it's what keeps me healthy and and and and moving. Like I said, I'd be in a rubber room if I couldn't play music. I would be in a rubber room if I couldn't write and listen to it. I hear you. And I and I gotta be honest, I say I play, man, I'm I'm really not that good of a player. I I think I I feel like I'm a better composer than I am player. A lot of the stuff that I'm writing I really can't play with. You know. I mean my my brain and my heart can come up with it, but my fingers don't completely cooperate.

Speaker 2 13:32

I don't know. They seem to uh on what I've heard so far. I think you're being modest.

unknown 13:37

Okay.

Speaker 1 13:42

I'd rather be in the studio creating than be in a bar playing the drunks.

Speaker 2 13:48

Well, I think anybody would take that, unless you're a drunk, right?

Speaker 13:52

There you go. There you go.

Speaker 2 13:55

You have been so much fun to talk to. Got a good sense of humor. I really appreciate it. So Well, Luthan Keith, thanks for having me.

Speaker 1 14:02

This has been awesome.

Speaker 2 14:04

Oh, sure. It's been my pleasure, and uh let's stay in touch with all the music and uh I'll get this information out to you later on. Probably this evening, I'll get everything uh together. Uh actually, we'll go live with the the interview here, but I'm gonna hold off on putting your review out for the release date so everybody can hear it and stream it and listen to the interview. How does that sound?

Speaker 1 14:32

That sounds great to me. Uh uh I mean, I'm kind of whatever you and Diane and and everybody else she's got me talking to tell me to do is what I'm gonna do.

Speaker 14:44

Okay, sounds good.

Speaker 1 14:45

She seems to she initially got me some tra she got me some traction on one of my other songs that I released, I think it was Naval. Um Sleepy Eyes, but one of my songs, like she's she did something just to show me what she had, and I made number 15 on the NACC charts for a week. With nothing. Um uh so I had uh life happened and it was a long story. Um we're not still being recorded, are we? We're still still being recorded, yes we are. Oh, geez. Well, then I won't get into the ugly details, but life happened and I wasn't able to get back in the studio for like a year. Um so uh when I was finally able to get back to it, her and I talked about you know what what the next steps were to really get some traction. And in the meantime, she had gotten a friend of mine, Ilka De Gast, uh, if you if you've met her, some traction as well. Uh and Ilka and I are Ilk and I know each other through the Dispensa uh meditation groups. Um and so I just called her back up and said, okay, you know, what do I need to do to get the music out there to folks? And next thing I know I was talking to you and several other people and and my Spotify list is growing every day and I'm suddenly getting traction again. So that's great. Whatever magic you guys do, I appreciate it.

Speaker 2 16:16

Well, Bar Barman and Barnum and Bailey uh circuses, P. T. Barnum said, You know what happens without publicity? Nothing.

Speaker 16:26

Probably nothing. Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 2 16:30

All right. Alan, thank you so much for your time and uh we'll be talking to you again soon.

Speaker 16:36

Yes, sir. Thank you.

Speaker 2 16:38

You take care. Bye bye.

Speaker 1 16:40

Take care, have a great day. Bye bye.

Speaker 2 16:41

You too, bye.