"glare" by indifferent
indifferent is the new wave solo project of Polish musician Jack Reid. Reid's debut album "glare" is a raw and unique record, built around dreamy guitar, philosophically complex lyrics "I am not alive, I am not dead", and simple patterns. We reached out to Jack with a few questions about his process and his life in Poland.
 |
| 'indifferent' logo |
Hello, indifferent, how are you today?
I'm having a fairly average day today. Nothing is really happening. I'm just sitting at home and playing guitar.
Your recent album "glare" is really impressive. Could you tell us how it came together?
"glare" came together in a few months, and it was just me messing around in Ableton live when I had free time, not really knowing what I was doing, and that's why it's rough around the edges sometimes.
What is your musical or artistic experience prior to this release?
I didn't have any experience before making this album; I was learning while making it. At the start, I had no idea no how anything worked, so I was just listening to my favorite records like, for example, The Cure's "seventeen seconds", Joy division's "Unknown Pleasures", and lots of David Bowie's stuff and trying to do what was done from a production standpoint on their records.
You describe "glare" as a "Minimalistic album that tries to capture the vibe of living like a middle-class person in Poland." Can you elaborate on that? What is a typical day like for you? From the music, it sounds fascinating but also dark and a tad disorienting.
In Poland, every day looks basically the same. Most people look at you like you did something terrible to them even though you've just seen them for the first time. It seems like people's mindset stayed in the communist times even though they were born long after communism. Polish mainstream culture is also awful, and I hate it from the bottom of my heart because it's all about who can do more extreme things, and the pathological behaviors are shown as something normal and ok. Overall I don't enjoy living in Poland because it's the place where the most closed-minded people live, and that frustration of not fitting in and not accepting what the media and people are trying to say is coming through my music.
What is the art/music scene like in Poland?
I have no idea how the Polish music/art scene is.
Your music is fantastic, but I think we can both say it's not commercial. Do you listen to commercial music? Have you always been attracted to more artistic forms of expression?
Thank you, yes, my music is not commercial, but I enjoy listening to commercial music. I think good music is good whether it's commercial or not. The most important thing for me is if music is honest. I was always drawn to more experimental and expressive music like all the albums of Syd Barrett, early Velvet Underground stuff, or John Frusciante's solo albums (my favourite of John's is "Niandra Lades and Usually Just a T-Shirt"), not because their music is great from a production standpoint but because they are just filled with expression and honesty, so I don't care if an album or the song is commercial. If it's filled with the things I mentioned, I can listen to it and enjoy it.
Could you recommend; one book, one album, one movie?
Oh man, one book. I will probably go with George Orwell's "Animal Farm". I love "A Clockwork Orange" and most of Stanley Kubrick's films because he is not messing around. There are no boundaries in his movies. One album I would probably go with is The Cure's "Pornography" just because of how intense it is.
Do you have any plans regarding future projects you could share with us?
I am working on a second album, I have already written most of the songs, but I want to take more time with this new project and experiment more, just to make something I would be really proud of.