A Visual Journey Through HAND's Reveal

A Visual Journey Through HAND's Reveal
On ​Reveal,​ Sascha Bachman, aka ​HAND​, has created a unique balance of classic ambient music, sounds and musical figures that touch the edge of melody and harmony, and a just-above-subliminal pulse. These elements come together in a sound world that is in turn comforting and haunting. Reveal is out now on Puremagnetik Tapes.

What might not become immediately obvious is the fact that Bachmann arranged and produced all of Reveal as an audio visual collaboration with London-based filmmaker Adrian Cousins. Just like the musical journey of Reveal, the visual experience evokes a nostalgic, ambient trip through a beautiful collage of Super-8 footage. We talked with HAND about this collaboration and the creative process that drove it.

Who is Adrian Cousins? 
Adrian is a British filmmaker/ developer, living in London. He is working with analog film and has wonderful skill in developing old expired film. 


How did you meet and decide to work together?
We met in online in a film forum. Unfortunately not in person yet. He liked my first record and I really liked his 8 and 16mm fimwork. By that time I was experimenting with 8mm film as well, cutting loops, coloring and manipulating. But his work was beyond my skills and in January 2018 I asked him if he could join the team for my next album, which is Reveal.


What was your day to day working process with Adrian like? 
Working with Adrian is quite easy, because he is constantly working on new analog film material and I was lucky enough to pick the videos that fitted with my sounds. 
I concentrated on one track at a time and kept looking through all the film material he sent me until I found the right vibe.


How did you approach the visual direction? 
As I started to work on Reveal, I wanted to try keeping the best parts from my album Debut and compress it. For me the track "Loop 03 - Lied von der Sehnsucht" is very on point, so I decided to go in this direction. As I met Adrian, the whole picture came together because his videos translated my musical idea perfectly.



When I started working on the music for my first album, I always had in mind to combine it with visuals. Also I was kind of influenced by that time, because as I said I just had started working and experimenting with Super 8 film myself. I am always inspired by a lot of different things, not only music.

For me analog film had this vibe I wanted to create. Of course after I found out about Adrian's work it all made even more sense. I was so inspired by his work that I wanted this exclusive collaboration for Reveal.


Did you have any role in the video creation or post production? 
Adrian send my a lot material. I guess he is just filming without thinking too much. But I think he just has an eye for the special moments and he captures them very good. I am kind of bound to his ideas but I can chose choose the video for each track and decide what kind of mood I want for it.


Are you performing with Adrian live? 
No, but who knows. I hope someday we'll met in real live, somewhere in London on stage. Would be awesome!


Do you have any significant upcoming dates where the music and video will be shown together?
Since I'm playing concerts with HAND, I am always using visuals. They are a very important part. So I basically never perform without them.
Here are my next dates:


13.07 @BACHBLYTEN FESTIVAL, Kiel
27.07 @FREUNDETREFFEN FESTIVAL, Berlin
13.09 @TRAURIG UND UNTANZBAR, Berghain Kantine
25.11 @FEATURE RING, Dresden 


Is there anything else you wish to share?
Yes of course. I want to share my co-production with Ruffmercy. I love his work and I hope we create more new stuff together.
HAND's Reveal is out now on Puremagnetik Tapes as limited edition cassette and digital download.