Rollin’ & Scratchin’

Morgan Geist has kept himself busy, to say the least.

As part of the production duo Metro Area, Geist has had his hands on some of the most popular remixes of bands such as The Rapture. He also runs his own record label, Environ and has released important mixes such as “Unclassics”, which featured scarcely-heard disco gems. Geist, alongside DFA’s James Murphy, is commonly grouped together under the batch of NYC-area disco-preachers who brought back the movement a few years ago and continue to pay homage to the sound.

Between production, remixing and crate-digging, Geist has found little time for his own material until recently releasing his latest disc, “Double Night Time”. The disc dives straight into pop-material and provides songs for all listening situations. Whether your in the club, or on a road-trip, you’ll find some thing on this album.

Some of the most effective tracks feature the smooth vocals of Jeremy Greenspan (known primarily for his Junior Boys). Greenspan’s minimalist vocal fit perfectly with Geist’s simple and beautiful layers in each of the tracks. A perfect combination.

Morgan Geist feat Jeremy Greenspan – The Shore

At Wrongbar on October 11, Morgan Geist jumped behind the decks and delivered a solid mix of disco beats and classic house vibes. The drawn-out mixes were a refreshing change from the patchy and distorted remixes we’ve become accustomed to in the clubs lately.

Prior to his show, Morgan was kind enough to chat with R&S and answer a few questions.

Double Night Time, features vocal contributions from Jeremy Greenspan of Junior Boys. When producing with Metro Area or recording solo material, what draws you towards the artists you work with?

They just have to fit, and I have to like them. Pretty simple criteria.

You respect the classics. What has been the single-biggest influence on your sound for this album?

That’s nearly impossible to say. I think philosophically, there was a lot of Yellow Magic Orchestra (and especially all their side projects, like Yukihiro Takahashi’s solo stuff) going on in my brain.

With so many projects on the go (your label Environ, production duties with Metro Area and your new album, Double Night Time), how do you find a balance between all of those activities? Does one suffer if you focus on something else? Or do they all contribute to each other?

I think when Environ was a small, underground 12” dance label and I was the only person putting out music on it, and (most importantly) we still lived in a world where people actually bought records so making a record actually bought you time to make another record, everything contributed to one forward, healthy movement. Now the individual elements do, as you say, cause other aspects to suffer, the main example of that being label/office work taking time away from my music-making/studio work. Maybe I can sum it up by saying it all used to be fun, whereas now that’s no longer true…there’s a lot of onerous bullshit instead of that pure “make some music, put it on a record, sell the record” simplicity of the early days.

You once said in an interview that a lot of today’s edits/re-works take the best part of a classic tune and render it meaningless through repetition within the track. What is your approach in the studio (or behind the decks) that keeps things interesting for yourself and the listener?

Make good music that can be satisfying to experience in more than one environment. My favorite so-called dance music records can also be listened to on headphones or at home. That’s the point of good arrangement and songwriting: holding people’s interest.

It’s 2am, the dance floor is packed. Give us your top 5 tracks that’d come out of your crates.

It’s different every time. Really.

October 14th, 2008 by Brian