The Conduit is a math metal composer creating music from Orlando, Florida. The sound is designed for listeners who desire complexity and a distinguished melodic profile. Most songs are comprised of Fibonacci rhythmic motives and meticulously head bang-able time signatures. Many songs are written with subliminal hypnotic scripts and include tempos that correspond with various planetary orbit speeds, most notably “Hiraeth” from the Abraxas Shrine album that corresponds with Jupiter’s orbit time. This was all written, performed, and engineered by Jeffrey Bobbin.

The Conduit is Bobbin’s personal music project where he composes all the instrumentation and vocals. He also mixes and masters everything at home. Bobbin is also the vocalist of a prog metal band in Orlando called TRAVERSING INFINITY.

We had the chance to ask Bobbin a couple questions as part of The Refrain Interview Series. Check it out below.

Refrain Music Blog: Thanks for taking the time to do this interview. You have a new single out now. What’s it called? 

The Conduit: Thanks for having me. The new single is called “Tripcode”

RMB: What’s the single about? 

The Conduit: The single is about being true to yourself despite cultural influence. Lately the idea of collective consciousness becoming engineered and centralized has been seeming more apparent. When you go to a bar these days people seem to espouse the same ideas, maybe because they’ll be shamed for being unique or having a personal opinion, but to me this seems like Orwellian hell when I’m honest with myself. When you’re just trying to have a good time and keep the energy in conversations flowing, in some instances, you get people so consumed by their cultural paradigms that they can’t even joke. I had a guy cry to me about Ukraine at the bar the other day. It completely killed my buzz. I’m a vegan hippie who drives a prius but I still disdain mainstream narratives in all aspects, so neither side of any cultural paradigm accepts me unless I fly under their radar somehow. This song is for the people who are tired of the programming, the cliche, and the media matrix, who want to get back to having fun and creating their own new ideas, not regurgitating someone else’s. I embrace metal because it’s all about new ideas, not qualifying to anyone, going against the mainstream and exceeding it in terms of creativity, skill, and production value.

RMB: What’s the story on how it was recorded? Any good stories about the recording process?

The Conduit: I started writing the guitar parts at my place in Orlando back in June of this year. At the same time I was filming Tik Tok videos to promote it (@jeffeyinfinity), but for some reason one of my older albums, Icosahedral, went viral instead of this single. Which I’m cool with. It took a while to get everything done because I work with another band here called Traversing Infinity and was also recording a single with an Australian band, Primordial Project. During this time working with other bands I was tracking the drums, bass, and electronic aspects of the song. I finally got the vocals tracked after a few months. Songs usually take me a week to write and record but I wanted to be more careful with this one. I also wanted to incorporate electronic and hip hop elements, while maintaining a sinister and complex vibe. Making music that’s hyper engaging, distinguished, and evocative is my main priority when writing music so keeping it technical is imperative. I don’t like fillers or sitting in pockets too often. Repeats aren’t even a component of music I value much but sometimes it can tie a composition together and cultivate more meaning with listeners for a single release.

RMB: Is it part of a larger album?

The Conduit: It’s part of a series of singles I’ll be releasing. I’m in writing mode now so I just released “Tripcode”,  then October 9th I’ll be releasing an electronic song named “Coat of Arms”, and once I’m back from Ireland in October I’ll be releasing a prog metal track I think will be called “Persona non Grata”. We’ll see how things work out. I’m loud and dumb on Tik Tok  shamelessly self-promoting new songs everyday. I might never record an album again unless the demand exceeds writing singles.

RMB: How does this single differ from your previous work?

The Conduit: I’ve written and recorded over 100 songs at this point that are on Spotify. I’ve played drums in metal bands, bass, guitar, and currently sing in the band Traversing Infinity now. I’ve honed my skills to some degree as a songwriter and metal composer so I took the opportunity to demonstrate that with this song “Tripcode”. It has three different key signatures which is unusual for me. The syncopated rapping over djent grooves is something I haven’t done too much of previously. Now that I’m better with software and automation I incorporate more electronic aspects to the music. This song to me sounds like the nudist buddhist of metal songs, in terms of the effort I made to be distinct from the rest.   

RMB: Tell us a little bit about yourself. When did you start pursuing music?

The Conduit: I started pursuing music when I was 13. When I was a noob I used to play guitar at parties to impress people but now, I just walk in and find the guitar player, stand in front of him and start doing a conducting pattern hand motion. This way it looks like I composed what he’s playing and now I’m conducting his performance. It’s a life hack. Throughout highschool I was playing drums in bands with 24 year olds so I got to be in the scene and play in Orlando venues at a young age. Then I started playing drums in more technical metal bands in Ocala, Fl. Composing the Void was one of them but I think they might have changed their name to Foreverless. When I moved to LA I’d go to shows and meet musicians then start playing bass and guitar in different bands at places like Whisky-a-Go-Go and Viper room, but my passion has always been in full song composition. I recruited musicians using craigslist and because I had a pretty extensive Spotify repertoire it was easy to find good musicians who were down to play shows and record music videos. I like to brag about the musicians I work with because I’ve always felt blessed to find amazing players. At this point I’m lucky that I have my own personal project, The Conduit, where I can be a control freak and then have a band like Traversing Infinity where I can be collaborative and take a step back during the writing process. I might make The Conduit a live performance band again at some point, but right now I enjoy just performing vocals live with Traversing Infinity. 

RMB: Who are some of your biggest musical influences?

The Conduit: Lately I’m obsessed with Frontierer, Destrage, Northlane, and an Indonesian band named Stars and Rabbit. My gateway bands into heavy metal were in this order: Korn, System of a Down, Atreyu, Between the Buried and me. Once I understood Mordecai by BTBAM this new world of prog metal was open to me for consumption. Then I was obsessed with bands like Animals as Leaders, Periphery, Tesseract, Architects, Vildhjarta, Protest the Hero, etc.

RMB: What’s the one thing you are most proud of in your career so far?

The Conduit: I pioneered the shuffle-core genre with a 20 track album called Icosahedral. You listen to the album on shuffle and it plays as one randomized 20 minute song. 1-3 musical phrases per track with no repeats. Please listen with a good internet connection though. I’ve heard complaints that there are pauses between tracks but there are none. I put work into the timing and each track ends on a subdominant note then resolves into the next track on a dominant note. Bottomline is it works. Plus it has more utility with streaming services when looking at the listener analytics and save ratios. Every label is going to start releasing music in this format. I composed this album in 2016 and it’s finally gaining traction now and several musicians said they would implement the idea in the Tik Tok comments.

RMB: If you had to pitch your music to a potential fan in less than 10 seconds, what would you say?

The Conduit: Please don’t listen to this if you’re basic.

RMB: What’s one piece of advice you’ve gotten that you think everyone needs to hear or that has meant the most to you?

The Conduit: Never stop fighting. You see too many people at the mercy of perceived authority. People can bash what you do but what they say means nothing when you keep pushing forward. I know I’m doing everything the exact artistic way I need it to be in the moment even when it comes down to character and principle. Know thyself. Art is paramount above all else. Things like feelings, safety, security, and ideology are secondary if not last in terms of your priorities. Don’t apologize for your art, music, or self expression. Don’t placate the collective by becoming boring and non-expressive. You need to be part of the dialogue even if you’re wrong. The world’s a stage. Shine your light.

RMB: If you could go back in time, what’s a piece of advice you would give to a younger you?

The Conduit: Even if your music is undeniably good you still need to explain why it’s good. Even the best art masterpieces are prefaced with a writeup next to them at the major museums. Sure, the art should be able to sell itself on its own merit. When people look at or listen to it they should know that it’s good but it doesn’t work like that most of the time. If you’re a musician you have to explain everything about the process that went into your work. Spoon feed it. People are sold on band biographies, pitches, and a view into the artist’s life. Then you have to have great music on top of that. At first glance even the Mona Lisa doesn’t have much appeal, but once you have a view into Da Vinci’s life, the fibonacci mathematics that went into his work, and the nuance of what occurred during the process of painting the people who paid him, his paintings then have immense value.

RMB: What’s coming up next for your musical project?

The Conduit: I might start doing some more electronic music because I’ve been enjoying the process and the feedback. I’m enjoying the cheesy 80’s themes with guitar solos so I hope to create more of those. My heart is in metal music so I’ll never stop writing metal and I do believe it’s the apex genre.

Thanks for having me on the interview. I hope you enjoy my new song Tripcode and please feel free to message me on Tik Tok, anyone, anytime, @jeffeyinfinity

Connect With The Conduit:

Spotify / Tiktok