Resonant Frequencies Vol. 5 – Gobby

Last week you released El Honko Mixed, an epic follow up to your 2016 album on DFA, No Mercy Bad Poet. As I understand, El Honko Mixed is a memoir of your formative experiences living in New England and on America’s East Coast, told via three different timelines that weave throughout the album. What do you feel you can express more clearly about your life by portraying it through these parallel narratives?

I wouldn't consider it any clearer but if anything a vague strangeness just from being present and observing stuff. Like if I'm walking from point A to B I tend to wonder how similar my experiences may be to others in the past. And then there's the constant bits of current info always going—and everything that happens is distracting. And then you have to engage with other real live people and all that stuff flies out the window.

Like your album, your mix is an epic collage of video game OSTs, charred beats, chromed country and way beyond. Are these all styles that influence your recorded music? Would you say a mix is a memoir of one's collected tastes and influences?

[The mix] definitely represents one side on influences cause I'm listening to it—it's impossible for a mix to actually represent the full picture though because of all the other stuff you hear that you never will again—like anything coming out of speakers in any place. Feels like we are drowning in taste.

What is your perspective on committing to a focused artistic identity vs oscillating between different styles and platforms or are these two not mutually exclusive? 

It's like an inhale—hold—exhale—repeat thing / focus on one thing and another gets loose—my goal has always been to be able to fully focus and not focus loosely simultaneously. I think both are good and benefit each other and are very much doable at the same time. All that really matters in terms of image is what the viewer/listener comes in contact with. So I guess we can never really know.

As part of our mix series, we ask our contributors to choose one charitable organization they’d like to shine a light on. Do you have a cause you’d like to let others know of? What feels most urgent to you on a social/political level?

Anything that raises minimum wage.