It is difficult to talk to Moby without imagining him in a remote country house, although the singer has decided to leave the camera on black during the interview and feed the legend of the pop star who went from shy composer to king of the party and collector of great drunkenness to almost ascetic and retired from the madding crowd. His latest album is called Always centered at night, Rare avis in his career that serves as a pretext to remember a past full of self-destruction, fame and music and, with its mix of voices from artists from all over the world (don’t expect to find big stars) and soul, jazz, blues and drum’n’bass renewed by electronics, has been hailed as one of the best of his career.
His career in the musical world was in checkmate when he presented playan album that he believed would be the last on his resume, but the album sold more than 10 million copies and its songs became the soundtrack of an entire generation that enjoyed his hits while he dated celebrities, called Madonna friends and David Bowie and made the night his best companion.
His current life is completely opposite. Always centered at night consists of working with writers and artists to create songs inspired by the spirit of musical discovery. Singer, songwriter, producer, author and animal rights activist, his arms are covered by an immense tattoo that reads Animal Rights, album title hardcore which he published in 1996, and on his neck it reads Vegan For Life.
”When I was little, I was determined to have a big voice,” he recalls. “When I was nine years old I wanted to be the best singer in the world, like David Bowie, but I realized quite early that although my voice is not bad, it is not wonderful. In the eighties, when I started working on my own electronic music, I realized that if I wanted to have beautiful vocals on my albums, I had to find great singers and learn to work with them. I’m not looking for technical perfection, just a voice that makes me feel. The irony is that many technically perfect voices don’t really give me anything emotionally, while those that have more personality and character are the ones I fall in love with.
When she talks about that type of strong voice, as a Spaniard, it is impossible not to ask her why. Rosalia. I don’t know her, I’m sorry for my ignorance.
Having worked with so many singers, have you also had to get used to dealing with explosive egos? You have to approach each person with a different strategy. Some singers believe that they should be technically perfect, but what I look for is that they be emotionally perfect. Many feel comfortable in that technical perfection, so one of my tricks, when I bring in a singer, is to turn off the microphone and tell him to sing simply to warm up his voice. That’s the material I end up using.
Although now that the secret has been revealed, the trick loses its power… As long as you work with singers who speak Spanish and read ICON. Then yes.
How does it feel to know that nowadays, songs are increasingly shorter because of Tik Tok? When music becomes so manufactured and algorithm-driven, the question is when is music no longer music? Her goal has always been to be expressive, happy, sad, spiritual or interesting, not to respond to an algorithm. That’s why when music changes to adapt to technology, I don’t even know if we can continue talking about music anymore…
On many occasions he talks about himself as a narcissist. Is it still considered as such? 20 years ago, a childhood friend told me: “I’ve finally solved the mystery: all this time I thought you were a narcissist, but what you are is an only child. You simply haven’t grown up among people.” I live alone and usually work alone, the truth is that I am not good at understanding humans. If we went to a party, I tended to leave, and he would get offended, but then he realized that in reality, he didn’t know what he was supposed to do. I hope he is right and that he is not a belligerent narcissist. I have a test to know when someone is, and it consists of analyzing how many questions he has asked me and how many I have asked him.
![DJ Moby](https://imagenes.elpais.com/resizer/v2/I6WQEKGBB5CUZO7A66WYZXRKGQ.jpg?auth=75f9cda90b4fd8736f03a2114f003f639e2a10a52730ac0ba9a12c2278a94e52&width=414)
He once suffered an electrocution and said that surprisingly, he felt calm. Have you found a less near-death way to achieve calm? It was one of the strangest experiences of my life, because I didn’t get hurt. I remember being taken to the airport and there I was, sitting and feeling strangely calm. It’s not that I felt good, but that I felt a neutral calm. You know those electroshock therapies from the past? They used to be barbaric, but now they say it calms some people, and I think I accidentally had electroconvulsive therapy.
Before releasing your album play, played the album for a date to listen to and evaluate. Have you done it with the new one? I haven’t been on a date in nine years.
Giving up on dating and sex seems like a widespread movement… I have had many dates when I was young, and now I think there are more interesting things. Spirituality, creativity, activism, creative projects, hiking... All of that is better than going on dates, which are fine, but it is not better than going to the top of a mountain.
Without quotes to give your opinion, what do you think of your album? The first thing to evaluate is the process by which it was made, because it was somewhat complicated. The pandemic forced me to get into Soundcloud, YouTube, Spotify and turn on the radio to listen to singers I had never heard before. That took me a long time, as well as getting in touch with them, finding out if they wanted to collaborate, sending and receiving the music… However, I hope the music doesn’t sound complicated. No one needs to realize how difficult it was to do it, but when I listen to it, I think about how complicated it was. I’m very grateful that it turned out well.
“It’s liberating not to think about commercial success, because for me it’s not even an option. “I’m relatively reconciled to the idea of making music that no one pays attention to.”
He believed, not with much vision, that play It was going to be a failure… Do you think this one can succeed? I don’t even know if there’s a world where non-pop music has any chance of being successful, and I find that liberating. I can’t compete with Taylor Swift or Cardi B, so… Why try? I’m 58 years old and I don’t tour, apart from a couple of shows in September… It’s liberating not to think about commercial success, because for me it’s not even an option. I’m relatively reconciled to the idea of making music that no one pays attention to.
100% of the profits from his tour will go to European organizations fighting for animal rights. My life’s work is working for animal rights. That is my job, the non-fun part of what I do, while music is the fun refuge, an activity that brings me calm and pleasure when I am not developing the role of activist. But for me, working for animal rights is the most important thing, more than my life. I couldn’t go on tour and make money for myself when the truth is I don’t need it. It would seem disgusting and wrong to me.
Do those of us who eat meat seem like scum to you? The first 19 years of my life I loved going to Burger King and pepperoni pizza. I think that when people eat meat they don’t realize that what they are eating are animals. If you go to the butcher shop, what you buy doesn’t look like an animal. People take it home and don’t see the process, so they don’t think about how horrible it is. In fact, if you try to show the process in the US, you can be arrested. There are people in jail for having recorded what happens. I think that says a lot about it: the people involved know it’s such a terrible thing, they make it illegal to document it.
![DJ Moby shows his tattoo](https://imagenes.elpais.com/resizer/v2/S4QZJFJLTVARNF3Y7E5WGVSTLM.jpg?auth=f72d3ff053753535961e267a737c4ffd983e0488349eff6b93e6c54f49b2c7ca&width=414)
What do you think about people continuing to support Donald Trump? It’s something horrible. I think there are a lot of Republicans who are old, racist, ignorant people, people who tend to hate, and Trump’s problem is that he has told them that hating is okay. That’s his great gift, allowing people to be the worst version of him. When he was young we thought that Republicans thought differently than us and that they weren’t bad people, but those who support Trump are. These are people who are happy to strip people of their rights and who support the use of guns. The sad thing is that that hatred has always been there, but now it is part of the system. I’m not proud to be an American right now.
He goes to bed very early and considers that meeting for dinner at eight in the afternoon is crazy… What do you think that in Spain we have dinner at ten? I think it’s great. When I drank, Spain was paradise for me. Staying out until six made perfect sense when he was always drinking. I remember being in Ibiza, having dinner at midnight and thinking that was heaven. Now I am a sober old man and live like a celibate farmer. I go to bed at nine at night, I wake up at four in the morning… The way I approach life and sleep is not very Spanish.
When did you decide to stop drinking? There were about a thousand moments where I felt like it had gotten out of hand, but I never stopped. In 2008 I found myself hungover again and I realized that nothing was going to get better, that the hangovers were getting worse… I couldn’t pretend that nothing was happening. In October 2008 I realized that after decades of alcohol and drugs, the time had come to stop.
You have worked with dozens of celebrities, is there one that stands out to you? Once I was brunch and Al Gore came to talk to me about climate change. I like people who use their voices and their platforms to talk about important things. I have no respect for those who are afraid to do it, and just want to promote themselves.
What is the worst thing about fame? I would never complain about it, because it is wonderful to have financial resources and to be able to use the money to help activism and support creative projects. The only thing I would complain about is that fame can be lonely, because sometimes it’s hard to have normal friendships when people see you as someone different. But considering that I can use my platform to talk about climate change and animal rights, it pays to be alone if I can do good.
Did that happen to you with Bowie, for example, did you see him precisely as someone different because you were a fan? There is a scene in Wayne’s World in which Mike Myers meets Alice Cooper, gets down on one knee and exclaims, “I don’t deserve you!” That’s how I felt every moment with David Bowie. He pretended to be his friend, but every second he was aware that basically, he was with a demigod. I pretended to be normal, we had dinner, we had coffee, but every moment, a voice inside me told me: “You’re having coffee with David Bowie!”
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