Music is not a game, but it's still a competition
The topic of the week is competition. More precisely, it's about analyzing what other house producers do, what separates their music from mine. I've chosen some recent releases on those respectable labels, trying to listen to them closely, find out the missing ingredient, that special something that made the label choose that particular track for their release. The tracks aren't really the biggest hits, neither are they necessarily my favorite tracks the last few years. I've simply chosen ones that would be stylistically at least somewhat similar to what I do, so they can be compared to my work.
First in order is a track from the latest installation of Innervisions' series Secret Weapons. It's called On Two Strangers and it's by Thomas Gandey and Santiago Garcia.
I've listened to it a few dozen times on a loop now, trying to understand what makes it tick and why did Innervisions choose this particular one on their compilation, instead of the thousands of other tracks they could've chosen instead. Overall the production is clean, the arrangement works and there's enough musical ideas to keep it interesting. What makes it special though and especially, what makes it different from my tracks? Comparing it side to side with them, the main difference is the sparsity of the arrangement. I often put all my eggs into one basket, have too many elements fighting for space at the same time, which results in a track that can get a bit boring because there aren't enough changes. I don't think any of my individual elements are that much worse than in this example track, I just need to learn how to mix those elements together, both in the mixdown phase as well as the arrangement.
Next up is a track called Northeast by Martin Buttrich, released on Carl Craig's label, Planet E. Primarily a techno label of course but this track is stylistically pretty close to what I try to accomplish and of course, everyone still remembers Buttrich's classic track Full Clip, which the Resident Advisor recently called the best club track of 2006. I still listen to Full Clip a lot and it's a direct influence in my music.
It's of course not fair to compare my stuff to an industry heavyweight like Buttrich but my intention is to aim high, not stay at amateur level all my life. To be completely honest, I don't think Northeast reaches the heights of Full Clip, but it is a well produced, professional track, released on a respectable label so it can easily be included here.
Trying to analyze it, the first thing that pops up is the production. The highs sizzle, the low end sounds balanced and the whole thing is sort of glued together in a way I'm not able to accomplish yet. The whole thing sounds like a complete track, not just a collection of random ideas, like my tracks often do. The musical ideas and the arrangement aren't THAT far away from my level I think. Could be just my ego talking here of course, but I feel that once I learn how to get the production a tad better, I can get in the ballpark of this track.
Overall, I think I'm behind these reference tracks. I have some half-decent musical ideas, but I don't quite yet have the production chops these kinda tracks require and I also often struggle with arrangement. I tend to cram all my ideas together and don't let the tracks breathe enough. I should learn to minimize the arrangement, not just go full on all the time. Production-wise I need to learn how to make the highs sizzle a bit better and reduce the harshness in the upper mid frequencies, as well as make the overall sound a bit more coherent, my music often sounds like the instruments, at least some of them, don't really belong to the mix, they float on top of the music, instead of being an integral part of it. These are things that can be learned, it's not magic.
In the next blog post I'll show you some of my own, recent tracks and there will be a poll involved. Get ready!
First in order is a track from the latest installation of Innervisions' series Secret Weapons. It's called On Two Strangers and it's by Thomas Gandey and Santiago Garcia.
I've listened to it a few dozen times on a loop now, trying to understand what makes it tick and why did Innervisions choose this particular one on their compilation, instead of the thousands of other tracks they could've chosen instead. Overall the production is clean, the arrangement works and there's enough musical ideas to keep it interesting. What makes it special though and especially, what makes it different from my tracks? Comparing it side to side with them, the main difference is the sparsity of the arrangement. I often put all my eggs into one basket, have too many elements fighting for space at the same time, which results in a track that can get a bit boring because there aren't enough changes. I don't think any of my individual elements are that much worse than in this example track, I just need to learn how to mix those elements together, both in the mixdown phase as well as the arrangement.
Next up is a track called Northeast by Martin Buttrich, released on Carl Craig's label, Planet E. Primarily a techno label of course but this track is stylistically pretty close to what I try to accomplish and of course, everyone still remembers Buttrich's classic track Full Clip, which the Resident Advisor recently called the best club track of 2006. I still listen to Full Clip a lot and it's a direct influence in my music.
It's of course not fair to compare my stuff to an industry heavyweight like Buttrich but my intention is to aim high, not stay at amateur level all my life. To be completely honest, I don't think Northeast reaches the heights of Full Clip, but it is a well produced, professional track, released on a respectable label so it can easily be included here.
Trying to analyze it, the first thing that pops up is the production. The highs sizzle, the low end sounds balanced and the whole thing is sort of glued together in a way I'm not able to accomplish yet. The whole thing sounds like a complete track, not just a collection of random ideas, like my tracks often do. The musical ideas and the arrangement aren't THAT far away from my level I think. Could be just my ego talking here of course, but I feel that once I learn how to get the production a tad better, I can get in the ballpark of this track.
Third track lined up for comparison is Family Ritual by Andy Bros from 2017, on Solomun's label, Diynamic. The main riff sounds familiar to Henrik Schwartz's remix of Detroit Experiment - Think Twice, but that might be just a coincidence, it's not the most complicated riff in the world.
This is a very well built track. The production is good and the arrangement works for the entire length, almost 10 minutes, of the track. It's pretty much the type of track I'm trying to write. I love these long, epic builders. I also feel this level of a track is not completely out of reach for me, if I only raise my game by a level or two during this year. There isn't anything in particular in this track I couldn't do myself, except I don't have a plugin which would do those strings. It's just the whole that eludes me. I have the ingredients but I can't bake a delicious cake, just some dry, tasteless rolls.
In the next blog post I'll show you some of my own, recent tracks and there will be a poll involved. Get ready!
Comments
Post a Comment