Rob Garza

Visible in Instagram posts dated February 4, 2020, March 12, 2020, December 5, 2020 and April 2, 2021.

Visible throughout the music video for “Something That’s Different” starting at 2:04.

Visible in Instagram posts dated June 20, 2014 and February 12, 2016.

Mentioned in this December 18, 2018 Oregon Music News interview and visible in this July 20, 2021 Instagram post.

What’s your favorite gear to use?

I love old synthesizers, old Rolands, Korgs, especially the Roland JP 8000, Moogs, the Korg MS2000 has also been a favorite keyboard. Sometimes it is great to pull out old drum machines and guitars as well. We have used an old Wurlitzer we got from a school auction—that one has been on many records. We sometimes just pull up a lot of random things gear-wise as well.

Visible in this March 19, 2020 Instagram post. It is specified to be the Suite edition in this March 31, 2020 download article.

*Requires a Live 10 Suite license or the free trial.

Visible in this October 21, 2020 Instagram post.

In a February 5, 2020, Instagram post by Rob Garza, the Roland Juno-60 synthesizer is visible, showcasing its use in his setup.

Featured in this January 21, 2015 Instagram post.

Shout out to @vmoda for the fly new headphones featuring the Out of Body Workshop mix design. 🎧

Visible in this February 4, 2020 Instagram post.

Used for Sounds from the Thievery Hi-Fi and The Mirror Conspiracy, as stated by bandmate Eric Hilton in this May 15, 2017 Music Radar interview.

Why did you adopt electronic music rather than just using acoustic instruments?

“It’s the power of the sampler … You can sample sounds like kicks and snares, chop up beats and make your own beats. That’s what gave birth to our music from the very get go. We were using an Akai MPC3000 as our main brain when we made our first two records and a couple of other workstations back then, which were keyboards that had samplers built in. Our music was heavily sample based, and that was exciting, and it’s still exciting to use snippets of things and treat them in a certain way.”

What workstation were you using?

“The Ensoniq ASR-10, which was like our tape machine because it had 270 seconds of mono sampling time. When we recorded a vocal, we would record it onto DAT and bounce pieces of it onto the keys of the ASR-10 and then the Akai would trigger the different keys in a sequence. That’s how we taped, which is kind of incredible – we’d store the vocals on floppy discs. The saddest thing is that my ASR-10 start-up disk is broken.”

(...) Did you combine gear with Rob initially?

“We did. Both of us had limited gear, but together it was enough. I think I only had the ASR-10, a turntable and a bunch of records. Rob had the Akai and I can’t remember what we used for monitors at the beginning; it wasn’t anything special. Eventually we bought a pair of the cheapest Tannoys, which we still use today as our main reference monitors because we know and trust them so well. We set up a studio in a friend’s bedroom and used that for a few weeks and made two songs. We hit it off and really liked working together, so we moved into what was, basically, the liquor room of Eighteenth Street Lounge – a club I’d started with some friends. Then we found a studio space right next to the lounge and rented that out for about ten years.”

Mentioned in this March 31, 2020 XLR8R download article/interview for “Floating Inside My Bones (Floating Breaks Mix)", which was reposted by Ableton.

You often use a “call and response” technique where your sounds play off of one another. In tracks 10 and 11, you have two organs with similar yet contrasting timbres. How do you go about finding sounds that work well together like this?

The first organ sound was made in u-he’s Diva synthesizer. Then I found the Organ5 Vibrato Instrument Rack inside of Live. I wanted to create this ethereal sound, which, when layered with pads, gives a super lush vibe. A lot of it is about relying on your ear when finding the right sounds to play off of each other.

Used for The Temple of I & I, as stated by bandmate Eric Hilton in this May 15, 2017 Music Radar interview.

“We are pretty hooked on Pro Tools these days. We used to use Logic, but we like the sound of Pro Tools because it seems a little less dark, and we’re using a lot of UA plug-ins. We have a lot of outboard gear too, a lot of vintage compressors that we use a lot. We use a lot of vintage keys, like a real Wurlitzer keyboard and an old Lowrey organ. For keys, I really like the vintage stuff – we just got a Korg Polysix synth that we’re really into. But we basically stopped engineering our own stuff after our second album, so we rely on an engineer these days.”

Visible in Instagram posts dated April 2, 2021, June 11, 2021 and June 14, 2021.

The office.

#musician #musicianlife #keyboards #roland #arturia #korg #nativeinstruments #synth #electronicmusic #triphop #thieverycorporation #garza

Mentioned in this December 18, 2018 Oregon Music News interview and visible in this April 2, 2021 Instagram post.

What’s your favorite gear to use?

I love old synthesizers, old Rolands, Korgs, especially the Roland JP 8000, Moogs, the Korg MS2000 has also been a favorite keyboard. Sometimes it is great to pull out old drum machines and guitars as well. We have used an old Wurlitzer we got from a school auction—that one has been on many records. We sometimes just pull up a lot of random things gear-wise as well.

Visible in this July 1, 2020 Instagram post.

Visible in this August 4, 2019 photo of Garza. A version without the watermark that shows the model name can be found here.

Featured in this March 10, 2014 MONO video.

Visible throughout Garza's Instagram, beginning with this June 28, 2014 post. The others are as follows:

• September 15, 2014
• December 14, 2015
• October 3, 2016
• October 5, 2016
• November 14, 2016
• December 21, 2019
• July 9, 2021

A MK2 is visible in Instagram posts dated March 12, 2020 and December 5, 2020.

Visible in Instagram posts dated February 4, 2020, March 19, 2020 and July 1, 2020.

Visible in Instagram posts dated July 1, 2020 and April 2, 2021.

Mentioned in this March 31, 2020 XLR8R download article/interview for “Floating Inside My Bones (Floating Breaks Mix)", which was reposted by Ableton.

Track 12 features some lush, wide pads that cut really well through the mix. What was your approach to making this sound?

These pads were from the Arturia Jupiter 8V software synth. With this mix, I really wanted to do something that harkens back to the old days, when Thievery Corporation first started. At the time, I was listening to artists that inspired me, like Kruder & Dorfmeister, Fila Brazillia, and people like that. I wanted to create that kind of atmosphere and I think those pads really take you back to that time.

Mentioned in this March 31, 2020 XLR8R download article/interview for “Floating Inside My Bones (Floating Breaks Mix)", which was reposted by Ableton.

In track 13, you’ve introduced a plucked guitar melody at bar 33. Here you have used the Guitar Palm Legacy Instrument Rack in Live 10 Suite which holds two instances of Tension, Live’s physical modelling string synthesizer, along with a chain of effect devices. You’ve then added some additional processing with Amazing Noise’s Max for Live device Outer Spaces and recorded the effect’s signal into Track 14. Can you tell us a bit about why you did that?

Yes, I really love that effect because it gives a different quality of reverb and space, which adds a really cool atmosphere on top of what you already have. It really is a go-to for me.

Mentioned in this March 31, 2020 XLR8R download article/interview for “Floating Inside My Bones (Floating Breaks Mix)", which was reposted by Ableton.

On track 15, you have this “Sweep Audio” sound. Can you tell us about this one?

I was actually in the back of a tour van when I was making this sound. I used Arturia’s Modular V soft synth.

Used for The Temple of I & I, as stated by bandmate Eric Hilton in this May 15, 2017 Music Radar interview.

At that early stage in Jamaica, did you focus on EQing the recordings in any way, or did you save that for later?

“Not past the basic recording EQ. We didn’t really get into any production down there; we just made sure the drums sounded really good and that we were getting great bass or guitar signals. We didn’t do any fine-tuning, although the console we used down there was the Rupert Neve 5088, which is pretty special and a little better than what we have here.”

Featured in this April 2, 2021 Instagram post.

The office.

#musician #musicianlife #keyboards #roland #arturia #korg #nativeinstruments #synth #electronicmusic #triphop #thieverycorporation #garza

Used for Sounds from the Thievery Hi-Fi, as stated by engineer Christopher “Stone” Garrett in this July 28, 2011 Universal Audio interview.

Back to Eric and Rob, so you set up their studio, but how did you end up becoming their engineer?

They had another engineer at the time, and he was using Cakewalk. Their albums before that were recorded onto DAT tapes [laughs]. It was so archaic. For Sounds from the Thievery Hi-Fi (1997), which was their first effort, they had an Ensoniq ASR-10, Akai MPC3000, and a DAT machine, and that was it. And they had an Alesis MIDIVerb 4. They did the whole record with just the DAT. So I was coming into these guys, and I had worked at the music store, and I was really familiar with all this equipment that was out there, and it was a lot of emerging sort of digital technology at the time. So, I set up a Macintosh system, and sort of rewired their studio.

Rob Garza used the Korg Wavestate during a performance at the Butterfly Dance in Austria on July 5, 2024. His Instagram post features a photo where the synth's brand and model are clearly visible.