When two childhood friends turned creative professionals unite to follow their dreams of making music together, the results are sometimes spectacular. Such is the case of Nate Kogan and Justin Brennan Smith, aka Toronto's R+D. Kogan is known as that renaissance wild man photographer, avant-garde artist and graphic designer with a lust for extreme and disposable aesthetics, while his partner Justin Brennon Smith guides the way with exacting video editing precision. Their debut release has simply been called One, and skirts the regions of progressive throbbing techno, and unabashed psychedelia. Catch them soon at a discotheque near you!THUMP: How did you start making music together?
Justin: I used to DJ a bit back in the day, and The Guvernment main room was the biggest venue, playing tech house, maybe seven or eight years ago as Razor FX. I came into the game late but fell in love with raving. At the time, I was starting up my current company, Biz Media, and that was just more viable. The opportunity for online video was just starting to expand so we came in at a good time, so I gave it up. But when you love something, you can try to bury it but it somehow finds a way of coming back into your life. I started going out a bit more, getting deeper into music, this was about the same time as Nate was getting into it and all my other friends started to phase out, so his energy fed me.Nate: I got into it way later, I'd only been going out to parties in my mid-20s. I followed him to a few parties and he told me he'd teach me how to DJ. We both see DJing and producing as a natural extension of what we're doing already. I see making art a bit like Lego where I'm taking things and putting them together. With music production, I'm taking sound elements and making something cohesive out of them.J: We work well because we came into it almost the same time and we've known each other for 22 years, so we don't hold anything back either. It's become a natural progression.How has the switch been from making visual art to music?
N: It's happening pretty fast for us I think, because it's easy. Anyone that tells you DJing is hard these days is wrong.J: Well programming a deep set is pretty hard.N: True. The technicalities of DJing are really easy but programming and sequencing a set is the real challenge.What was your first gig like?
N: It was at this Halloween loft party. It was a complete disaster because the guy before us played a really heavy dubstep set and it was so loud that it got complaints from the neighbors. By the time we went on, they had to crank the levels way down to the point you could barely hear us. We could barely hear our own set. But that just motivated us to play harder and better. Our next set was at a place called Detour Bar and we blew it up. They had lineups around the bar, which was unheard of for them. We've also played at some top nightlife spots like Coda and The Hoxton.You must have some crazy party stories.
N: Haha, yeah there are a lot of moments that I can't speak to but we threw a house party once and the place was so packed that people were crowd surfing just to get through the crowd! Normally I'd be all about people going nuts, but I was so freaked out since it was my house and I didn't want anyone to get hurt so I was acting like a concerned dad yelling "Put that guy down!" While crazy throbbing techno was blasting in the background.So how did you make the jump to producing?
J: With production, we were so in love with what we were making, and we both love getting lost in the art and flow of the music. The world around you disappears and you're just going on a gut instinct and flow. Producing music is just that, and we're totally addicted. We're not afraid to put our work out and we didn't want to wait on any labels. We are just going with it. This is our first release, and we know that it can only get better. It's not about being a legend right off the bat.N: Yeah, it's about finding your own voice. We really wanted to be playing our own music as well. You have to produce and you have to make stuff! We want to be playing one of our own tracks every three songs.Who do you look up to in Toronto?
J: Hunter Siegel, Gingy, Box of Kittens, Breakandenter, Mansion, Embrace and Way of Acting. We admire those guys so much. They've done such great things for the city. Connecting with them on a producer level is a beautiful experience.N: Seeing your peers play and then working with them is the coolest thing in the world. Considering we've only been playing music for just two years, I consider ourselves really lucky.What's your approach to making music?
J: We don't pre-program anything. I grew up watching a lot of jam bands like Phish that never play the same show twice. Every show is unique. I want to be playing unreleased stuff all the time. There's a special feeling when a group gets together and they know the experience they will have is theirs only, and it will never happen again. I know that some people love it but I think that playing the same thing over and over again would make you want to kill yourself. When you do something new and you see the crowd react to it, you feed off it even more. Although of course, it can go the other way too….N: We never want to be back room DJs. I'm happy when people are humping the speakers, coming up and talking to us. I thrive on people going crazy around me. You have to be a bit of a showman.Tell me about your production style.
N: we're trying to do deep progressive house and progressive techno, which is Justin's real love. My first love was Richie Hawtin because it was so crazy and repetitive, just like my old photography work. It's a deeper techno with grimy elements like Modeselektor, or Dirty Bird Records. We're a melting pot of Toronto's techno.J: We use Maschine to layer and build our tracks. It's all unique content, so you'll never hear us play the same song twice.N: We're not technology fascists. I'm not the kind of people to say you have to use this deck, and that piece of gear. I know for a fact that my crowd doesn't care and that's all that matters to me. I don't think it takes away from what you're doing. Technology wasn't created because there's no need for it; it was created because of demand.Huh, interesting. What does a "Toronto techno sound" mean to you?
N: In Toronto there's a lot of indie dance, indie beat and soulection. But there's a lot of good underground techno like Kevin McPhee, Nautiluss, and Graze. Those guys are really putting Toronto on the map and they're definitely not cookie cutters, but it's amazing. We're inspired by the idea that a lot of Toronto people are amalgamating a lot of styles and feelings.What do you think of bigger names jumping on the techno or tech-house bandwagon?
N: You mean like Deadmau5 as Test Pilot? I think it's inevitable. We started doing proggy music and then moved to techno. It's inevitable because your tastes change. We saw the nuances of it the more we started making it. But Deadmau5's DNA has always been that stuff, but he sold out to make money because he spent 10 years in a basement trying to make a living. I never hated on him. I think that anyone who can score episodes of CSI knows what they're doing. I'm a big fan of the Andy Warhol philosophy where that people who hate sell-outs just haven't had the opportunity to do so yet. I don't think you have to give up your integrity to sell out. Deadmau5 must have liked some of his own music and the performing aspect, but now that he's got 80 million dollars, he can do whatever he wants.What was your direction for the new EP?
J: We go with our guts and feelings. You start to make something, and you have a loop that you like, so you build arrangements around it. We just let whatever feels right to take us places. We don't worry too much about what it sounds like, just as long as you dig it, and feel like you can dance to it. But some people call it weird psychedelic techno.What does R+D mean?
N: If people were to look at our genesis, they would be able to figure it because there's photo evidence out there. But we like people to think it's Drunk + Ready. It's an enigma wrapped in the donut of a riddle, dusted with conundrum powder.Jesse Ship is a freelance music writer and former Juno Juror for the Electronic Music category. You can follow his rants at @Jesse_Ship
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Justin: I used to DJ a bit back in the day, and The Guvernment main room was the biggest venue, playing tech house, maybe seven or eight years ago as Razor FX. I came into the game late but fell in love with raving. At the time, I was starting up my current company, Biz Media, and that was just more viable. The opportunity for online video was just starting to expand so we came in at a good time, so I gave it up. But when you love something, you can try to bury it but it somehow finds a way of coming back into your life. I started going out a bit more, getting deeper into music, this was about the same time as Nate was getting into it and all my other friends started to phase out, so his energy fed me.Nate: I got into it way later, I'd only been going out to parties in my mid-20s. I followed him to a few parties and he told me he'd teach me how to DJ. We both see DJing and producing as a natural extension of what we're doing already. I see making art a bit like Lego where I'm taking things and putting them together. With music production, I'm taking sound elements and making something cohesive out of them.J: We work well because we came into it almost the same time and we've known each other for 22 years, so we don't hold anything back either. It's become a natural progression.How has the switch been from making visual art to music?
N: It's happening pretty fast for us I think, because it's easy. Anyone that tells you DJing is hard these days is wrong.
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N: It was at this Halloween loft party. It was a complete disaster because the guy before us played a really heavy dubstep set and it was so loud that it got complaints from the neighbors. By the time we went on, they had to crank the levels way down to the point you could barely hear us. We could barely hear our own set. But that just motivated us to play harder and better. Our next set was at a place called Detour Bar and we blew it up. They had lineups around the bar, which was unheard of for them. We've also played at some top nightlife spots like Coda and The Hoxton.You must have some crazy party stories.
N: Haha, yeah there are a lot of moments that I can't speak to but we threw a house party once and the place was so packed that people were crowd surfing just to get through the crowd! Normally I'd be all about people going nuts, but I was so freaked out since it was my house and I didn't want anyone to get hurt so I was acting like a concerned dad yelling "Put that guy down!" While crazy throbbing techno was blasting in the background.So how did you make the jump to producing?
J: With production, we were so in love with what we were making, and we both love getting lost in the art and flow of the music. The world around you disappears and you're just going on a gut instinct and flow. Producing music is just that, and we're totally addicted. We're not afraid to put our work out and we didn't want to wait on any labels. We are just going with it. This is our first release, and we know that it can only get better. It's not about being a legend right off the bat.
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J: Hunter Siegel, Gingy, Box of Kittens, Breakandenter, Mansion, Embrace and Way of Acting. We admire those guys so much. They've done such great things for the city. Connecting with them on a producer level is a beautiful experience.N: Seeing your peers play and then working with them is the coolest thing in the world. Considering we've only been playing music for just two years, I consider ourselves really lucky.What's your approach to making music?
J: We don't pre-program anything. I grew up watching a lot of jam bands like Phish that never play the same show twice. Every show is unique. I want to be playing unreleased stuff all the time. There's a special feeling when a group gets together and they know the experience they will have is theirs only, and it will never happen again. I know that some people love it but I think that playing the same thing over and over again would make you want to kill yourself. When you do something new and you see the crowd react to it, you feed off it even more. Although of course, it can go the other way too….N: We never want to be back room DJs. I'm happy when people are humping the speakers, coming up and talking to us. I thrive on people going crazy around me. You have to be a bit of a showman.
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N: we're trying to do deep progressive house and progressive techno, which is Justin's real love. My first love was Richie Hawtin because it was so crazy and repetitive, just like my old photography work. It's a deeper techno with grimy elements like Modeselektor, or Dirty Bird Records. We're a melting pot of Toronto's techno.J: We use Maschine to layer and build our tracks. It's all unique content, so you'll never hear us play the same song twice.N: We're not technology fascists. I'm not the kind of people to say you have to use this deck, and that piece of gear. I know for a fact that my crowd doesn't care and that's all that matters to me. I don't think it takes away from what you're doing. Technology wasn't created because there's no need for it; it was created because of demand.Huh, interesting. What does a "Toronto techno sound" mean to you?
N: In Toronto there's a lot of indie dance, indie beat and soulection. But there's a lot of good underground techno like Kevin McPhee, Nautiluss, and Graze. Those guys are really putting Toronto on the map and they're definitely not cookie cutters, but it's amazing. We're inspired by the idea that a lot of Toronto people are amalgamating a lot of styles and feelings.What do you think of bigger names jumping on the techno or tech-house bandwagon?
N: You mean like Deadmau5 as Test Pilot? I think it's inevitable. We started doing proggy music and then moved to techno. It's inevitable because your tastes change. We saw the nuances of it the more we started making it. But Deadmau5's DNA has always been that stuff, but he sold out to make money because he spent 10 years in a basement trying to make a living. I never hated on him. I think that anyone who can score episodes of CSI knows what they're doing. I'm a big fan of the Andy Warhol philosophy where that people who hate sell-outs just haven't had the opportunity to do so yet. I don't think you have to give up your integrity to sell out. Deadmau5 must have liked some of his own music and the performing aspect, but now that he's got 80 million dollars, he can do whatever he wants.What was your direction for the new EP?
J: We go with our guts and feelings. You start to make something, and you have a loop that you like, so you build arrangements around it. We just let whatever feels right to take us places. We don't worry too much about what it sounds like, just as long as you dig it, and feel like you can dance to it. But some people call it weird psychedelic techno.What does R+D mean?
N: If people were to look at our genesis, they would be able to figure it because there's photo evidence out there. But we like people to think it's Drunk + Ready. It's an enigma wrapped in the donut of a riddle, dusted with conundrum powder.Jesse Ship is a freelance music writer and former Juno Juror for the Electronic Music category. You can follow his rants at @Jesse_Ship