Three Music Thingz with Noo Jii

Cowabunga, it's another rendition of Three Music Thingz, the blogseries where I ask musicians for three thingz that are essential to their music-making.

Today we have Noo Jii! Noo Jii is the musical identity of Paul Hannouche, who put out a beautiful experimental pop album called Vision Virgo in February. I stuck it in the ol Koss Porta Pros® for a twilight walk to CVS yesterday and the set and setting were perfection—the dark and rich synth tones, Hannouche's velvety voice (which reminds me of a less aggro Trent Reznor), and the plush arrangements seemed to pair seamlessly with that particular moment of sunset when the air turns from oppressive to refreshing.

My favorite song on Vision Virgo is penultimate track "Cloud Surfing," which has crystalline bell-like synths that ride a hypnotic ultralow bass line, then boil over into a massive and painfully gorgeous wall of harmonies. The whole thing sounds like pure unadulterated heartbreak. Sheesh!!

Hannouche shared his three music thingz with the blog...read them now!

1. My roots.
   I lived in Lebanon and was supposed to be mainly of Armenian decent but because of genocide i lived 10 years in lebanon when i was young which is an endless source of inspiration. I have hundreds of memories i can sometimes dive into to fuel my parallel life in montreal as a musician as an adult here. The warmth of my experience living in lebanon and the culture is continuously inspiring and conflicting but necessary for my writing process. I feel like the best lyrical ideas are sat with and contemplated for a while. Reminds me of the process of the writing for the song “Lebanon to Montreal” took me years to write and sort of finalize the lyrics which are mainly about immigration.
2. Working with people.
   There is only so much i can do alone, which took me a long time to realize. I feel like i've met some amazing people from playing music over the years, and the experiences whether it be being a session musician on different instruments for different projects for shows or producing songs the feeling of being in a room with a different energy can drive me. Its communication at its most basic form that i value.
3. Learning from things that don't work out.
   I'm so grateful for each and every breakup whether it was platonic or romantic, there is no way my album Vision Virgo would have come to life without reflection on situations that had some sort of heartbreak involved. I thank all my cardinal placements in my chart too.

Thanks Noo Jii! Listen to Vision Virgo and check out his link aggregation.

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