I started to experiment with sound around 1986, but before that I was mainly preoccupied with visual arts theories. My interest in "gesture" and "subconscious" correlated to Surrealism (automatism) and Abstract Expressionism (spontaneous expression & improvisation) and I was motivated to apply these thoughts towards sound expression at least partially because of the ability of some sound-types to bypass association and origin. Abstraction was also possibly leading me towards this new solution, the world of "noise".

At that time, the "cassette underground" was quite active and I traded music and corresponded with a number of artists releasing quite strange and esoteric styles of music. Quite a few of these artists have dropped out by now, they're not active any more. Others are still here... Very early on I collaborated with Dirk Serries (aka Vidna Obmana), this was in 1988-89. I worked with Asmus Tietchens in 1990. I always worked through the mail sending collaborations back and forth with Hands To, Zan Hoffman, Jarboe, AMK, Athan Maroulis, Brian Ladd, Illusion of Safety, Jim O'Rourke, Big City Orchestra... many others.

Over the years, I've been privileged to have had my music documented by small record labels. In year 2000 I had two CD's released: one with the great Artemiy Artemiev called "Dreams in Moving Space", the other with Belgian electro-acoustic genius, Slavek Kwi (aka Artificial Memory Trace), titled "Transphere 1997-99".

Of course, how could you give a history of your work without referring to all of the day-to-day events and concerns, the things that changed you and wrought new images out of you? This side of the story, for me, is one of financial hardships, personal disasters, fatigue, despondency. The non-conformist must pay for their place out-of-pocket — there is little support for this kind of music. This is our time-frame, my work is a mirror.

Purposes for the noise music/just part of the underground entertainment?

I've often thought about this myself. Noise music is the antithesis of popular consumer culture basically because it appeals to so few! You won't get rich doing it, that's for sure. In fact, the corporate powers-that-be won't even bother with it at all... except to trivialize it, make it irrelevant. Noise is freedom from convention, but more importantly, it is freedom from elitism in art since anyone, even the untrained, can make a noise. I think most people will leave the room as soon as you put a Merzbow on, but it's those few who stay that I am most interested in. I also believe that the educated ear can become accustomed to more unusual, or "extreme" sound-forms, and begin to hear with a deeper complexity.

Yes, I agree with you: my music is not simple background. It is best listened to intently and with imagination. As each track unfolds in it's own manner, where it came from and where it goes are based on an inner logic within the sound structure. You can almost quickly forget how the track evolved and where it began. So each time you listen to a composition it becomes like a new experience--not based on memory of lyrics, or melodic devices.

Collaboration/comment on relationships with other artists/etc.

I'm very interested in applying my theories toward many different styles or aesthetic approaches. It is one of the reasons I work with so many different artists. It's also the reason why I've never considered myself a "strict" noise artist. I've never been closed-minded about other musical forms and I've worked in many diverse settings. I enjoy challenging my concept — does it work in this area of expression? or better over here?

My collaboration with AMK was typical mail collaboration. I met AMK in San Francisco back in 1989 and I've always had an interest in his turntable manipulations. I was working quite a bit with turntables as well, so I was very interested to put our ideas and methods together. In the tracks on the RRR Pure CD you'll hear me intermingling AMK's looping, skipping records with my own electronics and noise systems as well as on two tracks the free saxophone of Rob Backus! Miracle it works...!

I met Jarboe through a friend, Todd Zachritz, who recommended that we might work together. I wrote her and found her to be very open-minded to noise and electronic music. But, frankly, I could not come up with the right equation in relation to our collaborating. Sometimes things work very well, other times not so well, but it is not Jarboe's fault. Now, on the "Life-Sense Revoked" album I have always liked the way the collab tracks with her provide a different way of perception of the ideas therein.(i.e. noise is only one solution to a set of expressionist problems: pop forms, or folk forms, "song-forms", offer another valid solution)

I found out over the last five years what it means to be an improvising musician... How I must be prepared to spontaneously interact within a musical structure in a meaningful way. When improvisation doesn't work, as is sometimes the case, well I'm prepared to accept those consequences. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. The few diverse things I've done that didn't really work out very well were the result of some impasse I came on which I couldn't resolve.

First release on ND/comments

I discovered the ND organization early on, they were the premiere "contact" source for the cassette/mail-art movements throughout the 80's/early 90's. I met many artists through that ND magazine! I used to send them tape-releases for review and Daniel Plunkett, I think, always liked my work. As soon as ND began releasing their own music products, Daniel wanted to include me. I did a split tape with Vidna Obmana for ND's interview series and that music has yet to be released in digital format. A little later they released my first two solo CD's and I have always been honored to be associated with them.

How does your music appear in your head? How natural is music process for you?

Actually, music is never really easy for me — at least, I don't characterize it that way, as easy or hard. It's just that a certain fear arises prior to the start of performing or recording which you learn to deal with. I have had problems occasionally in getting feedback towards my work and that has been difficult. My work, being as spontaneous as it is, with very little pre-conceived forethought, it's hard to gauge how successful a composition may be. How does it correlate to everything else? When I create a new composition, I'll often listen to it obsessively and then grow tired of it, push it aside unsatisfied, return to it... Lately I've felt less doubt about it then years past but I still have the problem of dwelling on it too much

The album: is it art/product/something else? Are you curious what people think of it?

I don't live in a vacuum. So, of course, I am interested to communicate with my neighbors. My thoughts and ideas are best put across through musical means and after I've finished the piece it must be distributed. Otherwise, no interaction, no response, no communicating... My personal priority, naturally, is the making of the thing. I don't have much faith in the distribution process afterwards. Is the final product still art, or now commerce? Well, it's probably both... but let's face it,the artist must still eat and needs also "time" to work at their art.

People can be very generous and I'm lucky to have had great critical success. I've also been lucky to work with some very unique artists over the years and the interchange of ideas and responses there has been invaluable. I think that people often use my music to create environments conducive to a certain state of mind, whether that be meditation, creative activities or even having sex...

Thoughts about academia and electronic music education. Has there been progress in this music since the breakup of Throbbing Gristle?

It's very obvious to me that in this time-frame the untrained, non-academic, "unofficial" composers have very much superseded the accomplishments of their academy-trained forerunners. And as we move forward it will be astonishing to see how the new technologies are used to open up creative channels and give the untrained person means to create art. Not that I don't respect the accomplishments of Stockhausen, Xenakis, Cage, etc., they are heroes of mine, big influences, and deserve their place. but more interesting music is being made outside of the academic community now (and has been for some time). Let's not smash that creativity with a new academy of dogma,,, How far has electronic music come since T.G.? They helped establish the path that we now find commonplace in this type of music. They represent the rhythmic and aggressive side of electronic music as well as the atmospheric dark ambient side, and they've been paid tribute too. But the whole electronic music scene has become much more complex since they broke up. Technology is pushing it along but also a voracious appetite for the "new"; new sound expressions, new inventions of composition. Everything seems to be moving more eclectic now, like artists are drawing from every possible source and incorporating multiple aesthetics. Progress? Why would I want to try and measure it?

Art Movements/Festivals. Opinions on the academic side of the avant garde.

I have never aligned myself with any movement in music. You could say that I fall into the category of "noise composer", but this isn't a community. I think it is really difficult to define musical movements, or evolution of music, at this time because things are moving very fast and there are so many sub-cultures. A manifesto would be akin to dogma and nobody I know wants to be tied down to a concept like that. That's why academia is so stale and uninteresting, it always insists on definitions... I love to play concerts and have done a couple of festivals, one in Paris, France. I hope to be invited to more festivals, especially since I've honed my live skills and intend to do more live concerts in the coming year. One of my goals for the next five years will be to arrange a tour of Eastern Europe and Russia. I would be very happy to do this and the only obstacle, really, is financial.

Your music: pure experimentalism? or capable of expressing emotion?

Sometimes it may only be possible to move forward, to find new paths, through actions of "pure" experimentalism. But I think my music is a merging of both ideas. Even though I have developed many of the "parameters" of the musical structure through accidents of chance, I'm still fascinated by the emotional impact of the gestures. The expressive elements are there in my work, some people have even asked if my music has religious implications? I would answer that my music is so spontaneous it would undoubtedly reflect my feelings, thoughts and ideas even in an abstract way.

Can a same set of criteria be applied for both classical and modern music? Points of certain difference in it's perception?

The answer for each individual is directly related to what importance they would place on "tradition". I advocate listening to music with new ears — innocent, as if never having heard any music before. I was thinking the other day about musicians who keep tradition alive by playing "period" compositions — say Dixieland jazz tribute bands - their apparent concern is to emulate an earlier form of music without changing it or bringing it into the modern context. I prefer the thought of taking a form and restructuring it, filtering it through modern ideas and references to create a new form that draws from the wellspring of both old and new thought.

Do you ever have side-projects to compose music in another style?

I find it difficult to pre-conceive a musical venture since what I'm trying to do is spontaneous invention. Rather than setting out to create a specific sound, I try to incorporate MY aesthetic into other forms. I've applied my concept to free-jazz, hip-hop and even heavy metal with varying degrees of success.

Talk about your personal life

My life is what is reflected in my art. The day-to-day struggles, relationships, family, money concerns, society around me, my interests, emotions and feelings. The time-frame in which I live is also reflected there. I live in a time when music of this sort is not supported by a large enough audience to afford it's composers anything close to a financial reward. And yet the artist must continue to work even when confronted by realities of simple living. In some way, I feel like I am looking forward into the future... I see music becoming more a piling up of events into very complex patterns. It's definitely moving towards abstraction, but this abstraction, like a computer chip, contains tremendous amounts of information and resonance. I'm happy to move forward with the "new" and accept the consequences of my actions as they apply to my family, my children and my love.

Closing words to the russian audience

CD/VINYL

2000

"Dreams in Moving Space" by Artemiy Artemiev & PBK CD, Electroshock Records ELCD014 (Russia)

"Transphere 1997-1999" by PBK & Artificial Memory Trace CD, Erewhon Records WhON002 (Belgium)

1996 - 1999

"The Mescaline Tracks" by PBK CD-R, PBK Recordings CDR-001 (USA)

1994 - 1995

"Life-Sense Revoked" by PBK CD
(guests: Jarboe, AMK, Brian Ladd, Hands To, etc.),
Lunhare Records LIFE? 3 (Italy)

"System-Music-End" by PBK CD
(with Hands To, AMK. Rob Backus, etc.),
RRRecords PURE#35 (USA)

1993

"Shadows of Prophecy/In His Throes" by PBK CD, ND Recordings NDCD04 (USA)

1991

"Macrophage/The Toil and The Reap" by PBK CD
(guest: Vidna Obmana),
ND Recordings NDCD01 (USA)

"Domineer/Asesino/Retro" by PBK 3XLP Boxset, RRRecords RRR-PBK (USA)

1990

"Five Manifestoes" by PBK & Asmus Tietchens CD, Realization Records RZD-008 (USA)

1989

"Monument of Empty Colours" by PBK & Vidna Obmana C-60
(re-released on 2XCD set "Memories Compiled"),
Projekt Relic#7 (USA)

CASSETTE RELEASES
(all currently unavailable)

1999

"Headmix" by PBK C-60

1994/95

"Listening to the World Vibrate" by PBK C-60

"Shifts in Strategy" by PBK/AMK C-60
(some tracks re-released on "System-Music-End" CD)

1990

"Narcosis" by PBK C-60

1989

"A Noise Supreme" by PBK C-60

"Shamanistic" by PBK/Deaf Lions C-60

"Melachoir" by PBK/Hands To C-60
(some tracks re-released on "System-Music-End" CD)

"Depression & Ideal" by PBK/Vidna Obmana C-60

1988

"Die Brucke" by PBK C-60

"Asesino" by PBK C-60

"Verfall" by PBK/Hands To C-60
(some tracks re-released on "System-Music-End" CD)

"Poetry & Motion" by PBK C-60

COMPILATIONS
(with at least one PBK track)

"Objekt 4" CD, Ladd-Frith LF67 (USA)

"The Passing Gods" CD, PlayLoud PL01 (Portugal)

"As Yet Untitled" CD, Realization Records RZD-001 (USA)

"The Carnival Within" CD,
collab track with Jarboe (ex-Swans), Cleopatra CLP013 (USA)

"The Unquiet Grave" CD,
collab track with Athan Maroulis(Spahn Ranch),
Cleopatra CLP052 (USA)