Remember when you were little and people would sing “Row, Row, Row Your Boat” as a round, layering each vocal on top of each other in a constant fashion? Take that same principle, but with musical instruments and riffs overlapping and constantly replaying, and you have the basic idea of looping.
There aren’t many musicians who are commonplace when you think of a one-man concert where looping is used — Keller Williams and Zach Deputy are just about the only ones. Though their styles are different, the basic idea is the same. They’ll create a beat or riff that is replayed over and over. On top of that, they’ll layer more “loops” of a beat, riff, noise, lyric or anything else. Instead of having a band performing the music, the loops are played over and over while the musician sings, solos, strums or does anything else.
Imagine that this is the way you make your living — performing concerts on a regular basis and relying on looping instead of bandmates to get your sound created. Now, imagine that all of your equipment is stolen in the blink of an eye. What would you do?
If you’re Deputy, you play the next show, even if it means performing your first ever acoustic guitar-only concert. The stress of losing your truck full of equipment, clothing, unrecorded songs, laptop and everything else can be disheartening, but for Deputy, it was a case of “the show must go on.”
“It was just me and a guitar on the worst PA system of all time,” Deputy says by phone from the road on his way to Maine recently. “I didn’t let it stop me. There was a lot of emotion in that show — different emotion than usual. I had to be in the studio the next day, which was another nightmare because I had already rented the space. Somehow I still managed to finish the album in four days. It was crazy, but the album turned out good and everything happens for a reason.”
Deputy says he was so stressed out during that time that he couldn’t hold down food and it “actually affected my bowels,” without, thankfully, going into detail. The robbery led to the song “Paramus” which goes into the events lyrically and also sparked creativity in the studio.
“The show was the first acoustic show I’ve ever done and it gave me the idea that it would be cool to do occasionally,” he says. “I’ve only done one acoustic show since then, but I have started to do acoustic songs during the set. I plan to do more, but I like the acoustic shows to be more of an intimate thing. I think it was all sparked from the same event.”
He’s been playing 250-300 shows — his music, which he calls “mutt music,” has a heavy Calypso influence, but combines funk, soul, rock and folk — each year for the last four years. Most people would get burned out at that relentless pace, but Deputy jokes about what keeps him going. “I don’t smoke crack … that’s a plus,” he says. “I try not to get smashed. I sleep at least three hours a day. You have to manage your life really well. You aren’t getting the vitamin D from the sun. You should eat at a Chinese buffet twice a day. I can keep going … I really don’t know how. I love to make people happy. It’s hard and it’s tough, but I try to remain positive and focus on the good things.”
The truck was found two-and-a-half weeks after it was stolen, completely gutted. The only thing left was an empty fire extinguisher, an item that has taken on a more prominent role in his live show for producing sound effects and percussion.
Deputy has been in bands before, but after a gig in which his bass player was unable to perform because of back pain, he decided it was easier to play gigs on his own.
“I had a delay/loop pedal and decided to loop some tracks and play over them and see how it went,” Deputy says of that first gig. “It wasn’t pretty at all, but it was easier than putting a band together. And I didn’t have to split the money. It started out as a side project. Three years later my solo stuff was drawing 350 people and my band was only drawing 100. I never meant for it to happen, but it did naturally.”
He enjoys being one of the few people to use looping, but says because of that, few people understand what he’s doing. A lot of people will think he’s not actually playing or singing even though he performs all of the layers live — songs usually contain 15 to 20 loops on average — and they are not backup tracks. Because of that, songs are played differently every time. “When they finally figure it out, it’s a revelation and I usually get a fan for life,” Deputy says. “I do it so fast, most people don’t even see it, but it’s all about the music. I don’t care if people see me do it since it’s about the song and if you close your eyes you’d never know it. That’s what matters to me.”
Though Deputy’s performances are focused around looping and it’s a defining characteristic of his live shows — he’s worried people will think that’s all he can do, so he hasn’t lost hope of forming a band one day.
“I don’t think I’ll ever stop looping,” Deputy says, before adding, “if I ever have a huge band one day like I plan on having, I’m still going to do the looping stuff. It will just change the dynamics. I write so many songs that can’t be done on a loop machine, but it’s a part of my show and it always will be.”
Zach Deputy will perform at the Double Door Inn on Dec. 17 at 9 p.m. Tickets are $10.
This article appears in Dec 15-21, 2009.
