Matthew Dear- 2012 in focus

DJ, producer, frontman - whatever you want to label him, 2012 is the year of Ghostly International’s co-founder and own label popstar, Matthew Dear. Next spring his much anticipated follow-up LP to 2011s Black City drops, with the EP, Headcage, released tantalizingly soon in January. The 4-track teaser featuring a duet with The Drum’s Jonny Pierce along with co-produced tracks by Van Rivers and the Subliminal Kid is set to mark Matthew’s return. But despite 2012 readying to be one of the best (and busiest) of Matthew’s career, it’s a step back from the decks, the stage and spotlight that he’s wanting. We catch up with Dear for a quick retrospective of 2011 and then a quick-jump forward to predict what 2012 has in store.

Pulse: What’s been your highlight of 2011?  There’s been so many this year. The live tour probably for me in 2011 was really great. This year, I really wanted to focus on the live show and getting the band pretty tight and together, I wanted to play a lot of places that we’d never played before. Specifically though, a highlight would probably be when we supported Interpol in the UK and Europe. Really just anywhere that we were able to be on the road, honing in on the live performance, really trying to make it something special.

Has 2011 seen any career-defining moments?  I think there’s always so many factors at play but going back to the live thing, we were able to play a lot of festivals that I’ve never been to which really helped us as a band. One in particular was Primavera Sound in Barcelona and I think just being able to see so much other music out there - it was a great year for just performance. Seeing Animal Collective on the mainstage, there was almost about 10,000 people there just kind of gloating in this late night weird Barcelona air with AC doing this totally bizarre, totally unique live show that they can only do - I think for me that was the high water mark for alternative music and they way it’s being accepted now.

Will you be concentrating on your live sound next year more than you’ve done in the past? Yeah totally. In the past I think we were still trying to find how to do ‘it’, experimenting with different combinations of technology and live equipment and I think 2011 saw me finally found our live sound.

Any NYE Plans?  It kind of just came out of nowhere, I was planning on just being at home, relaxing but I was walking my dog just down the street and a promoter I’ve recently met said hey I just emailed your agent like 5 minutes ago I was wondering if you want to DJ at our party in Soho New York at The Loft, it kind of just came out of nowhere, a random New York street meeting.

Have you made any resolutions?  It’s a very transitional time in my life right now. I’m nearly at the end of my stint, my permanent stint in New York City, I find myself gravitating more towards upstate New York. I’m looking to move to the woods for a bit so the resolution that would tie into that would be this year I’m looking to spend some more downtime, more family time asides from touring. But that being said 2012 will definitely be one of my busiest years yet focussing on the next album that’s coming out.

Where do you see your yourself this time next year?  I guess that’s also a bit trivial and mundane too, more of the same: I just hope to be doing what I do as good as I can do it. Not over-extending myself, I’m not going to go out and play every possible opportunity I can get or do every possible remix I can do for me its about a balance so I hope next year at this time I can just have a very a shortlist of collective achievements under my belt that works on the trajectory that I’m putting on now. So this time next year: just more of the tour and expanding upon what I’ve already done live - trying new things, stepping things up just a little bit.

What do you hope the reaction to your next releases will be?  I can’t always say what everybody should feel but I guess I’d like people to hear that there’s always progression, that I’m taking breaks. I’m in the studio this time not the live environment but I’m always learning more and learning how to do things a little bit better, the sound’s getting cleaner so I’m hoping people will hear that in my music.

Do you have a label of 2012?  I don’t know, I get so wrapped up in my album I don’t really pay any attention.

Any artists/DJs/sounds of 2012 to watch out for?  No, not really.

We should just look at for Matthew Dear then?  No, no, no I don’t want to sound like that [laughs].  I’m just so bad when I’m put on the spot about what I’ve been listening to. I buy so much music, I get so lost. I sit there when I’m collecting, and find a song I really like and say this would be a great song if I get asked what should get a listen, as soon as I’m asked I just lose it, If you come to a DJ gig with me and when I play that track I’ll be like this is the one you should look out for.

Destination of 2012?  I need more beach-time. I’ve never been to Hawaii so that would be good. Then again, an even better dried-up beach I guess would be Burning Man festival, I’ve yet to do Burning Man. Everyone’s saying ‘you have to go, you have to go it’s a special experience’.  It’s this big desert-party-thing but it’s a really beautiful, awesome experience too so that would be the destination for me.

World event for 2012?  I just hope everybody keeps their cool, you know. I hope we don’t get any of those crazy doomsday prophecies. I just read this cool thing about the Mayan civiillisation and they’re doing this celebration about renewal - 2012 it’s the end of the cycle. People get stuck on this end of the world thing but really it’s about renewal, so the way we feel on NYE it’s kind of like that but it’s a lot larger and spiritual, if we can comprehend new year resolutions as new era resolutions - maybe we can just look at the whole thing with an optimistic, really good feeling on what’s the next 3000 years is going to bring.

Matthew Dear releases the Headcage EP on Ghostly International on January 17th 2012

Listen to Matthew Dear on Pulse Radio