It's my cherry poppin blog post and it's got to one of the longest interviews the Estoy Con Stupido universe has seen. While Jason Letkiewicz might not be a household name, you've probably picked up one of his releases under his many guises. With records on Future Times, Clone, his own Touch Your Life Records and a new one on Ron Morelli's L.I.E.S. label he's showing no signs of letting up.

a few years ago a mutual friend of ours showed me your
confusedhouse.org site and i was impressed by what i heard. what's up
with all of the different groups you've got stashed away there?

Confused House is a way for me to share various projects I've worked on or am currently working on by myself or with other people. I also have an area on the site where I have various mixes from different friends of mine. I enjoy working on lots of different kinds of music and often found over the years that not all the songs/ vibes could be reconciled using the same name. Plus it's fun to create new projects that are their own self contained worlds so to speak. There aren't any rules for each project but there are things that are specific to each one. I hate to reduce the various projects to their influences but here we go :)

Steve Summers - early chicago influenced house tracks
Rhythm Based Lovers - italo/ boogie/ chicago house vibes
Innergaze - synthwave/ electro
Malvoeaux - filter house
Death Commando - slasher film style soundtrack music
Waking Dreams - lush/ quasi aquatic electro

in the early 2000s you were in the group Manhunter and released some
tunes through Ghostly, what was that like?

Our relationship with Ghostly happened very early on. Ari (Beautiful Swimmers) and I were just starting to make dance music after making the transition out of more noise oriented stuff. Sam was very supportive of us and in many ways it was positive experience. In the end though I think we expected a bit more to come of it and ended up feeling a little bit disappointed. It seems like they took a lot of artists on with the intention of releasing their material but after awhile it became clear that a lot of what we were told wasn't actually what was going to happen. The 2 Manhunter tracks on confused house were supposed to come out on Ghostly in 2006 as part of a series of 10"s. We were supposed to be the first release but it just never happened. No hard feelings though. It was a learning experience and in many ways I think it helped push us towards our decision to either self release our music and/ or work with other small labels. The only real exception to the small label rule has been my relationship with Clone Records for the Steve Summers 12"s. Working with them has been a really great experience.

how did you make the transition from being part of Manhunter to
producing house music?

Manhunter was very influenced by italo/ techno/ chicago house etc. You can hear the chicago house influence a lot more in the 2 tracks on the site so there wasn't really much of a transition to producing house music from Manhunter. In 2004 I began to expand my gear collection and started working a lot more on music by myself and started the confused house site. That year I started working on the Malvoeaux, Steve Sumemrs and Rhythm Based Lovers projects.

what sort of gear do you use when you produce?

I am definitely a hardware guy. The mainstay of my set up is the MPC-1000 with the JJ OS. My 24 track Alesis Adat is also incredibly important these days. A few of the synths I have at the moment are a Juno 6, 106, Korg Poly-6, Future Retro Revolution and an Arp Odyssey. I also have a good collection of drum machines such as the 707, 727, 808, 909, RZ-1. My recording methods have changed a bit over the past few years though the main idea has remained the same and that is to capture a live take. Sometimes that means recording everything live to 2 tracks as it happens and sometimes that just means mixing it all live down afterward to 2 tracks. That was something Ari and I did in Manhunter and is something which I thought was a very important part of the process. Basically inviting the element of chance into the final mix is very important to me. The Innergaze record was really fun to make. Aurora and I hand played all the synth parts by hand from start to finish. We would jam and record a basic track that would have drums and a couple of synths on it and then from there we would shape the tracks into songs by giving them sections/ choruses etc.. It was a really amazing experience.

what is your setup when playing live?

I generally only play live as Steve Summers and my setup usually includes the exact gear I used to record the tracks. For instance when I recorded Shake The House it was a live take with my mpc, Revolution and a vocal mike. Everything on the recording was done live and recorded onto a crappy cassette tape. I tried to rerecord it a couple of times fr the release but for whatever reason none of the takes quite felt as good as the one thats on the Jack For Daze record. I guess in some ways it's a testament to the importance of capturing a particular moment. So anyways when I play live I just recreate all the songs from 2-4 bar patterns. I might have some of the synth parts sequenced by midi but it is up to me to turn them on and off. It's fun because it means that every performance is slightly different.

you've got a new release out on Ron Morelli's L.I.E.S. label. how did you guys get connected?

In 2005 Manhunter had the amazing experience of going on a 2 week tour with the Novamen (DJ Overdose/ MR. Pauli) and Ron Morelli. That was one of the best musical/ personal experiences I've had. All those guys are solid and amazing people. I had known Ron prior to this but it was on this tour that we really became close. In fact that was when I played him the Malvoeaux tracks and when he expressed interest in releasing them someday. I'm really glad I held on to them all these years and that Ron was finally start his own label L.I.E.S. (Long Island Electrical Systems). I couldn't be happier with the way the record turned out. The mastering guy, Ralf, did a great job on the tracks and the label art looks great...love those battle axes :)

what were you like in high school?

Ha..well...for one thing I was a rollerblader for years...I used to compete in "aggressive inline competitions" :) It was only after I injured my ankle my junior year that I began playing bass guitar. From there playing/ making music became my thing. Ari and I actually met because both of our high school bands played a show together. I was in a pop punk band called Phyllis Styles and he was in a glam band called Beta. Good times for sure.

top 5 dj records?

Let's just say the 5 tracks I'm really feeling at the moment.

Marcus Mixx - Sweet Nectar
Gregory Isaacs - Report To Me Version
New Musik - 24 Hours From Culture Part II
Peter Moesser - And So On/ HIgh
Ataraxia - The Unexplained (One of the first entirely moog based records. Check out the track The Unexplained for a very early instance of electronic disco. You can find it on the ConfusedHouse account on youtube. The other winner from the album is the track Deja Vu.

top 5 non-dj records?

Ross 154 - Strike
Harald Grosskoph - Synthesist (though I do occasionally dj a couple of theses tracks)
Bernard Fevre - The Strange World Of Bernard Fevre (original version not the recently released reworked/ extended versions)
Arthur Verocai - Arthur Verocai
Clara Mondshine - Luna Africana

top 5 places to eat?

Cholula Bella in Bushwick. Seriously the best Al Pastor tacos around. It's one of the few places that satisfies my craving for San Francisco level mexican food.
Minca in Manhattan
Punjabi in Manhattan
The Islands (803 Washington Avenue)
Caracas Arepa Bar in Williamsburg