With Halloween just around the corner we got the opportunity to connect with one of our favorite horror hounds, Figure. For the past decade he has had a massive career touring the globe with his unique mix of drumstep, dubstep, and freaky synths, scares, and samples – a career that has found him collaborating with Universal's Hollywood Horror Night's for going on SEVEN years now. He's also had a song in Season 11 of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia and a release on Skrillex record label OWSLA.
Now that October is here, Figure just dropped another installment under his Monsters umbrella this past Friday, October 12th. Titled The Asylum, the album is a 13 track creep show featuring the likes of Dack Janiels and Hatch, and replete with some of the scariest samples and sounds we've heard in quite some time. Figure will be sure to keep you on your toes with this new release as Halloween creeps closer.
Check out our interview below and let us know what you think of the album in the comments!
How did you come up with the concept for the album? The Asylum, Patient 138 and Doctor Death. There are so many possible references, but what stories, movies, or real life instances inspired this album?
For the past .. almost 10 months I’ve been watching every movie and reading about Asylums, doctors gone wrong, old ways of surgery I could find. I even got to stay in an old Asylum (that has been on all those Ghost hunting shows) alone, for 3 days. It was extremely heavy and something you can’t get from just reading and watching about it.
You have a lot of reoccurring collabs across your Monster's albums. How did these come about? Anyone, you particularly like working with? Anyone you'd like to collab with in the future?
I collab with whoever I’m friends with at the time, or maybe when someone sending me a draft of an idea that I like and what to work on.
What is your favorite track on the record?
That would have to be between Shock Therapy and Lobotomy.
Having created so many horror based songs and creations – what have you learned about what it takes to make a track truly creepy, or scary? Any resources you've leaned on in the making of these albums?
Well, it’s about creating a story, scene, and the environment. There is a difference of someone tossing a vocal sample that says something creepy, and creating a creepy vibe from the get-go. It’s about the intro as much as it is about the drop.
You're now on the ninth release of a Monsters record – what do you see as the future of the series? Do you plan to continue it? What are you doing to keep the series from becoming stale?
Well, this is and isn’t Monsters. Monsters is a series of themed songs. The Asylum is a concept album within the Monsters series if that makes sense, an audio movie in ways. I always try new things and try to stay out of the current box of what’s going on in the scene. I think that is something that keeps it from getting stale and not repetitive.
How has your collaboration with Universal's Hollywood Horror Nights been going? Have people been receptive to your music? Is that collaboration ongoing – if not what did you learn from it?
It’s such a fun project to work on. It’s been about 7 years now and every year is as smooth as the last if not more. We are like minded so we both know what to ask from each other. Sometimes they use my older music around the park, while at the same time I will make them custom things for certain areas or straight up full dubstep tracks that are only for them and you can only hear in the park.
Do you have any future projects you can talk about?
I’m on tour with Megalodon right now, the BloodBath tour. It’s been so fun so far!
A fun one – what is your favorite scary movie villain of all time?
That's a tough one. Modern movie-wise, I would say Death Head and Sex head from 31. Classic wise, I’d say Creature of the Black Lagoon
