IARA LEE: EYES OF ELECTRONICA BY AIDIN VAZIRI

Electronic music has always been a medium of radical experimentation and pioneering. Since the days of minimalist composers like Philip Glass and Steve Reich through to the Hip-Hop avant-garde of the present, the use of synthetic instrumentation has spawned countless genres of music. During the forty-odd years that comprise the history of electronic music, several figures have emerged as influential forerunners of particular sounds or styles. In her new film Modulations, filmmaker Iara Lee takes the viewer on a journey through that rich history, discovering along the way the origins, cultural impact, and evolution of this modern artform. To complete this "journey," she herself traveled the world conducting nearly 300 interviews with everyone from Afrika Bambaataa and Ryuichi Sakamoto to DJ Shadow and the Prodigy.

Lee, thirty-one, achieved notoriety for her 1996 film debut Synthetic Pleasures, a hyper-kinetic documentary about the blurring lines between things artificial and natural. Modulations is familiar territory for the filmmaker given that much of the focus of electronic music over the decades has been the interface between creativity and technology. Lee is specially suited to such an endeavor with a style of filmmaking that closely resembles the aesthetic qualities often associated with electronic music. Her conscious use of technology to solve production issues, as well as her acceptance of "glitches" and other "mistakes," give her a philosophical commonalty with her subjects.

Modulations, which premieres at this year's Sundance Film Festival, is only one of several projects she and her new production company Caipirinha have been hard at work on. The week before Christmas, writer Aidin Vaziri sat down with Lee when she was in the Bay Area to do the final sound mix for her film.

AV: Where did you find the inspiration for Modulations?

IL: "I'd always thought I didn't want to make a documentary because it would be too hard, but this film (became) an extension of what I started with Synthetic Pleasures, in which we were studying aspects of controlled environments, bodies, and minds. I had interacted with a lot of musicians who were using technology to make music, so (Modulations) was a way of giving the subject... more focus."

What were the main topics you wanted to address?

"I wanted to ask&emdash; how does technology impact music-making and the concepts of music-making? Is electronic music something that started with raves? No, it goes back to the futurists&emdash;Stockhausen, John Cage, and so forth. My idea was to (explain) how the pioneers and the intellectuals of electronic music influenced rave and techno music. My main interest is always the philosophical aspect of this cultural shift. Technology empowers us. You have this very sophisticated sound that is not created in a big studio but in someone's bedroom. That was very interesting to me."

Did you realize there was such an extensive history behind electronic music?

"Kraftwerk, for me, is the way of pin-pointing when pop starts with electronic music. People think Brian Eno is the father of ambient, but actually it was John Cage. One of the people in my film, DXT, who did the scratching on Herbie Hancock's 'Rockit,' said Stockhausen was the precursor to hip-hop. It's interesting to me how (everything is) totally interrelated. The film is a lot about collage, about how we did it all, and now we're basically regurgitating and resampling and recontextualizing everything. There are no new elements, but the way things are combined and put together creates these different results."

Was it difficult to take this vast subject and make it cohesive?

"This film, in a way, demands a lot from the audience. I didn't organize it in a chronological way. Since the subject matter is so wide, I can't go too deep... The film is more like a journey; it's not an education. I expect people to watch the film and then do a little bit of homework. There is nothing casual in the film; everything is very well thought out. When you first see it, you may miss a lot of things. It's more like an appetizer. That's why I think it would be nice to make a book&emdash;to go deeper into the subject. (The film) is a journey, going through disco, house, jungle, Detroit techno and getting into how this music was created out of the 'misuse' of the synthesizer and...went on to influence the whole world's youth culture."

Did you go into the artist interviews with a loose story board?

"I had a book of questions. There were certain topics I'd wanted to discuss, like&emdash;what is this culture made of? What is this music made of? How did this music start? It started with kids who had no access to big or expensive equipment. They took these synthesizers that 'failed,' according to the original desire of sounding like an acoustic instrument, and used them for what they actually were. These little boxes actually launched this new genre of music and a big revolution of youth culture. The film is really about the impact of the technology in music-making, about how music impacts culture at large and how culture affects music."

How selective were you about the artists you chose to cover?

"When you are editing, there are so many elements to consider. It's not only about the good musicians, but also about the way they articulate within the context of the storytelling... The narrative is told by the musicians, but we're not trying to portray musicians (so much as) trying to reconstruct how things started and where they've gone. It's not really about the best of the best or the who's who. I feel bad that I can't use all the interviews, but maybe there will be a second part to this film..."

What lessons did you learn from making Synthetic Pleasures?

"You try to cut corners, but you can't cut too many because, if your standards are high, you're just going to keep re-doing everything. This time I used more professional people. I indulged myself in a higher tech way of (filmmaking). Synthetic Pleasures was edited on Steamback, a very low-tech way of doing things. This time we edited everything on the Avid and used computers from start to finish to log everything, digitize, (and) edit; in the end, the whole process is going to be in the digital domain, which does help because of the cumbersome activity of logging all the footage. We needed the computers just to figure out where things were. You do learn, because the process was much more efficient and fast. The first (film) took three-and-a-half years; this one took just one year."

How big was the crew on Modulations?

"The crew is small. I always have a camera and a sound person&emdash;and sometimes an assistant. We have to hop around all over the world. We covered the Berlin Love Parade, went to Sonar in Barcelona, did the Essential Music Festival in England, and visited tons of clubs in New York, Toronto and around the United States. It's crazy, but I think it's much more efficient with small crew because the communication is faster. It was a logistical nightmare to go to all of these countries with customs and all our equipment. I did a lot of virtual filmmaking too. I would hire a cameraman in another country and e-mail all my questions. He would get my questions and conduct the interview without my presence, which I had to do to cut costs. Sometimes I had three shoots in one night&emdash;one shoot in Montreal, one in Paris, one in England. (As) I couldn't be in three countries at the same time, this 'virtual filmmaking' became the best solution."

Was the shift in camera styles a matter of style or convenience?

"Most of the film&emdash;interviews, for example&emdash;was actually shot with digital equipment. My interviews were very lengthy. We could not afford to interview 300 musicians for two hours each with film. The film footage was mainly shot with a Bolex camera, because it's the least intrusive. We did a lot of experiments with that. When we were in Japan, we had this big crowd dancing, but we didn't have a high vantage point to shoot from. So my cameraman would repeatedly throw the Bolex into the air to get the footage. When we were shooting the skateboarding kids, my cameraman would chase them on skateboards. The whole style was very experimental. I wanted to incorporate a lot of the glitches like camera roll outs, flares, and jump cuts. All these elements that are considered impurities I wanted to integrate into the style of editing. I think it's a little bit of what happens with music. We don't look for clean sounds any more. We use digital technology, but we like the dirt. Some musicians even specialize in making music with glitches. I like the idea of using zeros and ones of digital with the impurities of low resolution."

How much archival footage did you use?

"This time I filmed a lot of the material. Synthetic Pleasures used a lot of pre-existing material and computer animation by third parties. I would say only 20 percent of Modulations was other people's material."

Was it difficult to get all the clearances for the interviews and the music?

"I could become a lawyer now. There's so much hassle. You would think that because this music is not mainstream it would be easy to deal with. But sometimes it's more complicated. These underground labels don't have offices or people sorting out these requests; the record label is often their bedroom. It makes it more difficult. On the other hand, a lot of these small labels are part of a conglomerate like Polygram or Warner Special Products. It becomes very cumbersome to deal with. I'd want to use ten seconds of a track, and they're trying to charge me $50,000. Ridiculous! It's kind of sad, because when you're making a documentary you want support; it's a document, not a Hollywood picture. But it's hard to convince people. There was some footage in our film that we had to lose at the last minute because of some problem with permissions. The fact that we got invited to festivals so fast, even before the film was totally locked, gave us very little time to do the clearances. I didn't want to lock with footage that I would later have to take out and re-cut. Hopefully, after mutilating the film, it's still going to be good."

You market your independent films broadly, using soundtracks, books, and clothing.
Is that unusual?

"Ultimately, a book is going to complement the movie you've created. Most of the films I make have so many tracks that I could put out a soundtrack series. We like to create all the paraphernalia. After I did my first film, we launched a record label; we released six CDs that are doing really well. In 1998, I plan to double that. It's all integrated, because the research I do for the movie can be used for A&R at the record label, just as the contacts we make at the label can be used for the film. I see art as totally multimedia...not just one isolated thing."

How do you have enough time to devote to all these projects?

"I sleep very little. Sometimes I wonder if I'm going to drive myself this crazy forever. It's much more difficult to be simple. It's easy to get yourself complicated, but to go back to simplicity is very hard. In the end, life is so short that you always have to think about leaving some sort of cultural legacy. There is nothing else you can do. There is a lot of suffering required, but you can only do it for so long without some form of support."

Have you designed a clothing line for Modulations?

"I did with Synthetic Pleasures, but I haven't yet for the new film. My sister and I are planning to do something high-tech and related to this music. It's still not finished. At this point, I'm more into pushing the book project and the soundtrack. But we will do something later."

Is this a trend other independent filmmakers will pick up on?

"I'm wondering how many filmmakers would be willing to give up their lives to devote their time to this. One has to be willing to run these activities without the support of any big companies. The idea is there, but who wants to do it? It (takes) a lot of organization, a lot of money, and the coordination of different talent. Every medium requires a whole new technicality, and each is its own legal nightmare. If there are filmmakers willing to learn all these aspects, then I can say that I started a trend."

Will you ever take on a project of such proportions again?

"No. The next adventure will be a fiction film. I'm looking for a screenwriter. I was also thinking of producing other people's films, using the expertise I got working on these films. I want to work with young, talented filmmakers who want to do their first films."

How do you plan on distributing Modulations?

"I want to have a small theatrical release. People tell me I'm crazy because nobody wants to go to theaters to see documentaries. But I'm stubborn. With Synthetic Pleasures, I ended up doing the distribution myself. We sent it to 70 cities in the United States and got very good reviews. I'd like to do the same with this one. It's a lot of work because in America electronic music is just starting to happen. It's still really underground. I'm trying to team up with some good promoters and have parties with screenings of Modulations. The very first screening will be at Sundance, so we will see. I had some offers for Synthetic Pleasures, but they were so small I felt like the distributors had less power than me. If I get a more high profile offer (for Modulations), I will give them the film. But if it's something small, I'd rather do it myself. After going all out to make a film, why not make the extra effort to get it shown? Otherwise, there's no point in working so hard."