12 questions for OBERMAN KNOCKS

OBERMAN KNOCKS is no stranger to the international IDM scene. The prolific UK based producer whose music was once touted by Sean Booth as making Autechre sound like ‘a posh garden party’ has no interest in tech-talk or music trends and much rather focuses on the creation and manipulation of sounds for the pure pleasure of the production itself. His latest work, Khaptop Arc Phore, which released on Errorgrid on May 9th, is a testimony to his passion, but blends a new layer of frail emotionality into his signature sound. A much needed reminder that IDM is in fact a matter of the heart.

In a world that is filled with noise, what makes the music of Oberman Knocks ‘stand out’?

From a very young age I’ve always had a very strong sense of what I like music wise and more importantly never been troubled by being at odds with what other people around me (or at large for that matter) are into, which invariably led to a real confidence in my own ear and subsequently what I produce, so I’m not swayed by what’s currently in vogue or knocked for six if someone else doesn’t like my sounds.

As I only really started making music in my early thirties, that probably also served me well in regards to forging a more specific sound that was to became Oberman Knocks, as I’ve been into a pretty wide range of music over the years, so I don’t think it draws on one specific genre.

In terms of ‘standing out’ I’ve never made a conscious decision to do that, and the impetus is more about trying to create something that doesn’t already exist. So as much as I understand people wanting to replicate their favourite artists in order that they can become part of a scene or genre, I’ve never felt that desire and fundamentally there’d be no sense of achievement, excitement or fun in doing that.

If you were to reduce your music to one central mental image or concept, what would it be?

Well, the very first release I had out, which was under a different name, had a really great review that ended with “sounds like the mind of a mental patient, walking down a mental ward”, which quite a few people thought was pretty offensive, but I was super happy with.

For a more self-defined reduction I’d say my music is a series of sonic constructs using pretty varied elements, texturally, size and shape wise, spatially realised within what starts off as an empty space. The concept is usually to explore those relationships and push ahead, trying to improve on what’s gone before, or move things into a direction that feels like I’ve not ventured towards.

What is your relationship with technology? Is it a mere tool that helps you express yourself or is it part of the message itself

Predominantly a tool, but I wouldn’t say that it sits exclusively in that role and it’s something that I’m conscious of, particularly when trying to avoid sounding like something has been ‘shaped’ by the technology itself.

As much as I can be in awe of what some people produce technically and am interested in new and emerging tech, generally I try to swerve all of that in favour of pushing my very basic set-up as much as possible, so that the focus is primarily on the sound itself, rather than the means of production.
Although I’d call myself a ‘proper techno’ fan, and definitely belong to the generation where a big part of the sound was inherently about emerging and affordable technologies that were integral to its production (I’m thinking 80s electro in particular here), for the most part today, technologies are so ubiquitous that they don’t have that edge for me in the same way, particularly in relation to how exciting that all was when I was in my teens.

Having said all of that, when it comes to practical things I need to address, then I’ll go seek out a piece of tech for something that I may need specifically, such as last year when working on a dance piece with a choreographer and seven dancers. That required a lot of compositions being worked on in real time, and as much as I’d prepped a lot of material ahead of the initial rehearsals, I found that I needed to be able to access specific sounds really quickly. Sononym, which is a sample browser using machine learning and allows you to navigate sounds related to one another, but using variable search criteria, was such an invaluable piece of software in that situation and I’ve started using that in the studio now too. 

Likewise, over the last few years, new technology, such as Sensel’s Morph, has been a great help, because I’ve had to adapt what and how I use technology in order to help with physical challenges and restrictions that my hands pose, due to a degenerative form of arthritis. So going back to your question, technology does help me express myself, but at the moment in a more practical sense.

What is your opinion on the current state of the music scene? What are the challenges you acknowledge? What are the opportunities you consider untapped?


As a very general sweep on music as a whole, I think there’s some really amazing and interesting stuff out there, but it can get really hard to sift through everything that gets released. There’s so much material from huge amounts of producers now that it can be a little overwhelming trying to find artists who get you really excited, or even single tracks/releases that you really get a buzz from, without getting bewildered or fatigued by the swathes of material out there.

Challenges – well platforms such as Spotify are obviously a big concern for independent artists, making it practically impossible for the majority of people to make any kind of income from their work. The ease with which huge amounts of tracks can now be listened to or downloaded for free has of course really devalued people’s work, as well as shifting many people’s expectation that ‘content’ is just there for the taking – and that’s pretty regrettable. 

There’s also been this really unhealthy focus and misplaced notion that complexity equates better or more progressive music. I’ve never bought into that school of thought and it’s something which makes people miss out on some amazing work. Deathprod’s Treetop Drive 1, would be something that could be illustrative of that for me. What some might see as a really basic or simple track, is such a phenomenal piece of music and one I love going back to often. For a lot of artists who are solely concerned with keeping up with the vanguard, you tend to find that the actual music produced itself can quite often become secondary to the processes and production method and after a while I find that really tedious. I love complex music, but there has to be something visceral for me that makes me want to keep going back to it.

Untapped opportunities from my perspective that I’d love to hear would be the new wave of kids coming up with some amazing vernacular that’s completely mind-blowing and new. That and some of the ‘quieter’ artists (I don’t mean that literally) getting heard more. Something that is pretty universal is that those who make the most ‘noise’ (again not literally) tend to garner more attention, which can be detrimental on many levels. It’s a shame that for artists who have a tendency to be less self-assured, not as connected, or less visible, that they can quite often be overlooked, which I know has always been the case, but that’s really been ramped-up by social media over the last decade. I’m sure that there’s plenty of all of those types of artists already out there, so if anyone can point me in their direction I’d be really grateful.

You operate in a world filled with genres, styles, concepts and ideas. How do you navigate all of this without getting restricted in your creativity and authentic expression?


If you’re not caught up in trying to second-guess what might sell/work/go down well, then it’s much easier to get into your own head-space and start making sounds and constructs freely. The best approach for me personally is to start off by not trying to make anything ‘finished’, or a track if you like, and just let things manifest in a more organic way. At some point I’ll hit on something which then acts as a springboard for where things might go next.

None of that is ever concerned with feeling like I need to justify or position what I’ve made, or which genre/style it belongs to, nor where it sits in the pecking order etc. – that’s for other people to decide. Essentially I don’t really have much of a desire to feel like I belong to a certain scene, or fit into a specific genre, which then removes that crippling action of constantly comparing yourself to other artists. 

Being apart from all of that is really beneficial, in that I’m focused on the things that are more important to me, such as the structuring of tracks, where that track sits in the overall arc of a release, naming conventions, the gaps between tracks down to fractions of a second. All of those things I will obsess over no matter how long it takes to get them right and they’re what I’d rather be occupied with.

Is your musical process one of ‘struggle you overcome’ or ‘flow you celebrate’? Are you more of a passive observer, an active experimentalist or an organized architect?



Probably in part all of the above to some degree, but if you really want to pin things down then an organised architect with no formal training, who in the main works quite extemporaneously, would be a good fit.

What I used to see as a really bad habit of jumping around between things I’d started and then leave, I now see as a productive way of working and as opposed to looking in a folder and sighing at the sight of say 70 ‘unfinished tracks’, now file them in one labelled ‘sketches’. That simple act of filing, both mentally as well as ‘physically’, allows me to spend any amount of time on something, leave it be and go back to it and not feel any obligation to get it to a state that’s considered finished. I don’t throw those away anymore either, because if I’m listening back to sketches that I’ve previously worked on, and I’m in a totally different head-space, then it allows for the possibility to hear something in there that’s the nub of a new piece, or perhaps move it into a totally different direction that’s more unexpected. 

Usually I start with making one shape (sound) and then progress by bringing in others in relation to that, which in turn leads to mutating them and giving some form to this nebulous collection of sounds and space. Generally I really like to build up dense constructs of sounds and from there I’ll start ‘scoring’ them into ‘phrases’ if you like, but I’ll start each one from scratch using a different sound as an initial seed, then build up something that feels like it’s roughly in the right zone that I want it to be. Once I’m at that stage there’s lots of adding, removing, shifting things around, mutating, and quite a lot of the time with total disregard for the previous ‘phrase’. If and when it feels like there’s something happening that could form a ‘track’ or I’ve exhausted things, then I start juxtaposing those ‘phrases’ in a pretty random manner initially, which allows for the possibility of something interesting structural wise to happen, that I might not have gravitated towards otherwise. Once I get a feel for things overall, then more deliberate and subsequently discreet decisions come into play such as how long the track feels it should be and I may write additional phrases bridging sections, or focus on the negative spaces. 

Having confidence in your own sound is also really important and as a part of that, being accepting that ‘failing’ isn’t something that you should consider being incompatible with or external to what you produce – it’s all part of the process and quite often leads somewhere unexpected. I’m a great believer in happy accidents and find it really exciting when surprising outcomes present themselves. There’s a real thrill to wandering down a new path that you come across totally by chance, or a door left open where you thought one might be shut.

I love that sometimes you can be working into the early hours and being convinced that you’ve made your best track ever, but then the next day going back to it and it’s the biggest piece of crap and what were you thinking?! Quite often those things are a good way to exorcise what you might call ‘white noise’, interference, unintentional influences or an itch you just need to scratch, and are a good reminder of what fun you can have and that not everything needs to have some ‘end piece’ to be of value.

What triggered the making of Khaptop Arc Phore? Was there something that needed to be said?


Khaptop Arc Phore is really a glimpse into some months of both emotional and thought processing around the loss of friendship and love, in a totally unexpected situation and a personal marking of someone’s importance in my life. 

After the passing of a friend, who I’d drifted apart from over the years, there was this difficulty in processing the grief when mentally I’d already said “goodbye” to that person. And so as an outlet I decided to sit down and try to put into sound those feelings and make something that reminded me of that person specifically.

Although never initially intended as a release as such, after seeing that Errorgrid were on the lookout for a few guest artist spots, it seemed like the right time and thing to do, to share the tracks with the wider world and at the same time, to commemorate a friend in a very personal way.

With so much new music surfacing each day, how does an artist like yourself keep the courage and inspiration to keep going? 


The fundamental impetus for my sound work is essentially about its making and the enjoyment that I get from that, which is incredibly liberating because then the quantity of new music being put out isn’t really that relevant, and your main concern isn’t how or where you sit amongst all of that, particularly if you don’t spend time constantly comparing yourself to other artists.

As much as I love the way that technology and the Internet has really democratised sound production, the importance of editing and being selective about what goes out into the world has really suffered from people’s drive to be heard amongst the burgeoning scenes. Although I understand the desire to get work out into the world and heard by as wide an audience as possible (and also hopefully make some money if you’re really lucky), it quite often feels like quality control has suffered as a consequence of that, and replete with amounts of material, free or otherwise, that should’ve probably stayed out of the public domain are released. 

Chips or crisps?

Is that a UK specific question, as in do I refer to thinly sliced, fried potato snacks as chips or crisps? If we’re going full UK ways, I don’t really eat either on a regular basis, but when I do it’s with full gusto! So for chips triple cooked and crisps a decent sized bag of hand-cooked. If I had to choose though, chips would win out every time. Crisps are probably more predictable and you pretty much know what you’re going to get, whereas with chips, if they hit the right spot – bliss. And if I were going full-on and back to my Northern roots, I’d get them with gravy on!

Many artists struggle with mental health issues, not only since the pandemic. What is your tip for facing such inner darkness in the context of making music?


There’s obviously no one-size-fits-all in those situations and ultimately you have to try and gauge to what degree that inner darkness is affecting your everyday life.

Make sounds if you feel like it’s an outlet you’re able to manage and don’t put pressure on yourself to produce anything that’s perceived to be ‘finished’. And if you’re not able to do that, it’s ok to leave and then make a start when you do – there’s no point beating yourself up and compounding your mental state further – that time and energy can be better spent getting back to a place where you’re better positioned to start producing again.

Do you have any artistic idols? In all honesty, do you consider them a source of inspiration or sometimes limitation for your work?

I don’t have any idols in the typical sense of the word, but there are plenty of people I really admire in terms of what they’ve produced, be that over many years, or in some instances a single track.

My obvious choice, for having played a really important role in my music making, would be Autechre, but that would be coming more from a dynamic position and not simply seeing them as ‘idols’.

What they’ve produced over the years is incredible and they really are in a league of their own when it comes to having their own sound. I’ve a huge amount of respect for them, not only as artists and their output, but also for the fact that they’ve maintained a working relationship for so many years, which I think is really admirable. 

In regards to being an inspiration, Sean was the first person who suggested that I should have a go at making my own music, which gave me the confidence to get started, so that was certainly a pivotal role. However, being a huge fan of Autechre it would have not only been limiting, but also totally impossible for me to try to rip them off, so things worked out pretty well really.

Your naming conventions seem odd. Are they erratic and random or is there a specific concept and meaning behind them?

Odd is one of the more polite remarks about the titles – over the years people’s responses have ranged from those who really like them and were interested in their meaning, right through to “I hate your titles”! For whatever reason they seem to be somewhat polarising and I’m always a bit surprised at what an allergic reaction they can elicit from those who really don’t like them.

Titles are really important for me, because they’re an integral part of the track and need to resonate with it in some way, whilst not being too literal, plus I don’t want them to feel like some necessary identifier or insignificant adjunct. So although the majority of the words are totally made-up, it’s really important that they feel correct for each specific track, and they’re certainly not random in any way. Some tracks have genuine words in there, but that’s when it feels like a recognisable element is needed to provide something such as a direction, an adjective, or I may pivot that word into something that would be considered an incorrect usage in another context. 

Initially I started thinking about titles that were more abstract because the aim was to hit a spot that was somewhere between using actual words, so as to avoid any implied narrative, or the opposite end of the spectrum, by employing a much more scientific/mathematical cataloguing convention that a lot of people use, particularly within electronic music. So coming up with pseudowords felt like a good way to title things and also feeds back into a very English (particularly Northern) play with words, where regional dialects change quite markedly.  

Sheffield (where I grew up) in particular has a whole slew of words and phrases that for an outsider, even if you can get beyond the accent, don’t make any real sense. So for example a common phrase used would be “Thas a reit nesh”, which roughly translates as either “You don’t like the cold”, but more commonly, particularly amongst kids and younger adults, “nesh” means afraid or scared. So it’d be used as a bit of a taunt or jibe – Thas (You’re) a reit (a real) nesh (wimp/scaredy-cat).

Whenever a word or series of words come into my head, that gets noted down, checked if it’s already an actual word, and if not it’s added to the ever-growing list of potential titles. Once a track is finished I spend a lot of time going through that list and working out which title is the best fit, whether that be that its written form looks suggestive of a particular element within the track, or if it just seems to marry with the vibe of the particular piece. There’ll be some notion of where it needs to land, such as a title that feels like it needs to resonate with a more aggressive set of forms, or one that’s perhaps more suggestive of an arrhythmic structure etc.

When I’m putting a release together other factors come into play, such as making sure that the entire tracklist feels like it has some sense of coherence, that too many elements aren’t replicated (such as too many titles starting with a particular letter), that any feel repetitive (unless intended), and that there’s a good mix of single word titles with those that are made-up of multiples. 

Love ’em or loathe ’em, they’re all mine and by this stage recognisable as such, so they feel like an integral part of Oberman Knocks.  

‘Khaptop Arc Phore’ is now out on Bandcamp.

Check out his full discography.