Inside Tracks

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After finishing college I had a production-type room for a while, which led to me going to work at a big studio in Dallas, called the Dallas Sound Lab. I hooked up with a gospel artist there called Kirk Franklin, and we worked together for seven years and won two Grammy Awards [for Franklin's albums Hero in 2005 and The Fight Of My Life in 2007, both in the Best Contemporary R&B Gospel Album category]. Because of my connection with Franklin I recorded mainly Christian albums for many years, but around 2007 some musician friends of mine hooked me up with Timbaland, which is how I got to work with him. Since then I am wherever he is, which may be in New York, Los Angeles, Miami or his studio in Virginia Beach.” 20 Days

From comparing the amount of money placed on a horse versus the total on the race you can tell if a horse is overweighted in the market or underweighted.

Inside Tracks: Tech House

Born in New Delhi, India, Bainz got to his position as chief engineer and mixer at YSL in Los Angeles via Australia, Florida and New York. He recalls, “I never played an instrument, but got into DJ’ing and I was into electronic music. I went to Melbourne to do a bachelor degree in something, I can’t remember what it was, but I hated it. I dropped out and then enrolled in the School of Audio Engineering Institute in Melbourne. I was always into the technicalities behind music and there I realised I wanted to be an engineer.

This view of the Pro Tools Edit window shows some of the beats, which were programmed in some cases by cutting and pasting audio clips rather than using MIDI. Although the vertical waveform zoom level has been raised to make the contents of each clip visible, Pro Tools’ Clip Gain feature has been used to reduce most of them in level by up to 15dB.

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James Taylor (left) and Dave O’Donnell at work in the former’s Barn studio. Photo: Spencer Worthley There has been a 13–year hiatus since Taylor’s previous album of new material, 2002’s October Road, punctuated only by an album of covers called, well, Covers (2008), a few live albums and a Christmas album. In interviews, Taylor indicated that modern life was simply too busy for him to take the time off he needs to write. The other major challenge for any older artist is to come up with something that’s not only relevant today in terms of music and lyrics, but that can also compete in today’s sonic landscape. The songs from the special were released on streaming platforms on June 10, 2021. The special was nominated for six Emmy Awards in 2021, of which it won three: Outstanding Writing for a Variety Special, Outstanding Directing for a Variety Special, and Outstanding Music Direction. “All Eyes on Me” also earned Bo his first Grammy win for Best Song Written for Visual Media at the 2022 Grammys. We are working hard to get the remaining issues brought over as soon as possible but this conversion and reformatting will take time, due to commitments to producing the new issue each month. Then in 2010, when I was 22, I moved to Toronto. I had a room at Dream House Studios, and behind every wall another producer was creating music in a different genre, which made me feel very uncomfortable, as I was working my way through a lot of insecurities. During that time I went to LA to have meetings with people, but nobody was interested. No matter what music I was working on, it wasn’t going for me. The main thing I did during this period, and still afterwards, was developing my techniques. At one stage I was mapping out the different frequency octaves in different keys of songs, and I would visually approach mixing with these different frequency ranges in mind. It was like maths. I literally had vocals rolled off at certain frequencies because it opened up for this other sound to come in. I drove myself absolutely mad! I don’t do that at all any more, but I had to go through it. It was a step along the path.”

Forty–seven years after the release of his self–titled debut album, James Taylor finally achieved his first American number one in June this year. His 17th studio album, Before This World, surpassed the chart placings of Taylor’s classic early–career albums Sweet Baby James (1970, US number three) and Mud Slide Slim And The Blue Horizon (1971, US number two). Before This World also enjoyed notable chart success in several other countries, reaching number four in the UK, for example. According to Bainz, working on the album made little difference to his daily rhythm, apart from the complications of the epidemic. “Since I started to work for YSL, I have barely had any days off. I am Thug’s and YSL’s full‑time engineer, and they are in the studio every day. Because YSL is such a big camp, as a team and as a label, somebody is always working. They operate like a big family. I do mixes for others as well, sometimes, but I am on call all the time as an engineer. The only reason I can do so many mixes is because I have my room in the same facility, right down the hallway, so I can just walk over to help with recording when needed. By the way, the above vocal treatments are not part of a template. Every song is different. I cannot stress this enough. Vocals are different, and in general I like to change tools with every song. I might have gotten a new plug‑in that I like. I love new technology, so I like to try things out! O’Donnell recorded all the material for Before This World to Pro Tools at 24–bit, 96kHz: “I was never a big fan of 44.1, and I feel that 96k is definitely better for acoustic music. With 24/96 I thought for the first time that digital sounded good.” Be Prepared As a producer I see my job as making sure the songs are great, by getting great performances, and doing whatever it takes to achieve that,” explains O’Donnell. “It can include choosing the songs, and working on any aspect of them: the tempo, the key, the lyrics, to the structure, parts and so on. With a different artist it can mean a lot of guidance, but with an artist like James you know the songs and the performances will be there; it’s just a matter of capturing these the best you can.”When collaborating, people who use other DAWs simply send me WAVs, and I then load these into Cubase, and that’s when my work begins. It’s a process of chipping away at things and building them out. I’ve worked in Cubase for 12 years now, and I’m incredibly fast and efficient with it. I do everything: all my writing, producing, recording, tuning, editing and mixing in one session. Cubase is the one thing I couldn’t do without. But I’ve recently also been playing with Ableton, and that’s fun. I can work in it without looking at numbers or graphical interfaces, I’m just creating and throwing things together without quantising or treating them. After that I Rewire things in Cubase, and get into the technical side and zone in on the details. It’s become an incredible workflow for me. Engineer, mixer and producer Carlo Montagnese likens his work with the Weeknd to painting — and he’s not afraid to use plenty of colour! He thoroughly covers all the major aspects of music production that our students are constantly asking about. How do you get inspired to start an idea? How do you fully develop an idea and how do you mix and master that idea to a fully polished idea that is done?! All done in a fresh new way. Angad Bains, aka Bainz, works primarily in the Atlanta rap scene. There used to be a time when the red light ruled — make a noise or enter a studio when it is on and you’re dead meat — and artists would come into the studio with carefully prepared songs, with chords and lyrics written down and laboured over for weeks or months. But Atlanta rap culture completely ignores the old paradigm. A relaxed vibe is imperative, and sonic corruption a problem to be solved after the event.

Justin Timberlake's album release schedule appears to be inspired by the proverbial English buses: you wait ages and then several come along at once. Before 2013, the singer had released only two albums in a decade: his 2002 debut Justified, and the follow-up Futuresex/LoveSounds in 2006. After that Timberlake became preoccupied with his acting career, though he remained an active chart presence by guesting on other people's hits, such as Madonna's '4 Minutes', TI's 'Dead And Gone', Timbaland's 'Carry Out', and Jamie Foxx's 'Winner'. Deep in the middle of 2020 and of the pandemic, YSL hatched a plan for another Slime Language album. The concept of the Slime Language compilations is to showcase YSL’s artists, as well as a large collection of guest artists and Thug’s close friends. And so Slime Language 2, which also became a Billboard number one, features the likes of Travis Scott, Drake, Lil Baby, Lil Uzi Vert, Big Sean, Skepta, Future, Kid Cudi, Meek Mill and many others, as well as Young Thug and Gunna, of course. Now 28, Carlo ‘Illangelo’ Montagnese takes the modern approach to making music to an extreme, with every significant move done in software. Unsurprisingly, Montagnese also learnt his skills in typically 21st-century fashion: he’s self–taught, and the Internet is his main source of information.It’s easier and more flexible to work in the box, but it does mean that I spend a lot of time making sure the programmed stuff sounds less sterile. One way of doing that is by adding grit. Distortion is a big part of working in analogue, and the way you hit the console can make a big difference. You don’t have that in the box, but you can simulate it. I’ll use various plug-ins to create grit in the box, like the SoundToys Decapitator and sometimes the Waves NLS console emulation plug-ins.” Chorus lead vocal: Antares Auto–Tune EFX, FabFilter Pro–DS, Pro–Q2, Volcano, Pro–MB & Timeless 2, Waves Vocal Rider, Reel ADT, H–Delay & Doubler, UAD API 560, 1176, MXR Flanger & EP34, SoundToys Little Radiator, Decapitator & MicroShift, Audio Ease Altiverb. Not much. What I use is this: a MacBook Pro, in my studio together with a PCI chassis with two UAD Octo Cards, and the Metric Halo ULN8 soundcard. When I’m travelling I use the same laptop with a UAD Apollo Twin soundcard. I have two sets of headphones, but frankly, I don’t mind which I use. I’m also happy to work with anything for monitors. I used to use Genelecs, and I really like the Yamaha NS10s. But it does not matter.” I work fully in the box, on my six-year-old MacBook Pro, with a UAD Apollo Twin soundcard and Octo Satellite, plus Audio-Technica M50X and Beats Pro headphones. This setup allows me to work anywhere, also at home. I love my A-T headphones! The Beats are not that great, but many people listen to them, so I use it as a reference. It’s not for final decisions, but more for the vibe. At Fight Club I use Yamaha NS10 monitors and the Augspurgers. The NS10s are my favourite monitors. If I go to a studio to mix, I make sure they have the Yamahas — but I can mix on headphones, because the current direction in music is not about hi-fi. People listen with earpods, in the car and so on. It’s rare for people to listen to good loudspeakers. It’s the new generation. I had some plug–ins over the stereo bus, even though I have driven myself crazy over the years with many different stereo bus plug–ins, and in the end found that it doesn’t matter. You can get to the same point using different plug–ins. On this song I used the Slate Digital VTM virtual tape machine, which gives you the flexibility to decide how much you want to push the bass in the Settings tab, and which has very realistic hiss noise. On History Of Man I actually used tape, to hear what it would do to my sounds, and when I used the VTM, I found that they dialled that sound in spot on. I also used the Pro–MB, very subtly, just to glue everything together in the song.