Task 1: Three Minute Song Production (70%)
Task 2: 1000 Word Write-Up (30%)
Process
My inspiration for this composition stems from my research into and analysis of Portishead’s debut album for my first contextual studies assignment. Whilst studying the album, I found that experimenting with techniques and sounds outlined in their music to not only be creatively fulfilling, but also served to deepen my understanding of the musical style as a whole. I also found that techniques such as re-sampling, or sampling their own music assisted in my main issue as a writer, which is developing my own ideas into finished songs. Through this technique I was able to re-imagine my older ideas, whilst contextualising them in a setting which matched the assignment brief of incorporating sampling. Viewing my old ideas in new contexts allowed me to experiment with repurposing the music in the context of different musical contexts.
Being a more rock/indie oriented musician and producer, exploring this musical genre was both creatively inspiring and provided different perspectives which I aim to Implement into my own process.
Although the track I ended up producing has elements of trip hop, I would say that the overall genre is a blend between trip hop, pop and some alt rock elements.
I began by taking a sample of one of my acoustic guitar ideas, which is heard below in the intro of the song:
I kept this element in the intro only, to demonstrate the initial idea, as well as for musical effect.
I then sketched out an old chord progression heard below:
I used the ‘frozen strings’ Spitfire Labs plugin to do this. I used this sound as I was drawn to the more unnatural sounding strings, which I believe contributed to the overall direction.
In order to write the vocals/ melodic content, I worked closely with the vocalist (my partner). With myself not being a singer, the electric guitar which can be heard to double the vocals was originally a melodic guide I had created whilst improvising around the chords. However, upon layering in the vocals I found that doubling up the guitar in octaves, and panning them around the lead vocals created an interesting texture. These were then automated as to not interfere with the vocals. This is heard below:
As for the drums, I had originally played them in on a Midi keyboard using the Spitfire LABS percussion plugin, for convenience during writing. However, a technique which stood out to me about Portisheads’ writing is their manipulation of Soul and R&B Grooves through sampling. Therefore, later in the refinement process I opened a separate logic project, played the drum groove double time, bounced the groove and half timed the groove in a sampler to emulate the more twisted and unnatural sounding drums. I then edited this signal with Flex Time to keep the timing consistent.
I then doubled the snare, kick, crash and ride elements with various MIDI inputs to ‘brighten’ the overall sound and to bring some clarity back in. I believe this contributed massively to the overall sound. The combined elements can be heard below:
Additionally, to further emulate the vinyl manipulation and destructive techniques heard in trip hop, a vinyl crackle effect is heard on the drums. Due to my re-sampling and manipulation techniques being digital, achieving this effect in a believable way was a challenge. To do so, I used an Apple Loop of vinyl background noise, and used a noise gate side chained to the drum track which triggered the vinyl noise, in order to make the appearance of an analogue distressed audio signal. This can also be heard on the above drum track, and in isolation below:
Finally, the vocal recording itself was done with a sm7b. In the choruses, the vocals are double tracked hard left and right, with these tracks having a bandpass, telephone style effect. Throughout the track, the vocal is split across two channels. One channel is more clean and reverb heavy, whilst the other is being ran through a logic guitar amplifier. I did this to retain clarity in the vocals, whilst achieving more of a Low-Fi, distorted effect. Each independent element is heard below:
Commercial Potential
As for commercial potential, The track could be used for sync licensing. Specifically, a more soundtrack- esc manner, such as a cinematic trailer. The overall darker sound lends itself to a thriller/ spy genre of movie, similar to its inspiration.
Additionally, the lyrical content tackling the feeling of being left behind, losing people over time and growing apart, in combination with the Lo-Fi musical aspects would lend itself to usage on modern social media platforms.
The sound of the track itself is distinctive yet borrows from multiple genres, such as Trip Hop, Pop, Alt Rock and Lo-Fi and could therefore find an audience within these niches. This broad span of genres would increase the potential reach of the track.
This track could also be released as part of an Album, EP or single release for an artist.
Research
As mentioned before, the inspiration for this project occurred whilst researching into Portishead’s ‘Dummy’, as well as the wider world of trip hop. I found particularly the area of vinyl distressing and manipulation the most interesting, as well as the overall attitude of trip hop, being centred around developing and distorting existing music to fit a new and unique sound.
Evaluative analysis
I believe overall I met the assignment brief, whilst also challenging myself to explore a genre which is outside of my usual work. Although I have listened extensively to trip hop, I had never attempted to write in the style of/ take inspiration from it until this assignment. In doing so, I have expanded my perspective on music writing as a whole, and intend to use this more creative and outside of the box approach in my day to day work and to experiment outside of comfortable genres.
Fumo, D. (2019, August 22). Making Portishead’s “Dummy”: The Production Experiments of a Trip-Hop Classic. Retrieved from Reverb: https://reverb.com/uk/news/making-portishead-dummy-production-experiments-trip-hop-classic
Gourley, B. (1994, N/A N/A). Portishead interviewed about their debut album “Dummy”. Retrieved from Chaos control digizine: https://chaoscontrol.com/portishead/
Utley, A. (2023, November 16). Portishead’s Adrian Utley – Our Generation | Rotosound. (Rotosound, Interviewer)
