Formula Indie Sessions _ Interview with RIPL3Y

What is your earliest memory connected to music?

My parents are musicians, and I started music at the age of 4. So my very first memory connected to music would be my mother playing the guitar while I was still in her womb. But the first memory I clearly remember is me composing a song for a stuffed toy when I was 4. The piece was called “Little Seal”, haha.

How did your passion for creating music begin?

I have always created things, not only in music. I live to build, to make things happen, so I think it’s a part of me, more like a need than a gift. If I stop creating music, I need to create objects or do something else that fulfills this need.

What’s the story behind your current music project?

This current project is the meeting point of all the different projects I have explored in my life. I have worked, and I still work, in the classical music field. At the same time, the moment I decided to fully commit to music was when I was playing and working in metal music. Then I developed a lot of electronic music, and I also worked with visual arts, including visual artworks that incorporate sound, such as sound sculptures. These are radically different styles, but this project is fueled by all those experiences.

How would you describe your sound to someone who has never heard your music before?

My music is mainly aggressive and melancholic, I think. From that come a lot of epic, cinematic, narrative, rhythmical, and energetic elements. I don’t limit myself in terms of inspiration, form, or sound. Sometimes weird things happen, but I like it, and the genre accepts it well too.

What is one thing you’ve learned that completely changed the way you make music?

The biggest step for me in this project was learning about mixing, especially compression, and how to let all these different elements live together in the same song. It took years to reach this result, through many realizations and learning phases.

What tools, instruments, or software are essential in your creative process?

Essentially, I work with Ableton Live and all the built-in tools. Over time, my workflow has relied on fewer and fewer plugins. Mostly EQ, reverb, limiter, clipper, and transient shaper. For synths, I use Serum, but I also really like Phase Plant from KiloHearts and the whole KiloHearts suite. With time, I realized that the simpler the plugins are, the more they help avoid blocking creativity from an ergonomic point of view.

Which indie artist or song are you loving right now?

I listen to a lot of different things. It goes from pop to metal, bass music, French chanson, etc. I really like what artists like RL Grime, Virtual Riot, Viper Active, and obviously Skrillex are doing right now in bass music. But the track I’ve been listening to on repeat lately is “Everything Matters” by Aurora and Pomme. The song isn’t recent, but I discovered it two weeks ago and really love the atmosphere and the arrangements. I would love to remix it if it were possible. It pushed me to work more with harmonic elements and to add them more strongly to the rhythmical and spectral elements in my music. It’s something I already do, but now I want to push it further.

How have your personal experiences influenced your music and artistic vision?

I come from very different genres and backgrounds. I started classical music with piano at 4, then drums and classical percussion. In high school, I played a lot of metal on drums during the Slipknot era and similar influences. Then I entered the Conservatoire Supérieur in Lyon in classical percussion, where I worked a lot on contemporary music and orchestral projects. All of this appears in my compositions when I approach bass music. Rhythm comes from drums and percussion, sound design and spectral work come from contemporary percussion, and harmony comes from piano and classical percussion. This project is a convergence of all my past research, and it has strong meaning for me to mix all of this into music for a larger audience, within an efficient and powerful genre.

What emotions or messages do you hope listeners take from your work?

I think my work is about diversity and sincerity beyond music. What pushes me to play and compose is the idea of music as a universal language and, in a way, a universal truth that exists through emotional honesty. It may sound like a deep concept for my music, but it can also simply be about trance or an energetic connection between the listeners and the music.

What’s the most important lesson music has taught you so far?

The lesson is always the same when you play or compose. You have to sing. Everything comes from that. When you sing honestly and without overthinking, you find your singularity.

What is a dream venue or festival you would love to perform at?

Haha, for this one I can only dream big, maybe Ultra Music Festival or Red Rocks. These places are associated with incredible moments created by very talented DJs, so naturally they are venues we want to discover and experience ourselves, because they marked us through those artists.

If you could collaborate with any artist, past or present, who would it be and why?

In a dream scenario, the answer is pretty simple and often the same. Skrillex or DJ Snake. For a French guy and for a bass music man, they are iconic artists, and it would be a dream to share something with them, first of all to learn from them.

Where can our listeners follow and support your music? (Website,Spotify, IG, links)

You can find my website at: ripl3y.com

Mainly on my Instagram: instagram.com/another_ripl3y

Spotify: open.spotify.com/artist/6r96YeBR3Bo3MAOE6L7ZUg

SoundCloud: soundcloud.com/another_ripl3y

All links are also available on my Linktree: linktr.ee/ripl3y

Looking toward the future, what’s your dream for the next chapter of your musical journey?

For now, I mainly focused on the composition part of my work, and I’m not performing live yet with this project. The next step this year will be to develop the live and scenic part, creating a set and playing my first shows.

What do you hope listeners will discover about you along the way?

I think I have an identity and a way of composing that can bring another point of view and another way of listening to bass music. My daily work is about developing this singularity and making it sound better and more coherent.

If you want here you can add a representative Youtube video to insert below the interview 🙂

This is my latest work, a metal and epic inspired track that works well as an opening for a set. I really like how I managed to combine all the different elements that create this headbang, mystical, epic, nostalgic, and almost “believer” atmosphere.

You can watch it here: