We’ve all been through that really tough breakup at some point in time in our lives. Whether it was our high school sweetheart that we never thought we would get over, or an ugly divorce that we never saw coming. For most, a tough breakup consists of long bouts of sobbing, support from friends and family, and copious amounts of alcohol. For Bass Kleph, the healing process included something completely different. Stu Tyson (aka Bass Kleph) sat down with us in an exclusive and personal interview to talk about going through a very dramatic split, and how it ultimately transferred onto his music. The experience drove him to write up his own lyrics, and actually do something he had never done before. Stu sang his own lyrics. He forced himself outside his comfort zone for his latest single, “Make Me Forget”, leaving him completely exposed (perhaps much like his heart).
The end result is a genuine track dripping with emotion that you can both hear and feel. It will resonate strongly with everyone that listens to it, because we’ve all spoken these words (in one way or another) at some point in our lives. As difficult as it was to discuss, we were honored to have Stu share his personal story and walk us through what had happened. We won’t be able to disclose every single detail but we will try our best to give you a fair insight into his situation.
As an added bonus, we’ve also been cleared to give away the vocals of this huge, progressive electro gem. So feel free to download it, and make your own remix.
’Bass Kleph: Make Me Forget (Original)’
TMN: Let’s talk about “Make Me Forget.” Where did the lyrics stem from? How did you come about to write this track?
BK: I wrote it, at least the chords for it, around the end of last year after the biggest break up of my life. The hardest one for sure, for me. You know, for a lot musicians and writers it’s kind of the natural thing after you go through something difficult is to write about it to try and help you get through it. I was writing on the piano, chord progressions and things, and writing lots and lots of lyrics. That chord progression really stuck with me, it was one I was playing over and over again when I had that thought in my mind.
I really wanted to set some lyrics to it that matched the feeling that I felt when I wrote the chords. I spent quite a while trying to write exactly those lyrics, that kind of message, and trying to figure out the melody and phrasing for it too.
I do a bit of vocal writing stuff for some of my tracks, but I’ve never actually sung on them. This time I laid down the vocal demo just so I didn’t forget what the idea was, but everyone liked it after I produced the track around it. They just said, “Man, you should just sing it.”
I was like, “You know what? If you guys think it’s ok, and possible, it would kind of be cool for me to sing this song because it’s such a personal song to me.” I had a feeling that if someone else sung it, I wouldn’t be happy with how they sung it.
TMN: This relationship was back in Australia. Do you feel that this breakup was part of the reason you came to the states?
BK: Well I wanted to move a while ago. My ex and I had originally planned to move together, it would have been great for her career too. When we split, I was like, “There’s not really anything else I want to stay in Australia for now.” I had kind of done everything I had wanted to do in Australia at least once. I’ve worked with all the main labels, I’d played at all the festivals, clubs and everything.
I had been touring internationally, and I kind of wanted to get out and do more stuff in America because the scene over here is just exploding. Although, I could never leave Australia completely. It’s my roots, and my home, but it just made more sense to live in LA and tour in Australia, rather than the opposite.
I was only really staying in Aus because of her. When she showed me how she really felt about me, I realized it wasn’t worth postponing the pursuit of my passion anymore. So I moved to LA, and she moved to London.
TMN: We’ve caught wind that it was a really public thing. Can you talk a little bit about that.
BK: I can tell you the full story, but I don’t really want to publish the full story.
TMN and BK discuss his breakup. Out of respect for Stu, we’ve chosen not to reveal the details of his break up. We hope you understand.
BK: I felt like I got ditched. I got sold out, and she went, “Thanks for everything up to this point Stu, but I’m going to take it from here.” Awesome. That’s great. Thanks.
She was an incredible girlfriend. This all seemed out of nowhere, so I was just shocked. That’s the tough thing, that’s hard. Despite what happened, I still really care for her. We shared too much to be bitter. I mean, I could go around telling people the full story, and it’s an interesting story, but at the end it’s just gossip. I don’t want to hurt her feelings by telling it.
TMN: We understand where you’re coming from. Let’s go back to music. You’ve traditionally produced a lot of tech house, that’s kind of how you built your name for yourself. Do you feel that this break up influenced your music to move into some more progressive, electro, and big room style sounds?
BK: 100% it did. It started making me want to write songs that are more emotion driven versus just energy driven tech house or techno track. I still love that stuff, and still play a lot of that. But going through and experience like that, such a massive emotional experience, I couldn’t help but let it bleed into my music.
I listen to all types of music too. I love heart wrenching chords and stuff. I love music that still has the energy and groove of tech house, but it also touches you in an emotional way. You feel those tingles down your spine and you can resonate with the lyrics. You go, “Fuck yeah, I know what you’re talking about.”
I feel like all of these are elements to a good song, and having them all together just makes an ultimate song. It’s really satisfying when I can combine the things I’ve learned about production and put my emotions in there from my life experiences. When I can sew it all together, I can come back to it and feel like I’ve written a journal entry about my life. Like this is a snapshot.
TMN: A nice thing too is it’s always good to change up styles and energy flow within a live set. It has to be cool to use more of your original work now to break up the tech house.
BK: Absolutely, yeah. I can swing back and forth between both styles. It’s really fun to do that where you go to a show where they’re expecting some big electro and you can introduce them to some tech house. And if you introduce it in the right way, they’ll fucking love it. And vise versa, at an underground show, if you’re playing a lot of tech stuff and you bring in some big vocal tracks that are still really cool, they get into it as well.
TMN: Back to you being a vocalist, is this something you feel like you’re going to continue to do? Or was this just a one time thing due to the story behind this song?
BK: I think more actually! I’ve done a couple more since then that are coming up for release. It’s funny you asked though. Someone asked me the other day, I was giving them some instrumental tracks to get other vocalists to sing them, because I want to do both. I don’t want to just have my vocals on everything. Anyways, the guy is finding me a singer, and he asked me, “Hey man, I heard your track ‘Make Me Forget’. It’s a great track, I love your voice. I have a project coming up and they’re looking for a voice like that. Would you be down to sing that for them?”
I was just shocked. I do not consider myself a singer at all. I’m feeling like I’m just going to say “yes” to all these things right now. I’m having fun doing them. Let’s see what happens!
TMN: Let’s finish this up by talking to your fans. Talk about what your plans are for the future, and what they can expect from you.
BK: Lots more music. There’s still plenty of tech house tracks coming as well. I’m going to do both. More tracks like “Make Me Forget” as well, some vocal and some just instrumental. I’m actually working on a new radio show again. I used to do one for years, I’m starting again. We start in December. Lots more Maschine stuff. Lots more videos. The remix parts for “Make Me Forget,” and I’m really excited to see what people can do with them. More tracks on the label Vacation. Maybe some events with them as well. Can’t wait to tour back in Australia, looking forward to that as soon as March or April. Man, so much going on!
There’s a bunch of projects going on in LA that I can’t really tell you about. I’ve met some interesting people doing some amazing stuff and they’ve approached me and said, “We need someone like you to be a project to make it work.” So you might see some different musical stuff next year. Apparently I’m not allowed to talk about it yet though.
TMN: Well we’re looking forward to it all, and hopefully we get to see you at Beta again! Thanks again for sitting down with us.
