For a lot of people from the Dutch or more specific Utrecht scene, Thrills in +41 isn't a new name. Actually, the name is relatively new indeed, as he was previously active under his real name, Lucas Tromer. Earlier this year he released his first EP called Mind Express on United Identities, a 3 track EP filled with clubby atmospheres and high tempo breakbeats. He also contributed to compilations on Amsterdam based label Who's Susan and Unposed from Germany. In May we visited him at his home studio to have a conversation about his musical beginnings, current projects and more.
While having been a music lover since he was a child and a DJ for quite a while now, Lucas has only recently started producing and releasing his own music. His first meeting with music production was Dance eJay, a Windows and later on PlayStation released software from the late nineties where you could experiment with pre-made loops and sounds. A while later he started working with Fruity Loops (nowadays knows as FL Studio) but at the time it was more about playing around without intention to really do something with it. More than a year ago, during the start of the pandemic, Lucas decided to embrace his passion for music and the creation of it, and started to transform the silence and loneliness into sound.
A typical Thrills in +41 track is hectic, filled with synthesised sounds and microsamples flying through the tracks. The influences from nineties breakbeat and jungle are obvious. A good example of this is the track he dropped on his soundcloud, Ben Skafani earlier this year, a Gwen Stefani edit clocking in at the ever so underrated 160 beats per minute. Earlier this month he also did a DJ set at RadioRadio, using only unreleased work of his own. For those of you interested in hearing how diverse his sound is, ranging from ambiences and soundscapes to the club heavy hitters, the livestream is available for playback on the RadioRadio Soundcloud page.
Talking about musical diversity, another example of this would be the following project Lucas has been working on. In collaboration with Tijmen Lohmeijer (known for his work under the name Tala Drum Corps), he did sound design for an audiovisual installation called Canvas: What Does Freedom Look Like, presented by Utrechts own Tivoli Vredenburg. Lucas told me he would love to work on films and projects like that, so this is a perfect step in that direction.
Lucas has suffered from Tinnitus, a complaint about always hearing sound or noise even when the room is silent. Now that he has found has a way to cope with this, he made it his mission to help others. Tinnitus can be caused by several causes such as ear damage by exposure to too loud sound, but can high stress levels can cause Tinnitus too. In this point of time, we don't have much info about Tinnitus and how to cure it, even though it isn't a rare complaint. So that is why Lucas himself decided to research it for his master at the HKU. He specifically researched in the context of music producers, such as himself. He came up with a concept called: The Cardgame for Music Producers. As you might expect, this is about a cardgame for music producers. The cards in this game feature little tasks to raise the awareness of Tinnitus and helps you keep your ears "fresh,"and others cards help stimulate your creativity or productivity. In our time and our circles a lot of people suffer from Tinnitus or other forms of ear damage, but a lot of people still don't take it too serious. So I'm really glad to see individuals like Lucas take action to raise the awareness of problems such as this.
Next week Thrills in +41 will release his second EP on the before mentioned label Who's Susan. The first two singles are already out and the full EP called Skipman 1998 will be released November 19th. The first single is called Purifry The Attention and it's a bass heavy hitter, featuring everything you'd expect from a Thrills in +41 track. The other single, d'Ache, leans a bit more towards house and perfectly shows how diverse this producer is within the world of club music. The full EP is definitely something to look out for.
Steppin' Into Tomorrow stands with artists & labels and encourages listeners to support by buying their music directly from Bandcamp.
Comments