// Interview July 2026 by Yuta Umegatani, Floor Archive
Q. I understand you were born in Texas, USA.
Did you spend your childhood there? When did you move to Germany? And if you've ever lived in Japan, could you tell us about that as well?
I was born in Texas, USA, in 1976. When I was about a year and a half old, my parents moved to Germany, where I grew up and have lived ever since.
I’ve never actually lived in Japan, but my mother’s side of the family is Japanese, and I have a large family there. Growing up, I spent almost every summer vacation in Japan, so it has always been a familiar and important part of my life.
Q. What were you like as a child? Is there a particular experience from your childhood that had a major impact on shaping who you are today?
I spent a lot of my childhood on my own.
During preschool and elementary school, I never really found my place among the other kids.
I grew up in small villages and rural towns in Bavaria, and we were the only Asian family there.
My father was often away for work, so I spent most of my time entertaining myself.
I was constantly inventing games, wandering through forests and fields, building entire worlds in my imagination and closely observing whatever I found in nature. Stones, branches, leaves, insects, textures - almost anything could become part of my imaginary landscapes and stories, I made up in my mind.
Looking back, I think I was already doing what I still do today: creating worlds from very little.
That experience has had a profound influence on how I make music and how I understand myself as an artist. My work is less about self-expression in the sense of presenting myself or my abilities to an audience.
It’s more about building places I can inhabit - sonic environments where I can recognize myself, feel free and safe and process thoughts and emotions that often remain unconscious until they emerge through sound.
Even after many years of working in professional studios, I still get excited by the simplest setups.
I’m perfectly happy spending hours with a single synthesizer and one effect - maybe just a reverb or a short delay. Sometimes those sessions already feel like complete pieces to me. I enjoy discovering how much can emerge from very little.
In that sense, my music has always been intrinsically motivated. I don’t begin with an audience, a market, critics or expectations in mind.
The music exists because I need to make it.
Everything else comes afterwards.
Q. When did you first become interested in music, and what sparked that interest? Do you remember the first record or CD you bought with your own money?
Music was always present in our home, so my interest started very early. My mother listened to a lot of classical music, while my father had a large and very eclectic record collection - everything from Krautrock and American rock to post-punk.
I think I was around five years old when my father gave me a 7-inch single of the Jackson 5’s “ABC.”
Since it was basically a children’s song, he thought it was a good place to start. I still remember being fascinated by the record itself and the whole ritual of putting it on.
The first records I bought with my own pocket money came a few years later, when I was about thirteen.
I think it was 1989. Since 7-inch singles were much cheaper than vinyl albums or CDs, I bought three at once:
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Moses P. – Twilight Zone
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Salt-N-Pepa – Push It
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S’Express – Hey Music Lover
Looking back, it’s a funny combination - but it already reflects the fact that I was never interested in just one style of music. My parents definitely sparked that curiosity and encouraged it from the very beginning.
Q. You've mentioned artists such as Miles Davis, John Coltrane, and Freddie Hubbard as part of your musical roots. How did you first discover jazz, and what drew you to it?
I discovered jazz through a friend who played electric bass in couple of jazz bands. Around 1992, he made me a mixtape filled with bebop and cool jazz — Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, John Coltrane and others. Before that, I only knew the jazz fusion records my father used to play, like Chick Corea and Keith Jarrett.
One track on that tape was Miles Davis’ version of My Funny Valentine and I think that was the moment everything clicked. It was the first time I truly connected with that kind of musical energy.
What fascinated me wasn’t virtuosity itself. It was hearing musicians who had mastered their instruments to such a degree that technique became invisible. Their instruments no longer felt like tools …
they became extensions of their bodies and minds. Every note carried intention.
Even the smallest phrase seemed emotionally meaningful to me.
I was equally fascinated by the way jazz musicians improvise together. The constant listening, reacting, trusting each other and shaping something in real time that has never existed before. It feels less like performing and more like having a conversation in a language beyond words. I still find that incredibly inspiring.
Q. I remember seeing you post about jungle records on your Instagram Stories. Have you always been a fan of jungle and rave music?
Did you ever go to raves in Germany or the United States during the 1990s?
It was in Frankfurt, where I lived between 1994 and 1996, that I really discovered electronic music - especially techno, acid, breakcore and jungle.
I went to a lot of raves back then, both legal club nights and underground parties that weren’t publicly announced. The illegal ones usually took place somewhere outside the city. You’d get vague directions, maybe a meeting point or rough coordinates and you definitely needed a car to get there.
What I loved most was the complete unpredictability of it all. You never really knew where you were going, who would be playing, how long the party would last or what would happen once you got there.
Anything felt possible - and that sense of the unknown was the real attraction.
Looking back, that’s what I miss most. The DIY spirit. The openness. The willingness to take risks simply because people felt compelled to create and make something happen for themselves - not because to fit into an algorithm or a marketing strategy.
There was a hunger for the unexpected and for a certain amount of danger.
That’s what made those nights feel so alive and unforgettable.
Q. When did you first start making music? What were your earliest musical activities?
As a child and teenager, I played the piano - first classical music and later jazz.
What’s probably unusual is that I wasn’t making my own music before joining ATR. I hadn’t played in bands and I had never produced electronic music. Touring with Atari Teenage Riot was really the beginning of everything for me.
For the first few years, I borrowed most of my equipment from Alec. The first pieces of gear I actually bought myself were small, portable devices that I could also use in live performances - things like a Korg Kaoss Pad, a Yamaha SU10 Pocket Sampler, guitar pedals and a Fostex four-track recorder.
Looking back, those limitations were probably a good thing. I learned to experiment with whatever I had instead of waiting until I owned the “right” equipment. That mindset has never really left me.
Q. You're known not only as an electronic musician but also as a noise artist. How did you first discover noise music, and what made you choose noise as a means of expression?
I actually discovered Japanese noise relatively late, around 1996 or 1997.
Other forms of noise, especially power electronics, never resonated with me in the same way.
Much of what I encountered there at the time felt connected to ideas of nihilism, punishment and deliberately transgressive aesthetics.
I can completely respect that approach - it just isn’t something I personally connect with.
What I found in Japanese noise was something entirely different. I never hear it as negative or destructive. Quite the opposite.
I hear an overwhelming sense of life force… of euphoria, freedom, sexuality, curiosity and an almost limitless creative energy. If I had to reduce it to a few words, I’d say it feels radically life-affirming.
The sheer physical intensity of it creates a kind of ecstatic loss of control. It feels like being overwhelmed by something that maybe appears to be pure chaos, but underneath is an incredible density of ideas, spontaneity and creative freedom. That’s what I find euphoric about it.
It’s a bit like laughing uncontrollably - you don’t decide to do it, you simply surrender to the experience.
It’s like an autonomous reaction of your nervous system. And maybe that’s also the connection to sexuality for me. There’s a willingness to let go, to stop trying to control everything and to fully give yourself over to the moment.
I also hear resistance - not necessarily against one specific political issue, but against the pressure to fit into predefined roles, social expectations or ideas of how you’re supposed to live or express yourself. That spirit immediately made sense to me and I think that’s why noise became such a natural language for me.
To me, noise isn’t the absence of structure. It’s an overwhelming abundance of it - so much information arriving at once that analysis gives way to pure experience.
Q. Free jazz musicians have often collaborated with noise artists, and there seem to be many similarities between jazz and noise. As someone whose roots are in jazz and who has also worked extensively with noise, how do you see the relationship between the two? Beyond techniques such as improvisation or playing outside conventional scales, do you think they also share a common spirit or philosophy?
I do think jazz and noise share a common spirit, although they may arrive there through very different musical languages.
For me, both can be extremely information-dense.
I don’t necessarily mean complex in a theoretical sense. I mean that even a very short sound or phrase can carry an enormous amount of energy, emotion, texture and intention. A distorted frequency, the breath inside a saxophone tone, feedback, silence or the attack of a single note can contain as much information as an entire conventional melody.
In both jazz and noise, timbre is not merely decoration - it can become the actual content of the music.
The way a sound is produced, how it breaks apart, how much resistance or physical effort it contains, can communicate something before you even begin to analyze harmony or structure.
They also share an openness to risk - for me that’s one of the most relevant aspects. Improvisation is part of that, but it goes beyond simply playing without a fixed score. It requires presence, deep listening and dedicated willingness to react to something unexpected.
The musicians are not only performing material - they are negotiating the direction of the music in real time.
Both forms can also challenge conventional ideas of musicality, harmony, beauty and technical correctness.
They allow instability, friction, excess and even failure to become meaningful parts of the work.
Perhaps that is the deepest connection for me: both jazz and noise can turn sound into a very direct form of communication. When they are at their strongest, technique and genre almost disappear and what remains is pure intention, energy and human presence.
Q. Even today, not much has been said about your activities before joining Atari Teenage Riot. What were you working on during that period, and what kind of vision or goals did you have at the time? We'd love to hear whatever you can remember.
Before Atari Teenage Riot, I didn’t have any artistic ambitions at all.
In January 1996, I moved from Frankfurt to Berlin. Before that, I had spent two years working full-time in the finance and accounting department of a logistics company. For me, it was simply a temporary job.
The unemployment benefits I received afterwards allowed me to move to Berlin without immediately looking for work.
My actual plan was to study psychology.
I wasn’t sure which field yet - criminal psychology and child psychology both fascinated me …but I didn’t feel any urgency to decide and figured I had plenty of time.
So instead I spent my days exploring Berlin.
Just a few years after the fall of the Wall, it was an extraordinary place to be: full of abandoned spaces, new ideas and a fresh energy, that I‘ve never experienced anywhere else before - and a feeling that almost anything seemed possible.
I was more of a slacker than anything else. I was living on unemployment benefits, wandering around the city without much of a plan…
Until one day my neighbor Carl knocked on my door and asked if I’d like to join Atari Teenage Riot on a U.S. tour with Beck.
The rest is history.
Q. You joined Atari Teenage Riot in 1997. Could you tell us how that came about? Had you already known Alec Empire and the people around Digital Hardcore Recordings before joining the band? We'd also love to hear how you went from being a live support member to becoming an official member.
I had actually met Alec as early as 1994. At the time,
I was going to a lot of parties and regularly travelling between Frankfurt, Cologne and Berlin.
Through that, I got to know many of the people who were part of the Bass Terror Crew, other artists who released on Digital Hardcore Recordings, as well as various DJs and producers.
So by the time I moved to Berlin, I already knew quite a few people in that scene.
When Hanin was eight months pregnant, she no longer was able to travel or tour. It was Carl’s idea to take me on the Beck tour and his sister Lisa joined us as well.
We reworked the live setup so Alec could take over all of Hanin’s vocal parts, while Lisa and I covered Alec’s role on the machines. Carl and Alec became the two front people, while Lisa and I were essentially the backing band.
We toured with Beck for five weeks and then played several European summer festivals in that lineup.
After that, Alec asked me if I wanted to become a permanent member of Atari Teenage Riot.
Of course I said yes.
I was having a great time, it felt right and I thought, Why not? Everything else can wait.
Our first show as an official four-piece was at the Fuji Rock Festival in 1997.
Q. Since 1997, you've performed under your real name, Nic Endo. What made you decide to use your real name as your artist name? And is there any particular meaning behind your trademark face paint?
Nic Endo is actually not my real name.
“Nic” is simply a shortened version of my first name. Since we’re talking about names, here’s something I’ve never really shared before: I also have a second given, Japanese name - Noriko.
“Endo” is my mother’s family name. I never officially adopted it, but I chose it as my artist name instead. My legal name is the one I use for paperwork and paying bills - but Nic Endo is who I am creatively.
That’s the identity I’ve built over the years, and today it feels just as real to me.
The face paint is based on the Japanese kanji 抵抗 (teikō), meaning “resistance” or “opposition.”
I modified the character slightly to make it work better visually on my face, so it isn’t immediately recognizable as the original kanji, but the intention has always remained the same.
For me, it was never just a visual trademark.
It expressed a mindset. Resistance wasn’t directed at one specific thing - it was an attitude, a way of moving through the world and it perfectly reflected the energy I brought to Atari Teenage Riot.
The original inspiration actually came from David Mack’s Kabuki: Circle of Blood.
I loved the idea of using a single Japanese character as part of a visual identity, but I wanted to make it my own by choosing a symbol that reflected my own mindset.
Q. What are your strongest memories from touring the United States with Rage Against the Machine and Wu-Tang Clan? In the TV series Wu-Tang: An American Saga, there's a scene where the members talk about Atari Teenage Riot. Did you have many opportunities to interact with Wu-Tang Clan during that tour?
To be honest, I don’t remember the members of Wu-Tang Clan all that well anymore. That may also be because they were only on about the first half of the tour. Their major label decided to stop funding the rest of it and they were then replaced by The Roots.
I do remember Ol’ Dirty Bastard stopping by our dressing room a few times just to hang out and chat. He seemed genuinely curious about what we were doing, which was pretty surreal at the time.
What has stayed with me most, though, is the tour itself. I had already been a huge Rage Against the Machine fan for years and had seen them live in Germany, so suddenly finding myself on tour with them was hard to believe.
On top of that, it was the first time we played to audiences that size: sold-out arenas and sports stadiums every night. It was incredibly exciting.
I was also fascinated by the scale of the production. Instead of one tour manager or stage manager, there were several. The catering crew traveled with what felt like half a restaurant kitchen. And for the first time,
I saw women working everywhere - tour managers, stagehands, production staff. It was a completely different world from the one I had imagined.
Looking back, that tour gave me a real sense of direction. It made me realize that this was where
I belonged: making music, being on stage and living that life on the road.
Q. In 1998, you released your first solo record, White Heat. What was the concept behind the album, and how did the project come together? Looking back on it today, how do you feel about the record?
To be honest, there wasn’t a grand concept behind White Heat. I didn’t overthink it at all. I simply wanted to capture the essence of what I was doing with Atari Teenage Riot in its most concentrated form.
I wasn’t looking at other noise records, nor was I trying to position myself within the noise scene. I saw the record in a completely different context.
To me, it was much more closely connected to the energy of our live shows than to the conventions of any particular genre.
Because of that, I was genuinely surprised when people immediately started comparing it to other noise artists. Those references mainly came from journalists and critics. I hadn’t anticipated that at all, because in my mind I was simply documenting one aspect of what I was already doing with ATR - just stripped down to its purest form.
I certainly didn’t expect White Heat to have the impact it did. Over the years, many artists have cited it as an influence, the music press embraced it and even more than twenty years later, younger people still discover it. That’s incredibly rewarding.
And it still amazes me that I recorded the entire EP in just two afternoons. When I listen to it today, I can still hear how completely immersed I was. There’s something incredibly immediate and raw about it that I don’t think could have been planned. I’m still very proud of White Heat.
Q. Here's a slightly more technical question. What equipment did you use to make White Heat? And what kind of setup were you using during Atari Teenage Riot's live shows at the time? You were handling the backing tracks, noise, and backing vocals live. Were the tracks played from DAT while the noise was performed in real time? Were there any technical challenges with your live setup back then?
White Heat was recorded with a very simple setup: mainly a Yamaha SU10 sampler, a Roland SH-101, guitar pedals and a four-track tape recorder.
I liked working with limitations - and still do.
You learned to be creative with very little.
ATR’s live setup constantly evolved depending on the venue, the sound system and the practical realities of touring. We were never interested in recreating studio recordings as faithfully as possible.
The important question was always:
How do we get the energy across?
ATR was heavily inspired by early hip-hop DJ culture. Digital Hardcore was not about “playing” instruments in the traditional sense - it was about triggering sounds, sequences, samples and beats in real time to get the energy and ideas across.
We wanted the freedom to change arrangements, react to the audience and reshape the music while we were performing.
Programming the energy - and constantly reprogramming it.
When you see early video material or photos from ATR shows, we also had a Technics turntable next to the TR-909 drum machine, sampler, Atari 1040ST, four-track cassette recorder, TB-303, SH-101, guitar pedal / effects rigs etc.
All of that, plus microphones.
3 MCs and 1 DJ. But punk.
The DAT recorder was just one part of a much larger live system. Depending on the situation, it could be used to synchronize machines, record the performance, play longer samples or serve as a backup if something failed. Our goal was never to run a fixed show. We wanted the freedom to reshape the performance in real time and react to whatever was happening on stage and in the audience.
And that setup always allowed us to change the structure of a performance in real time rather than being locked into a fixed sequence.
Q. The music video for "White Heat" was incredibly striking. At the time, the idea of a noise music video itself felt quite unique. The visuals, including the costumes, also seem to present a fetish-inspired aesthetic. Was there a particular intention behind that visual direction?
The visual language wasn’t really about fetishism itself, even if some people interpreted it that way. I was much more interested in communicating the ideas that I also heard in noise: life force, sexuality, resistance and the tension between control and losing control.
I liked the contrast of presenting a woman standing in front of a wall of machines, navigating sonic complexity with purpose - because at the time, that really wasn’t an image people associated with electronic music.
The machines weren’t there as props - they were the extension of my body and I wanted that relationship to feel powerful rather than decorative.
Q. Also in 1998, you released the album Poison Lips under the name She Satellites. What was the concept behind that project? And why did you choose to release it under a different name rather than as Nic Endo?
Like the White Heat EP, Poison Lips was a true bedroom production. I made it during a short break between two overseas tours with Atari Teenage Riot, in my apartment, using a Yamaha SU10 Pocket Sampler, a Roland SH-101, a few guitar pedals, and a four-track tape recorder. Everything was performed and recorded live.
Originally, these recordings were never meant to become a finished album. They were simply rough sketches … ideas I wanted to capture quickly before recreating them later in the DHR studio with better equipment. But the more I listened back, the more I fell in love with the lo-fi sound, the atmosphere and the imperfections. At some point I realized that producing them any further would actually take something away from them, so I decided to leave them exactly as they were.
The name She Satellites came from the idea that this would become a small series of releases.
I wanted a separate space for these more intimate,
lo-fi recordings - something distinct from the noise of White Heat and my work with Atari Teenage Riot.
It was never about hiding my identity or releasing music anonymously. Even back then, I knew I wanted to explore very different musical directions throughout my career. Giving those different bodies of work their own names simply felt like a natural way of organizing them, while allowing each project to be understood on its own terms.
Q. DHR Fatal focused on female artists and released music by Hanin Elias, Lolita Storm, and yourself. Looking back, how did you feel about the environment for female artists in the music industry at that time?
DHR Fatal was actually Hanin’s idea. She wanted to create an all-female label that would give women in electronic music more visibility and also create a space where artists could exchange ideas and support one another.
Initially, I thought it was a great idea and I believe White Heat was the first release on the label.
Over time, however, it became clear that Hanin and I had very different perspectives on feminism. We had also had very different experiences as women in music, so I gradually distanced myself from the project.
Not long afterwards, Hanin lost interest as well and DHR Fatal remained a very short-lived idea.
I can only speak about my own experience within electronic music, not the music industry as a whole.
Personally, I never felt sexualized, discriminated against or underestimated because I was a woman.
Quite the opposite. Since working in that field, I’ve mostly been surrounded by people who encouraged me to follow my own artistic path. I never felt that I wasn’t on equal footing with my male colleagues.
Of course there were moments, especially in the 1990s and early 2000s, when I walked into a venue and the local crew would automatically talk to one of the men instead of me. But I never interpreted that as hostility.
I always assumed it was because seeing a woman operating the machines simply wasn’t something they were used to. Thankfully, that has changed enormously over the years.
Ironically, some of my more difficult experiences actually came from within certain feminist circles.
I often felt overlooked or simply left out of conversations, festivals or events that aimed to highlight women in electronic music.
I can’t say exactly why. My impression was that I didn’t fit comfortably into the categories people expected and that made me difficult to place.
I’ve never been particularly interested in belonging to a category. Whether that made me harder to place,
I don’t know - but it may well have played a role.
Whatever the reason, I also think this has changed significantly over the past fifteen years.
Today I experience far more openness and mutual respect, regardless of gender.
Q. I'd love to hear your own thoughts on Live at Brixton Academy 1999. What was going through your mind before the performance? How did you feel while performing? What did it mean to you to release the recording as an album, and how do you look back on it today? For many people, it was the first noise album they ever heard, and it went on to have a profound influence on their lives.
Did you ever feel a sense of accomplishment—or even think, "We really pulled it off"?
To be honest, that show feels so far away now that it’s difficult for me to reconstruct it emotionally.
I think that’s probably because, for us, it wasn’t some legendary night. It was just another incredibly difficult day on that Nine Inch Nails tour.
By that point, the atmosphere within the band had become extremely tense. We’d been living together in a tour bus for weeks, everyone was exhausted, everyone was dealing with health issues and unresolved conflicts had been building for a long time. Then, just before the Brixton show, Hanin suddenly left.
The three of us had to decide, almost on the spot, what we were going to do.
We decided to play noise, with Carl taking on the role of MC.
Looking back, I think the performance became what it became precisely because of everything that had happened beforehand. It was weeks of frustration, exhaustion, anger and immense pressure suddenly finding an outlet.
That’s why we decided to release the recording afterwards. It captured an exceptional moment, because everything reached a breaking point that night - it all exploded right in front of our faces.
Live at Brixton Academy 1999 quickly took on a life of its own. People began talking about it almost as a mythical moment in Atari Teenage Riot’s history and even in electronic music more broadly.
For us, though, it was simply another shitty day in ATR.
At the time, none of us thought we were making history. We were simply trying to survive the evening. The fact that people later found so much meaning in that recording is something I’m grateful for - but it certainly wasn’t on our minds that night.
Q. In 2001, you released your first full-length solo album, Cold Metal Perfection. It's an incredibly tense and cinematic record that feels remarkably cohesive from beginning to end. What themes were you exploring on this album? And are there any tracks that remain especially meaningful to you?
Cold Metal Perfection came out of a period when I was completely burned out, although I didn’t realize it at the time.
For the previous four years, Atari Teenage Riot had been touring almost nonstop. Looking back, it’s incredible how much happened during that time and how much energy we had to keep everything moving. It felt like there was only one direction: Forward! Faster!! More!!! There really was no time to stop and reflect.
Then, almost overnight, everything came to a halt.
Carl’s mental health had deteriorated, so the band needed a break. Around the same time, Hanin became pregnant with her second child. For me, and
I think for Alec as well, the pause wasn’t something we had chosen. Personally, I could have kept going forever.
Instead, I suddenly found myself alone in my tiny two-room apartment in Berlin. I didn’t even own a refrigerator or a washing machine.
A friend had given me an old television from the 1960s that received only two channels, endlessly repeating Seinfeld and The X-Files.
For the first time in years, I had no choice but to slow down. Physically at first and eventually mentally.
I finally had to process everything that had happened.
Looking back, Cold Metal Perfection wasn’t a concept album either. It became a process of transformation.
I found myself asking questions I had never had time to ask before: Who am I without Atari Teenage Riot?
Who have I become?
I was rethinking not only my artistic identity but also my personal one. Those four years with ATR had changed me profoundly, but at the time I couldn’t see that yet. Instead, I questioned myself constantly and often struggled with self-doubt.
Tracks like I Didn’t Exist and Mask Identity are direct reflections of that state of mind.
Today, I hear the album differently.
I no longer hear myself falling apart at twenty-five -
I hear myself trying to understand who I’d become during that short, incredibly intense period of my life.
Q. Today, there's a whole new generation of artists inspired by Atari Teenage Riot and Digital Hardcore Recordings. Personally, I feel one reason is that today's social and political climate has certain similarities to the 1990s. Do you feel that your work has been passed on to a new generation? Why do you think people have been rediscovering Atari Teenage Riot and Digital Hardcore Recordings in recent years?
I’m probably the wrong person to answer that, to be honest. I’m not very connected to younger generations or constantly following what’s happening in underground music today, so I don’t really know how people in their twenties experience Atari Teenage Riot or Digital Hardcore Recordings.
What surprises me, though, is that younger people continue to discover our work without having lived through that time themselves.
That tells me the music must be speaking to something beyond a particular historical moment.
Maybe every generation eventually reaches a point where existing structures stop making sense and people begin looking for art that demands something from them rather than simply comforting them. Art that is intense, honest, confrontational and pushes against limitations instead of accepting them.
If that’s true, I can understand why ATR still resonates.
Q. There are people around the world who are still eagerly waiting for your music and your live performances. Are you thinking about any new releases or live shows in the future?
Absolutely! I’m working on new music at the moment - and I’m deliberately taking my time with it.
Last year was all about exploration. I spent countless hours recording my own sample library: synthesizers, drum machines, vocals … experimenting, collecting sounds and discovering new directions.
Now those ideas are gradually taking shape. The arrangements are becoming clearer and I finally feel like everything is starting to come together.
One thing that’s completely different this time is that
I actually began with the visual world before writing the music.
I did photo shoots, developed the artwork and overall visual identity, defined the central theme and even came up with the album title and all the track titles before I had written most of the record.
That’s a completely new way of working for me. In the past, both with my solo work and with Atari Teenage Riot, the music always came first.
This time, the music is growing into an already existing visual world and I find that process incredibly inspiring.
Visual design has always been an important part of my creative work.
Over the years, I’ve designed artwork and branding for myself and many Atari Teenage Riot releases and promotional material, so it feels very natural to let both disciplines influence each other from the very beginning.
As for solo live shows, I’ll start thinking about them once the record is finished and released. If everything goes as planned, I’d love to play a handful of shows around the new release.
As for Atari Teenage Riot, there aren’t any concrete plans at the moment. Right now, we’re all focused on our own projects and solo work.
Q. Finally, do you have a message for our readers?
I’ve really missed Japan. I can’t believe it’s been ten years … or maybe even longer, since I was last there.
I would absolutely love to come back, bring my new music and finally play some shows for you again.
I’m doing everything I can to make that happen.
See you soon 🇯🇵
