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Going Analog with Producer @quanticmusic

To see more of Will’s photos from South America and around the world, check out @quanticmusic on Instagram. For more music stories, check out @music.

For Will Holland, digging for records in Medellin, Colombia, has become a tradition. There’s one spot he favors, located inside a small house in a dodgy neighborhood downtown with wall-to-wall music. On his most recent trip, Will took photos of the dusty records left in crooked stacks on the ground, and columns of coverless 45s and 78s lining the stairs (which he fittingly dubbed the “Stairway of 45s”).

“The last time I went it was in a completely different neighborhood, and they managed to transfer all the records to this other new place,” says Will, better known as the producer Quantic (@quanticmusic). “There were four of us and we went through it for a day. It was pretty entertaining. But it was hard work.”

Will’s connection to Colombia dates back to a recent seven-year stay in the country (he lives in New York City now), where he hopped around recording music, learning the accordion and experiencing the culture. For a record collector, Medellin was always a good place to visit –– an epicenter of the Latin American recording industry, it was the perfect spot to stumble on bucket list albums.

“The great thing about Latin America: Records are currency, even if they are without a cover and stacked in a column,” he says.

Will has always been drawn to an eclectic mix of sounds. Growing up in Birmingham, England, his parents encouraged him to explore different genres, both through records and live music. His mom would take him to different shows –– one night, it would be baroque musicians in traditional dress, the next, revolutionary Jamaican poetry. Meanwhile, his father was obsessed with Americana.

“He was a very good banjo player who learned all these American songs,” says Will. “So I had this very American-orientated household life as well, where I listened to a lot of American, a lot of Southern, a lot of folk.”

It should be no surprise that the now 35-year-old musician is known in the music world for his chameleonic efforts. Will’s most recent solo album, Magnetica, captures a variety of sounds from different genres and eras, mixing elements of Latin, soul, reggae and hip-hop.

That historical component of music has always played into Will’s creativity. That’s why, for instance, he began playing the accordion (“I like the mysticism of all these folkloric tales of these accordion players riding horses or donkeys and playing at the same time”), or why he’ll opt for old analog equipment in his songwriting and photos.

“It’s just the grandeur of it,” he says. “They really concentrated on the aesthetic of how they looked. You have the faceplates and the designs and the way the colors are used and the chroming. It’s like something akin to vintage cars, where you have this illustrious and classic look, which sums up the sound as well.”

–– Instagram @music

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