You walk into a room. It is difficult to see over the heads of the multitude of people occupying the dance floor. In some ways you don’t need to see, you can hear it from a distance and you can almost grasp that sensed dynamism with bare hands. Instinct tells you it is Ben Cromack. You edge your way closer to the front. A warm melody misses your left temple by an inch as you dart to miss the raw, percussive rhythms grappling at your ankles, the minimal bass line slapping at your hips and the soul attempting to inject itself straight into your chest. Finally you reach the front and glimpse the man responsible. One of his hands is assaulting the mixer and the other is bouncing lightly on top of a piece of moving vinyl feeling for the invisible groove. Your instinct was right.
Ben Cromack’s style is as unique and revealing as his individual fingerprint. Perhaps his unique style can be attributed to hours on end of pure, unadulterated experimentation. As a self-taught DJ, learning the ins and outs of acetate was a process centrally focused on feeling and interpretation. “When I started to learn how to DJ there was probably only one person I had ever seen DJ before in my life,” says Cromack. “The whole ‘how to do it’, I never had that. I never had anyone show me how to do anything as far as mixing goes. I didn’t really have any preconceptions of what was right or wrong so it was all experimentation. I never had rules set to it, however, the things that I wanted to do I thought about and I planned out very carefully. It was more that I could do what I want, what sounds good to me, what I thought was happening and it was all just relevant to me. It helped me to build my own way of doing things.”
His own way of doing things included building an inimitable sound, and a warming ferocity behind his trio of turntables. From the other side of the decks, Ben Cromack’s ability to compose a spontaneous opus from a plethora of sounds and silences forges an unbreakable magnetism and an extended two-way road between himself and the crowd. “As far as I am concerned, personally, I get very bored playing the same kind of music in the same way all the time,” he admits. “To me, techno is open to each individual’s different perception of the music. Everyone gets something different out of the music. It is open-ended music and it is very interactive. Music means different things to each person. I like to try and present my tracks in a different way each time, purely for the moment, just to show people the endless possibilities. There is so much you can do with music.”
However, to describe this inimitable Ben Cromack sound is a daunting task. No adjective quite seems fitting. What is certain, however, is that his sound is open to anyone who is willing to lend him their ear and trust that his creativity is endless. “When I listen to music, buy music or play music I just think of it as that – music,” he says. “I think putting everything into genres is a big problem now because I think it is really segregating a lot of people who could be enjoying a lot of different music styles together. As far as I am concerned genres don’t really exist. I guess people just feel comfortable if they can put a label onto something, but these labels vary from person to person. People might not have the opportunity to experience something they might really enjoy because they are too busy stuck in their box.”
For Ben Cromack, being surrounded by and involved in music is simply an unconscious element. This is his life. This is how he spends close to every waking moment, possibly even a few sleeping moments. “It is everyday. Whether it’s working in the record store and listening to different styles of music or whether I am at home mixing, mixing out or in the studio with my friends … it is a large percentage of my free time,” he affirms. “It is major part of my life, music is, without a doubt. And other than that there is not much I really want to do.” Anyone who has seen Ben Cromack play can attest to the instinctual nature of his presence and touch, it is almost inevitable in his DJing.
“Everything has rules that is the fact of the matter, but it is how far you can bend those rules. It is not something that I find difficult or easy, it is just something that happens,” says Cromack continuing to describe the ‘in the moment’ experience of DJing. “I don’t even think it is a conscious decision. Whether I am feeling a particular way or the crowds feeling a particular way or there is a vibe in the room – that’s what it is about. I don’t really think about it too much. It is very instinctive for me.” For Ben, this passionate nature is one of the main reasons why music is such a fundamental part of our lives. “I think that is the reason why music has been around since man and there is a reason why it is still around. You got to love it. You as a music lover have to love that experience. You can definitely tell, with any art form or anything really, that someone has a passion or a feeling for something as opposed to just doing it.”
After five years of solid experience Ben Cromack’s multifaceted presence is as strong as ever in Melbourne and Australia’s electronic worlds. As a DJ, he has mastered the basic rudiments and the ability to push himself and the crowd further and further. Now, Cromack is taking small steps back towards pure, unadulterated experimentations, but this time it is behind the four walls of his studio, which he occupies with two like-minded, talented beings – Quentin Eastop and Dan Langton. “I don’t think there is any rush,” he says honestly. “I have a lot to learn about writing music. At the moment, it is a learning process. I really don’t have any preconceptions of what I want to do when I go into the studio. I might have an idea, but it is different every time I go in there. We are using all hardware and there is so much to learn about each instrument. It is kind of exciting, but daunting as well. With producing it is back to the start, I have to start from scratch.”
Another aspect, which is daunting for Cromack is meeting the expectations of his legion of appreciators and listeners. “There are people out there who like my DJing and I want to make sure that what I am writing is up to the level that people expect. I don’t want to release substandard product – there is no point. There are a lot of producers doing that now; just producing music for the sake of it. I want to write music that actually means something and makes a bit of a difference.” In hearing Ben Cromack’s motivations for producing it is clear that this is a man with a respect for his craft, respect for fellow musicians and respect for his listeners. “As a DJ you play other people’s music all the time and I feel that if I am going to be playing other people’s music than I have to contribute as well and let other people have an opportunity to play my music and use my music in the way they want to use it,” he says. “I think it is a bit unfair. To call yourself a real musician and just use other people’s music, I don’t feel that is right. It is absolutely a two-way road. I think a lot of people out there don’t give the producers a lot of recognition that they deserve or they don’t understand how important the producer’s role is. They see the DJ up on the stage, and they are like ‘this guy is my favorite DJ’ and they don’t realize that he is playing someone else’s music and some people don’t even really care about that, but I think the DJ should.”
At present, there are a number of producer’s that Cromack feels are pushing the envelope, constantly and consistently; producer’s that are deserving of this recognition he speaks of. “All of the guys from Ealing in England like Max Duley, Tommy Gillard, Rob Alcock and Oliver Ho – they are all doing really interesting stuff with techno. Music has to have some kind of structure to it for people to be able to understand it and relate to it, but these people, they have their structures but they really push the envelope where they can. It is really interesting music,” says Cromack. “Then you have people like Regis and Surgeon and those kinds of guys who are pushing the more abstract element. Then, of course, you have all of the Detroit guys. I don’t think they are really pushing anything new at the moment, but you just can’t go past it. It is timeless music; it is a format that you can’t mess with. They have a soul in their music.” Speaking passionately on the topic, Ben identifies with the raw, passionate nature of these compositions and their creators. “The music was made by people who had a passion for what they were doing and who were in love with their music and that is what you can hear. It was something that was really connected to them; it was from the heart. It wasn’t about the money or using the top rate equipment or super produced albums it is from a musical perspective. It is about putting emotion into what you are doing and those guys do it without a doubt.”
So now, after all of that, we take a step back into that room. This time we close our eyes, but we open our ears once again. A warm melody misses your left temple by an inch as you dart to miss the raw, percussive rhythms grappling at your ankles, the minimal bass line slapping at your hips and the soul attempting to inject itself straight into your chest and this time it succeeds. There are no preconceptions, just an interaction, an open box of records, spontaneous combustions of sound, a grooving dance floor and our instincts.
Ben Cromack plays Asymmetric|Structures @ The Big Apple in Perth on Friday 5th September. You can also experience Ben Cromack as a rotational resident at Jack the Basics @ The Lounge in Melbourne on Wednesdays and in the near future at War of the Worlds 4 @ Altona Sports & Leisure Center on Saturday 20th September in Melbourne (BUY TICKETS) and at Utopia Electronic Music Festival @ Glenworth Valley on Saturday 5th October in Sydney (BUY TICKETS).
