How long ago did you start writing the Zahara EP it and how did you decide these tracks should come together on Inspected?

It's been my dream to release an album on Inspected. They’ve been one of my favourite labels for the longest time and have played an essential role in the development of my musical personality. After I completed my first EP I made the decision to focus on elevating the quality of my work with the intention of eventually releasing on Inspected. For a while there I really focused on improving my production and sound design skills. About a year and a half ago in August I moved to Bristol. The formulation of this album began maybe a month prior to this. I went to Bristol to explore the musical scene and gained a lot of understanding about the British Music industry as a whole during my time there. I found myself sitting in my apartment all day which is when I began to work seriously on an EP for Inspected. I didn’t want to make bangers all day but I specifically wanted to curate a release for them, my favorite label.

This goal of writing something geared for Inspected is what made it so hard to produce. In fact, to be honest, it was really hard making this EP *laughs* I got stuck a lot mix-wise, arrangement-wise, sound design-wise, the whole thing was quite a challenge. There were some tracks that came more easily than others, but they didn’t come in any particular order. I started with 'Astarte', then 'Ammonite’s Wall', then 'Neo' and lastly 'Viernes'. My whole purpose was to bring the heaviness and dance-floor quality into my music but to also imbue it with emotion.

I rearranged and finished the structure of the whole EP when I got to the United States. Then I wrapped it up and sent it to Inspected.

That sounds pretty intense, completing the album in such a short span - did you have any of the bits together before you went to Bristol?

The formulation for the album began about a month before moving to Bristol. So I would say collectively it was maybe around nine months.

How did it feel making an EP with the aim of releasing it on a particular label like Inspected? Did you find it challenging or pretty easygoing?

It was a bit of both. I’ve been inspired by Inspected for a long time and I kind of knew the vibe of music I like to bring would be a good match. The merging of dancefloor and heavyiness, that’s kind of what the whole NUEQ project is about. I tried to put myself aside and think about the release from the point of view of somebody from Inspected, and tried to make each tune keeping this and mind and imagining how they were going to hear it.

How did you connect with Inspected? What happened when you sent them the EP?

I asked around and got a hold of the label manager’s email and sent it along. Ryan from Inspected got back to me quite quickly, a day or two later. I bet you can imagine how excited I was to hear back so fast.

They told me they were quite busy at the moment with Vorso’s album (released last October) but that they were definitely interested and saw the potential for a release with them. Over the coming months, we talked a lot about the mixdowns and masters and how we wanted to do the release. I flew to England in May to play Balter Festival and visit some friends, including my mate Culprate. He and I got together outside of the festival and worked on the mixdowns for the EP. He put major effort into it on his own too which really helped a lot in getting it polished and ready for release. While waiting for the chosen release date we had the time to get the art just like I wanted it and prepare the release. The cover artwork was made by Funilab who I’ve worked with before on my first EP and logo as well.

What do you think of when you begin making a track?

I really like to take the listener on a kind of journey. If I'm starting something, not immediately but soon into the process I decide if it fits one of my album/EP concepts or if it’s more of a single. Then I create something around the idea based on that decision. If it is going to be a banger or club track I usually start with the drums. For this EP I think most of the tracks started with the chord progressions and harmonies, establishing a general vibe and emotional connection to the track.

Your music has such clear energy and colour to it, it’s very unique. May I ask where you’d get so good at drums by the way? The arrangements are super wild and unique, do you play the drums at all?

Yeah, I play the drums! I'm not very good honestly *laughs*. I started playing the drums pretty late in my life, maybe six or seven years ago. There were times during those years when I took the drums very seriously, and since then I’ve never looked at them the same when producing my tracks. They definitely helped develop the love and desire for making music.

Your high-speed drums show me why your sound makes a lot of sense at Balter Festival. It's been really cool seeing this sort of hardstyle stylistic influence out here in the states where you’ve been playing.

Thanks. This kind of aesthetic and vibe is definitely the kind of music I want to bring here, to the US. A gap that could be filled.

Would you call your sound neuro?

It's so hard to name music these days. I'm definitely inspired by neuro stuff and I really like this kind of bass sound design.

Culprate is one of my biggest inspirations. Ekcle for sure, they made some amazing music when they were together. I was so devastated when they broke up. I thought they had the perfect balance of everything in their music. Their live songs and their drums are so beautiful. I’m really inspired by people who bring the music to the dance floor and it's not just strictly bangers. In addition to those guys, Tom Finster is also amazing. Vorso, Refraq, and all these producers are huge inspirations to me.

Can you tell me about some of the production and songwriting for the EP? Ammonite’s Wall might be my favourite on the release.

Yeah, let me give you a breakdown on that one. It sort of applies to my general process for all of the tracks on the EP.

The workflow and process on Ammonite’s Wall were interesting actually - it was a lot of fun to write this one. I’ve had so many creative ideas for the track and I’m happy I was able to bring them all out. There are five different drops in this one tune! It's not rare for me to go into a flow state while making music, but with this track, it was really good and came together entirely in about a month, which for these kinds of complex tracks it’s usually quite hard for me to make. With Ammonite’s Wall, I wanted to surprise the listener with an interlude right before the breakdown and main drop of the track.

I had the whole chord progression for the track and then I used the chords in different synths to experiment with different sound design processes and see where it goes. When I got to do the second drop, I wanted to do something unexpected. In my music, I never repeat the same drop, so for this track, I tried a lot of different things and ended up taking the chords and changing them from the first drop. I messed with the sounds in Operator and set up a pre-drop to build tension

In the chords, when you add distortion to it, some of the notes clash. When you work with distortion and the sine waves in the right way you can come up with really interesting harmonies and sometimes that works out into something special. I wanted it to sound good, but still weird so I added XLN Audio’s RC-20. RC-20 is a multi-effect tool that has a feature that shifts the pitch to move like a tape. So when I had the frequencies moving at the same rate as the distortion, I automated a frequency shifter at the beginning of every bar to give even more harmonic weirdness. I designed the drums as well to be in this kind of vibe. The snare is filtered and complements a lot to the vibe I was going for.

Are all the instruments digitally made or do you ever do any field recordings or live anything?

This album was made with just my laptop and headphones in Bristol and in Mexico. I did use some field recordings I made back in Israel from an old sample bank of mine. I captured a lot of field recordings for my first EP and I still use them sometimes.

It’s like an old sample bank that you've got which helps bring a familiar coherence to your music across time.

Exactly.

The album reminds me of spring. There’s a tremendous energy to it, but there feels like a deep optimism to it as well - almost like a resilient hopefulness. I didn't get much anger or rage or anything out of it, even during the crazy parts it doesn’t feel overly abrasive or aggressive. Can you tell me about the vibe you created?

That's the vibe I like to bring to this project. I want to kind of mix the heavy and dark vibes with a resilient optimism, and that kind of reflects myself as a person too. There’s always a solution, that's how I see life. I think we as humans always need to see a light. We will always get into darkness in our lives, that’s true for every person. I think that's part of the balance of life. Without darkness and without heaviness or sadness, there will be no light. You need to have dark and sadness and things we don't like to know what happiness really is. It's always this balance at play.

For me, my music always needs to have a ray of light that I'm attracted to and aiming for. Physically, I really like being in the sun and really need it in my life. When I was in Bristol for 3 months I couldn’t stand the constant darkness and rain.

On this album, the shortest was track clocked at about four and a half minutes and the longest one was like, maybe five and a half minutes. I really enjoyed the long length and journey-like compositions of these tracks, the music further expresses itself over the extended length of time. Is that style of songwriting something that you enjoy working with or was it a conscious thing for this release?

It's funny that you ask that because when I first started making music, all of my friends were into Psytrance and psychedelic music and these tracks are long. They always told me, “Dude, why is your music so short, man? Keep it going.” And I was like “Dude, this is 4 minutes long, that's a full song! I don't have that much information. I don't have that much else I'm trying to say in this track.” *laughs* There’s a big difference between Psytrance and bass music.

But to answer your question - I’m definitely into the musical aspect of writing my tracks and enjoy making them into a journey. When I start writing it has to be seen through to some end result. How long will it take to get there? I don't know, but at least two wholly different drops and then kind of a resolution. Enough to give it a vibe and a story.

You do that when you play live, though I’m sure. I feel like your tracks on this EP have the advantage and the flexibility of being able to listen as a journey album at home or when you're driving. But also if DJs put them into their USB when they play them live, they could just play certain parts and make them into bangers also. Did you consider that at all when you make music?

At the beginning when I first started making music I didn’t ever consider playing live at all! I just made my music. But then I started to integrate into the party scene and specifically the scene in Israel. Unlike the US most of the Bass music scene in Israel consists of DJs rather than producers. Everybody out there are crazy DJs and the mixes are very important. So when I first started making music it was hard for me to mix properly and I did it without really beat matching. I used Ableton to mix the set for my first gig and then over time I learned how to DJ properly and developed my mixing technique and style.

A great performance is a main goal for me these days so when I make music, especially banger-type tunes, I always consider how I’m going to mix it live, how other DJs are going to mix it, how can I make this track more flexible for shows?

Congratulations on the release, you should be proud. It's fantastic.

Thank you! It's definitely my best work up to date and I’m really grateful for Culprate’s help on the mixdown and also to Inspected of course for their support and belief. It's been one of my biggest dreams to release there and to achieve that is unbelievable for me.

What inspired you to make your way to the States to visit in the first place?

One of the things which encouraged me to visit the States was meeting a group of producers from the States over at Fusion Culture’s Desert Bass festival. I’ve been hearing about the music scene in Denver for years alongside Bristol, and since I had already tried Bristol, Denver was the next natural stop.

When I returned to Israel I was given the opportunity to play Fusion Culture Festival, a huge bass music production out here. That’s where Duffrey and kLL sMTH saw me play. They’re such great producers and human beings from Denver. They told me a lot of people recommended them to go see my set at Fusion, so when I got off stage they were waiting for me backstage and I was in shock with the warm reception they all gave me.

Did you know of kLL sMTH and Duffrey’s music previously? They’re pretty big in the bass music scene out in the States.

Yes, I knew their stuff. I also knew that my style of music was still a little bit different than what they make - it's a bit more UK-inspired. But they appreciated my music and there were similarities to their live sets nonetheless. After I left Bristol I had it in my mind that the US would be more receptive to my sound and more accepting of my music than the UK. I was really lucky they came to see my set and loved it so much, that my dreams essentially came to life.

I met Duffrey the following day and he asked me what I was doing in Feburary. My plan was to go to Mexico and get closer to America for the summer in hopes of being there for the festival season and experiencing the American bass scene. I was planning on pulling some strings through my own connections but then Duffrey invited me to visit him in Denver and to attend a few big shows he was playing as a guest. I couldn’t believe it. He hosted me for two weeks and did so many kind things for me. I'm so grateful he introduced me to Denver and to all these people and how he exposed me to the music scene here.

All the homies I met through Kris and Woody and generally in Denver have been so supportive.

What have you gotten up to while you’ve been here?

I’ve been able to see a lot of the shows out here so far. Visiting cool venues and watching friends play at legendary places such as Red Rocks Amphitheatre, Cervantes, the Black Box, Infrasound Music Festival, Submersion and many more. The production scale of music events out here in the United States is massive! It's been a pleasure to go to shows, dance, meet people and experience the music scene first-hand. I also picked up snowboarding and have gotten to enjoy some of the nature in the United States which has been really nice, especially in Colorado.

Do you intend to come back to play one day?

I would love to! I have a big vision for NUEQ in the USA and already have some following around here. I think people will really enjoy seeing NUEQ live here. So I will do it as soon as I can!

Music-wise at the moment, I’m working on some collabs with Culprate, Duffery and Mr. Bill. I want to aim my music towards labels that I really admire such as VISION one day, or also Neosignal and DIVIDID. I’m really inspired by those kinds of sounds at the moment.

Are you working on tunes that'll be more in line with those kind of experimental Drum & Bass labels?

Yeah, I want to create music that's more techy and banger-like, but in my own way. For this kind of release, I’m working on a four or five-track EP that I want to send to more experimental Drum & Bass labels like the ones I mentioned. This is the style of music I’m most interested in producing right now.

Besides music, is there anything that supports your creativity? What do you like to do when you’re not making beats?

I really like basketball, exercising and taking care of my health. I see music and specifically music production as a key part of who I am. It's all about your life. I believe that we need to work on our life and well-being as a whole for a musical career to work out and be sustainable. Sitting for hours, designing and arranging tracks on the computer can be hard work. To me, a balance in life between music and other activities is necessary for inspiration and my muse to develop in a healthy way.

I find that music producers usually have some sort of alternative practice or just other interests besides music that balance it out because you can't just be all on music all the time.

When coming to think of it I also find performing live shows, going to parties and dancing to be very inspiring for me as well.