Category Archives: Interviews

Interviews, News, Press, Reviews

Lovespirals Featured by WRTU FM, Puerto Rico

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Radio Universidad de Puerto Rico stations WRTU 89.7 FM and WRUO 88.3 FM are running a series of programs with Lovespirals on the ecclectic music show Frequencias Alternas. Last week, host Iohann Rashi, interviewed Ryan and Anji about their new release, Windblown Kiss. Tommorrow he will run a special show hosted by Anji, highlighting some of the bands and songs which inspire Lovespirals. The program runs from 9pm to midnight.

Here is a Google Translation of Rashi’s recent review of Windblown Kiss.:

The Sound of a Kiss to the Air
By Iohann Rashi, WRTU

Lovespirals Windblown Kiss

THE GROUPING
Lovespirals is the fusion of talents of Anji Bee and Ryan Lum. Anji, is the one in charge to give voice to the project, Ryan music through different types from guitars.  Both create a unique sound that explores all type of styles and textures, that include from eclectic and the ethereal thing, until experimentations with I touch of jazz, ambient, folk and world music.  A quality that distinguishes them is its expressive freedom in its musical composition, allowing the imagination to travel freely by any route that the sound of its compositions allows it.

THE DISC
Windblown Kiss is the turn out to join tastes and influences of both integrates in a unique style that has given the seal them that distinguishes them.  We can appreciate in the voice of Anji Bee a sweet and enthusiastic voice that molds its intensity in each cut, showing to us the guitar and enchantment much that can express a voice that without technological complications can fill to its ears and their minds with beautiful stamps.  This disc includes 10 songs, plus a hidden additional song at the end of the CD Between the additional enchantments of this disc, a song sung in titled Spanish “Déjame” and “Windblown Kiss” is included who includes letters in English and German, in addition to a tribute to the America band with the song “You girl”.

THE RECOMMENDATION
When listening to this album you will notice a mixture of all type of styles, which gives it its particular singularity:  it has something of blues, jazz, rock, folk, world music, ethereal, gothic.  But it is not any of them.  Or perhaps it is all them all simultaneously.  That is what is so special about Lovespirals, its capacity to fuse so many influences and turn them something so simple and simultaneously so diverse.  Reminding us that music is a freedom of expression, as a kiss sent to the air.

Our qualification from 0 to 5:  5 radios

Interviews

Chain DLK Webzine Interviews Anji Bee

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August 2002, Chain DLK Webzine, Shaun Hamilton

SHAUN: How did you two meet and start working on music together?

ANJI: We met a few times at different places in Los Angeles. We first started talking at a little Projekt Records party that both our bands were invited to. Then we got to know each other more through a series of appearances he made on KUCI, for both my radio show and other DJs’ shows. One afternoon he had me come over to his studio and he showed me a few new songs he was working on. One of those became the instrumental, ‘Beatitude,’ and the other eventually turned into ‘Love Survives.’

The first song he had me do vocals on was the club track, ‘Ecstatic,’ which just has a little ‘oooh ahhh’ sample. Our first song that came out on CD was a remix of “Bittersweet” for Claire Voyant, in late 1999, early 2000, I forget exactly. 1999-2000 was a very transitional time’ We weren’t totally sure where we were headed yet. Ryan was still very immersed in the DJ scene then, so the tunes we were working on were all 10-minute dance tracks — pretty unsuitable as album material. It wasn’t really until 2001 that things clicked into place for us, as far as the album goes.

SHAUN: Have you or Ryan had jazz training, and what are your musical backgrounds?

ANJI: No, neither of us has had any Jazz schooling. Our sax player, Doron, actually does have a degree in Jazz, though! Ryan’s been reading up on Jazz the last year or so. He used to joke that he’d become a Jazz guitarist after he played a year in the NBA, but now he’s already accomplished the former without getting much closer to the latter goal’ (Ha ha!) Both Ryan and I had a few lessons when we were young, but we’re mostly self-taught. He’s been playing guitar for most of his life. I think listening to a wide range of good music, and studying it to find out what makes it work, has been our best training.

SHAUN: Your work seems to revolve around the subject of love. What is your opinion on the state of love in today’s world?

ANJI: I believe that love is the most important thing in the world. Certainly nothing great can be accomplished without love as a motivating factor. Everyone is searching for love, in one way or another, and many are finding unsatisfactory substitutes in our modern world. I don’t think we can ever feel truly whole until we surrender to love ‘ not only love for another person, but for ourselves, and for the world around us, as well.

SHAUN: Any words of advice?

ANJI: Never doubt your ability to grow and improve as a human being. Don’t let negative people get you down. Pursue your dreams and live your life with joy!

Excerpt from the full interview hosted at the ChainDLK site.

Interviews

The Women of Mp3.com Interview

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Jianda Johnson interviews Anji for a feature article on the Women of Mp3.com Station.

JIANDA: How did you get into music, how long have you been making it, and when did you join Lovespirals?

ANJI: I’d say that I first got into music through my dad. One of my earliest memories is circling around the coffee table to “Here Comes the Sun,” when I was barely able to walk. I started singing very early, doing school productions from Pre-School on. Shortly out of High School, I got invovled with different garage bands, doing gigs, and recording 4 track demos. Strangely, I really always wanted to be a guitarist, but I’ve just never been very adept at it! I did play guitar in an industrial noise rock band for awhile, but it was a struggle for me. I played percussion in another band around that time too. It’s funny to think about those old bands now, in comparison to my work with Lovespirals. Speaking of Lovespirals, I began working with Ryan in early 1999.

JIANDA: Can you please explain the difference between Lovespirals and Love Spirals Downwards?

ANJI: When Ryan and I began working back in 1999 on Drum ‘n’ Bass tunes, he was in a transitional period, unsure if he wanted to make another listening album or start releasing 12’s instead. At that time, we weren’t sure if our stuff was going to be released as Love Spirals Downwards or as some kind of side project. We were just recording songs and pressing dubplates for him to spin in his DJ sets, not sending them around to labels or trying to get them released. Then I made those tracks available online through mp3.com and folks started contacting us to include stuff on compilations, so by now all of them have been released somewhere or other, which is really cool. But I digress… It’s tremendously hard to explain exactly where or how things changed between Love Spirals Downwards and Lovespirals, because it was all just a natural progression.

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Interviews, Press

Jive Magazine Interview & New Song

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Russ Marshall of Jive interviewed Ryan and Anji for the music section of their print magazine. Their website also features the Lovespirals interview plus an mp3 of the brand new unreleased song, “Love Survives.” Be sure to check that out at www.jivemagazine.com and if you can pick up a copy of the magazine, snatch it up now!

Q: When did the Ryan/Anji collaborations begin, and how did that come to be?

Anji: Ryan and I started working together late 1998, early 1999. We pretty much hooked up through my radio show on KUCI 88.9fm (in Irvine, CA). He had me come over to his studio to check out some new stuff he was working on (which later turned out to be ‘Beatitude’ and ‘Love Survives’) and I was really into it. The first two songs we did, “Ecstatic” and “Hand in Hand,’ Ryan made dub plates of; he was more heavily into deejaying at that time.

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Interviews

MacNETv2 Interviews Lovespirals

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MacNETv2, a fansite for Mac users, just posted an interview with Ryan and Anji discussing their use of Macs in music, design, and website creation. We’ll include some excerpts below:

Interview by Chris Volpe

Chris: Why the Mac platform and not Windows?

Ryan: Actually, we do have one Windows machine, a Compaq, that we use as the server for the studio and house. I’m interested in getting Mac OSX server one day, but I don’t have a spare Mac that I can use as a server right now. But back to your question, there are many reasons why we use Macs. The biggest one is that I enjoy working on them. When there is a problem, I can most often figure out what’s wrong and fix it myself, while PCs seem more complicated in that regard. I like the plug and play ease of use that Macs have. There’s nothing worse than trying for hours and days to get hardware working. Plus, Apple continues to create the most innovative products. If I had enough money, I’d go out today and buy the new flat panel G4 iMac for the office, an iBook for lighter work and playing games, a Titanium PowerBook for doing live shows, and a 1 ghz G4 to run a ton of audio plug ins in my studio. I can’t say that I want to rush out there and buy a copy of Windows XP.

Chris:: Do Macs enhance your creativity in any way?

Ryan: I don’t know if Macs make me more creative, but as far as computers go, they’re the least obtrusive in letting me get on with my creative work in the studio without being forced into thinking like a computer. You just point, click, drag, and don’t have to worry about anything else with regards to the computer. I see computers as a tool, a tool you use to get things done. I think Macs are by far the best platform for anyone who does music or graphics. Also for getting photos, mp3s, and video into and out of your computer, nothing can compete with Macs and all the new Apple software like iTunes, iMovie, and iPhoto. But if you’re a more nerdy C++ or ASP programmer, I’d say PCs are the way to go and a Mac wouldn’t be the right tool at all.

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Audio, Interviews

LSD RadioSpy Interview Feature

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March 17, 2000 RadioSpy Interview by Sean Flinn:

“Indie goths gone electronic, LSD’s sound now sketches its past while tracing its future.”

“We’re the first and only for a lot of things on Projekt,” says Ryan Lum, the multi-instrumentalist and driving force behind Love Spirals Downwards, darkwave label Projekt Record’s top-selling act. Lum is sipping on a soda in a RadioSpy conference room and choosing his words carefully. He’s speaking of his band’s use of saxophone riffs on a song from its latest release, Temporal, a career retrospective that includes a number of unreleased tracks. Lum was concerned that Sam Rosenthal, Projekt Record’s sometimes finicky founder, might be less than enthusiastic about the sax track.

“[Rosenthal] actually made a positive comment about the saxophone. He said, ‘You know, it fits somehow,” recounts Anji Bee, Ryan’s self-described “partner-in-crime” and recent collaborator on everything from album art to vocals. Lum’s experimentation — with his sound and with the band’s direction — initially met with grudging acceptance from Rosenthal, who eventually warmed to the band’s new sound.

“It’s not his cup of tea,” Lum says of Rosenthal’s reaction to the band’s shift in sound from “shoegazer,” the ethereal style of feedback- and synth-drenched pop defined by British bands like My Bloody Valentine, Slowdive and the Cocteau Twins, to drum ‘n’ bass. “But we more or less have artistic freedom to do as we please. I guess being the top seller on the label doesn’t hurt us in that,” Lum says with a chuckle.

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