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The year is slowly drawing to a close, and we just have enough time left to fit in a 2021 Q&A with NRVE! 'Spin Cycle' will be the last release on Full Flex Audio in 2020 (dropping on December 23rd), finalising a brilliant year for the label. Check out what NRVE has planned for 2021 and what to expect from him in the not so distant future below!
Q1. Welcome to Full Flex Audio, NRVE! Since we are nearing the end of 2020, how has your year been, with all the craziness that has been going on?
"Hey! Thank you for having me! I can definitely agree with 2020 being a very crazy year for everyone. Overall though the year for me has been pretty okay, I’ve been able to hang out with my family a lot more, and its given me time to officially start NRVE, which I started around May of this year! Even though this year sucked, It gave everyone, especially me, a lot of extra free time, which I greatly appreciate. This year especially I was able to take the time that was previously going to school and homework and really work on my craft, and because of that I have quite a lot of material to show in 2021!"
Q2. For those that don’t know about NRVE, tell us a little bit about yourself, if there is a meaning behind your name and how you started to create dubstep/EDM music?
"I'm NRVE. I'm nineteen, and I've been producing for about four years! I got into dubstep around 2011 or 2012, and I want to say I had Skrillex’s “Reptile’s Theme” and Zomboy’s “Nuclear” on repeat all the time. I did not have a real interest in making dubstep back then, primarily because I was very intimidated by it. I always questioned how these artists would come up with all of these crazy sounds. As I kept listening to more and more artists, I knew that music production was something that I wanted to try! Around 2017 I had started producing on Ableton 9 Lite, which to those who don’t know, is an extremely bare bones version of Ableton. It only had 8 or so tracks, and a very limited amount of instruments and plugins. However, it was a very good start for me and somehow I managed to make a lot of cool things with it. At the beginning of this year I had decided to upgrade to Ableton Live 10 suite, and that has been my main DAW ever since! I have had experience in other DAW’s such as Logic X and FL Studio, but I would say that I am a fan of Ableton’s workflow and organization. This upgrade definitely helped me improve my skills and find my sound!
As far as the meaning of NRVE, the name NRVE kind of happened by accident really. I remember around May when I was first wanting to make this alias I was constantly thinking of cool names, and nothing was really sticking. One day while thinking of alias names, I though I had a pinched nerve in my arm. I looked up symptoms for said pinched nerve on my phone, and I typed in pinched nrve on accident! I honestly wish there was a better story or meaning behind it, but there isn’t."
Q3. What advice would you give to upcoming artists in the dubstep scene, or music industry as a whole, who are just starting out?
"My advice to any upcoming artist is to be confident in your music! I used to struggle with this quite a lot, primarily due to me judging my music with other peoples music, which is a bad thing for any artist to do. Even thinking of releasing my music back then gave me a bit of stress, and It took a lot of support from friends to push me to release a lot of my older work. A prime example of me being stressed about a release is my Jack U remix. This was a big departure from a lot of the stuff I was making at the time, and I was very hesitant about releasing it. When I did release it, a lot of people really loved it to my surprise and now its the most popular tune on my page. It is very important to have that high level of confidence when starting out in music, because having that will defiantly help you out when releasing your own material."
Q4. What would you like to achieve in 2021?
"Something that would be super cool is to be able to hit one thousand followers on SoundCloud by the end of 2021. I feel like going for one thousand followers is a really good goal to set and something that if I work hard I can definitely achieve. I also want to release a lot of diverse music thought 2021! Even though I will still be releasing dubstep and riddim tracks, I want to try and experiment with a whole bunch of other styles and genres, and I think it will be very interesting to to put my own spin on them! One thing that I’ve been trying to tackle as of late is drum and bass!"
Q5. What do you enjoy most about being a musician? Anything you dislike as well?
"The thing that I enjoy about being a musician is the level of creative expression and freedom that comes with being one. You can create anything you feel like because you have the tools and experience to do so! You can kind of compare your DAW to a blank canvas, and instead of paints, you use serum patches and drum fills. You can create literally whatever you want! This is what pushed me to create music in the first place, every one has their own interpretation of what “music”, or in this case what “dubstep” is. These tools help you make your mark on the scene. Looking at EDM and dubstep with that perspective has helped inspire me and has helped me with some of my most recent music that I’ve been working on."
Q6. What’s coming up in the immediate future for NRVE?
"In the immediate future, expect a NRVE showcase mix! This will be highlighting what I plan on releasing in 2021 and beyond, featuring remixes, collabs, and a bunch of IDs from myself! That will be coming sometime in January!"
Q7. Describe your single ‘Spin Cycle’ in only 3 words!
"Invasive, Punchy, Hypnotic"
'Spin Cycle' drops on all stores, December 23rd, as the final release of 2020 on FFA! Get ready for a spectacular single dropping very soon!