Aether.
When Aether, formally known as Jason Taylor, was pronounced legally blind at age 17 with the diagnosis of Retinitis Pigmentosa, he didn’t let it stop him from making music. The producer built keyboards and programs that allow him to continue using production software with audible mechanisms that translate what's happening on the computer screen. Through this method, Taylor has been able to create his signature moody, emotional and angelic sound. Today, March 14, the Scottish-bred and Montreal-based artist showcases his sonic abilities and celebrates 10 years of making music with Moonstone, out via Monstercat.
The four-track EP is inspired by the way gemstones are formed by chemicals and heat reacting beneath the Earth's surface. He aims to convey this transformation in each track, producing each one in order as they sit on the EP, by molding his sound into a refined ambient experience that reflects beauty and light, like a gemstone.
“That's the view I took upon the music,” Taylor says of how he produced the songs to reflect the idea of gemstones. “If you would view the initial ambient sketches as the raw earth and then the final songs as the polished gemstones [that are] transformed in a way that turns something that's already wonderful in its form, you give it a brand new coat of light.”
Moonstone boasts otherworldly sounds, organic soundscapes, glitchy synths, tinkering vocals, downtempo beats and more. It reflects his adaptation to the challenges he faces in the musical domain, and it involves samples of his previous tracks throughout the package. Indeed, Taylor is able to successfully refine a sound of dreamy keys and atmospheric textures.
Aether also spends his time in the studio composing video game soundtracks that can be heard in ... [+]
According to the producer, he maintains some vision although he is registered as legally blind, and the disease begins by deteriorating peripheral vision and night vision. Consequently, he is unable to drive and he can’t leave the house when it’s dark, causing him to feel “cooped up.”
“When it comes to the musical scene,” he says, “I can't really travel to see live shows and stuff unless I'm accompanied by a friend, not a carer but someone who would act in a similar way where I can put my hand on their shoulder and they can guide me around. So that would be the way I would define my current blindness. I'm looking around [during this interview], and I can see the guitars in my room. Fortunately, I'm very grateful to have that be the case.”
Taylor adds that his favorite track he has ever made is “Resplendent Star,” which is a track off of his album slated to be released this summer. He says it was sparked from a conversation he had with his roommate about religion. While he isn’t a religious person, he says his roommate was giving Taylor his perspectives on the Bible and what he took away from it, which wasn’t the religious aspects but more of seeing the light in everything. From this conversation, the idea for his upcoming album was created.
“Every time I was writing these songs, each song was a different emotion that [I was] processing, whether it's acceptance or whether it’s having confidence in yourself—ways to develop yourself,” he says. “It was a very emotional process for me in the studio.”
