The Moogfest Q&A

Grimes
Creepiest place you’ve ever been to?
Any time I've been in the woods in British Columbia at night time (where they filmed most of The X-files) … that’s pretty creepy. 

Kode9
Favorite Moog instrument?
I have a Moog Voyager with green lights … It’s such a beautiful object, I'm slightly daunted by it.
Creepiest place you’ve ever been to?
The first time I played on pirate radio station Rinse FM in east London in 2003, it was located in a deserted warehouse next to City Airport in east London's Docklands area. It was like the computer game Doom becoming real — completely dark, with no lighting except your mobile phone, long corridors, lots of empty rooms, dead ends and the green monsters of my mind.

Moon Duo
Favorite horror movie?
The original Halloween, hands down. Best soundtrack as well!
Creepiest place you've ever been to?
The Sedlec Ossuary, a chapel in Kutna Hora, Czech Republic. It contains the skeletons of between 40,000 and 70,000 people, arranged into sculptures and various decorations. It looks like the set of a horror film.

Glasser
Favorite Moog instrument?
My mom got me a vintage Moog Rogue when I was in high school because I was obsessed with Devo and that made me feel closer to them.
Favorite horror movie?
I love the movie Suspiria by Dario Argento, and I also always enjoy watching Carrie. There are so many great performances in Carrie.

Causing A Tiger
Favorite Moog instrument?
Carla Kihlstedt: Taurus Pedals
Shahzad Ismaily: Moog Rogue
Matthias Bossi: Moogerfooger

Ben Neill
Favorite Moog instrument?
It would have to be the mutantrumpet, my own instrument which was originally created in 1984 in close personal collaboration with Robert Moog.
Creepiest place you've ever been to?
A church in Otranto, Italy where the walls are covered with vitrines full of skulls and skeletons.

Dan Deacon
Favorite horror movie?
John Carpenter’s The Thing

Jason Hann of EOTO
Favorite horror book?
The Walking Dead graphic novel series for the last couple of years.
Creepiest place you've ever been to?
An old opera house in Austria. It had seven floors below the main stage where they kept rotating stage setups. I went to explore it after sound check and when I went down there it seemed very lively with random sounds and shadows moving on the outside of my peripheral vision.

Marley Carroll
Favorite Moog instrument?
Moog Synthesizer 1C
Creepiest place you've ever been to?
Catacombs, Paris

Ben O'Brien from the Wham City Comedy Tour
Favorite Moog instrument?
I'm a big fan of the Moog with the all-seeing, all-knowing eye. I got a mod-kit and added about forty silver tongues to it, which, as you know, causes it to bleed incessantly. Sometimes I would lay in bed all night and just let my essence be completely absorbed by the tentacles. I eventually got rid of it because the oscillators buried themselves in the Earth's core and that made the low-end a bit tinny.

Ghostland Observatory
Favorite horror TV show?
Tales from the Crypt and Creepshow.
Creepiest place you've ever been to?
Milwaukee. We played a venue there that was pretty creepy. The guys working there said it was haunted.

Kip Uhlhorn of Cloudland Canyon
Favorite horror movie?
Obviously, I am a complete synth nerd, so I really love the horror movies from the late ‘70s/early ‘80s that have soundtracks by Goblin/Giorgio Moroder (even though his stuff's not really horror a lot of the time.) The first Halloween, Deep Red, Suspiria, etc. are great, especially for the soundtracks. However, if we are going purely on film alone without the soundtrack weighing in, I'd probably have to go with The Silence of the Lambs (book or movie).

Fine Peduncle
Favorite Moog instrument?
Right now it’s the Taurus. The deliciously dirty bass tone it gives off scratches the pineal core of the brain, and you can play it with your feet. 
Favorite horror book?
I really loved the Goosebumps choose-your-own-scare series as a kid. I love options, and linear format reads stress me out sometimes. In these, you get to the end of a chapter and have a choice of what you want to do. So, basically, it’s a book which reads like a video game. Genius idea.

Emancipator
Creepiest place you’ve ever been to?
An empty swimming pool in a Masonic basement.

Ford & Lopatin
Favorite Moog instrument?
The Moog Liberation Keytar and the Memorymoog

Paul Duncan from Warm Ghost
Creepiest place you've ever been to?
Savannah, Ga., and not because it's supposed to be haunted — the people are just creepy. Aside from that, probably Longview,Texas, where I grew up.

Darby Cicci from The Antlers
Favorite Moog instrument?
I used to have a Moog Rogue that is sadly not with me anymore. I still borrow or rent one from time to time. I love how simple it is to get some of the crazy modulation sounds that can be a bit more complicated on other synths. I’ve only used a Moog Modular once, but it’s definitely my favorite. Nothing beats the sound design capabilities of modular synths.
Favorite horror movie?
Dario Argento’s Susperia is probably my favorite horror film. It’s about ballerinas and witchcraft and it has some brutal death scenes. Such a beautifully shot film as well. Very expressionist at times. Also it has my favorite horror score, by Goblin, who worked with Argento on quite a lot of films. Very psychedelic.
Creepiest place you've ever been to?
I stayed in a house in rural Maine that was supposed to be haunted. A woman a long time ago hung herself in a closet on the second floor, and you were supposed to be able to see her in the room sometimes. I decided to sleep in the room where she died. I didn’t see her, but it was pretty difficult to try and sleep.

Anika
Favorite horror movie?
I really like the film Peeping Tom. I like the way it's shot and the subtle attention to detail, like the fact that he writes for The Observer. I love horror films in general because when I was younger, I suffered from insomnia and this channel in the U.K. used to play loads of classic horrors between midnight and 6 a.m.
Creepiest place you've ever been to?
This tunnel out in the country just outside of L.A. I shot some footage there with PBW [Peanut Butter Wolf] and his mate, the ginger kid from Airplane! [Ross Harris], who's now a very talented filmmaker. It was pitch black and all we had was a small flashlight. I was petrified. I didn't really know PBW very well at that point, so being so far down a concrete flood tunnel in the depth of the night was a little worrying.

Adrian Belew
Favorite Moog instrument?
The new Moog Guitar. It's amazing!
Creepiest place you’ve ever been to?
Gary, Ind. It just has this smell …

Brandt, Brauer, Frick
Favorite Moog instrument?
The Little Phatty. We use it in our 10-piece ensemble as the only electronic instrument, and it integrates perfectly and can sound really subtle and organic when we want it to. In the studio we also play most of our bass parts with it.
Creepiest place you've ever been to?
Italian jail a couple of days ago.

Jacob Graham from The Drums
Favorite Moog instrument?
My favorite Moog instrument that I currently own is the CP-251. I don't know if you'd actually consider it an instrument unto itself, but it is certainly a very handy tool for anyone involved in analog synthesis. I did hold onto a classic Minimoog for a friend of mine for a couple of years and grew rather attached.

Beats Antique
Creepiest place you've ever been to?
The Mall of America!

Amon Tobin
Favorite horror movie (or TV show)?
Sex and the City. Covered my eyes through most of it, and the rest haunted me for days.

CANT (Chris Taylor)
Favorite Moog instrument?
Minimoog Model D
Creepiest place you’ve ever been to?
Salt Lake City

SBTRKT
Favorite Moog instrument?
Moog Filtatron app on the iPhone. Great for messing around with LFOs whilst sitting on the tube. I am definitely buying an Etherwave Theremin for the live show shortly!
Favorite horror movie?
The Birds. There are a massive amount of crows that hang around on the the roof of my building. A reminder every time I see them!

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