Skip to Content, Navigation, or Footer.
The Daily Lobo The Independent Voice of UNM since 1895
Latest Issue
Read our print edition on Issuu
James Breslin works on making music at his house on March 12. Breslin is a local DJ who performs at various music events.
James Breslin works on making music at his house on March 12. Breslin is a local DJ who performs at various music events.

DJ Sunuvphun is a former 'jazz elitist'

He looked up again; it was four in the morning. DJ Sunuvphun would have to get up soon to work his day job as a roofer, as his wife Sarah had reminded him the night before. Another night was lost in creating music.

Breslin, 34, said he frequently experiences this while working at his DAW to produce his own music. It is time-consuming and difficult to put down, he said. The Daily Lobo asked Breslin about his experiences as a local DJ.

Daily Lobo: Talk a little about yourself.

Breslin: “I’m a lifer here (in New Mexico), and I’m a crusty old roofer with a wife and four kids. Roofing runs in the family, even in my extended family back east in Missouri. I’ve been on roofs since I was about 10 years old. I ran away when I was 17 to go on tour, and that was an incredible time of my life. I was playing baritone and alto saxophone and piano, and I was writing and arranging for a while. I actually enjoy roofing, but I love music production.”

DL: How did you get involved in music production?

DJ: “The first exposure I got to electronic music was from a gentleman by the name of Richie. He was in a live drum and bass band, and they were some pretty heavy cats. They were rolling out tunes and drum and bass at 170 BPM. That piqued my interest. Before, I was a jazz elitist, and my opinion was always that of my peers: (I thought) with electronic music, all you did was spin records, play other people’s music and take credit for it. We were way too fancy for that. But then I came back home and I ended up walking through the desert with a baritone saxophone. I walked into this odd place called the Three Sided Whole and there was a rave, an electronic music concert, going on at full force. There was something about the repetitive nature of the music that hypnotized me, and it changed my way of thinking and the way I felt.”

DL: How do you produce your own music?

DJ: “I did not know what to think when I got my hands on my first DAW ... It was designed by a company called Propellerhead, and they designed a music program where they made exact digital copies of a bunch of analog music equipment ... so you basically have this cornucopia of musical devices at your fingertips. It’s a little overwhelming because I went from having a saxophone that produced a couple of different tones to a library of half a million samples, tunes and loops. Many (DAWs) now have come together and given you ways of using them interchangeably, which is mind-blowing and incredible and beautiful. One of my favorite Digital Audio Workstations is Ableton. They seem to have focused on a way to aid musicians when they’re playing music live: they found a way to tie the BPM, or the tempo, and all these different things that you would be doing together so that they can line up and start mixing all these different textures of sound ...”

DL: Why do you like the ability to mix all these sounds so much?

DJ: “The same reason I think a cage fighter would love being bionic. I think that aptly describes it. I used to think that (kind of) sound was really hanky, but over time, just wow. You can take an ordinary Juilliard dropout like myself and make a Mozart out of him with these kinds of things ... People think you can just push a button and the computer does all the music for you, but that’s not true. You still have to be an artist.”

DL: What is the hardest thing about producing your own music?

Enjoy what you're reading?
Get content from The Daily Lobo delivered to your inbox
Subscribe

DJ: “Electronic music tends to be kind of a one-man show very often, and I personally, coming from a jazz education, thrive on collaboration and other people’s energy. Currently, in the electronic scene that’s kind of rare, and so I hope to personally make it a little less rare and collaborate with other musicians to create the music live.”

DL: What is the best part about being a DJ?

DJ: “You can communicate things in music that you can’t necessarily communicate with even truly brilliant words. Also, when you bring that conglomeration of music together, there’s an advantage to using other people’s music and taking it out of always just being (their) ideas and groove and feel, and honestly making it better. When all that just pops into place, you connect with the audience and you have all that energy going. It’s just ecstatic.”

DL: What is your best memory from your time as a musician?

DJ: “I remember a good friend of mine, Sam, (who) died of alcoholism ... We were very close, and it hit me really hard. It was one of my first real exposures to death. At the time, I was playing in a kind of jazz, hippie-groove band and when the downbeat of a song we were playing changed, (the emotions) just poured out of me. My hands were doing things that I had no idea they could do. I remember locking eyes with a gentleman in the audience in Club Rhythm & Blues and I was crying. All of that pain and sadness was right up front, and I was experiencing it very poignantly — and then he started crying. I knew in that moment he could feel everything I could feel. He had known the same kind of suffering, and in a way that was very healing. It was healing to not be alone.”

DL: What is your advice to people trying to produce their own music?

DJ: “Go for it. Get into it. Don’t close your mind to anything. So many people are so ridiculously opinionated, and yet the tapestry is blank and wide open. That’s what I love about music theory ... It’s not called ‘music fact.’ It’s called ‘music theory’ because even though we have established the parameters and rules, you never know when some unknown person just wanders into the scene and changes all the rules. Finally, never give up.”

Skylar Griego is a culture reporter for the Daily Lobo. She can be reached at culture@dailylobo.com or on Twitter @DailyLobo.

Comments
Powered by SNworks Solutions by The State News
All Content © 2024 The Daily Lobo