I was really impressed by the thumping new single by Ara One and invited her to answer a few questions for my blog; here they are:
Please give us a brief background about yourself?
Well I released my first track as Ara One called “Through Space and Time “ in my last year of high school in 2021 as a final project for my audiovisual class. It was independently released through Distrokid, though I recently was lucky enough and switched to being distributed by AWAL.
How did you get your name? Were there any names you rejected?
The name “Ara One” comes from the Greek constellation “Ara“ which was an altar where Zeus and other greek gods made an alliance before defeating the titans. I was looking for a space themed name and this one was short, simple and beautiful, so I went with it. Now I must admit The “One” part was added purely because I thought It sounded like a serial number that a cyborg would have, so the whole name Ara One to me sounds like a very cool cyborg model haha. I did consider other names like Andromeda but I think they all sounded a little too cliche.
How would you describe your music?
I would generally describe my music as a sci-fi inspired genre mix that an inter dimensional entity would listen to on a festival from the 15th dimension (the 14th dimension is too lame).
Tell us about your creative process and where do you record?
I produce and record everything in my bedroom (if you ask my neighbours they’ll gladly confirm). My creative process is a big mess because I’m a very disperse person, I can get inspired randomly at 3 am and make the best chorus of my career and not finish the song until 4 months later just because I can’t get into the right mindset. It takes me a lot of time sometimes to finish tracks because I’m very perfectionistic (especially with vocals) and often get stuck on little details, I’m working on doing it less though.
What are your musical influences?
Well I think everything I listen to throughout my life influences me sonically in one way or another, from bands like Gorgoroth, Gojira, System of a Down or Metallica, all the way to Bach, Chopin, Marilyn Manson and also artists like Grimes, Purity Ring, Yeule and (recently) Poppy and Jazmin Bean . Whenever I make a track I don’t consciously think of any artist but once I finish it I can many times recognize how a particular song or artist (or a mix of a couple ) has influenced me in the process.
Please tell us about your latest work?
My latest single NonSelf is a criticism to extremely polarizing opinions and trends online. It seems to me that many times people jump on opinions and conclusions without thinking about them and it creates this almost mob mentality effect where you have two massive groups of people extremely enraged one at the other where most of them don’t really have a good reason for it. This is besides one of them being right or wrong, its about many of the people confidently hating others or someone in particular, having only a vague notion of why the discussion is happening in the first place.
Do you play live shows, if so, what do they involve?
I am starting to experiment more with Ableton Live and the Launchpad so playing live shows with them is definitely something I’m looking forward to doing this year.
What can we expect from you next?
I’m currently working on finishing my first album that I expect to release this fall/winter. It will contain some of the singles I’ve released so far and some new tracks as well. As for NonSelf, I’m also working on a super cool sci-fi entity music video and visualizer that I’ll be putting out shortly after the release of the single.
Which track would you like to nominate for the Spotify Sidetrack Jukebox and why?
Well if I had to pick one track I’d have to mention Grimes again and say 4ÆM. I just think it’s an absolute production masterpiece. The vibe it has is amazing and it has so many little details that you can get lost in them, as a producer I really appreciate that.
Finally, where is the best place for people to connect with you?
I think at the moment the platform I use the most is Instagram, I do have other social media but Instagram is the one I’m more comfortable sharing new ideas, 3D render prototypes, makeup… or any other thing I come up with so I’d be really happy to connect with the people of this world there.
Ara One's single NonSelf is available now - please check out @araoneprototype on Instagram for more information.