Dave Weldar might be the most prolific musician you've never heard of. For a short while, he's released an astounding 26 records that span electronica, dub, ambient, kosmich, and drone. One of those albums, Thunderdrone, is over four hours long. Based in Bristol and Haw, and described as a "rotating cast of musicians and artists", in reality "Dave Weldar" is mostly the work of one man who's been quietly working on it so far: film-maker Ben Wheatley.
"I've always wanted to make music", says Wheatley, whose films include indie hits High-Rise, Kill List and Sightseers, as well as big-budget Hollywood movies such as the shark thriller Meg 2: The Trench. "I wanted to do it for my films, but there was a dissonance. Out of all the art forms, I really couldn't get my head around it. I'd dream of being able to play, but then it was, "No, I can't."
After starting to play with GarageBand a few years ago, it quickly became an obsession. "It's this weird flow state where you're sitting at the machine and then this melody comes out and it's like, "Oh, fuck." He listens back and doesn't know how he made some of the things. Creating music can be a healthy distraction: "I might have work to do, but I'm like, "I don't want to do it", so I'll make music and then get back to it." Alternatively, "the reward of doing a task, whereas before it might have been playing games or doomscrolling. It's a more productive and creative way to chill."
Wheatley's latest project is an experimental sci-fi film, Bulk - and for the first time, the music is his (or Dave Weldar's). "One of the great things about film-making is working with amazing composers, and I've managed to fuck that up", he says with a laugh. However, the feedback loop was a simpler process. "The back-end of being a composer is listening to directors, but luckily for me, my director is me. So I'm like, "Oh, that's pretty good, bro!"
Wheatley describes his approach to scoring for the screen as in keeping with the aesthetic of Bulk: "very cottage industry, very handmade." Providing dialogue with hilariously skewed dubbing, Sam Riley's character Corey explores the multiverse as the film shifts to film noir and B-movie sci-fi, abandoning conventional narrative. Beyond writing, directing and scoring the film, Wheatley also created all the models used in the lo-fi special effects and even hand-drew the credits sequence.
These credits are like a punk-style fanzine, with instructions on how to recreate the film and its soundtrack using the same primitive equipment, such as iPhones and GarageBand. "There's a punkness", he says of the overall approach. "Modern technology, while it pushes you, actually allows you to create and release it." The credits also pay homage to some of Wheatley's musical inspirations, including The Fall, Neu, and Aphex Twin.
Is this newly discovered fun, experimental music creation and the strictly DIY ethos of Bulk a reaction to projects like Meg 2, with a budget of $130m? "It's all part of the same creative thing", he says. "It's a reaction, but not in a negative way. After Meg, I did Generation Z, which was different." While shooting his next film, Normal, with Bob Odenkirk, he was still making his own music all the time. "I'd be on Bob's film, and then I'd go back at night and do stuff and listen to it. It sounds like listening to your own music, but it's one of the secret pleasures."
Wheatley has caught this bug so intensely that he has ideas for creating new immersive experiences combining music with films in cinemas, involving stacked sound systems and custom narrative light shows. "Like a concert and a film", he says. "That would be a wild experience, but I don't know if it makes any economic sense..." He has also performed some secret live shows under the Dave Weldar name, including one at London's Café Oto. "Music needs to be heard by people, so it doesn't make sense to just release it and leave it languishing in the backwaters of the internet", he says. "I wanted it to be heard on massive speakers. I've always been trying to do different things, and doing live shows was another such experience, but I was thinking, "How did I end up here?" I'm really glad I'm doing it, but it's absurd."
