It’s the age of the calm evening, and thankfully we have the soothing melancholy of underground rapper and producer Son Silva to see us through. Debuting last year with his full-length LP A Love Minute, the London-based artist’s sing-song flows slither through melodies that glisten with an intergalactic feel; a cosmic snake, with introspective dreams of love.
A Love Minute opens with a cinematic vocal wail over textured, colourful piano chords, accentuated with the occasional guitar lick. Suddenly however, the track switches up introducing bouncy drums and a defiant nonchalant flow that reminds the listener what time it is. It’s reminiscent of what Baby Keem did on early albums like Die for my B*tch — you never know what to expect.
Silva’s musical reference points are as eclectic as the sound would suggest. Flying Lotus, DOOM, Charles Mingus, Milton Nascimento and the Cocteau Twins all play a part in his musical upbringing. This is reflected in the wild, sometimes sporadic variety of sounds, harmonies and rhythms heard in his creations.
Alongside an interview about his production approach Son Silva provides a mix of self-produced beats and instrumentals. Hard trap drums and bombastic, cinematic horns melt into sombre piano meditations giving us soulful snippets of a vision into the future.
Let’s start with an ice breaker, what’s your earliest musical memory?
Alright so it’s one of three moments in the late 90s/early 00s that I can’t pin down. No word of a lie, Ja Rule and Ashanti might’ve been it. I remember having my lil Action Man figure and my cousins getting dolled up to go clubbing while ‘Mesmerise’ and ‘Livin’ It Up’ were playing in the cut.
Either that or playing Final Fantasy X for the first time on PS2 and just sitting, staring and listening to the opening menu theme for what felt like an hour. Or it was the Pokémon theme song that played every morning at like 8am when I was getting ready for primary school.
Did you have a particularly musical upbringing?
Kinda but not really, I just copied what my older siblings and cousins did. I got my little hand-me down MP3 player back in the day so I had a steady stream of rap and RnB. I know my old man played a lotta MJ but also kizomba when we threw house parties.
Throw all that in with whatever soundtracks I heard in video games and movies and that sums up my early musical years.
What led you into music production and rapping?
Growing up I had friends who were musically capable in their own ways, some were guitarists, others were drummers, pianists or vocalists. My admiration for both the musicians in my life and the music I listened to just spurred me to learn to play. Used my sweet sweet SFE money to buy a piano and some software to make music with.
I used to do spoken word poetry before I rapped; I was great at it but I quickly realised where the glass ceiling was for poetry and rap/lyric writing made way more sense, so I became great at that too.
Are there any producers or artists who have inspired your production?
Countless artists. Different artists influence different aspects of my own art. I take as much influence from film scenes as much as I would from listening to music, but the more pronounced artists I take influence from are Flying Lotus, DOOM, Charles Mingus, Milton Nascimento, Cocteau Twins, Sonic Youth, Stone Roses, just to name a few.
Are there any particular rituals you go through before you head into the studio?
Nah, but I’m passively trying to be more ritualistic. The most ritualistic thing I do is probably use the can and then have a coffee. Either that or some of the loose leaf.
Do you come in with a destination in mind before starting a jam?
If I’m in project mode, then I’ll usually have a core concept or set of themes I wanna incorporate. Otherwise I just go in and see what comes out.
Occasionally, I’ll have rough ideas of what I wanna start out with, like “I wanna do some garage style vocal chops but then I’m gonna slap some fuzzy guitars over it” and then it’ll just snowball from there.
Are you the type of artist to work on a track until it’s perfect, or are you more of an impulsive creator, happy with first takes and sketches?
Earlier on, it was definitely working until it was “perfect”, whatever that means, but that got draining and it stopped being fun when I approached things like that. Like, the first track from my debut took five months to produce and while I’m proud of it, it was effort.
Nowadays, I tend to go back to sketches and they’re so great. I’ve listened to a one and a half minute clip of me noodling on the piano and it’s held me down for months on end.
Can you talk us through how you might construct a track?
Usually, I come up with a chord progression and then I’ll just play it in a bunch of different ways until I get something I like. Other times, I’ll have a vocal idea I came up with while washing dishes or doing mundane shit and then I’ll expand on that.
Very rarely, I’ll start with drums first but only if I got a solid idea of what I want. After starting it, it’s just a trial and error process to see what works. I see it as a musical puzzle board but I can create and shape pieces to fit in the gaps.
How much of your material is sample based and how much is original?
Like 70-85% of the music on my hard drive is original cause sample clearance is a pain but I wanna get back into sampling for practise and fun.
What’s the most important bits of kit that make a Son Silva track?
Definitely a keyboard and FL. With either of those alone, I can make doves cry.
This mix is comprised of 100% original Son Silva material. Could you tell us a bit about it? Any tracks that are particularly special to you?
So it’s a purely instrumental mix cause my microphone hasn’t worked for like a year. They vary in terms of completion, some are just piano pieces, others are full blown instrumental tracks.
Some have samples in them so they won’t have a home outside of my hard drive, but others are actually instrumentals to fully written singles, collaborations and EP cuts that’ll be in your hands this year.
I see it as a retrospective mix with some future tracks to hint towards the musical direction I’ll be taking. Generally speaking, the piano pieces are dearest because they’re so bare and scarce. Very beautiful stuff.
Anything on the horizon for you? Any releases we should know about?
Apart from more singles starting from next month, I’ll have two EPs coming this year; a “prelude” of sorts and a more conceptualised project.
So look out for ‘Age of the Calm Evening, Pt I’ in the second half of this year.
Otherwise, check out my 2020 debut project ‘A Love Minute’! Her first birthday passed last month not too and she’d always appreciate more love thrown her way.
