Contagion

In_Faction: You do so much in the field of music. . .you must have no time! Is Contagion your highest priority, or is it more of a hobby amongst your many projects?

Keith Arem: Contagion was really my first professional project after College. Unfortunately, immediately after the first album, I was pulled in so many different directions that Contagion lost it’s initial focus. I was really paranoid that friends and fans would think that I’d “sold out” from working on so many other projects, so I’ve been making an effort to revitalize interest in the group. We still get about 30,000 hits each month on the website, so were know there is still a strong fan base, so this year we’re going to try and get another release out.

IF: You have an extensive amount of education in music production under your belt. How do you feel about artists that release lots of material, but have learned informally and on their own?

KA: I think that formal training offers discipline and theory that may not be achieved otherwise, however I constantly find that I need to break the rules to get the sound I want. I think that people who learn informally are not restricted by conventional ways of thinking, and may find their own way through experimentation. Although I have had extensive production training, I found that I was much more creative when I ignored traditional things that I had learned. I still think education is important, but it doesn’t make up for real world experience.

IF: You had a track on Troma’s “The Chosen One”. I rented the flick to hear your contribution, and it was great, but as for the movie itself....no comment!

KA: Yeah, well....I actually really had fun experimenting on this project. I did the entire score for this film entirely in ProTools, which is a non-linear digital editing system. Rather than a traditional score, I created hundreds of instruments, voices, and sound effects and I edited everything direct to picture. The score became more raw and tribal, allowing me to incorporate more sound design elements.

IF: After working with the hard-edged sounds of Contagion and various “death/destruction” interactive game soundtracks, you must have had a miserable time producing music for “The Jungle Book” and “Golden Nugget” casino games...

KA: For these projects, I try to focus my attention on sound design and traditional engineering. If I’m not comfortable doing the score myself, I will often subcontract musicians for these types of projects. Once I’m brought onto a project, I try to take each production as a challenge. . . even if I don’t directly relate to the style of the work. I also like the irony that most clients have no idea of what my real musical background is.

IF: You work for some pretty big companies. Virgin and Capitol aren’t the typical homestead of bands of your style. How did you become involved with each?

KA: Actually, working with larger companies had compromised our initial credibility with fans. Most of the aggro-industrial culture (including myself) tends to reject any form of bureaucracy, so our signing with a major label was very suspicious. Our first deal with Capitol was established through “World Domination”, which was their production label at the time. We liked the fact that we could have Capitol’s distribution power, but the support of an indie. Some fans thought the Capitol deal was going to be a sell out, but after the record was released we were able to retain most of our creative freedom. I was hired by Virgin Interactive in 1994 to direct their audio facilities. I had just finished scoring my first few motion pictures and video games when Virgin offered me the position. I really didn’t want to work in-house for a big company, but they have been very flexible; allowing me to work on outside projects on my own time (I’ve even done work for Playboy, Disney, and Universal, but I won’t go there...). Although I did direct and score the majority of our releases, I try not to let this conflict with the band projects.

IF: Does your non-Contagion related work keep you from devoting attention to Contagion, touring, side projects, ect-?

KA: Unfortunately, it has. My work over the past 5 years has really kept me out of the band scene, but I think this next year things may change. My production label, PCB Productions, and several of my side projects are also getting a lot of attention, so I may be back in the industry very soon.

IF: When you toured with Front Line Assembly, you must have gained a lot of recognition. Since a lot of your work was released independently, how did a somewhat high profile tour help? How is your progress now?

KA: The FLA tour really helped jump start our album. Contagion was formerly know as Biohazard PCB, but due to a legal maneuver, we were forced to change our name a few weeks before our CD release. This really killed our initial fan support because no one really knew about the name change in time. We actually had people accusing us of ripping off of Biohazard PCB songs, until they realized it was actually still the same band. Once word got out, the tour was fantastic. Front Line were great to tour with, and the audience was exactly right for our music. I think that most of this culture is word of mouth, so a larger tour really got our music heard. We were asked to come out to headline several shows after the tour, and continue to get requests for concerts. Unfortunately, until the next CD comes out, we probably won’t be doing any shows...

IF: Is it hard to work with bands such as Reel Big Fish, Low Pop Suicide, Teen Heroes,ect.? Is it just part of your job at Virgin, or do you enjoy working with music outside of your own genre?

KA: For most of the band projects, I’ve been doing MTV music video mixing and sound design. The Reel Big Fish, Goldfinger, MxPx, and Teen Hero videos have gotten a great response, so I’ve been getting a lot of work outside of my music deals. I’ve produced several tracks and remixes for electronic based groups, but I really enjoy the sound design work too.

IF: What are your future plans, for both Contagion and yourself? What projects can we look forward to?

KA: We are currently working on the soundtrack for the upcoming ultra-violent fighting game “Thrill Kill” for Sony Playstation. There are 11 new songs in the game, and we are looking to release a soundtrack album based on mixes from the game. The game is pretty violent, and hopefully the controversy will get it more attention. We also have several new tracks in production for the next album. We’re hoping to get our next CD released before the end of the year...

IF: Any last comments, words to the wise, rants, or messages for your fans?

KA: Thanks to everyone for the long time support. Sorry for the wait, but keep your eyes out. We’ll make it up.

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