BIO
Nathan Zadrick has spent his entire life enamored by all-things-beautiful in the music world. Finding himself drawn to haunting, avant-garde music even at a very young age. Beginning with classical music and film scores to various other types of music; anything else that felt innovative or didn't fit well into one particular genre.
As a self-taught piano player and avid movie fan (who has also dabbled in writing and acting), Nathan has been an ongoing disciple of composers like Jerry Goldsmith, Elliot Goldenthal and John Barry (along with bands like Depeche Mode, Recoil, Curve, Cocteau Twins, Goldfrapp, Juno Reactor, Portishead, Massive Attack, Nitzer Ebb, Kraftwerk and Nine Inch Nails, to name a few). Always trying to experiment with melody in an attempt to mix the atmospheric world that film scores evoke, while incorporating that into various incarnations of something more conventional.
In the mid 2000's, as Nathan was discovering that like-minded collaborators were in extremely short supply, music technology was finally becoming more accessible for a DIY musician. It was then that Nathan decided to write and produce his own material.
In 2010-2014, Nathan's oeuvre began to take shape as he compiled and augmented his tracks (written over the course of many years) in the form of three limited release promo albums. These would later be combined and featured on some redux albums, including “Revisited” & “Revisited, Vol. 2”.
Over the course of the next few years, quite a few albums/EP’s are planned, in one form or another.
Q&A
HOW DID YOU GET STARTED IN MUSIC?
I got into film scores at a pretty young age. It all started with the obvious stuff like...the Star Wars / Indiana Jones films, Alien, the early Bond films, etc. As well as classical music, mainly by Tchaikovsky and Khachaturian.
Although it did take me a while, I did get into more mainstream music later on, like new wave, shoegaze, the so-called “high energy dance-pop” scene and then moved on to artists who I thought were really trying to do something different.
I got a bit of a late start with music production. I didn’t really get serious until I was in my early 30’s. Admittedly, I didn’t have much ambition when I was younger. I was fairly content with keeping music just as a hobby. I had a fairly comfortable life in Silicon Valley, during its heyday. When that whole thing came crashing down, I was sort of left to deal with some personal demons and various other financial issues (like pretty much everyone else did, back then). But it galvanized me out of my complacency. It was just the type of ass-kicking I needed to get back into making sure my musical ideas finally took shape. Thankfully, this was around the same time that digital technology was getting better, so experimental musicians didn’t need expensive amounts of analog gear to try out new things. It could all be done on the computer.
WHEN DID YOU START WRITING SONGS?
“Killer Smile” and “Softer Rain” were the first songs I ever wrote. I was around 17 or 18. But I didn’t really compose anything beyond that until around 1997-1999. I got more serious (and a lot more ideas) around 2007-2010. Ever since, the floodgates of inspiration have only increased. The Fall of 2023 Singles, Revisited 1 & 2 (as well as Petrichorian Nebula 1 & 2) cover stuff I wrote between 1994 and 2014, give or take. I might create a “song history page” to go into further detail, but a lot of it I may not remember.
WHAT INSTRUMENT(S) DO YOU PLAY?
Only piano. I taught myself at around the age of 9 or 10 because I have (and still do) a serious issue with sight-reading music. But I was super determined to learn how, regardless.
I’m a fairly sloppy player (timing is poor too) compared to most, but I can still play certain pieces with relative ease.
What is more important is that it taught me some fundamentals of music theory, which make composing melodies fairly easy for me.
WHERE ARE YOU LOCATED?
I consider CA my home, and am sort of based out of Los Angeles. Although, I’m currently in the Seattle area for various personal reasons until probably late 2024.
WHAT SOFTWARE DO YOU USE FOR MUSIC PRODUCTION?
I use Logic Pro for MIDI and sound creation, and I use MOTU’s Digital Performer for mixing and audio editing. I love the FabFilter, u-He and Soundtoys products. I use Native Instruments’ stuff a lot as well.
HOW & WHY DID THE REVISITED SERIES COME ABOUT?
It was quite an undertaking. It’s been a culmination of roughly twenty years worth of material (mostly from a few defunct promo albums) that I have remixed and reconfigured.
These are my oldest compositions and some of them have gone through a multitude of incarnations, because i just couldn’t get them quite right. Over the years, I’ve learned how to not be such a perfectionist, and just get on with it…but it’s a daily struggle.
And...being the movie geek that I am, it also occurred to me that the first bit of Revisited’s completion coincided with the 40th anniversary of two of my favorite scores as a child: Disney’s The Black Hole by John Barry, which is fantastic, and Jerry Goldsmith’s Star Trek: The Motion Picture, which is probably my personal favorite of all time. Not so much for the heroic bits, but the darker, atmospheric cues.
Interestingly enough, both of these movies were actually released within 2 weeks of one another in Dec of 1979. They also both include a unique instrument (exclusive only to that era, for whatever reason) called a “blaster beam”, which is one of the most beautiful sounds ever created. You’ll know it when you hear it. It’s almost impossible to recreate synthetically and heaven knows, many of us try. As painfully obvious as it may be, these two scores (along with many others by these composers) were massively influential to me.
HOW IMPORTANT IS EXPERIMENTATION TO YOU?
It’s imperative. I love experimenting with melody and texture, and can’t imagine not doing it.
I’ve always thought it was great when an artist would go the extra mile to add some texture & atmosphere to an already solid track; people who value that sort of thing...like Elliot Goldenthal, Hans Zimmer, Alan Wilder (Recoil / Depeche Mode), Dean Garcia (Curve / SPC ECO), Ben Watkins (Juno Reactor), Robin Guthrie (Cocteau Twins), Harold Budd, Trent Reznor, too many others to list. These artists know how to properly take you on a musical journey. And I just hope I can add a similar vibe with my own music, no matter how insignificant.
YOU’VE MENTIONED WORKING UNDER DIFFERENT ALIASES,
IS THIS STILL THE CASE?
Yes, it is. I’ve gone back & forth on the idea for a while now, but I’m considering five or six additional aliases under my vanity label. So far, it will be for more ambient/neoclassical stuff and some other experiments. I haven’t decided yet.
ANY PLANS TO TOUR?
As I will be quite busy with various projects over the next few years, I’m really hoping I can squeeze in some live performances here and there. I’d even like to write a symphony at some point, but that is probably a number of years down the road.
As I’m a “bedroom producer”, I haven’t quite figured out the logistics of doing my stuff live quite yet, but if I did - it would probably be for the instrumental stuff. That way I won’t be torturing people with my singing…:)
But who knows what the future may hold.
We shall see!