Right On Beat

Can you please introduce yourself?
I’m Alphaeus, an engineering student from NTU, and also the drummer of the band stereoblu.

Where did your passion for music come from?
From when I was really young. The TLDR version is that my brother started taking lessons from this group called Thunder Rock. He sang and produced music and bought all the equipment. I naturally got curious, but he went off to the army and left everything behind, so I picked them up and started learning how to play, and here I am now!

Interesting! How long have you been playing drums?
I’ve been doing it since I was nine, so that’s about eleven years now. My brother started learning it first, so I figured I’d try.

Can you play other instruments?
Yeah, I actually got up to Grade 4 in piano, but I lost touch with it because I struggled with reading notes and basic music theory. I also taught myself to play the guitar.

What attracted you to the drums?
I was shit at reading notes until I started learning drums, and realised that you also had to read notes there (laughs). But at that point it was too late to turn back, so I just continued.

How did that lead to you joining stereoblu?
Sufi sent out a message in a Telegram channel saying they were looking for a drummer. When I saw that they played indie music, I was immediately interested since that’s what I play too. I replied to the message, and thankfully, they took me in.

Cool! Apart from indie, what kind of music have you been into recently?
Recently I’ve been getting into a lot of boiler room mixes. Kpop, shoegaze, and a bit of R&B here and there as well.

Any music recommendations?
wisp is really good. She’s a shoe gaze artist who does an amazing job of letting her vocals shine through all the noise. There’s also this up-and-coming artist called Love Spells. I’d recommend listening to Lovers Only.

What attracted you to these musicians?
I used to listen to a lot of emo music, but right now I feel like you shouldn’t listen to music that is just produced for the sake of sounding angry. I think lyrically, those two artists are quite strong. Their lyrics are not too abstract or psychedelic, so you don’t have to think too hard. It’s easy to follow.

Do you also write music?
Not at the moment, but I might! I don’t know.

Since we’re coming to the end of the year, what resolutions have you managed to achieve?
I just told myself that I wanted to produce more music as a way to learn. I’ve been using Ableton, so I wanted to get more comfortable with the software and improve my skills. Earlier this year, I actually worked on one of wisp’s songs but I kind of let it rest after that. Lately, I’ve been thinking about getting back into making music again, because the longer you leave it, the harder it is to get back into it. So hopefully towards the end of the year, I can do at least one more song.