Chain DLK Magazine #8 Ganymede interview

interview by Maurizio Pustianaz
(visit Chain DLK magazine online)

CHAIN D.L.K.: Could you please tell us how you met and how you decided to form Ganymede?

GANYMEDE: We met at film school in Los Angeles, although we're both from Pennsylvania. We discovered we have similar tastes and interests ­ music among them ­ and it was a natural choice to collaborate.

CHAIN D.L.K.: Your band's name comes from one of the Jupiter satellite's name. Why you decided to pick up such a particular name? Does cosmology fascinate you so much? There's something in particular that you dig?

GANYMEDE: We went back and forth on a name for the group, and decided that Ganymede, both in the concrete and abstract senses, seemed to fit our music well. There's certainly an aspect of otherworldliness wherever analog sounds are employed. Also, we're big fans of space exploration. Part of the disillusionment of the last decade has been, in my view, the loss of the dream of feasible space travel. In choosing our name, Dave and I realized that moderately obscure celestial body names like Ganymede, Cheron, Io and others inhabit our minds and evoke fanciful flights of the imagination.

CHAIN D.L.K.: Your music in my opinion is deeply influenced by bands like Human League and Pet Shop Boys: "Lady Of The Night" for example has got the musical structure that could remember Human League with the voice melodies of the Pet Shop Boys. I'm not telling you aren't original, but I'm curious about how much bands like the ones I mentioned influenced you…

GANYMEDE: My real influences to start writing music were instrumental, mostly: Vangelis, Mike Oldfield, and film composers Jerry Goldsmith and Ennio Morricone. But as I worked through the music I was writing, I realized that these influences were shared by bands like PSB, the Human League and others. So putting vocals and vocal structures on our instrumentals resulted in music that draws on the same influences and necessarily has some simliarities. But I think our music is significantly different in many respects, and when it comes down to specifics, there really isn't much music that sounds like ours. And there certainly isn't an album like "After The Fall."

CHAIN D.L.K.: I read that you used mainly analog synthesizers; could you please tell to our curious readers how you interfaced all the gears? Did you have midi problems? Which keyboards did you use?

GANYMEDE: Equipment is a crucial, crucial thing to me, and I think that's really where the art of synth music resides. I'm lucky enough to have a few analog synths with at least rudimentary MIDI interfaces. Some of the older equipment is played live. I use MIDI only to trigger notes and not for programming filter sweeps and whatnot, because I really think it takes the fun out of it. My favorite all-around analog synth is the Juno-106, and it makes up a good bit of what you hear on "After The Fall." Except for those crazy old monsters with tuning and electrical problems, the Juno-106 can't be topped for sound quality. And for reliability and versatility, it's probably the best analog ever. I also think an analog synth is like a girlfriend -- the more time you spend playing with it and learning its secrets, the more it's going to give you down the line. I've spent a good part of the last few years with headphones on making almost every last sound for "After The Fall" -- no presets here. (Except for the orch hits on "Clever Girl," which we couldn't resist.)

CHAIN D.L.K.: Your album is titled "After The Fall", is the title related to society and consumerism (even if a lot of song seem to be a sort of love songs)?

GANYMEDE: "After The Fall" has many shades to its meaning, and I think that's why it was a natural name for the album. Foremost, it's an homage to "After The Fall of New York" and other post-apocalyptic movies. By extension, it's about being the last men standing after the end of the world. And I think in all our lives there's a point where something terrible that we think will never happen does indeed occur. After you've gone through that, it's "After The Fall."

CHAIN D.L.K.: The fourth track is titled "Communism": would you please explain the sense of the song? I know that communism is still a sort of tabu in USA…

GANYMEDE: Communism is a fun one. I would characterize it generally as about human beings' responses to external stimuli. Specifically, it's about modern-day China, and how they hold on to this concept that most everyone else thinks is a failure. And, by extension, it's about our own desire to hold on to the past, to capture it and distill its essence. I think that's something everyone wants to do, really.

CHAIN D.L.K.: I know that you are preparing the new album. Would you please talk about it? Is it different from your previous one?

GANYMEDE: We're trying hard to contain our excitement about the new album. The songs on our first album are all now somewhat old to us, as it took a long time to finish them ­ Dave and I were both moving around a lot, the technical aspects were hard to coordinate, and it took a long time to get something we were happy with. Now, with a contract and a system in place, we're taking it to the next level. I think people are going to be surprised and engaged by the new material. And we're hoping to have a single and video out by the end of the year.

CHAIN D.L.K.: I read that on September you'll do your debut gig, are you preparing something special for it?

GANYMEDE: Well, it'll be special because we're there... No, seriously, we couldn't be more thrilled about doing some gigs and taking "After The Fall," as well as the next album, to the stage.

CHAIN D.L.K.: Anything else?

GANYMEDE: Yeah, please check our website http://www.planetganymede.com for all the latest news and info. You can also order the CD there -- we promise you won't be disappointed!