Metamatics- I Hate IDM (and Man United)

3 years after giving up LSD and weed, Manchester born producer Lee "Metamatics" Norris, has created his best music to date, Death To Passwords Where You're A Paper Aeroplane", an achingly beautiful electronic album. Compared to "Aphex Twin at his most bright and accessible or Orbital at their most mesmeric" (NME) the record is an easily listenable and highly chilled out collection of tracks of rare originality and quality, heavily centred on songs and the melancholy that clearly comes from him home town of Manchester.

Nowadays living in near isolation in a cottage on Dartmoor (Cornwall) he continues to only write music when it's rainy and grey, and continues to maintain his near fanatical support for his home town's only proper team: Manchester City.

"Down here (in Cornwall) everywhere you go you see kids with United tops on," he told Skrufff's Jonty Adderley.

"Sometimes I stop them and say, 'Are you from Manchester-", they say 'No', and I say "Well, why don't you support Exeter or Plymouth-'"


Skrufff: You've described the new album as a deliberate attempt to make music that will last for years as opposed to tracks that will date, how did you set about doing that-

Metamatics: "I bought loads of new digital equipment such as samplers, having using analogue machines in the past. There's a feel with old analogue gear that makes the music sound retro, it always sound dated. As soon as I started writing the new tracks I knew they'd sound alright. I also always try to avoid following trends."

Skrufff: They sound much more song based, was that deliberate-

Metamatics: "I've always liked emotional music such as David Sylvian and Nick Drake, and I tried to put emotion into it like them, but in my own little way. It came out well."

Skrufff: the album title is very unusual and thought provoking, do you see yourself as an artist-

Metamatics: "I used to be into all that art thing, I was also involved in visual art but I guess it was when I was still taking drugs. But I haven't taken any for three years though I guess that state of mind never leaves you. The title's a load of old cobblers (rubbish) really; It's just a load of words stuck together." (chuckling). I knew it would raise a few eyebrows."

Skrufff: You've also printed on the sleeve the words to "What the Birds Overheard" which delve into much deeper ideas and concepts, suggesting patterns behind the surface, why did you put that on-

Metamatics: "My mate Graham did them, he writes short stories and poems, he visited me last summer and that was one of them. I really liked it and thought it would be nice to put some music to it, so I did. But I got a Polish guy to recite it so it sounds like broken English."

Skrufff: When you're writing your music are you starting with certain patterns-

Metamatics: "It's weird the way I write. For example, I find it really difficult to write music when the sun's shining. I associate the summer with happy music such as reggae. I write all my music when it's raining and grey outside."

Skrufff: I would have thought Manchester would have been better for grey rainy days than Cornwall, why did you leave Manchester-

Metamatics: "Because my girlfriend got a place at University at Exeter, so I moved down to be with her and never went back. I thought, 'This is the place for me'. It's so quiet here; people are different as is the whole pace of life. I'd hate city life now. I live on Dartmoor in a little cottage in a hamlet and the nearest shop is two miles away. I run my own label from here now too which was a dream I always had when I used to live in Manchester."

Skrufff: You've named this project after John Foxx's 1980 original Metamatics, has he contacted you since- (John Foxx was the original singer in Ultravox)

Metamatics: "I've never met him but I've had feedback from him saying he likes my new album and other things that I've done which is really nice."

Skrufff: Are you planning on playing this< Tags

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