Gary: Hi Steven, thanks for having us onboard. Nature of Wires has been going in one form or another since 1986, although there was a ‘6 month break’ between 1994 and 2014.  It is now pretty much my solo electronic music project, but always with a collaborator (mainly because I can’t sing).  My favourite food is curry – the hotter the better!

Annie: Machina X - well, it's got complicated since the coup happened over in Myanmar in Feb 2021. It was becoming harder for Cyrus and I to communicate let alone make music - though we were able to finish what is probably regarded as our best duo album to date, The Art of Letting Go, which released Oct 21 (exclusively on Bandcamp). Apart from an epilogue track for that album that released Oct this year, Machina X has really been me collaborating with other producers like Montage Collective and Jigsaw Sequence.

Gary: Annie contacted me by e-mail in early 2020 with a view to working together.  I checked out Machina X’s previous work and was very impressed and so ‘Within’ was born.  We first properly met in the autumn of 2021.

Annie: Yes, I was becoming more involved in the indie electro scene online and collaborations seemed to be a 'thing' and when I heard Gary's music, think it was Modus in particular and I was like, 'Wow!'. I thought I would drop him a cheeky email about collaborating. Given he's held in such high regard on the scene, I was gobsmacked and thrilled when he said, yes. 

Gary: I will usually create a very loose framework of a song, send it to the vocalist, who will write and record lyrics and send back a demo.  I then build up the rest of the music around the vocals, making sure they’ve got enough room to breathe.  Annie has a bigger hand in the instrumental side than most of the other vocalists with whom I collaborate, so it’s very much a joint effort.  I stay well clear of anything to do with words!

Annie: I love working with Gary because he's open to and tolerant to try my ideas and accepts my ways of writing. I have yet to give him a bare melody and build from the middle out but it will happen!

With 'Dance With Me', I had a very specific vision and sound I've always wanted to do and with Gary's expertise, experience and enthusiasm for this one, we were able to build the instrument bed together.  Usually, I 'hear' and put a topline melody over the framework then the words follow closely behind - phrasing can be so important when it comes to the final delivery. Then, sometimes it can get stripped right back in places, added to - it's a pretty organic process for me.

Annie: More an observation or a provocation of thought, rather than message, I think. We live in a very 'visual' world.  There is such a pressure to meet societal pressures regarding the image we put out to the world but I do wonder if a sense of who we are as people can get a little lost under our 'public veneers' sometimes? Everyone wants to look their best but in the great scheme of things, it's a small part of us - we are also so much more. I think what I am trying to say is that 'inner beauty' is as important as the outer, sometimes more so but of course, everyone sees the outside first.

Gary: It was an idea which Annie put to me at our first actual meeting.  2000 Miles was a good choice, because three of the original Pretenders are from the area where I live (Herefordshire, UK).  My local BBC guy played it to Martin Chambers and I think he liked it (haven’t had any cease & desist orders thrown at me anyway).  I’d written an original Christmas song with Lady bNOW in 2019 called ‘It’s Not a Happy Christmas’, so it wasn’t a total alien concept.  It’s done about as well as I could have realistically expected and of course we can give it a good push every December.

Annie: Interesting you should say 'odd' because that makes me even happier that we did it! I think we did a good job with this cover and folk want Christmas songs at Christmas so, why not give a synth-licious alternative to the original guitar track - which I always rated?

Gary: The opening hook is a sample I discovered on Splice and this instantly gives off the middle-eastern vibe.  Instrumentally the song borrows heavily from ‘We Kill All’, which I wrote with CountessM in 2015, but there are other occasional middle-eastern sprinkles in there too.

Annie: I have always wanted to make a track with Middle-Eastern vibes! When I used to do Arabic dance, I used to get totally lost in the rhythms, instrumentation and those melismas! The feel of We Kill All instrumentally had so much more potential to kick outside its boundaries. I was also able to reference Gary to other tracks with the vibes and sounds that I thought would work in this kind of track. I wanted to pay homage to what my dancing days gave me. Not saying I was any good but dancing to the more contemporary interpretations was incredibly grounding and mindful. I forgot life outside in those classes.

Annie: After the intensity and emotional investment of The Art of Letting Go, to receive an upbeat, totally synthpop framework to play with was scary but also exciting. Interestingly, I found myself taking up a chant-style vocal - it's a reactionary lyric. I can only talk from a UK perspective but so many sectors of society have taken a hammering from many of the decisions supposedly made 'for the people' I guess, in general terms, the sentiment is for those who are still adamant to flourish in the face of adversity.

Gary: We have talked about creating more songs and to hopefully get enough material to perform live together.  An album of say 10 original songs is something to aim at, but we’re a couple of years off that just yet.

Annie:  Very much looking forward to working more with Gary next year - when he can fit me in, haha!

Gary: More Nature of Wires collabs and remixes are planned for 2023 plus another solo dark ambient album (with a couple of guest vocalists).  Away from NoW I’m doing a lot of work with a producer in Manchester, who was a very big part of the scene up there during the 90s when it really took off.  It’s VERY different to what I’m used to, but I’m getting to meet a lot of interesting (and some quite famous) people and my horizons are being well and truly broadened.

Annie: If I've learned anything these last couple of years, it's to stay open to the POSSiBiLiTiES - watch this space!

Gary: Thank you.  Can’t think of anything else at the moment, other than links to our websites, below.