Trust us — Toronto’s Digits is less bland than he looks.

DETAILS

Axis of Conversation with Bonnie Blackout & Digits feat. Bonnaventure James
Broken City
Thursday, May 13 - Thursday, May 13

More in: Rock / Pop

While the term “bedroom” is regularly bandied about as a broad-stroke sub-genre for any introspective, lovelorn or melancholy electro pop, Toronto’s Alt Altman (a.k.a. Digits) takes the word to heart, literally doubling his boudoir as a DIY studio.

“It’s true! Just about everything is done right next to my bed,” he says with a laugh. “I guess the synthesizers are technically in my living room, and any guitars are recorded in a rehearsal space because I don’t want to bother my neighbours too much. But yeah, I do spend a lot of time alone in my room.”

As a former member of the bands Europe in Colour and The Ghost is Dancing, Altman first followed his chilly electronic muse as a hobby and a simple songwriting exercise. However, after Europe called it quits last year, Digits moved up from the back burner, and a debut album, Hold It Close, followed in October 2009. Despite featuring recorded contributions from his previous bandmates, this project is all Altman all the time. So far, he’s begun to notice the downsizing most when performing live.

“The biggest thing is that I don’t have harmonies, and that’s a real shame,” Altman says. “I’m hoping to figure out some sort of vocal looping method in the future, but for now I’m concentrating on the many other things I have to do onstage. Basically, I play using a bass guitar, synthesizer, and sing as well, so I loop the instrumental parts, then layer the songs together. It’s quite a different experience, but seems to be working pretty well. Definitely makes it easier to schedule rehearsals.”

Any time an artist combines hushed vocals with minimal beat-driven soundscapes, comparisons to Arthur Russell — and in Canada, to Junior Boys — seem inevitable (and aren’t without merit). However, Altman also looks back to possibly lesser-known early electronic experimentalists such as Italy’s Giorgio Moroder, the U.K.’s White Noise and Alberta’s Bruce Haack, all listed proudly on the Digits MySpace page.

“Obviously I can’t get the same sounds those guys had, because they all used such incredible equipment,” he says. “However, what I can take away from a group like White Noise is the way they used such excessive delay on the vocals and maintained a sense of simplicity with their songs. Also, both them and Bruce Haack often came up with big, beefy synth bass sounds, which I can come close to replicating. I really like melding the cool, weird vibe they evoked with modern dance pop.”

Regularly posting similarly gushing prose about new and old artists he discovers on both his MySpace page and personal website, digitsmusic.com, it’s clear Altman is equal parts fan and musician. So, does he perceive any problems in playing both sides of the field?

“One of my songs, ‘Saturation,’ is actually about being overwhelmed by the easy availability of music,” he says. “However, in the electronic world, people who produce original stuff are often DJs with massive record collections as well, so it doesn’t seem like that much of an issue. These days, if you have a home studio or even just a computer, it’s a lot easier to combine your influences into something new. There are so many things that just wouldn’t have been possible 10 or 15 years ago.”