bio: The artist's tendency towards a chilled, ethereal and mystical sound
could be drawn from the part of his life in American Samoa in the
South Pacific, and the tinge of gothic darkness that could exist
within some of his music may be molded somewhat by his existance in the
rustbelt of Appalachian upper Ohio valley, and he listened mostly to
new wave/underground, college alternative, ambient,techno, trance,
synthpop and euro-club music in general.
With a sound in a vaguely similiar vein to artists such as, Mike
Oldfield, Klaus Schulze, Jean-Michel Jarre, early New Order, Jan Hammer, Red
Flag, Mark Snow, The Cure, Anything Box, Depeche Mode, and Tangerine
Dream, (but with a style all his own) Mr. Stewart is a New
Wave/Ambient/Experimental Electronic artist, he began playing original
music on synthesizers in the '80s and had airplay on hundreds of
stations in america and worldwide, beginning with local college radio
in the late '80s and growing further by the early 1990s.
"my music is usually abstract, and mostly built around instrumentals,
and when there is vocals, if the vocals are done by myself, they
generally are minimal and spoken-word, often with much echo, reverb,
vocoder and other effects. the words that i write for them are
generally abstract mysticism, which allows the listener to interpret
them however he or she feels."
"the music i compose is meant to draw the listener in, and allow them
to experience the sound somewhat as one would experience a lucid dream
or a great movie. it is intended to be listened to in its entire form
in order to be fully appreciated. it is best to listen to it in an
environment which would allow one to empty one's mind from worldly
distractions."
"i don't use computers at all in the compositions. all of my studio
kit is hardware based, keyboard/synthesizers, samplers, vocoders,
effect processors, sequencers and drum machines. i record to analogue
reels and sometimes use high quality cassette machines and minidisc,
usually live, to two tracks, sometimes to four tracks on the reel
machines, and when i do need to multitrack to more than four tracks, i
use a stand-alone portable hardware-based multitrack recorder, but i
never need more than eight tracks. much of my kit is one-of-a-kind
that i either built myself or modified to fit my specific needs."
"i do not do much editing, if any at all. what you hear, is generally
what was played as i composed and performed it. sometimes i compose
material on the fly as i improvise the material live in a session. if
there are any imperfections, generally i leave them be, to exist as
part of the sound, a sort of 'warts and all' approach...i guess this
is from my influence of what was played on the local college radio
station when i began listening to alternative music, as much of that
music had a raw edge to it. i find it refreshing to hear music done
that way, especially in an age of over-produced and over-edited
'popstar' recordings. my approach is somewhat the antithesis of the
'popstar' recording in some ways, i suppose."
Some of his trance tracks topped club and underground airplay charts
in Europe in the '90s and early decade of the 21st century, one of
which, was released on 12" vinyl.
His label, Robotique Records, focuses on quality, rather than
quantity, and most of his works are long-format and have a chilled and
dreamy, yet dark, sometimes gothic tinged edge.
He is also affiliated with Source of Gravity of the United Kingdom,
and has works, such as the above 12" single, "Earth to Mars" from the
Source of Gravity imprint's "Atlantis/Earth to Mars" record, released
on their label as well. an international label alliance between the
Source of Gravity team and Robotique, led to several renditions of
classic source of gravity tracks, including a maxi-single release of
"Full Moon" on the Robotique imprint.
Mr. Stewart has performed live before crowds numbering several
thousands, and has appeared on national television in concert
throughout parts of the 1990s.
He also has modeled, and had a radio mixshow on FM broadcast radio for
many years, wrote reviews of records, some of his record reviews were
featured in internationally-published music magazines and he has had
articles written about his music in several publications as well.
In addition to his solo recording artist project; he is involved in
other music projects, most of which are on the robotique records
label, the most notable, is The Fashion Police.
"i have a 'warts and all' approach with my recordings. i don't edit
out the imperfections, and leave things as they are, the same as they
are played in the studio or at a show. the music here in the player,
while sometimes roughly-recorded, often demos, is not trying to
impress for production quality, and certainly not trying to please the
masses of top-forty radio culture, is brought to you in here, because
it represents a diverse spectrum of recordings i had done over the
years, from the obscure early demos to the large concert bootlegs, to
a sampling of music that was aired internationally, to give the
listener a taste of genres of music that is different from the
ordinary."
"While i appreciate many forms of music, and enjoy much of it as much
as the next guy, when i play, i usually gravitate towards a more
esoteric and experimental sound. a bit dark and edgy, with a somewhat
gothic tinge, yet somehow somewhat uplifting, with a dreamy feel,
seems to be what comes out when i play."
"while i work very hard towards making each track be its best, i am
not one of those 'twelve hours a day in the studio, or months to make
an album' type of artists, editing the life out of a track. i usually
spend only a few hours working on a particular track. i don't try too
hard, as i have nothing to prove. if i am pleased with the recording,
even on one take, i move on to something else. (and i am not a fan of
over-producing tracks, to me, it does not sound natural or real if a
track is over-produced.) i don't try to sound like anyone else, but if
my music happens to come out that way (some have told me i sound like
depeche mode, mike oldfield, new order, or red flag, for example) i am
not apologetic, as i enjoy this type of sound."
Artist credits for remixing (while DJ on Underground Groove Radio):
Alternative/New Wave:
A Flock of Seagulls, A-Ha, Anything Box, Book of Love, Blue Clocks
Green, The Blue Nile, Camouflage, Close Lobsters, The Cure, The Dead
Milkmen, Depeche Mode, Duran Duran, Erasure, The Fashion Police, The
Icicle Works, Joy Division, Kate Bush, Killing Joke, Kon Kan, Love
Spit Love, Mike + The Mechanics, Missing Persons, The Mission UK,
Modern English, Morrissey, New Order, The Ocean Blue, The Pet Shop
Boys, Phil Collins, The Psychedelic Furs, Red Flag, Simple Minds, The
Smiths, Suzanne Vega, Talk Talk, Tears for Fears, Till Tuesday,
Trans-X, Ultravox, U2, Xymox (or Clan of Xymox)
Ambient/Underground/Abstract:
Aastiage, Amel Larieux, Crystalsphere, Enigma, The Fashion Police,
Klaus Schulze, Nocturnal Waveforms, Queen Millenia soundtrack,
Question Face, Source of Gravity, Tangerine Dream, Zeo
House/Trance/Club:
Anything Box, Book of Love, Boy George, Corona, Cher, Datura, Depeche
Mode, Dubversive, 2-Elvissa, En Vogue, Enigma, Eiffel 65, Faithless,
The Fashion Police, Garbage, Jocelyn Enriquez, The KLF, Kraftwerk,
Madonna, New Order, One Vision, Opus III, Plasmic Honey, Qattara, Real
McCoy, Red Flag, Robi Rob's Club World, Robin S, Rockell, Rhythm
Centric, Shabba Ranks, Stars on 54, Snap, Sunscreem, Source of Gravity
Your comments are appreciated, however please keep them relevent to
the site, the artist, and the music. any comments that are purely
self-promotional or spam will be deleted. Also, please direct all
Reverbnation messages to the artist to the robotique records label
page. Thank u!
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rus stewart
