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THE SWAMI SOUND INTERVIEW
It's an accelerated world we live in, and Swami Sound is navigating us the best way he knows how.
Where did you leave your heart today? Is the question asked in It Is What It Is, the 2020 EP by Bronx-born musician Swami Sound. The question is looped throughout Mad Ting, the third track in a collection of ethereal and experimental tracks with contributions from trailblazers like mau from nowhere, Chevy Kev, and Mwami. It was songs like Mad Ting, Hope It Stays, and Swami’s vibrant NYC Garage remix of Waitin’ by Kelela that forced me to sit at my laptop one afternoon and go: “what can I ask Swami Sound that hasn’t been answered in the music?”
“What do you hate being asked?” is what kicks off our walk in Soho. Accompanying us is photographer, fire sign, and friend of Swami Sound: Cooly.
Swami: I spent so many years trying to answer “What kind of music do you make?"
He is the founder of NYC Garage: an original and native take on rhythmic, electronic, genre-bending sounds.
Swami: To now be at a place where I know what to call my music, I hate being asked what it is I make.
As we leave Aimé Leon Dore to pick up a croissant, Swami effortlessly begins to explain the music from his, or rather everyone else’s, point of view. Critics among us are certain they understand a creator’s work the best, and its most apparent across the different fields of the internet.
"Do you get a lot of rebuttals?”
Swami: I get a lot of rebuttal based on the glimpse people get of me. They’re not taking the time to get the whole picture, which you can find through any written interview about me. Anything about me anywhere. Maybe I have to do this forever, but as an American pushing this sound I have to wonder: how long until I don't get asked that question anymore? The social media response is different from how my emails are looking. My emails are suckin’ and fuckin’. We got a lot of Europeans who are like:
“Yo, I fuck with this,”
“Yo, let's do it,”
“You want to be on this radio show?”
They get it. But Americans who think they know everything about everything want to challenge me. It's something that doesn't require too much discourse. But because I'm a musician with a community and people with me that all have an agenda, and we’re one of a kind, now there’s discourse.
“How would you describe you?”
Swami: I have to think critically about how to describe myself. First and foremost, I'm a collaborator. Collaboration means a lot. I'm nothing without my contemporaries, and I'm nothing without the people who show me how to be better. The person I am now is an amalgamation of everything I've learned from the people around me. Like, I got Cooly with me. I wouldn't be a hot topic without him. You know what I mean by that.
Swami laughs slyly and its infectious.
“What does he mean by that, Cooly?”
Cooly: Man, Swami is what's poppin right now. He’s literally the future, man. I’ve been talking him into believing he’s the future everyday.
In addition to piecing together introspective dance hits, Swami is also a contemporary who compares his life to telenovelas.
Swami: My life is a novela, in that there's a lot of mishaps, places I'm not familiar with. I just navigate and behave based on how I know. And worst case, I’m wrong.
As we walk towards Houston, Swami asks us to stop with him and observe as the tourists on our backs nearly crash into us. “They aren’t paying attention,” Swami laughs. There’s an ease to him, a coolness in the way he addresses the things around him.
“What’s your sign?”
Swami: Virgo.
Virgos are ruled by Mercury, the planet of communication and intellect. They’re earth signs, and notorious for being high achievers with a flair for critical thinking. When it comes to advice, Swami is open to receiving it in the best way Virgos know how.
Swami: These people told me how to do this one thing, and these people told me how to do this other one, and I’m actually gonna do none of what they told me to do. Or maybe a fusion of both things. And that's collaboration.
“Is music always collaborative?”
Swami: Yes.
We stop at City Hats on Delancey. An employee offers Swami different bucket hats, each one he studies in the mirror.
Swami’s outfit is color-blocked. Bold red and easy-going white across his Kangol hat and Lacoste jacket. His accessories are subtle and time-specific: a matching red Telfar, an iPod Nano, headphones.
“What are you looking for in fashion?”
Swami: Something cognizant to the Bronx and the dawn of Hip-Hop. I’m not saying I'm succeeding at it, either, because there’s so much research I need to be aware of to do that. I just understand what I'm going for, I’m learning shit on the fly.
“Do you keep up with brand culture?”
Swami and Cooly laugh.
"You’re doing things independently, only from your perspective, and your perspective is something that has contributions from many things. What are those things? Who, what, when, where?”
Swami: Bronx finest. Cooly. Artful Dodger, Blankforms. But the stark contrast between me and my contemporaries, sonically, is the melancholy sound. I find comfort in it. It’s very familiar.
“Is the music inherently melancholic?”
Swami: Yes. Isn’t nostalgia always a little sad?
We end up at the Elizabeth Street Garden and briefly talk about Everything Everywhere All At Once, alternate realities, and how Swami studied social work for four years at NYU.
“How important is New York City to you and how you make your music?”
Swami: At times I feel like I'm in a mental prison. Because [New York] is all I know. The longer I stay here, the more I realize that if I went somewhere else, I'd be assed out. I’d rather not be assed out somewhere else. I’d rather be assed out in New York. But really, I’ll never be assed out here. This is the space for me to create. Everything I’m doing, every nook and cranny and lego piece is just feeding my hunger. But I'm open to travel! [he laughs.] The music is allowing me to travel. It’s the vehicle to take me somewhere else. It's answering a lot of questions for me, and I didn’t expect it to do that.
“Did you have any expectations for your music?”
Swami: Never. I had none. This whole NYC Garage shit was supposed to be a meme. But then it became so much more, really fast. We’re still at the beginning of it, sure, but who knows what kind of impact this has on the city’s electronic scene at large.
“What is the Swami process?”
Swami: The process is showing people stuff. Show your work, see what people think, how they can contribute. In a way that’s how I make my decisions. The same way I engage the boys about women troubles is the same way I engage collaborators about songs. Connection is important. At its core, it’s also that social work shit too. It’s about relating. It’s not about “I think your music’s cool” - I don’t think anyone’s music is cool! [He laughs]
In a world with ample opportunity to talk to one another, Swami began to narrow in on which methods were best.
Swami: Instagram is where things go to die. The best way to get to know me is through email. Did you DM me about this initially?
“I emailed you.”
Swami: Exactly. And here we are!
“And how do you people relate to Swami? How does Swami relate to people?”
Swami pauses to adjust in his seat before answering: Relating to people really boils down to how you relate to yourself. How honest you are with yourself. The question in Mad Ting is relatable to me, off-rip. I don’t know, if somebody commits to me for more than 30 seconds, they’ll relate to me too. I’m making songs. I’m not trying to make catchy beats or loops, I’m making songs. I’m trying to be honest. This new song coming out is exactly that. It’s one bar:
When I feel worthless and you’re too afraid to say so
When I turn hurtful and you change your POV
We choose to prescribe to a life so subdued and shameful and for the cause I can’t refuse
And that’s the song. [He pauses again here, longer than when he did for the previous question, a mental gamble going on in his head that I try not to notice.] It’s very critical, the song, of myself. My music is critical of myself. I don’t make love songs. A lot of songs are about other people – I don’t like writing songs about other people. ‘Cause who am I to talk about somebody else?
Swami’s first Spotify release was in 2018. But the first Swami Sound project was out on SoundCloud as far back as 2016. “I was trifling on SoundCloud. I don’t even want to talk about it.” Swami credits his calc teacher for teaching him how to play bass, and he began to craft his sound after playing an original remix of Redbone by Childish Gambino at his senior year talent show.
“Ugh,” Cooly adds.
“I told you I was trifling!” says Swami.
Cooly: My main issue with Childish Gambino is: when was the last time he put on [new artists?]
Swami: We talked about this before. It’s what they call the “new Blacks.” We got the SZA’s, the Solange, the Childish Gambino, and we have Blood Orange commodifying the Black American Experience.
Cooly: They’re comidfying the experience, while we’re actually living it. It’s two different worlds and they’re living lavish. I listen attentively to both Cooly and Swami. It’s a conversation they’ve had before, but one that, if revisited, presented brand new things to add. It’s the kind of conversation I could see being had publicly (i.e. on Twitter) just for the range of different opinions.
In a lot of ways, Swami is tapped into the life of a global star. We have to stop our talk for one phone call, then another. There were some words exchanged, and Swami, looking assured, agreed to whatever was offered on the other line. “I'm sorry. If there’s one thing I’ll do, it’s start an accidental meet-up in Soho.”
We're joined by two multimedia artists and friends both named Chris.
Swami greets them: We’re talking about new Blacks in music.
Chris Chance, ½ Chris’ present and host of the soundintheurl podcast, makes a face and smiles brightly. “That’s hilarious! There’s so much to say.”
Swami resumes our talk about his Redbone remix: When Areatha Franklin died, I changed the title to “RIP Aretha Franklin” and it went up. [He laughs] I told you, I was lost!
“Would you say you’ve ‘found’ yourself?” I hesitate to ask. It’s a plain question but a ridiculous one.
Swami: Hell no. No, I’m just here. I’m not necessarily doing this to find myself. I told you, I’m just doing this to travel. To get into another country and renounce my citizenship.
There’s a moment of understanding among us when Chris Chance adds: That sounds like a Jay Electronica verse.
We end at 310 Bowery Bar where Swami, Cooly, both Chris’ and I talk about the importance of connecting with ourselves to connect with others. Art, it seems, can only come from within. And to reach within requires honesty, humor, and heart: things this group of friends knows well.
Swami: I always want to have a strategy. And I have a mission statement! At the core of our strategy we know everything as we see it, and we make it stronger with every move.
“What’s next for Swami Sound?”
Swami: Well it depends on when you put this out. Back In the Day. LP. 7 songs. NYC Garage in full force. I just hope this project shows everybody what I mean by NYC Garage. I’m done explaining what [it] is to people. I’m done talking about what it is.
“What is one thing you want to tell the world?”
Swami: To live life in fear of losing is to lose the point of life. It’s a fortune cookie I received when I was 12.
Swami Sound will be spinning throughout New York City this summer.
written by ethan velez
photography by @cooly.fooly
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