LANDSCAPE BODY MACHINE
by Julie Johnson

(Grave Concerns magazine, Sept 2000)

Julie: What makes your live show interesting, where it gives people an amazing feeling afterwards?

LBM: You can always tell when a performer is putting everything that they've got into a show. When I do a concert, I try to put enthusiasm and energy behind everything that I do. I give them everything that I've got. I feel it's my responsibility as a performer. I can't stand watching selfish artists who don't share themselves with the audience. Those people paying money to see you play enable you as an artist to share your work and to further your works. So why be so self absorbed and greedy? Musicians with that "rockstar" attitude makes me sick.

Julie: How does your music relate to your own enthusiastic ways?

LBM : Landscape Body Machine is truly my feelings and thoughts, ups and downs and I think it does say an awful lot about me and who I am. Sometimes angry, sometimes pensive, sometimes somber. LBM is my therapy so whatever is going on inside me or around me is what ends up in the music. I know that the music that comes out of must seem pretty heavy to other people. Overall I'm a pretty positive person. I try to enjoy my life. That's not to say that I don't get depressed or pissed off or whatever, I simply don't let those negative elements control me or my life.

Julie: Landscape Body Machine is deep and complex, so how do you incorporate 3 distinct musical directions into your sound, especially as a sole member?

LBM: I listen to quite a large variety of music so I try to bring as many diverse musical ideas as I can into LBM. Keeping it focused I have to admit is pretty difficult but I would rather push myself in new directions than just play dance music or just play ambient stuff or whatever. As the sole member I fight with myself a lot, trying to balance the material out and keep it coherent. It is very important to me that I don't do too much of one thing so I don't find myself pigeonholed in one genre or as having a singular sound. I feel that if I stay with this format of diversity that hopefully there will never be expectations put on Landscape Body Machine to sound a certain way.

Julie: When you first started listening to electronic music, did you ever think you would one day have your music packing dancefloors? (laugh)

LBM: No. It still seems pretty surreal.

Julie: How do you feel LBM, is shaping the industrial scene, especially in your home area?

LBM: I think that I've certainly helped keep the industrial scene going in Vancouver over the past five or so years that I've been playing live shows. I say that because there really aren't any groups here playing live industrial. Most of the shows I've played here have been without any other bands. Since Vancouver isn't necessarily a stop on most North American tours, not many Industrial bands come here to play. Hell, FLA doesn't even play here anymore. Over the past year I've been playing more and more in Edmonton and Seattle. Indirectly, I think that my lengthy journeys to these cities has inspired other acts to do the same which is great. On the West Coast of Canada and the US, we don't have the luxury of cities being close together like they are in the eastern states or Europe. When I play Edmonton, it's a 15-hour drive each way. Once the costs are calculated, you can see why a lot of musicians don't want to make the trek. Lately it seems more people are taking these same risks and that's great. As a result of these trips, I have found a home with Interdimensional Industries who are now LBM's record label and played shows with other progressive electronic musicians like Consume and Bahoketan. So I come home poor and in debt each time. Thus far it has been more than well worth it.

Julie: How are you looking to expand Landscape Body Machine's sound, and then with interest?

LBM:The new album I'm working on is similar to Structure in that I am trying hard to maintain that balancing act between ambient, dance and noise elements. The world is still on a path of destruction so the themes and topics will still reflect that. Beyond that I'm really not sure which direction I'll take the sound. Most likely, I'll move into much more experimental territory. I have been debating splitting the sound into separate albums (1 ambient, 1 industrial and so forth) for some time. Such a thing would be incredibly costly so we'll just have to see where my inspiration takes me. I'm hoping with the new album to reach a much more broad audience, to move beyond reaching only Industrial / EBM listeners. I have my sights set on raising LBM's profile in Europe and hopefully getting over to tour sometime in 2001.

Julie: How is the word about LBM spreading around the different scenes right now?

LBM: It's interesting to me how far this album gotten since it's release in 1996 considering it's only been distributed properly for about a year. I'm am endlessly surprised by the positive reactions to it by people who are into all kinds of music because I wasn't sure if it was that accessible to those not familiar with the style of music. While I have not had as much success breaking into scenes other than Industrial/EBM, I am happy with what I have gotten. I've had many people who aren't even into electronic music at all buy the album and that, to me, is probably the highest of compliments. I had one person tell me that it had become their favorite album to exercise to. Like aerobics. Too funny. My focus for the future is a much broader audience and sound so we'll just have to see how that goes..

Julie: How is "Structure" a timeline of your life experiences?

LBM: I was working as a cargo handler at Vancouver International Airport loading airfreight for planes. On this particular morning, we were loading up a 10,000-pound pallet onto a carrier to drive up to a flight. In a split second, I found myself caught between the rollers of the carrier and the pallet itself. The pallet grabbed me by the waist and legs and proceeded to pull me underneath it. The next 10 seconds or so became terribly surreal. Anyone who has been to the brink of death at some point in their lives knows what I'm talking about here. It felt kind of like getting to live your life from beginning to end again and come to terms with you death, all in a matter of 3 seconds. For the following three weeks, life was like a bad acid trip. I experienced visions, clairvoyance and severe depression. It was hard to come back to a grounded consciousness after what I had experienced. This was also terribly frustrating because I was having doubts about the album, the music, everything. I wasn't even sure if I wanted to put the record out at all because I wasn't convinced that there was an theme or connection between the songs and their respective titles and meanings. And then it hit me. Late one night in a conscious daydream or vision (I have no idea how to describe this) the true meanings of what I had been writing and how they all related to each other finally came together. When I came out of this daze I sat down and wrote the song order out (as it stands today) and something clicked. Structure is a picture of the world and the events that will happen during my lifetime on this planet. In some ways it even follows my own personal development and realizations. To put it a little more in context, the track 6 on the CD is called Cydonia. We've all seen over the past 2 or 3 years what's been happening with the planet Mars and all of those "failed" missions. Right now from what I can tell, the timeline appears to be right around Subterranean 2 (the terraforming). We are being bombarded by erratic and violent changes in weather and climate all over the world.

Julie: I hear you had a near death experience, how has this been effective for your musical development?

LBM: I'm definitely much more aware of my surroundings, my karma and my role in this lifetime. As for music, I am grateful that I was given what I see as a second opportunity to do something important with my life. I am frequently reminded of my gifts and that I should share them with others. I know that the forces that be are watching because 2 years ago I almost lost my life once again in a house fire. I nearly lost my right hand as a result. It's like someone giving you a wake up call in the most drastic possible way. Twice. They most certainly have my attention now.

Julie: Subterranean II (Terraforming) is my favorite track, what went into the design of this song to make it have a lasting effect?

LBM: Subterranean was written while I was living in downtown Vancouver for a short while in 1994. I was on the 20th floor of this apartment building overlooking the entire downtown area. Every night after work for about a week I would prop my keyboard up by the window and take in the view as I wrote. Seeing the pollution rise up, the filth, the noise, watching the city metamorphosis. Everyday the air got a little worse, the noise more intense and so forth. It was, to me like watching the industrialized world slowly terraform into an environment that would soon be inhospitable to mankind. But the change is subtle and so I wanted subterranean to have that same sort of feel. There is constant change but only if you stop, pay attention and take notice.

Julie: Esoteric is a dark epic, how would you define this song?

LBM: Esoteric is the journey's end. The finding of what it was you were looking for. For me, esoteric is the soundtrack to the end of the world. Not the destruction of planet earth, but rather on a much more personal level....I guess death really because that is when you truly begin to understand life. I am unsure as to whether or not this could mean my own physical death or a spiritual rebirth at some point later on in my life.

Julie: Structure was released in 1996, what have to been working on since this release?

LBM: Lots. I did a soundtrack and sound effects for the video game 'Gunmetal' by Mad Genius software. That was a pretty hefty project. Between myself and collaborator Keith Gillard, we made several hundred sound effects and wrote over 60 songs for the game over a two-year period. Unfortunately the company went under in a nasty way late 1998, a heartbreaking experience that devastated all who were involved. With the demise of Mad Genius, I found myself ready to pick up LBM where I had left off. In 1999, I suddenly found the profile of Landscape Body Machine really starting to change. This was largely in part to finally finding a label in Interdimensional Industries. They've been a tremendous help in exposing me to a larger audience. I finally started to play out of Vancouver on a much more regular basis, Edmonton in particular. LBM also did a tour in fall 1999 as part of Urseus Exit's Soiled tour hitting 7 major West Coast cities. Oh yes, and a string of shit paying jobs along the way, further instilling my hostility towards capitalism and it's marginalization of low-income workers.

Julie: In your thank you list, you thanked Noam Chomsky, are you talking about the Language guy, or something else? If, it is the psychologist guy, why is he important to you?

As well as being one of the most accomplished linguistics professors in the world today, Noam Chomsky is an incredibly articulate and well-read activist. He has a fairly extensive catalogue of books I would encourage anyone to pick up, particularly if the hypocrisy of US foreign policy interests you. The mainstream media in North America is very protective of it's respective business interests and doesn't really offer any exposure to much more than airline crashes and Coca-Cola. Intellectuals like Noam rarely get any exposure here, so I guess for me it's nice to know I'm not alone in thinking it's disgusting that unaccountable multinational corporations are exploiting workers and the environment worldwide and getting away with it.

Julie: What are you currently doing these days, tours, future plans for the year?

LBM: Right now I'm putting together my second album finally. It should be out winter 2000/ 2001. A video for the first single 'Revolution' is in production as we speak as well. I will continue to play as many shows as I can in the Pacific Northwest and hope that early next year I will get over to the East Coast. I'm also working with Destiny Media Technologies here in Vancouver on a secure mp3 format that would see the money from music distributed on the internet go back into the hands of musicians and songwriters. Finally.

Julie: Any last comments you would like to add?

LBM: Labels don't make you a person; they make you a walking billboard. Liberate yourself and burn your television. Fight the power.