Las Vegas Weekly

A “Weekly” moment with BT

BT

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Electronic music composer BT—aka Brian Transeau—performs a live “laptop symphony” at Rain Nightclub (February 20, 11 p.m., $0-$40).

I’m actually performing electronic music more live than I do in the studio, taking all these bits and pieces from my records—things that I’m composing live, bits and pieces from other people’s records—and recontextualizing all of these ... chunks and making something new in front of everyone.

One of the things that I love doing—and it depends on the night—many, many times I’ve plugged headphones into the mic input of the DJM 800 [mixer] and sung live right into the mixer. The first time somebody saw me do it, they were like, “What the hell are you doing? They’re headphones! You can’t sing into them!”

Mathematics is the language that nature speaks with. That’s what I think is so beautiful about it: There’s these recurring themes in the natural world that spring up all around us. Those are the things that inspire me and that form my work.

I have really smart fans, and they say really, really clever, thoughtful, insightful things. That makes me feel less alone on a ball of dirt spinning in infinite space.

When someone makes something—someone carves a table or they paint a painting or they write a song or they make an album, whatever it is—it has meaning and significance that’s personal for them. I’m deeply, emotionally invested in all of [my] compositions in a variety of ways and some of them in ways that I would never want to talk about, just because I wouldn’t want to take away the experience from someone else who’s going to attach something completely different to it.

BT discusses his new album, These Hopeful Machines, and more on the Nocturnal Admissions podcast. Download the mp3 for free here.