SYNTHWAVE producer, Turbo Knight, seeks enlightenment through his music.
Finland synthwave scene continues to grow.
11/14/2017 – Thank you to everyone who has sent encouraging comments about the synthwave music interviews. Continuing the series, we got in touch with Turbo Knight. Based out of Finland, but with an ever growing international following, Turbo Knight, is firmly rooted in 80s synthwave. Regardless of the genre label; vaporwave, dark synth, trance… whatever you may call it, the Finnish electronic music scene is healthy. Turbo Knight shared some his own musical history and lessons he’s learned from how to make synthwave.
We’ve scoured your social media and internet pages, but not much is known about Turbo Knight. You are a self proclaimed ‘Self-taught roadwarrior’ and a ‘Producer’ from Finland. That’s about all we know. Who is Turbo Knight and how long have you been composing music?
Turbo Knight is a guy who has been making electronic music since 1993 (So it’s been an journey of almost 25 years). I started with Amiga trackers and after a little while I moved on to PC and Scream Tracker 2. I finished my first complete track at ’94 with Scream Tracker 3. After getting used to trackers I was making noise in the computer demoscene for quite a long while. Somewhere around 2000’s was when I had my first touch with modern DAW’s with Reason. It took me from like two years and shitloads of trance music with it. After that I bought my first synths. MC-303 and Yamaha CS-2x, they’re both really decent synths but I really never got deep enough with them, just using some presets and tried to make listenable music 🙂
We know you are based out of Finland, MEGAHAMMER told us so. Is your fanbase primarily from Europe or do you have a lot followers spread out across the globe?
According to statistics from my sites, USA is the place where people listen my songs the most. Next follows UK, Germany, Canada, Sweden and the sixth, Finland. So you could say that people all around the world like to listen to my music 🙂
Can you please give a quick gear rundown that you use and abuse regularly? Which DAW, computers, plugins, and any acoustic instruments that you play?
I’m really in love with Reaper. It’s almost free ($60 for personal licence, get it!!!), it has incredible features like scripts, spectral editing like in Izotope RX and other amazing workflow speeding things. I have mediocre computer (I5 4690k overclocked, 16GB, GTX 1070) but, my best friend Reaper handles my massive projects nicely. I’ve never known how to play an instrument. I know the basics of music in theory, but I’m more of like the guy who has learned to hear the right chords and notes in my music. I really would love to learn more advanced music theories but there’s so much going on right now with my life that I need to postpone it for later (work, wife, two kids…….)
Synthwave, the music and artwork, draws heavily on the 80’s. It was an excessive era filled with neon and spandex. Seemingly frozen in time, during the post two decades following it, the 80’s were largely written off and shamed. However, that just isn’t the case now. More and more, artists are embracing the creations from that decade of trial and experiment. Why do you think that is?
I think it’s mostly because of nostalgia and musical freedom people had back then. In music industry the synthesizers were a new thing and nobody really had any restrictions on the music they make or genres they should/could do with them, so people were experimenting freely and doing what they wanted. Nowadays, people need to categorize their music to different genres and subgenres way too much, etc. I’ve been trying to get out of that loop and make music what I feel the best, melodic, catchy and without genre restrictions. Right now I’m working on a trance track. Last time I was producing trance was like 10 years ago 😉
Speaking of spandex, who do you think is hotter; The women of aerobics from the 80’s or the fitness models of today?
That’s an really easy question to answer…SPANDEX! Today’s fitness models just aren’t my thing… I love the mysticism BEHIND the spandex 😉
You’ve worked with some film scores correct? Can you talk about that experience and share some news on any upcoming movie/video game OST’s that you have coming up?
I really haven’t worked on the film scores directly, people just have asked me if they can use my music on their independent productions, but future looks bright, I might be getting my track on indie Hollywood project in the near future.
If there was a SYNTHWAVE Thunderdome, and in said THUNDERDOME, synthwave musicians had to duel to the death with Oberheim keyboards. Who would be victorious if Jan Hammer battled Harold Faltermeyer?
I love both, but Jan would win the duel! I’m getting more influences from his airy sounds and more futuristic/dreamy melodies!!
Thank you for chatting with Slickster Magazine and looking forward to a long career from Turbo Knight. Is there anything you’d like to promote to your fans, or anything else we didn’t talk about that you’d like to share with the world?
Thanks. It was my pleasure! Check out my Youtube/Spotify and remember to love each other! My advice to youngsters in the scene is to make your own sound, don’t try to mimic others, keep it your own! And if you’re willing to support me and the label I’m working with (Time Slaves) turbo up and go buy my album from their bandcamp site: https://timeslaves.bandcamp.com/album/rise-of-the-machines