Ryan Thompson (also known as Screendeath) and I have been friends for a while now. Well actually, that’s kind of a lie. We’re more like internet buddies. In this modern day and age it has become quite commonplace to make an acquaintance over the internet that you may never meet in person! Thanks to the wonderful World Wide Web I’ve made several great friendships and although I may not even recognize these people if I passed them in the street, I still treasure their friendships. Ryan was one of the first people to give us props for our productions and since then we’ve remained in touch and always bounce ideas off each other. His production has come a long way since I first “met him” and it appears he is beginning to make the transition from a more disco orientated sound to a bigger tech-house sound which I’ve been really digging! I recently had a wee chat with the caffeine-addicted 18 year old from Ireland about upcoming releases, his favourite munchies and his weak tolerance to Vodka.

TRUANTS: What the hell does Screendeath mean? Screendeath: Haha, I’d love to say it meant something cool but it had literally no meaning when I picked it. I was originally going by Thompson until I discovered about five others and realised I needed something different. Weirdly though, YouTubing Screendeath brings up some cult-esque stuff about decomposing your brain, haha!
Wicked! How did you get in to music production? I’ve always been into music and my dad’s pretty musical so I guess I naturally went that route. Then a friend of mine introduced me to Justice’s music and that was it haha, I knew I wanted to make music too.
You recently played with KiD COLA in London! Oh man, what a weekend! It was a seriously good fun night, Kid Cola was way too cool. With regards to the end of it, I think the lack of food, water and a diet of alcohol for a couple of days hit me a lot harder than I was expecting, resulting in a trip to the hospital in an ambulance. Not my finest moment at all! Big shout to Felix and Alex Warren for looking after me! Ryan pictured on a hospital stretcher here.
What have you been listening to lately, your music taste seems to have taken another 360? I guess it has. I’m still pretty new to dance music so I’m exploring it as much as I can. Variety means nothing gets repetitive, so it’s important to keep an eye on everything musically. At the moment I’m really loving all the tech house/ house stuff, particularly Tony Lionni’s new stuff and a lot of the stuff on Anabatic Records! I can’t wait to see what Kenton Slash Demon do next, those guys are injecting a real originality into the classic house sound flawlessly. Julio Bashmore, Solo and Femme En Fourrure are all influencing me a lot (not sure if it shows), but as cheesy as it is I guess I just draw from all over the place. Modern orchestral stuff has had some input as well, I guess.
It’s relatively hard to pinpoint an exact ‘sound’ for Screendeath, is that because you are still seeking one or do you just like to keep people on their toes? It’s becoming more and more obvious to me that I don’t really want a specific ‘sound’, I don’t want to end up being one of those artists that gets pigeon-holed into a particular genre all the time. As long as I’m happy with a track I’ll roll with it!
What’s your ‘must have’ snack when you’re producing? My mum bakes sweet cookies and muffins and stuff which keep our sugar levels up and helps us make sweet beats. You got a mum as cool as ours? Haha that’s awesome, envious! Yeah, I’m lucky enough that my mum’s an amazing cook. Although I normally just end up eating potato waffles with melted cheese and sweet chili sauce. Sweet chili sauce is my reason for being.
What would you say the ‘highpoint’ of your career has been thus far? What have you got planned for the near future?That’s a hard one, I guess the first time I heard one of my tracks on Radio 1 is definitely up there. It was pretty cool when the first remix I ever did reached number 10 on the Hype Machine charts. Made my month! My track Vitamin Friend is set to come out on a various artist EP on Tommie Sunshine’s new label Brooklyn Fire in the next few months so I’m super pumped for that! Aside from that, I’ve been working on my first EP (which has no name yet) and I’m looking forward to getting some feedback on it when it finally drops. Me and my buddy Savile (Southern Fried) started working on an EP together as well featuring a new version of Mitora. Everything he touches sounds golden so I’m too happy to be working with him. Unfortunately I’ve got no gigs coming up for now but I guess that gives me more time to write music. Let’s see how it pans out, I’m hoping 2010 will be a big year! •