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<\/p>\nMarley Carroll is a busy and well-known DJ who spins music from an eclectic assortment of styles and genres in clubs in and around Asheville. But Carroll is also an accomplished electronic musician and composer, with a catalog that includes many singles and remix projects as well as three full-length solo albums. His newest album, Flight Patterns<\/i>, builds upon the creative successes of his past recordings and makes use of the skills he\u2019s honed as a DJ.<\/p>\n
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At age 16, Carroll took part in a DJ battle hosted in Charlotte. \u201cI started getting into turntablism and scratching when I was really young,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019d only been DJing for about a year.\u201d He won that competition. \u201cIf that hadn\u2019t happened, I\u2019m not sure how seriously I would\u2019ve taken DJing,\u201d he says. \u201cYou kind of get a pat on the back at a young age, and you start to realize that there\u2019s something there.\u201d Carroll went on to college on a drum scholarship, switching to music technology. All of those experiences colored his approach to making his own music.<\/p>\n
Listening to Carroll\u2019s first two albums \u2013 his 2007 debut, Melanaster<\/i> and 2013\u2019s Sings<\/i> \u2013 one can identify some of his influences fairly easily. Some songs display hints of Massive Attack\u2019s trip-hop style, while others lean in a more electronica direction. As solid a collection as it is, Melanaster<\/i> is a bit of a sonic grab-bag, the sound of a young Carroll searching for his signature style.<\/p>\n
\u201cOn the first album, I was still really unsure of where I landed,\u201d Carroll admits. \u201cThere are a couple of straight-up rock songs with wah-wah guitar.\u201d He believes that Sings<\/i> hangs together better as a collection of songs, \u201cbut still there\u2019s \u2018Hold Your Wings,\u2019 which is a shoegaze rock song.\u201d<\/p>\n
Carroll explains that because his interests are so wide-ranging \u2013 a quality that serves him well in his role as a DJ \u2013 his original music can be all over the stylistic map. \u201cI like making just straight ahead singer-songwriter stuff, and I like making really tweaky, techno stuff,\u201d he says. \u201cSo when it comes time for me to finalize something, I\u2019ve found it difficult to find a consistent voice.\u201d<\/p>\n
But Carroll has found that distinctive voice with Flight Patterns<\/i>. He has combined the various styles that resonate with him into a work more unified than anything he\u2019s done in the past. \u201cIt\u2019s the first album where I\u2019ve actually aimed for some kind of sonic consistency all the way through,\u201d Carroll admits.<\/p>\n
He usually works alone in the studio, largely using software, plugins, sampling and other state-of-the-art tools to create his music. But Carroll does use some non-virtual gear as well, including a Moog Sub 37 analog synthesizer and a few other machines. \u201cI don\u2019t have that much hardware,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019ve got some guitars, and I\u2019ve got some funny miniature drum machine things and cheap keyboards.\u201d<\/p>\n
But it\u2019s the computer that remains Carroll\u2019s favored musical tool. \u201cI really like getting the most from what the laptop computer can do,\u201d he says. \u201cThere\u2019s something about the simplicity of having it all unified, rather than having a whole bunch of hardware everywhere with spaghetti cables and routings and all that stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n
Yet despite the technological nature of his musical tools, Carroll doesn\u2019t identify at all with the EDM movement. \u201cNothing against it,\u201d he emphasizes. \u201cI\u2019m fine with being genre-fluid, not really being pinned down.\u201d Still, he\u2019s modest about what he does. \u201cI don\u2019t think I\u2019m reinventing a particular style or genre or anything,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
The computerized origin of Carroll\u2019s music is offset to a large degree by the organic feel of the songs on Flight Patterns<\/i>. \u201cI feel connected to Western North Carolina as a region and environment,\u201d he says. His East Asheville home studio is surrounded by woods, and the noisy crows in nearby trees exerted an influence on his work. \u201cI started listening to them and started noticing what they were doing,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd that was the entry point for becoming obsessed with birds.\u201d He made a point of learning the call of all of the bird species near his home.<\/p>\n
The results of his obsession range from the obvious \u2013 song titles like \u201cStarlings,\u201d \u201cSeven Crows\u201d and \u201cMigration\u201d \u2013 to more subtle qualities like the placid, hypnotic and soaring textures found in tracks like \u201cFireflies.\u201d<\/p>\n
Carroll acknowledges that his approach to making music is a solitary pursuit. \u201cThat sort of introspection has always been really important in my life,\u201d he says. But he\u2019s no hermit; Carroll is a regular fixture of local \u201cLose Yourself to Dance\u201d parties in which he guides the emotional tone of a room via song selection and sequencing. \u201cDJing is sort of like my day job,\u201d he says. \u201cI really enjoy it. And I think that those DJ skills do compliment my original music.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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