Pjusk - Sart

Most electronic duos tend to produce louder, more club-oriented music--- how does the dynamic work with such minimalist themes? Is it a lot of detail-oriented work or does it have more to do with brainstorming ideas at the start?

I guess the collaboration works almost differently for every track we embark on. On a whole, I guess you could say that we try to achieve a goal of our music communicating some kind of notion that really conncets with the listener. That means we could start building a track around some samples or textures we really like - then arranging a song structure and adding details. But it is all about trying to establish emotional content. Our music is really not rational at all - we are not into understanding, but sensing / feeling - conveying human emotions on many levels. That's one of the main reasons why we choose to use organic sound material - instant recognition and the sound of the known and familiar -the combination with electronic sounds gives us a huge palette of musical colours.


Some of the best experimental music for the last few years has originated in Norway particularly and in the Scandinavian region (+ Iceland) in general. Do you see any reasons for this?

It is really difficult getting any distance from yourself and your own work, but I can't help thinking about scale and closeness to nature. Bergen, where I'm from, is located in the middle of seven mountains and I have to walk for only 10 minutes to start climbing one of them. My flat is overlooking the sea and thus I am constantly reminded of the forces of nature and how they interact with our existence. Probably sounds like a cliché, but I when I come to think of it, that influence propbaly shapes our music as well. Perhaps this is "arctic" music? And remember Norway is a small country indeed with a population of 4.7 million - that means a lot of unhabited space. A lot of nature.


You work both with and without beats--- is there a moment where you think, "this needs some propulsion," or is the beat the starting point in particular compositions. Is there the danger of beats dictating or defining the content of a track?

We don't feel that confident with "regular" beats, to be perfectly honest. I think beats can be quite fun working with - but they tend to make the track more "common" or genre-defining that we often wish for. Some reviewers have mentioned our dub inspired beats - and that is pure coincidence really. I think one reviewer actually nailed it when he referred to Plastikman's "Consumed" - that album was clearly an inspiration for some of our tracks - but then again .. we have been mentioned in relation to a lot of artists we've never even heard of .. But our real approach to beats is variation and a bit help, of course .. a decent perc/rhythm layer is really a great backbone .. pushing the track forward .
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Pjusk - Sart (12k)
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Some of Pjusk's favourite things from 2007

I (Jostein) have been listening to the new albums from:

}Bola
}Christ
}Porn Sword Tobacco
}Stars of the lid
}Last Days Sea

And we try to check out the releases from Taylor (Deupree) (12k) - and so far my favourite is Taylor's Landing.