A man of many talents is just one way to describe Aleksander Vinter. Having been diagnosed with Asperger’s and Savant syndromes (hence the moniker Savant) from an early age, Aleksander Vinter sees the world a little bit differently from everybody else. Since 2009, he has released tremendous volumes of genre-defying music with three chart-topping LPs in six months this past winter alone! In the last year, Savant’s music has reached #25 on the competitive iTunes Pop chart and #2 on iTunes Dance, as well as topping Billboard’s Heatseekers and Dance charts.

Each album is completely different from the other. Scratch that. Each track he has ever produced is completely different from the other. One never knows what to expect listening to an album for the first time from start to finish. His personality and performances are both unpredictable and thrilling.

This Friday, November 20th he will be debuting his new musical personal Blanco’s first official EP titled ‘BAJO.’ The EP is inspired by the rhythms of world music from Africa to Portugal. You can check out the first single from the EP titled ‘Carpe Diem ft. Turbulence’ here.

In early September, we had the chance to sit down with the energetic superhuman and his manager at Madison Square Park before his live show at Webster Hall in NYC. As you may guess, his mind was all over the place but we were able to get some incredible insight out of him regarding his intricate production process, thoughts on the human race and condition, and his emotional connection to his music.

TFM: Do you hear the entire song before you begin, or is there any trial and error in your process?

AV: Yes and no. Depends on if you are inspired, or if you want to play around. That’s how I see it. I play around, or I’m inspired. I wake up one day and I’m like “shit, I have this vision in my head.” It’s not necessarily the whole track laid out – every sample, every mixing detail, everything like that- it’s the feeling I want to feel. I have the feeling I want to feel when the song is done. I already have that. It’s like math, it’s like algebra, right, you know the answer, and you know the first thing but you don’t know what’s in the middle. So that’s what I figure out when I make music, it’s whats in the middle of that feeling I want. And playing around. But mostly it’s actually 50/50 ’cause sometimes I’m bored and just want to try something I’ve never done before. And that doesn’t come from inspiration because inspiration is pre-programmed knowledge – you know what you are going to do. This is more like I know where I’m gonna start but hope I don’t know where I’m going to end up. It’s like I’m running consciously into a maze – it’s like some people take drugs or something to get to that place, and I just like challenging myself into like “oh I’m opening something I’ve never tried before or making a genre I’ve never touched.”

…sometimes I’m bored and just want to try something I’ve never done before. And that doesn’t come from inspiration because inspiration is pre programmed knowledge – you know what you are going to do. This is more like I know where I’m gonna start but hope I don’t know where Im going to end up. It’s like I’m running consciously into a maze – it’s like some people take drugs or something to get to that place, and I just like challenging myself.

I think doing the same thing over and over is boring, so I always try a new method every time I start a song, right, because it’s schooling for me. I never went to school so this is my chance to learn something every time I do something instead of being all like “let’s make some money.” Bullshit. Everybody can make money, not everyone can make art. I want to focus on something that makes me special, not just blending in with everybody.

TFM: How the hell do you pack so many sounds – so many different diverse sounds and different components of music into one little section of a song?

AV: Do you know a person (or perhaps are you the person in somebody else’s life) that for instance when you eat with them – you are picky, or that person is picky – too picky – they’re taking away stuff, or they want more flavor – they dunk it in ketchup or whatever? There are some people who do crazy shit with their food that makes you say “whoa I would never do that,” and it’s because they crave more. It’s about craving more.

So when I make music, I can make a simple beat, but my mind will hear so much shit on top of that – fill in the blanks with psychoacoustics, and imagination, or whatever I’ve heard in my life previously – it just slowly slithers into the song and fills out the pieces. Suddenly there’s some “aha” melody line, or a Duran Duran piece in the back of the song, a guitar solo from Metallica that inspired the piece – there is always something that creeps into the song. It’s like Michelangelo said, “the sculpture is already there, you are just helping it emerge,” right? So when you start making it, it starts to resemble something, and you go towards what you think it resembles.

So when I make a track it’s like, “oh this reminds me of this and that and this and that and this and that.” And what if I took all of those things, or even contrasts of those things – “what’s the opposite of this” – black metal for instance – I’ll do some black metal in this. That will f*ck people up. And stuff like that. Why do you put a lot of shit in a song? It’s because you never see the end of the layers – you can fit stuff on top of it. It’s like legos – it’s “how tall can I build this?” It’s not about getting it so tall that it will stand up, it’s just because you feel like it could be more. There is no motive of showing off how much you can do or showing off how strong this building is, it’s just fun putting things on top of each other because it feels logical.

TFM: Let me play Devil’s advocate on that. Let’s say I’m stacking my legos right, what if it starts to get muddy? That is a problem a lot of people run into, but your stuff! It’s not muddy, you take things out at the right time and it works! It just fits.

AV: It’s a process. Here is what I think a good musician is. A good musician makes good choices. That’s all he does. He has a good taste, a good palate. “I believe in these things. I like that band because they have amazing chords.” And when you listen to that you go “you are probably right, it has some mathematically correct stuff.” It’s very beautiful. For instance, you can look at faces too and go, “symmetrical, blah blah.” There is this mathematical truth behind stuff like that. And sometimes when I’m making music, shit is so mathematically correct that I feel like “this is it!” and I move on. I make choices and decisions so fast. I don’t think too much about things, I act on them. So when shit makes me feel something I act on it IMMEDIATELY. Because everyone can do that, it’s just acting because everyone is so insecure about where to tip that pin. Negatively, yes or no, it’s like flipping a coin. When you are listening to something “is this sounding good?” Like… YES OR NO? No means follow a path that makes it better. Yes? Move on. End of story. Period. Move on, right? I have a lot of those ‘Yes’ periods – let’s move on. Choices are made fast. Decisions are made.

Today music is more than just melody and composition and notes, it’s actually sound design. Half of the product you are hearing or even more than half – all of the EDM today is just sound design.

I think I would be even more free if I could write notes. I can’t. But if I could just have a piece of paper, all of the shit that I hear in my head would be easier to put on the table. But here’s the fun part. Today music is more than just melody and composition and notes, it’s actually sound design. Half of the product you are hearing or even more than half – all of the EDM today is just sound design. You don’t remember the melody from any song, it’s just that “EEEEHHHHE EHEHHEE” sound. That metallic glitch… I don’t know, you cant even describe it half the time. I think that creating notes would be faster, but you can’t write down a noise. You know, that’s the new skill that the new producers today have, but they are lacking that old school composer gene where you go “this is the big journey I’m showing people” and like you said, there is shit coming in and out in the music, because there is a conversation. It’s like a movie – when you watch it, you don’t just watch one character on the screen the whole time jumping up and down. That’s boring as f*ck. There’s a story, there’s an arc, there are characters evolving, there is something disappearing and never coming back and you go “where the f*ck did that go?” I have to listen to it again to hear it again. It’s f*cking with you, treating you like you are an intelligent human being – like you have a choice of deciding what to do when you listen to it. And it’s supposed to be very complex for a reason. It’s supposed to break you out of a trance, not create one.

So most music today is created to make loops, to make a tribal rhythm – feel that primal instinct of dance and collectiveness and sex, sexual energy, but I’m trying to make – just – the high notes, the things that make your brain think, not your body move. But a little bit of the body moving at the bottom here, but more the brain thinking part. I hear a lot of people who go to school and have exams and when they listen to music or play video games, the music is reflecting so many things that they can recognize, like “oh it’s a melody and I recognize it but where from?” and they think so much about that, that the electricity in their minds is going through so many different memories and associations that they have had because they are hearing shit in the music, that their brain is high speed at the time they are listening to music.

People say you should feed Mozart to your baby. It will higher the brain capacity because it consists of complex mathematical compositions that are painted beautifully and perfectly to harmonize. Complexity is important because you are opening your mind. How else are you going to do that, drugs? That’s an easy ticket to get out of being dumb, ya know? That’s an easy escape – take some LSD and get some revelations. I know a lot of people who have done that to get where they are intellectually and they aren’t that smart, they are just very spiritually open and glad and happy and inviting, but I’m talking about when you can create art that really is almost like Mr. Smith in The Matrix when he puts his hand inside of you and places himself into you – copies himself inside of you. That’s what I’m trying to do with the music. Whatever disillusion or fantasy I had when I wrote it, I try to make it so visual that when people hear it, they feel the same thing, right? The same fantasy I felt creating it – I want people to experience that when they are listening to it. Some people are very flat and genre driven so they just hate shit because its happy.

TFM: So rewinding back a bit, you said you can’t write notes?

AV: Well I can read them – I could sit at a piano and have a piece of sheet music and go really slowly through it, but I have to kind of count my way up to what’s an F, and what’s a G and stuff. Because in the computer you have the piano signature on the side and you can see what note you are playing. It’s very visual. With a note you have to know that the third line is a G, and you have to kind of… work your way through it. And then you have the bass, the left hand and the right hand – two different types of writing, you have to write to that hand on the bass notes in a very different way than the high notes. So I just got confused with the whole thing and just left it alone – I didn’t need it. I didn’t need it to create anything I did in my life so….

TFM: So do you draw in notes or record yourself playing MIDI?

AV: I do both, some parts I just want to feel on my hands, you know, just make sure they are right. Sometimes it’s just faster to do it by hand. It’s about performance, right, if you know performance really well you can actually program some of those things in, because even MIDI is played in. It still has values – 96 % velocity here … why can’t I just draw that if I know? So I’m really good at drawing drums for instance – like make it sound real and like it’s somebody actually playing it. ‘Cause it’s all about velocities, and dynamics right? How it feels – it has to be humanized – doesn’t have to be clinical, it has to be a little off on every note, almost, for it to feel like it’s right – it’s just like, moving, because your brain notices the tiny movements.

TFM: No that’s good, because my next question is about that Joe Rogan quote from that “Orakel” track – it brings up a really interesting notion of human purpose and individual vs. species mentality – what is your take on the human condition?

You can notice if something is a machine or not. That’s called intuition for some people – I know, but I don’t know. Feel it. I feel it but I can’t explain it. Everybody has that inside of them. Everybody is way more talented than they think, because they have this mask on, or this helmet of society or whatever, whatever culture is today. You should look like this, you should have this length of hair, you should have this beard this season. You should definitely work for money, because money is good. You know, all these stupid concepts you are forced to believe as a kid– you are just told things your whole life. Instead of trying to break out of these things you are going like “f*ck, the human is way more than that man,” like I think the first time you realize that being human is more than what your parents tell you is when you have sex for instance, right? You go like “WOW, shit, this is like more…I never knew this was this amazing, right?” And then you get drunk for the first time, you do a lot of things for the first time and you realize there is more to being human than what you thought before. And there is always going to be more right, so why stop where we are at and not … I don’t even know what we’re talking about … we’re talking about notes really, and why I don’t write them. And I got into a social, political…

AV: Oh dude. This is interesting. Because I love that guy, and I love guys like him. And I think stand up comedians are the last defense of truth we have in this country. This is America, right? You can’t be honest. Because you have to be politically correct all the time. Because you’ll offend somebody with something all the time. So musicians and entertainers and comedians and politicians

Z: (Alek’s manager) – Not politicians

AV: Not politicians – they are allowed to lie! (Laughs) They are allowed to tell the truth through a lie. They are on stage pretending to do an act, but they are actually just complaining about life. And everybody agrees with them when they are laughing. And laughing is a sign of releasing nervousness by the way, so everybody is just sitting there getting preached to by a very smart human being, and they’re all just laughing it away like “wow we can’t do anything about this…”

Yeah, so … the human condition is that we think we are something we are not. We are f*cking animals and we have to get out of that. We think we have, but we haven’t. We believe we are created by God and all these fancy mechanisms that make us into these divine beings, but when you study the world and see the shit that’s happening it’s not like that bro, it’s not like that at all. Study Tesla and Einstein, and smart people that figured out shit more than Christianity or religion has. Then you go like “shit these guys know how to make life and universe from scratch, ya know? They can make atoms and see how they work right! They can make light and lazers and they can create electricity.” And how can you as a human being judge those people for their intellect when you don’t understand how they do what they do? And they tell you for instance God doesn’t exist, and that they can prove that. It doesn’t make sense, it’s not logical. And they are godlike themselves and they are teaching you that that’s not right. And you go “yeah, but then like science is the Devil” but it’s all “the Devil this and that,” right?

And then the computer came out, and it was a homosexual who designed the computer, so many Christians -when that shit came out – denied the computer because it was Satan’s work. Because it was designed by a gay person. So I’m just saying that society is f*cked up and we are all a part of that f*cking it up. And we are all here to actually be behind everything. We are animals, we want to kill each other, but we do it with hate and subliminal stuff, like if you get into the advertising business, you are clearly not a human sympathizer at all. You are learning how to break the code of human psyche, you are learning how to trick people in the best way possible. How to influence them without them knowing. You are becoming a surgeon in how to get people brainwashed.

So I’m just saying there are certain paths many people go down in life – military for instance, becoming something…a politician- they aren’t thinking about the better of anything, they are just playing this game of animalistic like “this is my domain, this is my alpha male kingdom and you should do what I say,” it’s all about getting to that, and the music business isn’t any different. Every part of life is like that. Even when you are in a house with a woman. So it’s the struggle of dominance between every particle on the planet. Like right now we believe we are friends – we are humans – we are all like “f*ck I don’t know that person there,” and probably if I tried to get to know that person it would get bad. That’s not right! That’s not what we think is going on, but it is going on. If I go up to a stranger and go, “HEY, YOU WANNA HANG OUT TODAY?” I would probably hear, “GO AND F*CK OFF DUDE!”

You know what that’s called? Divide and conquer. Make everybody hate each other so they won’t ride up against us. Basically, what the f*ck is going on here. Make everybody miserable so that they have other things to think about than ME ruling THEM. F*ck that shit ya know, “we’ll just bombard them with the shit we know they can’t stop looking at.”

Like this is how I think evil in the world works, I think evil – the finest concentrate of evil people on the planet – they don’t throw balls – I mean they don’t make things happen. They wait for other people to randomly end up in situations where they create those things for them, and then they support that. It’s how you do things from behind curtains at all times. Gangster rap is a good example right, I love gangster rap, I grew up with that shit. But when you analyze what’s going on with the genre of music and what it’s turning into, it’s this materialism and also bickering and fighting with people. It’s very negative, it’s territorial, it’s all about who is the better person. And if you are a banker and you hear this shit, you are like “oh he’s telling people to hate each other and love money, and like strive for that? That’s like win win for us right!”

So like the reason America is in this cultural state right now is because they love when stupid shit happens, and they just like help them out MORE! And they don’t talk to the artist of course. They talk to the guys who talk to the guys, who talk to the guys, who sponsors the organization, that works with the dude that knows the manager. Something like that. It’s like this circle of people they go through to get to that level of influence right? But they have your money. They print the money. Why the f*ck couldn’t they do that? Why the f*ck couldn’t they fuck around with you? Why wouldn’t they be so bored with having the most money and power in the world that they wouldn’t change society into an even more succulent little suck …what do they call it…a succubine…they suck on like a fruit…like Rothschild, I think he had like a dinner party outside in his garden in the 18th century, and the servants were going around with peach trees in their arms, serving fresh peaches to the guests on the f*cking tree, ya know what I’m saying? Like if they did that two-three hundred years ago, wouldn’t they just be bored of that shit a long time ago?

Being the BEST – like Cleopatra and Caesar combined – wouldn’t that just be boring for you at some point? When you start playing golf with people’s lives, and you start playing risk on a REAL level where you gotta go like, “Ah, global dominance, sounds awesome, let’s create the EU so we can control that region of f*cked up people – worked with the States – now let’s divide these countries even more and make them hate each other – because the euro f*cks everything up for everybody”

Z: That is what he believes about…

AV: …the world situation.

‘BAJO’ EP Out 11/20 on SectionZ Records

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Interview conducted by Zach Rosenberg