Dance Track Master, Accidental Fan

On a day off from his tour promoting the latest LCD Soundsystem album, “This Is Happening” (DFA/Virgin), he spoke with Ben Sisario. Mr. Murphy was relaxing in his loft on a quickly gentrifying postindustrial street in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, that reflects the mind of an obsessive collector eternally on the verge between clubland and adulthood. His huge collection of vinyl records was arranged in clearly labeled alphabetical order, and on a bookshelf near his wine refrigerators sat a complete set of the Oxford English Dictionary. Here are excerpts from the conversation.

Q. What’s your preferred way of hearing new music?

A. I prefer to find music by accident: Facebook, YouTube, recommendation from a friend. I don’t have a TV, and I don’t have a radio.

Chrome Hoof is a band I found on Facebook. An English band. Don’t know much about them, but they’ve been in metal bands and stuff before. Those turnarounds they’re playing on “Tonyte” are totally Yes. And yet it’s contemporary. Somehow it’s contemporary. And like the KLF they play in semi-mysterious outfits.

Q. How important is it to you how a band looks?

A. It’s not just a song in a vacuum. There are things that go around it: live shows, what a band looks like, what they talk like, the art they use to represent themselves.

The Fall was super powerful to me because of their covers. They were intimidating. I bought “This Nation’s Saving Grace” when it came out, in 1985, and there was something about it that made me nervous. It terrified me. Like in the song “L.A.” how the organ doesn’t sync up with the beat. And on “Paintwork” there’s a hand-held tape recorder chopping in and out.

The idea that someone just called that “done” was something I found magical. It’s like if you know science or you know math, there is a certain kind of mechanical calm when you’re like, “We’re done.”

Q. What do you think of the new Fall album, “Your Future Our Clutter” (Domino)?

A. It was recorded by my friend Ross Orton, who was in a band called the Fat Truckers. They made a seven-inch, “Superbike,” that just said, “Superbike, superbike, take me for a ride on your superbike,” over and over. It kind of sounded like Suicide. The Fall and ESG also have my favorite, super simple, slightly wrong, really funky bass. Both of them do things that are almost impossible to copy. They’re irreducible.

[Mr. Murphy pulled “Superbike” from his shelf and began spinning it on his turntable. He then cued up the first song on the Fall CD, “O.F.Y.C. Showcase,” and, using his D.J. crossfader, played both songs simultaneously, synching up the rhythms.]

It’s the same beat!

Q. You’ve said that “This Is Happening” will be your last album as LCD Soundsystem. Do you want to get back into producing bands?

A. I miss producing. I hate it when I do it, but I love it.

One of the reasons I want to be done with LCD is to be able to produce things like Light Asylum. The singer, Shannon Funchess, has a really powerful, deep alto, like a contralto — this arch, Heaven 17, Grace Jones-like voice. The production on it is a little too chatty for me, though.

Q. Chatty?

A. It’s like a room full of people talking — there’s not enough to focus on. It’s what I find wrong with most modern production. It started in the late 1980s, when people started having a lot of technology at their fingertips. Things started to become a lot less cohesive. With a computer you have access to so many drum sounds and samples that your snare drum will be unrelated harmonically to your kick drum. But take early Human League, or “Sweet Dreams”-era Eurythmics. The sounds are really specific. There’s just a couple of synthesizers.

Light Asylum’s song “A Certain Person” has an out-of-time chord progression on the synth, this amazing Philip Glass 3-against-4 thing. The sound is just nice and simple. And all the different drum sounds, although they’re creating something I kind of like, a sort of psychedelic space, it seems a little unfocused to me. I like the force of a simple set of things struggling for space.

Q. How did you begin working with Janine Rostron of Planningtorock?

A. I found Planningtorock on a blog years ago because someone sent me a link to something else. The video for “When Are You Gonna Start” was also on this blog, and I became obsessed with what she was doing. The video is mesmerizing — very strange and very normal at the same time. It’s in this crazy old mansion-y place out in Germany, and it looks otherworldly, but you can also see people just milling around.

It seems like part of a weekend trip where you might eat food, rather than a video, but in it’s not casual, it’s not slacker. It’s really mannered. It’s like the early Wegman films, where what he is doing seems very integrated into his day.

[With a few quick punches on his laptop, Mr. Murphy played the video on YouTube.]

I love how this manages to be super arch but not cartoonish to me. And I love how good the panda makeup is.

I love Janine’s voice. Super powerful, super singular. She uses it like an instrument, and she sings the way I like people to sing. It’s not necessarily pretty, but she has a really powerful voice. People like that, who have a lot of control, get to do things unconsciously that I think are pretty amazing. She’s directing my next video.

Q. Is that a white chain around her neck?

A. Yeah, she sewed it. She made this one for me. [He picks up an oversize, puffy necklace, with interlocking links like a chain, and the letters LCD dangling from it.]

Q. Wow. Why do you not wear that all the time?

A. Well, I do, just around the house.