Three years ago Allen Avanessian, Plug Research founder and keen producer in his own right, decided it was time to bring his extended family a little closer together: “I had always wanted to work with different producers from my label as well as producers and MCs I respected from around the globe, to create an album that would fit the aesthetic of what we feel is a progressive move for electronic music.”
In addition to running Plug Research, Allen has been DJing since he was 12 and producing since he was 17, while Jimmy Tamborello (Dntel, The Postal Service and Figurine), his prime collaborator on Headset has been a producer since the tender age of 13.
From this nucleus of Allen and Jimmy, who produced most of the album, Headset soon expanded to a loose association of illustrious contributors, with additional production by John Tejada and Daedelus, while Thomas Fehlmann (The Orb, Ocean Club) added atmospheres to “Sound of A Squint”. Words to the beats came from a number of local and distant MCs - in the true spirit of musical networking Non-GENETIC of the Shadow Huntaz (featured on “Then Again” and “Back Before”) not only brought Metalogic and his cousin Rocmon (who is also featured on “Then Again”) along to the recording, but also introduced Headset to Lady Dragon, who rhymes over “Grasping Claw” in Japanese.
Local hero Subtitle, contributed his atypical rhyming style on “Breath Contrails,” probably closest of all to the West Coast sound, while Beans (Anti Pop Consortium) got involved via a long-distance exchange: when Allen sent him a beat, he came up with “Jaw Modulation”, already destined to become a timeless hip-hop classic. Nevertheless, the production duo’s secret favorite turned out to be “Breath Contrails”, originally written by and for Dntel, here simply flipped and twisted into an electronic/hip-hop hybrid, slithering through the entire track with its breathless vocal acrobatics.
By inviting friends and acquaintances to contribute parts of their sound, views and vision, Headset has become a true blueprint of the current Plug Research periphery. Musically, spiritually and geographically, this is a joint effort, and an enlightened one.
