Skip to main content

'Drive' composer Cliff Martinez reads the manual to make music

'Drive' composer Cliff Martinez reads the manual to make music

Share this story

Cliff Martinez once drummed for the Red Hot Chili Peppers and the Dickies, but has since found more fame producing ambient electronica for movie soundtracks. Martinez provided the scores for a range of cult films, offering dark and brooding aural accompaniments to movies such as Sex, Lies and Videotape, Solaris, and Drive. Martinez describes how he honed his "atmospheric and textual" style in an interview with Cool Hunting, looking back over a career that started with him using 3-inch floppy disks to make music. The composer also explains how he teaches himself to create his art by reading manuals, and remembers his collaboration with a seldom-seen Skrillex.