Justin Lassen is a musician. In this field, he is one very passionate artist. While not a visual digital artist, Lassen creates visions in soundscape. Gaining inspiration from the works of the digital artists we see and celebrate, Justin emotes into music, the feelings and sounds he finds in his head while appreciating the art.
Justin Lassen tends to run at whatever takes his interest, in a mad rush to understand the field. “When science piqued my interest, my bedroom resembled Dexter's Lab,” starts Lassen. “When I became involved in gymnastics, I quickly escalated to a pre-Olympic level, winning competitions and such. Then, computers became the next obsession. I was entranced by how they worked, and learned several programming languages as well as I knew English.” When Lassen was given a video camera, he did everything from burning miniature sets, flying UFO’s on strings, directing sci-fi shorts to creating fake blood for horror films. "Though, once music seriously took over my life, when I was about 16, I could only think of myself as an artist. I knew then I could never be satisfied doing anything else.”
From elementary through to high school, Justin was involved in many music classes and musical productions. Choir ended up being the most important music class to him and he was taught basic theory. “Beyond that, I am completely self-taught,” he admits. “I love playing the piano or keyboard, and I am magnetically drawn to this instrument. Something about those 88 keys and 12 tones speak of limitless possibility and exploration. Music comes so natural to me that sometimes I feel a “ghost” is playing through my fingers. I also absolutely adore my Schecter S1+ custom guitar, which I use on all of my music because it just helps me get the music out without even thinking. I don't know if I ever was a ‘traditional’ musician in the classical definition of the word. Although, I was in choir, briefly played trumpet, obsessed with piano, and I have always been primarily a recording artist. This started at a very early age when I used to record myself on an old cassette deck I had received as a gift. My recording skills were heightened when a new karaoke machine allowed me to do layering.”
Justin's life changed when he discovered he could work much more effectively digitally. He admits also to becoming obsessed with MIDI, and he began composing with Cakewalk and using Adobe Premiere 3.0 in order to layer tracks in the mid-nineties. “As the technology keeps advancing, it has been important for me to stay on top of things. In my early digital composing days, I got by on basic recording gear -- Casio/Yamaha MIDI keyboard (controllers), Cakewalk Pro Audio, SoundFonts, and a Windows 95/98SE PC. As the music began to take over, my gear, hardware and software had to be top-notch.
At my home studio, I like using my Yamaha MOTIF8 workstation, Triton, etc. on my Intel-based personally customized PC DAW running through a Presonus Firepod/preamps and Behringer mixers. While I am traveling, my Behringer FCA202 and my Aviator MX6 Turbo laptop by Hypersonic make composing possible for my mobile lifestyle. I am a certified gear whore, but keeping my workspace (wherever it may be) to a minimum is becoming more important to me. I’ve had decked-out personal studio setups in Budapest, London, Paris, Phoenix and Los Angeles over the last seven years.
