Interview
Co-Operator of Seattle’s Heavy Sounds soundsystem, and Managerial Confectioner of Sweet Treat, Heavy Sounds’ sublabel, Sugarpea is the primary alias of the Jet City’s Paris Siris.
While Sugarpea and The Delectables are the channels for Paris’s more recent UKG releases, such as last year’s vinyl only The Reward. Previous collaborations under monikers Gruidae Gang, JamRat, and Mycelium Mustard all offer a more broadly developed understanding of soundsystem theory. Paris leaves few things to wonder.
This is further evidenced by the attention to detail required to independently operate a rig like that of Heavy Sounds on a DIY basis. Paris and the rest of the Heavy Sounds team, along with the speakers they operate, have become a central beam in the foundation of the Seattle scene, demonstrating what a key element the soundsystem is in the underground.
Paris shares their thoughts on the importance of the PA, the community behind it, and how it’s affected Seattle below to accompany their mix.
Beyond amplifying sound, what role do you feel the soundsystem plays in the modern day?
Our modes of listening are being rewired! Nobody hears anything anymore. All sound engrams - genres, structures, songs themselves - are now valued at the SEMANTIC level. The practice of sonic abstraction and play has been completely dissected and logged in the hopes of [electronic] music maintaining social/commercial legitimacy (resulting in nepo baby noodle garbage but that’s beside the point). EUROLIGICAL perspectives on improvisation - and thus creation - permeate the greater unconscious and unmoor us from the generative relationship WE have with temporal reality. The result is a VIRTUALIZED dromology on an indicated track taking us from TIMESPACE → IDENTITYSPACE.
Our only hope is SYNESTHETIC. The tools used to rewire our perception have physical constraints yet unaccounted for, and our BODIES aren’t rewired yet! The tactility provided by sub-bass emulsifies the Cartesian Split, rupturing the neural OS relied on so heavily by Imperial Capitalism. The spectacle and tension of the soundsystem in its violent stillness is only resolved by submission to a new mode of being in space and time, and an expanded understanding of creation, improvisation and relation.
As our perceptual continuum tunnels into a registration of symbols, the role of the soundsystem is a violent return to the situated present.
With that in mind, what role does the sound technician play?
A sound tech of a soundsystem is concerned with the deployment of sonic technologies as much as any other sound engineer - the difference is largely political and spiritual. Do you yearn for a revolution of everyday life? Do you value your work as hyperstitial futurhythmachine or merely as entertainment? Maybe all techs are plotting escape paths, but soundsystem techs are seeking salvation - not just reprieve.
Furthermore, what role do you think the DJ and producer have to play in this context?
I think a good sommelier should have strong gastro game in general. In the same vein, producers ought to be approaching programming with the mindset of an operator and thinking about the dancers as a DJ does.
DJ’s ought to know some music theory lest they mash vox, tangle arrangements and wreck trains over scathing chord clashes. An understanding of the soundsystem is critical as the DJ is the preceding actor in said system. Translating your empathetic skills into efficient parameter selections and affections comes only with knowledge and practice.
What do you feel PAs like Heavy Sounds and Sunrise Soundsystem have offered the Seattle scene?
Heavy Sounds is very much an underdog system from Seattle locals born and raised. The schematics for most of our speakers are open-source designs almost as old as we are! It just takes a good woodworker (shout out Brian) and a lot of research, practice and confidence. This means that the reputation is fully built from the work we put in. Opting out of the commercial association of a brand wasn’t exactly a choice as we are poor, but it still sits right with me knowing that the moments in front of our rig aren’t mediated or muddled by the signature optics of fetishized speaker companies.
A big hope is that we can be proof of concept to further the scale of local self-determination. We’re a truck and a generator from being in virtually full control of our means of production - and though having a home venue is a dream, we’re also here to prove that you don’t need to be paying the land-owning class in this city to throw a good party!
You mentioned to me that you have been raving for over half of your life. How did you enter into raving, and what’s kept you involved all this time?
My first raves were like happy hardcore kandi kids with lockjaw bizz. Kinda gnarly stuff in retrospect but still good urban fun. A couple years in I was finding myself in older crowds doing more traditional electronic genres with much better systems and much more stamina. I was probably 16 finding my first party with actual programming until well into the next day. RIP Cocoon. At one of those parties I approached a guy clearly on crew and told him I wanted to help and knew how to wrap audio cables (a clutch skill for any raver to have!). For the next couple years I found myself under his wing in a crew rocking mostly KV2 speakers around the PNW. RIP Kyle.
Not long after that I got run over by a truck - as I watched it roll over me I remember the resounding thought “at least I got music”. I’m visibly able at this point though so that’s cool I guess. It’s funny to consider what’s kept me INVOLVED all this time… It’s just my life yaknow? Like the only reason I do lots of other stuff (like work ew) is so I can live so I can keep working for the rave.
Besides shifting focus to other genres, can you describe how your musical aliases have documented the growth in your understanding of soundsystem?
Well I went from “P. Ross!” (a random nickname in HS) to “Sugarpea” because promoters always forgot the exclamation point, and then Todd Edwards introduced me to a dancefloor as “Ross”. That was the nail in the coffin for that moniker.
The way the different production aliases have documented growth in my understanding of sound systems is more subtle I suppose, just little things with mixdown, character, learning rules and breaking them etc. I feel like the JamRat stuff was messier but more timbrally coherent, Guidae and Mycelium were both kinda headphone and rules pilled which makes sense as they were during or just after lockdown. The latter stuff focused more on sounds sounding loud and being distinct actors - yes we were thinking about speakers, but we were thinking about how speakers could enact our ideas.
I think the hardcore continuum has much to offer us spiritually, so it makes sense this is where we’ve landed with UKG. The traditional hardcore practice of playing with “music” as sound objects is critical to our collective liberation, physically, now!
What’s next for you?
Well SWEETY02 is around the corner I promise! Heavy Sounds is getting the summer schedule locked down meaning lots of work and lots of fun.
Beyond that, I started a nonprofit called Sound Preservation Syndicate. It’s a real learning experience thus far, but now I can write tax-deductible donation receipts, so if anybody has a windfall they want to keep out of government hands HMU!
The idea is eventually fostering a space where we can train preservationists in recording, transmitting and deploying artifacts on the sonic battlefield. This means classes and mentoring, this means zines and dubplates, this means parties and lectures and beyond! Furthering the consolidation and impact of our own technologies is goal numero uno.
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