urika’s bedroom is an LA-based musician and producer. Their debut record, Big Smile, Black Mire, is out now on True Panther.
(Photo Credit: Khari Cousins)
urika’s bedroom is an LA-based musician and producer; Jay Are is a producer and graphic designer, and a member of the LA-based band untitled (halo), whose EP headbanger will be out November 22. ub’s debut record, Big Smile, Black Mire, just came out on True Panther, so to celebrate, the friends and collaborators got together to catch up about it.
— Annie Fell, Editor-in-chief, Talkhouse Music
urika’s bedroom: How did we first become friends? The only thing that I really remember about our first interaction is talking about some cassettes that you guys had [in your apartment]. There were YouTube videos playing on the TV, and it was just very normal, hanging out, everybody’s listening to and talking about music.
Jay Are: Yeah, when it gets to the point of the night where you’re just playing a YouTube video, and then everyone else queues a YouTube video, it’s a very bonding experience. So it’s very easy to make close friends if you do that enough times.
urika: I think it was pretty quick — I met a lot of people really fast at that time, and so it just kind of became normal pretty quick.
Jay: Yeah. I think also we were just seeing each other probably much more frequently…
urika: It was heavy pandemic, so people were hanging out, like, three nights a week.
Jay: Yeah, just watching movies.
urika: As far as transitioning into a music type of friendship, I think even then you had showed me stuff you had put on SoundCloud, or just things you had made on your computer.
Jay: I’ve been listening to old playlists, and it’s just funny because all that stuff is… I still revisit it just to feel the way I felt at the time. But I definitely didn’t know what I was doing in terms of production. I feel like now, I have a clearer sense of how to write songs, how to write with people.
urika: I mean, even me too. Back then, I felt like I was—
Jay: Kind of just throwing shit at the wall.
urika: Yeah, I was just trying out a lot of stuff. But I think that was mid-turning point of all that old stuff I used to work on, I was starting to hate, and trying to figure out a new project. And even then, I feel like we talked about making music together. This was, like, 2021. So we kind of put that in the air a long time ago, even if we hadn’t really tried to do it. To fast forward, when you guys were first doing untitled (halo), I remember a story post where you were like, “Who wants to come over and start a band?”
Jay: [That was] probably Ari [Mamnoon]. And I’m the only one that showed up. This is a story that we’ve been recounting — I remember I pulled up and I showed her a bunch of demos. And I was mostly just trying to get her to record. Just clicking record sometimes is the hardest part to do, unless you’ve already come with a fully cooked idea. But we were just kind of, again, throwing shit at the wall.
urika: Yeah. I saw that post, too, but I had to work or something. Which is like, what if, type shit… [Laughs.] But then I feel like right after, you guy recorded “el prado,” and it was floating around in the group chats. Then it was like, “Oh, let’s make music together.”
Jay: It definitely got thrown around in the group chat.
urika: Yeah, in my mind, it was already out even though it was just in the group chat. So then I was just like, “Oh, yeah, let’s, let’s do some sessions.” But I think you, Jack, and Ari — as soon as we all started doing sessions, it was pretty normal and quick, like three songs every session, and just kept it pushing because you guys work really fast.
Jay: That session that we did where we recorded literally half of “towncryer” — and I was really surprised that we were able to do that really quickly — but as soon as we walked in, you had already been working on “limewire” and you were like, “Hey, this is for you.”
urika: Yeah, I think I had made “limewire” as my warm up. I was like, OK, I’m doing a session, let me warm up.
Jay: OK, flex. [Laughs.]
urika: [Laughs.] Actually, though, I was nervous. I was like, Let me play guitar to warm up so I don’t start the session and sound like shit. So I was playing guitar and I was like, Oh, this riff is cool, and recorded it, and then you guys got here pretty much as I was wrapping that up. Then we worked on a lot of the stuff that was on “towncryer,” and then we kind of sped through three songs, and then we’re like, “What do we want to do now?”
Jay: Because at that point, we already had “el prado.” I think we also had demos of “spiral” and “intrusive.”
urika: Yeah, you definitely did. I think that’s one of my favorite things about doing music with you guys in general, just that it’s really fast and I don’t have to filter too much. Like, we can just keep it moving. I think it keeps the ideas pretty fresh.
Jay: I think that’s the purest way of making anything — not even just music. Sometimes, it is first thought, best thought, the purest idea is the one that you’re able to get out as quickly as possible.
urika: It’s funny because I don’t always do that, but anytime I do anything decent, it is from that. Even as far as the stuff that first got noticed for urika’s bedroom, I feel like I was just doing really quick short sessions by myself, and that stuff just has more energy. When is the first time you made music ever?
Jay: Actually making music, definitely a cracked version of FL. In terms of just getting into music, Guitar Hero. [Laughs.] It’s kind of funny because FL Studio is made by someone who made video games, so I feel like it was really an easy interface. I would just do drum programming, because that was what I was drawn to, and that interface just makes it so easy.
urika: When was that?
Jay: I think I was in high school, so it was maybe 2013? But I vividly remember downloading stems that Death Grips had put out of Exmilitary.
urika: I downloaded those too.
Jay: I think that’s the first time I ever saw tracks by themselves like that. like I was like, Oh, this is how… It just clicked. I was like, Oh, these are just layers. I was already in graphic designer mode by then. I pretty much applied the same thing I do with design to music, where I’m just like, OK, these are the negative spaces that I need to fill in.
urika: I had my cracked Ableton around the same time in, like, 2014. And I had made music before that, but it wasn’t anything to be proud of.
Jay: You had to get it out.
urika: Yeah. I mean, it’s weird to think about, but I was on GarageBand in middle school — so 2009, 2008. Maybe even 2007, I was already on GarageBand. I think I had a similar moment where I was just like, Oh, they have all these pre-made loops that are just layers for songs. And I was just making songs out of premade loops, and then just rapping over them. And it was so bad. [Laughs.] I didn’t make that much — I wasn’t some prolific kid or something. I made, like, three songs and then I went outside. That was my first time with software where I was just like, Oh shit, this is a thing. But then I remember that always sticking with me. Then at some point in high school, I just got it into my head — even though he doesn’t use it, I was like, Toro Y Moi uses Ableton. He does not. And I was like, Flying Lotus uses Ableton. I need to get Ableton.
Jay: I didn’t get Ableton until way after. That’s another core memory with making music, when I was just in my tiny dorm room and I finally figured out how to arpeggiate synths. So there was a time when I was just making… I don’t even know how I would categorize it. I think during that time, I had the Lex Luger drum kit. I didn’t really know how to do loops at the time, so I had to program pretty much just four bars, and then just copy pasting…
urika: Yeah, totally.
Jay: But I was trying to mix that with, like, slowed down synths. Also when I saw Animal Collective — because in the “My Girls” video, they have a 404, and I was like, What’s that? — that was another click for me where it was like, Oh, yeah, they’re not playing any instruments. Or they’re not visibly playing them, they’re just triggering all these different sounds.
urika: It’s so wild to me because I was so gear ignorant as a kid. I just could not conceive of the fact that people had all this gear. I was just like, All these people are wizards, they’re playing all this stuff on instruments and it’s insane.
Jay: I’m trying to think of what that argument is called — it’s, like, “rockist,” where it’s respected more because you’re playing guitar.
urika: I think that plays into our current projects, though.
Jay: Yeah, kind of just playing with that structure.
urika: Yeah. untitled (halo) and urika’s bedroom, I feel like we both recognize guitar as a symbol. But I don’t think we’re trying to be rock bands, at the end of the day. I don’t think that’s the goal.
Jay: I think we both have that producer-forward mindset… I’m thinking of how different bands, or different structured projects, have to jam out for an hour in order to get something out of it. But it’s really intuitive to just be able to see everything on software, and feel it out by putting the first thought down and then rehashing it later.
urika: Yeah. I’m not gonna write a song and then rewrite it a thousand times and rerecord it a thousand times. I feel like I know what the vibe I’m going for is for a song, and I’m going to try and get to that straight away. And if that’s not hitting, I might keep trying it a little bit. But I’m really bad at keeping a song around if it’s not immediately it. I’ll just be like, “That’s trash. I’ll just write a better version of whatever that idea is.” It’s not about the song to me, it’s just the concept.
Jay: How long does it take you to realize if it’s it or not?
urika: 10, 15 minutes. [Laughs.] I feel like I realize pretty quickly when it’s like, This is not executing the idea. But even when that happens, I feel like I will still try and finish a song, because then maybe there’s something else that just randomly happens in there and I can just pivot.
Jay: Sometimes it is just walking away.
urika: Yeah. But more now than ever, I feel like I’m not gonna just pore over a bad idea.
Jay: Someone described [untitled (halo)] — I think it was this French magazine — they were talking about hauntology. I feel like that’s thrown around with a lot of projects, especially ones that are sample based. I think it’s… not necessarily lazy, but it’s just kind of pretentious.
urika: I think it’s tricky because a lot of art in general today, people are nostalgia fishing. Which I think in some ways is valid, because nostalgia fishing is also just referencing a personal and individual past; everybody has a childhood and a past, so obviously you can reference that. But at the same time, on a larger scale, it’s low-hanging fruit. It’s like instant reference points.
Jay: I think also we live in the most visually literate times, so everyone is already exposed to so many images per day.
urika: But people aren’t — AI is whooping people’s asses. People see an AI video and are like, “Oh, my god, I can’t believe this is real.”
Jay: [Laughs.] OK, let me clarify: visually literate as in, like, visual culture literate.
urika: Yeah.
Jay: Also, do you think urika’s bedroom is on a mood board somewhere, and someone is claiming to have coined “digital decay” as a new buzzword?
urika: I don’t know. I don’t think so. I feel like I haven’t even tapped into my real visual core yet of what I’m trying to do. So much of me putting out music right now as urika’s bedroom has just been reactionary, out of necessity. Like, I got an opportunity and I was like, Oh, shit, I should have a song out because I’m doing this, whether it’s playing in somebody else’s band and I’m opening up whatever. So every time I put music out for the last two years was kind of out of necessity, and I didn’t really have a rollout where I had all my stuff figured out. And in that way, I feel like a lot of the visual stuff was just on the fly. Which I think gave it a cool vibe. But in terms of what I really want to do visually, I don’t think I’ve tapped into that yet.
Jay: Do you have a favorite song off your upcoming record?
urika: It’s either “Century Love” or “*66.” But I’m really attached to these new live versions of some songs — there’s a live version of “Junkie” that came out of this extended cut ambient version I made, and it feels crazy to play. It just feels great to play live. I think that has me more excited right now than anything.
Well, great time talking.
Jay: Yes, sir!
(Photo Credit: left, Khari Cousins; right, Adali Schell)
