In the beginning of 2008 Moby was about to release his eighth album, Last Night, which marked his return to dance music. I’ve known Moby since the ’90s and it became a tradition—at least in my mind—that with each new album we’d meet at his apartment on Mott Street in New York City and I would interview him. I always enjoyed these conversations where I was able to learn about the creative process that informed his latest effort. What added to our engaging chinwags was the setting—we were in the comfort of his home sans doting publicist. Musicians, like most of us, are are more comfortable talking in their kitchen as opposed to a sterile conference room.
I’ve always found Moby to be an approachable, often self-effacing anti-star. He’d probably agree with that sentiment. In fact, back when Big Shot was a print publication, I asked Moby on a whim if he’d guest edit our first anniversary issue in 2004. He didn’t have a new release to promote but was kind enough to curate a fantastic issue reflecting his diverse interests in music and culture. I fondly remember shooting the issue’s cover with photographer Bert Spangemacher in the hallway of Moby’s apartment building one afternoon as his tolerant neighbors squeezed past our makeshift studio setup.
When the press push for Last Night began, I started receiving press releases about legendary Japanese composer/electronic music innovator Ryuichi Sakamoto. I had heard that Sakamoto lived in NYC and was always interested in him and his music. I first discovered Sakamoto in 1983’s Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence, a film about a World War II Japanese prison camp which he scored and starred in opposite David Bowie. I dove deeper and soaked up the groundbreaking work as a member of Yellow Magic Orchestra in the late ’70s and early ’80s. So when I came across a missive about Sakamoto in my inbox, an idea popped into my mind: What if I got Sakamoto and Moby together for a one-on-one interview? I typed up my query and held my breath.
While Moby is ubiquitous in the media, Sakamoto has always been press shy. But the stars aligned and a few weeks later I was able to schedule an afternoon meeting between these two titans of electronic music at Sakamoto’s apartment in the West Village, a reader’s paradise that was filled with books and outfitted with a recording studio in the sub basement. Eight years later their conversation, which touched on politics to gentrifying New York City, is still riveting.
A key moment in the interview is when Sakamoto brings up his staunch anti-nuclear stance, noting that Japan has “3,000 earthquakes a day.” That fact wasn’t lost on Moby who made a prescient observation—three years before the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster following the Tōhoku earthquake on March 11, 2011—when he mused that Japan is “not the smartest place to be building nuclear reactors.” Here is the full interview with Moby and Ryuichi Sakamoto as it appeared in issue 23. Continue Reading
