• Ulrich Schnauss

    Missing Deadlines

    rgirl62, Release Date: 15/3/2010

    Although strictly speaking a remix album, Missing Deadlines sees Schnauss adopt the role of a master orchestrator or alchemist, rearranging and restructuring the songs of his contemporaries, as opposed to simply adorning each with throwaway beats-by-numbers. The record is a testament to Schnauss’s unique aural vision, showcasing his undeniable grasp of heart-warming, heart-wrenching melody. Schnauss’s telltale signature sounds are present in each track - whether it be the ever-oscillating synth patterns, the rich, reverb-laden voices, or the euphoric beats – whilst simultaneously remaining true to the spirit of the originals.

    "Essentially what makes me really happy about this album is the fact that it's a selection of the - in my opinion - best mixes from a musical point of view, rather than a compilation of the commercially most successful ones, or the tracks that have the biggest names associated with them. In all cases, the original songs are already great in their own right - which made it really inspiring to work with them." - Ulrich Schnauss

    At once uplifting and otherworldly, the music of Ulrich Schnauss combines multilayered synthesisers with beats and ethereal vocals, serving as an aural escape route from the trappings of reality. As Schnauss  explains, ‘I’ve always used making and listening to music as a way to escape – putting on headphones is a great way to leave reality behind for a while, reminding  yourself  why it still makes sense to carry on.’

    Aside from releases under his own moniker, Schnauss also plays keyboards for Engineers, and Longview, and has lent his hand to the production of recent albums by Kirsty Hawkshaw and Exit Calm. Regularly enlisted as a mixer, remixer, producer, DJ, and artist in his own right, Ulrich Schnauss may use music as a way to escape, but today he seems firmly rooted in the business, albeit constantly pushing against its staid sonic boundaries.

    Born in 1977 in Kiel, Germany – a post-industrial seaport at the Baltic – Schnauss began improvising chord changes on an old piano in his parents’ flat; a process which remains the backbone of his songwriting to this day. Once settled on a basic chord structure, Schnauss combines programmed synths with layered basslines and rhythms, to consciously adorn each piece with certain emotions and textures.

    The titles of Ulrich Schnauss’s studio albums to date – Far Away Trains Passing By, A Strangely Isolated Place, andGoodbye – hint at the artist’s backwoods background, growing up in the ‘cultural wasteland that is rural Germany’. Unable to find like-minded people to create music with, Schnauss’ aural vision became liberated by his discovery of the synthesiser, enabling him to create multilayered compositions on his own, with an aim to ‘translate the aesthetics of the ‘shoegazing’ sound into an electronic context’. Inspired by the alternative guitar bands of the late 80s/early 90s (Slowdive, Chapterhouse, My Bloody Valentine, etc) as well as Acid House and early electronica (Tangerine Dream, 808 State, The Orb), Schnauss began developing his own distinct sonic palette, melding delicate dreampop sensibilities with ecstatic electronic excess, defying the constraints of traditional music genre boundaries.

    After a move to Berlin and a slew of ambient, beats-based releases in the latter half of the 1990s - under the pseudonyms View to the Future and Ethereal 77 - Ulrich Schnauss felt confident enough to employ a more freeform approach and began recording ‘little electronica pieces’, culminating in the first album released under his own name, 2001’s Far Away Trains Passing By. As if adhering to a ‘less is more’ ethic, Ulrich created an album which is by turns spare and yet awash with melody. 2003’s A Strangely Isolated Place develops Schnauss’ ambitions to capture the dense, oscillating shoegazing sound, pushing the use of layered, modulated synth patterns to euphoric sonic effect. The inclusion of Judith Beck’s vocals on tracks such as ‘Gone Forever’ and ‘On My Own’ lends a human familiarity to the music. 2007’s Goodbye sees his multilayered approach expanded to include a variety of live instrumentation  and  guest players, including members of Longview, Chapterhouse, and Below the Sea, plus vocals by Judith Beck and Schnauss himself. The album is unashamedly complex and daring in its layering of hundreds of separate manipulated synth tracks.

    After an initial struggle to perform the unique, interchanging nuances of these tracks live, Schnauss’s discovery of Ableton software has enabled him to build new arrangements on the spot, lending diversity and distinction to each performance. ‘I can also react to the atmosphere of the room,’ he explains, ‘sometimes playing more ambient; sometimes more rhythm-orientated versions of the songs.’

    Today, Schnauss expresses a renewed interest in more direct electronic sounds, and aims to substitute traditional verse-chorus-verse structures for more freeform atmospherics. Stripping back the orgiastic excess of multilayered instrumentation, Schnauss is currently working on an album which intends to celebrate the synthesiser – the long-time cornerstone of Schnauss’s sound - as a musical instrument in its own right

    Tracklisting

    • Howling Bells - Setting Sun
    • A Sunny Day In Glasgow - Ghost In The Graveyard
    • Katharina Franck - Faithful Friend
    • Madrid - Out To Sea
    • Asobi Seksu - Strawberries
    • Dragons - Remembrance
    • aus - Halo
    • Mahogany - Supervitesse
    • Lunz - Lunz
    • Rachel Goswell - Coastline
    • High Violets - Chinese Letter
    • Mark Gardener - Story Of The Eye
    • I'm Not A Gun - Make Sense And Loose
    • Mojave 3 - Bluebird Of Happiness

All Rocket Girl Releases

  • Ulrich Schnauss
    Missing Deadlines

Artist Merch