Song 1 - Week 4
For my first track, I wanted to try and use the Fl Studio step sequencer to program in the drums in 4/4. I found the sample of Smatter by Kenny Wheeler, and cut a 4 bar sample then cut it up further and rearranged it to give me a base to build my drums on. The kick and the snare work extremely well together to give the drums urgency and bounce, with the added layered hi hats made to sound like a shaker. When mixing the drums, I added EQ to everything, adding low pass filters to the snares and kicks, to make a snap effect. I added a transient to the kick, which added more punch to it. With the snare, I had layered two snares together and added reverb to one of them to widen the snare. On one of my layered hats, I added a delay to widen that hat. In my screen shot of the drum pattern, it shows I used a sub bass, however I decide to change the bass to a trumpet synth, as I preferred the sound.
I then added a flute for the melody, and with `the scale of E, F, G, A, B, C, came up with the bass line and melody. Unfortunately I didn't get a chance to mix the trumpet and flute, but I did manage to mix the sample, adding a filter to it. The song was arranged intro - verse - hook - bridge - verse- hook - bridge - hook - outro. At the end of the week 6, I got a chance to work with a rapper but it was too late for me to mix and cut the vocals properly, so I have decided not to include them in the final cut.
I then added a flute for the melody, and with `the scale of E, F, G, A, B, C, came up with the bass line and melody. Unfortunately I didn't get a chance to mix the trumpet and flute, but I did manage to mix the sample, adding a filter to it. The song was arranged intro - verse - hook - bridge - verse- hook - bridge - hook - outro. At the end of the week 6, I got a chance to work with a rapper but it was too late for me to mix and cut the vocals properly, so I have decided not to include them in the final cut.
Here is the full arrangement of the track. As you can see there was a possibility of working with a rapper but due to time constraints I never got round to editing the vocals.
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The drum pattern for this track was created in the style of boom bap, with layered snares and hats.
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I used a trumpet synth for the bass line instead of a sub bass or 808. I did this to give variation to the track.
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Song 2 - Week 5
For my second track, I wanted to use a disco drum loop like all the old school hip hop producers do, and went back through my material research and found a song that was talked about a few time, Impeach the president by the honeydrippers. The first bar of this song are perfect for a boom bap style hip hop track, so I decided to sample it. I wanted the song to feel like an old hip hop tape, so tried to keep the loop repeating throughout the song. I added EQ to the sample, and attenuated the frequencies around the 400 Hz and 2K Hz marks, just to take the edge of the high end and lower end frequencies. I didn't want to you a high pass or low pass filter because with the former I'd be losing the percussion's from the sample, and with the latter I'd be losing the kicks and snares. I also added reverb to widen the track, then added a filter with automation to allow me to create a build up for the intro of the track and outro. I then added compression to the track. I also added something called gross beat to the drums, which allows me to manipulate the timing of the sample, which I also automated.
The bass line was made by me messing around with the controls on one of the Fl Studio plugins called Harmless. I played around with the pluck controller, which achieved a plucky synth sounding bass for the first bass, and also added a harmoniser. For the other bass I just increased the sub on the bass to give a deeper sound. I then added EQ, boosting the lower frequencies, and added distortion to the the subby bass, and reverb to the synth bass, just for extra depth. For the melody, I added a piano using a 3rd party plugin called nexus. It has a built in LFO feature that allowed me to modulate the pitch, causing the piano to have a really old, reverberated feel to it. I then added EQ, only really boosting the mid - high range frequencies, as I felt that was the only thing necessary. Lastly I added extra hi hats on top of the hats in the sample, to give the track a sense of movement and bounce, and added a delay to it for a shaker effect. I added automation to the track in the form of the gross beat, an filter and the volume for the intro and outro of the song.
The arrangement of the song was done in the form of intro - verse - hook - verse - bridge - hook - outro, to emulate the style of an old school boom bap style tape. each verse is 32 bars long, and the hooks and bridge are 8 bars. The scale I used was in the key of C, with the scale of C, D, D#, F, G, G#. This scale isn't a typical scale as I picked most of the notes myself.
The bass line was made by me messing around with the controls on one of the Fl Studio plugins called Harmless. I played around with the pluck controller, which achieved a plucky synth sounding bass for the first bass, and also added a harmoniser. For the other bass I just increased the sub on the bass to give a deeper sound. I then added EQ, boosting the lower frequencies, and added distortion to the the subby bass, and reverb to the synth bass, just for extra depth. For the melody, I added a piano using a 3rd party plugin called nexus. It has a built in LFO feature that allowed me to modulate the pitch, causing the piano to have a really old, reverberated feel to it. I then added EQ, only really boosting the mid - high range frequencies, as I felt that was the only thing necessary. Lastly I added extra hi hats on top of the hats in the sample, to give the track a sense of movement and bounce, and added a delay to it for a shaker effect. I added automation to the track in the form of the gross beat, an filter and the volume for the intro and outro of the song.
The arrangement of the song was done in the form of intro - verse - hook - verse - bridge - hook - outro, to emulate the style of an old school boom bap style tape. each verse is 32 bars long, and the hooks and bridge are 8 bars. The scale I used was in the key of C, with the scale of C, D, D#, F, G, G#. This scale isn't a typical scale as I picked most of the notes myself.
The initial track before any mixing or final arrangement. At this point the melody, bassline and drums were completed.
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The bass line, composed in the key of C, with a scale I chose myself.
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I layered two of the same bass synths to give added depth to the base line. One of the bass's was made to sound very plucky and sine-like, by adding a harmonising filter to it and making the ADSR attack a pluck filter.
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Collaborative Artwork - Week 7
For my collaboration for this project, I got the help of a friend and designer, Tom Watts. We got together when we were both free, and I spoke to him about what hip hop album art is meant to represent, and what I was aiming for for my art. I went with a more conceptual idea, as I am thinking about possibly using this style again as a type of Gorillaz/Daftpunk project with art work and story behind the music.