I’ve decided to follow with the very first attributes exercise I did and wrote down the attributes. The song was Meatgrinder by MADVILLIAN.
The attributes I decided were.
Uniqueness
Rustic
Original
LO-FI
Rough Mix
Tasteful
Breaks that knock
Passionate
Complex
Simple on the surface
Depth
I’ve decided to use similar tools that MADLIB would use when creating this song. An SP404MK2, a 4-track Tascam 424 and a turntable with some vinyl. I decided to start with the first attribute which was the drums and breaks that knock. I setup my 4 track and started going through some cassettes that I have to sample some drums, I ended up taking a high hat from a Commodore song, the drum and snare from Brick House from the same group. I chopped it into my SP404MK2 and started creating a drumkit, tuning the kit, chopping the waveforms, adding effects and then resampled them into a sequence.
I was trying to really hit the attributes and see what happened, the uniqueness I felt like would come from having no grid. Not quantising and just feeling the rhythm when creating the drum pattern. As well as this I was sampling different drum sounds, EQ’ing them to actually work and not clash. I even used one with a vocal sound to add an interesting texture to the drum sequence.
After creating my loop and figuring out the correct pattern, I set up my 4-track machine and recorded in the drum attempting to get some saturation from the cassette player. As well as hoping it would make my music wonky and change the frequency response, I wanted it to be muddy and just an expression.
After recording the drums into the 4-track I decided to look through another cassette and found a lovely guitar loop in a Sade record. I recorded it into my SP404MK2 and chopped and pitched, time-stretched. It really did lose all revelance and context from the original. I was just using it as an audio source. Then I jammed along and figured out a pattern, then record the pattern into channel 3-4. Finally, I felt like it needed an intro, I picked out a random 45 record and it had someone speaking at the beginning, it was a 1976 Worldcup record. Someone says “You’ve never heard anything like this before” I scratched the record after the person says this quote and used it as an intro.
Then I uploaded it into Logic Pro X, I used a multipressor, reverb send, and Chorus. I EQed the files as they were recorded in stereo which made it difficult to really mix it correctly how I wanted but I embraced the decision-making I had made before it. The outcome I’m pretty content with, I’m not sure where this will lead me again, but I’m curious about the process I did today. Tape and vinyl really speak to me in terms of sampling. I enjoy just pulling out physical media, perhaps I can use this as well?
Final Outcome audio