First things first, make sure to use a proper kick sound in the first place whether it’s taken from a sample pack or you making your own sound from scratch. Psytrance sub-genres has very strict sub-standards on that matter, you can’t make a Progressive-Psy using a Goa Trance kick, neither make a Darkpsy using Full-on kick: they all have different transient, pitch, body, length, and overall character.

3 ways to make a kick drum

Compare these kicks, for example:

Another crucial thing is the mixdown, or simply the volume balance of kick and bass relative to each other. Although bassline plays a very important role in any Psytrance track, the kick drum is actually the loudest element. To be more specific, I would suggest setting your kick drum level at 2-3 dB higher than the bassline.

At last but not least, the EQ. Usually, I gently cut the kick at the frequencies of the key bassline harmonics. Let’s say, we have a bassline in A, which means its harmonics would be at 55 Hz, 110 Hz, and 220 Hz (in 440-tunning). In this case, I would slightly cut these frequencies from the kick to give bassline a little bit more space in the mix, just –1-2 dB with a narrow bell-filter.

Psytrance bassline equalization

Sometimes I also use Ableton’s built-in Glue Compressor on the kick and bass group to slightly “glue” them together, but the compressor is a tricky device that can easily ruin your sound, so I wouldn’t recommend doing that unless you know what exactly want to achieve with it.

That’s pretty much it. You can hear the outcome in my productions.

Fellow producers, how do you fit kick and bass together? Post your routine in the comments box below.

A technique of creating a captivating audience by sharing your knowledge and teaching other people about your domain

Jason Fried, the co-founder of Basecamp (formerly known as 37signals), is an advocate of marketing by sharing. Photo © Intercom

I will allow myself to give more general advice because it seems that the situation is suitable for different professions and not just mastering engineers.

It is expensive and not always effective (and sometimes not very ethical) to cover the Internet with banners and chase people with tracking pixels to show them ads, especially when it comes to niche specialists: mastering engineers, wedding DJs, photographers, editors and other service professionals.

I’m confident there’s a better way to attract customers than direct advertising – to share knowledge and build an audience. Tell people what you do, how you do it, and why you do it this way and not that way. Not to sell to them (although you might, eventually), but to teach, show, and tell. And this way, you build trust and an audience.

Why you should run a blog

This point was so beautifully articulated and verbalized by Jason Fried in 2009, it couldn’t say better. Check out this short video and some thoughts from it:

“I think this [marketing by sharing] is especially relevant for small businesses and especially in the creative industry because it’s really expensive and difficult to break out: there is a ton of small design shops, there is a ton of video shops. And how do you get known, how do people find out who you are? Of course, you can hire a PR firm but it’s a waste of money and I wouldn’t do that, you can advertise somewhere but I don’t think it’ll work either because it’s hard to advertise design to kind of right people and it’s expensive. You can try some more traditional marketing ideas but I don’t think those generally work either.

What I think you should be doing is thinking about how can you teach people about your domain. If you are a web designer, for example, you can teach people about what it’s like to be a web designer, about CSS, HTML, what it’s like to land a client, you can talk about what it’s like to prepare a proposal or respond to an RFP. And these the things you can do on your website.

So, when you start sharing and start teaching other people, the great thing about it is all of a sudden you create an audience, which is a kind of a secret weapon when it comes to promoting your business. If you don’t have an audience, you have to constantly spend money to tell more and more people about your service, and after they buy something they go away and they don’t coming back until they want something else. But when you build an audience, when you generate useful content, people keep coming back to you every day for more information. Eventually, when they’re ready to sign up or they need a web designer or whatever you do, they will have you in mind because they were coming back to you every day. And that’s a really effective way of reaching people without spending a lot of money.

Or, let’s say, you are a writer. A freelance writer, or a journalist, or someone like that who needs to find more gigs and looking for more people to hire them. You should be talking about what it’s like to be a writer on your site. Most sites simply have a ‘Portfolio’, ‘About us’, and ‘Contact us’ page and that’s pretty much it, but you should have a section where you share drafts that were rejected, words that you left out. You should share one sentence you’re working on, share all different iterations and talk about why you left this one out, why you change these words, why you transpose these two words, what’s the difference between the final version comparing to the initial one. You need to share this process because people who read this are gonna go like: ‘This guy knows his shit. He cares enough about the words, he cares enough how words sound and structured to share with me the process he went through’. And that means a whole lot more than someone who simply shares a series of essays or articles they’ve written. That’s how you begin to build your audience.”

The best thing about this technique is that it can be used for any small business or service, even in the music industry. I highly suggest watching the full video above whether you are a songwriter, a mastering engineer, a film score producer, a journalist, a label owner, a visual artist, and so on.

“I’ll quit the job and will be free! I could make an album and quickly become a successful artist!”... No.

Adam, the short answer would be “no”, you shouldn’t quit your day job just for sake of starting a music career unless you have some other source of income to pay your bills. And here is why.

I don’t know whether you already have some experience in music production or not, but I’ll assume you don’t. In this case, you’ll have to spend at least two-three years just learning the basics and getting your skills to a decent quality level. Even when you see some new artist with great music appearing out of the blue, it always turns out he or she had years of music background prior to that release.

Another thing you have to keep in mind is that income in the music industry may be very indirect and not always match your expectations. Music sales give pennies, and it might take years before you’ll start touring on a regular basis. Just like in any business or entrepreneurship, you have to invest both time and money first and there is always a risk of never returning it back.

The truth about music sales

At last but not least, what are going to do with your free time? You see, there is a catch: the more of something we have, the less we appreciate it. There is some wisdom phrase for that, I don’t remember exactly but it’s something like this: “If you want something to get done, give it to the busiest person”. The truth is you probably don’t need 12 hours a day to make it, because if you do have all days long available for doing something, at some point you’ll find yourself sitting on the couch watching the fifth season of “Lost”.

Re-energizing for music production after 9-6 work

What you need, however, is to be consistent. Be sure to learn stuff, to make small but frequent steps. And while you still have a day job to back you up financially, keep music production as a hobby.

John 00 Fleming recent Q&A where, in particular, he also advised to treat music as a hobby

Do you remember my advice “The truth about music sales”, posted last year? Yesterday John Dopping from Research & Development posted his opinion on that, pretty much confirming what I was written about:

“Let me make one thing perfectly clear. Almost every ‘producer’ that appears in the Beatport top 100 makes absolutely no income from their work. Beatport take a cut, the distributor takes a cut (and tries to con labels out of money in a plethora of ways that I’m happy to elaborate on), labels invent artificial ‘expenses’ (which, as a label owner, I can tell you are completely bogus). After all that, the label typically contrives an arbitrary ‘minimum income payout’ which means they don’t have to pay the artist until they earn up to £100 or more, which is, basically, never.”

Almost every producer that appears in the Beatport top 100 makes absolutely no income from their work

These are the sad realities of the current music industry state that many producers don’t want to talk about, but I think it shouldn’t be hidden. If you are an upcoming producer, keep that in mind.

Link to the original post

TranceMag staff editor Florin has written a review of 2000 Years Ahead album, revealing the hidden meaning of the tracks titles.

If you’ve ever been to an interview, you know sometimes employers ask questions about your future, like where you would see yourself in 5 years to a decade. Daniel Lesden doesn’t mess around with these short time frames, opting to think on an altogether grander scale.

A year’s worth of studio work has now culminated with the release of his future-focused second studio album, 2000 Years Ahead. This tremendous sci-fi inspired 9 track long player draws a timeline for a human race which is at peak technological development, highlighting the possible hidden dangers associated with it.

But enough introductory text, let’s dive right in, starting with:

The End Of The Aquarius Age

Open up the album and you’re confronted with its first track, The End Of The Aquarius Age. In astrological terms, each zodiac sign has a so-called astrological age assigned to it. We are currently in the age of Aquarius, which is associated with technological development, transhumanism and giving more power to the individual. It is therefore no mere coincidence that Daniel selected the following quote from the movie Automata as the center piece of this ominous ambient creation.

The movie explores a future in which robots have taken over, and the struggles of mankind to stop the AI from altering itself. This first production from the LP has a slew of tech sounds infused into it, to further solidify its connection with the film. Antonio Banderas’ (who plays Jacq Vaucan) words fade, signalling the beginning of a menacing crescendo, which wraps things up nicely.

Pangea Proxima

As we shift focus from the skies to the ground, Pangea Proxima zooms into view. The original Pangea (from the Ancient Greek words pan – whole and gaia – land) was a supercontinent which formed 335 million years ago. Taking into account the geological cycles, Pangea Proxima (also called Pangea Ultima) is a possible future supercontinent which may form in the next 250 million years.

The namesake track brings proceedings into more familiar territory, with Daniel’s signature brand of Psy shining through from the get go. Heavy baselines and gated sounds lay the groundwork for the heavily acidized rest of this opus. It’s a demonstration of the masterful control and quality of sound design we’ve come to expect from Daniel.

The Dream Of Electric Sheep

Continuing on the path we set out at the beginning of the post, we get to The Dream Of Electric Sheep, and its subtle reference to humanity’s robotic counterparts. Clues for this are present at beginning (another quote from Automata, “Identify yourself” / “B-2206. Sorry, the city is not safe for any of us.”) as well as in the short breakdown. The Blade Runner quote “It’s a test designed to provoke emotional response” is particularly adept at emphasizing the relative rigidity of the AI in terms of ability to empathize.

Contrast is underlined not only via quotes, but changes in pacing, especially on the baseline front, switching from a full on to a triplet pattern in key parts of the track.

The pedal to the metal approach of The Dream of Electric Sheep accelerates our eventual arrival to a frightening future event.

Technological Singularity

Further down the list is a track which you should know from the production announcement video released about 10 months ago. Technological Singularity highlights a more melodic side of Psy Trance’s overall sound, drawing its inspiration from a future event often called simply “the singularity”. In basic terms, it is the idea that artificial intelligence may enter a cycle of rapid self-improvement, evolving into a kind of artificial superintelligence and leaving humanity in the dust.

Like the issue itself, the production is way more nuanced than it would appear at first glance, employing some lovely modulated acid lines throughout. The build-up is a particular highlight, with its almost Goa-like organic progression. Wonderful stuff.

Arrival

A familiar name greets us at number 5, Arrival, the teaser single which was released in December last year by the same lovely folks at Digital Om Productions.

Taking the issue of ETs arriving on Earth as its main theme, Arrival opens up with a breaks-like layering, only for Daniel Lesden’s beloved blend of Progressive and Psy to replace it shortly after.

With massive energy throughout and an addictive arrangement overall, this is not only my favourite of the 9 productions, but it can serve as an example of what the modern Psy Trance sound should be.

Not only was the subject interesting, but the execution was top notch, as usual. It’s a fantastic package all in all, which comes from an artist whose familiarity with the Psychedelic sound allows him to craft some exquisite tracks. No wonder the album reached #1 CD on Psyshop, it bloody well deserved to.

Structured Chaos

Sitting at number 6 is yet another fantastic Psy Trancer which you were able to hear in the album completion announcement video prior to the promo-blitz preceding the release.

In comparison to the others, the Progressive side stands out a little more and the overall vibe is heavier. Once again, the bubbling acids and the build-up are of particular note here, due to the sheer attention to detail and masterful execution.

Sacred Space (with AudioFire)

Following in the footsteps of the wonderful Prog Psy number above, we find a collaboration with London-based producer AudioFire.

A balance is struck between the two producers’ sounds, yielding a delightfully energetic, and ever-changing piece, which is much lighter in overall vibe than its predecessors. I’d dare say that near the end you could almost mistake it for an Astral Projection track. It really is that good.

Machinery

After a subject as ethereal as the sacred space, Daniel plonks down a mammoth base driven Psychedelic slab called Machinery. Employing plenty of gated sounds and delicious modulated acids, track number 8 also sports one of the most distinctive secondary acid lines of the entire bunch. I’ll only say it’s near the middle, but you’ll definitely recognize it instantly. Terrific stuff.

Middle Mode & Relativ – Divination (Daniel Lesden Remix)

Closing proceedings is Daniel’s take on the 2014 Middle Mode & Relativ collab entitled Divination. Despite using a similar approach to the original in the construction of his rework, Lesden manages to flip the entire atmosphere of the track on its head. What’s more, the end result is a much lighter, more dynamic interpretation than the source material, while still incorporating the quotes from Porcupine Tree’s Voyage 34 Phase IV.

Conclusion

The follow-up to Chronicles of The Universe (Daniel’s first album) shines as both a worthy standalone opus and as a part of the overall story arch. After his exploration of the universe, it made sense for Daniel Lesden to pick mankind’s technological end goal as the main subject for a second album.

Not only was the subject interesting, but the execution was top notch, as usual. Though I personally lean more towards Technological Singularity, Arrival, Structured Chaos and Machinery as the highlights of this LP, there’s no denying the others are equally worthy of your attention. It’s a fantastic package all in all, which comes from an artist whose familiarity with the Psychedelic sound allows him to craft some exquisite tracks. No wonder the album reached #1 CD on Psyshop, it bloody well deserved to.

Link to the original post
Text — Florin Bodnărescu

Well, formally speaking, a pad sound usually has a big amount of Attack and Release parameters, i.e. it slowly fades in and fades out. But since that sound in Leftfield’s track has pretty short Attack, I would call it a “filtered-chords-stabs-with-delay” (a sort of) rather than the pad. Anyway, it’s not that hard to re-create such kind of sound, so let’s get straight into it.

First things off, I’ll create a new MIDI-channel and add some synthesizer on it. I gonna use Spire in this particular case, although you can use whichever you’re up to.

Recommended synths

Then I’ll create two MIDI-clips and draw those chords, although you can make audio recordings using MIDI-keyboard if you have one. Here is how these chords sound like with no any sound manipulations, just using the initial preset in Spire:

Okay, the melodic pattern matches the reference track now, let’s go to the sound design.

I’ll increase “Voices” parameter up to 4 voices and open up the “Wide” knob to give extra width and dimension. Then I turn on a Band-Pass filter with a solid amount of resonance; add a pinch of reverb, and delay on 3/8th.

Important note for Spire users: by default, Envelope 3 is assigned to the filters, and “Cutoff 1” is selected as the sound source for modulation. We don’t need this here. Choose “off” instead, or simply drag its amount to a neutral position at 12 o’clock.

This is the very foundation of our sound, and I would say we’re 90% done. Just a couple of tweaks left. What else we can do here? Well, we certainly can EQ it: cut some low frequencies off and gently boost mid-highs.

Also, seems default wave shape is not the best one for this type of sound. I found “Organ 2” matches pretty close.

And at last but not least, in the reference sound, you can notice that each second chords hit sounds slightly “brighter”. You can either record Cutoff automation, or simply add a new modulation of Cutoff either on LFO, either on Velocity. Like this:

Sounds about right to me. Not 100% matches, but I hope you’ll get the idea. If some moves were unclear to you and you still have some questions about this sound, don’t hesitate to leave a comment below.

A specials thanks to the sound design guru Tetarise for the consultation. Check out his advice on creating an FM Psy lead, too.

I was cleaning up some old folders on my disk drive and suddenly discovered a quite nice archive of Psytrance flyers from the parties that took place in Moscow city in 2005—2007. Unfortunately, most flyers are lost so these are the only left. And yes, I was partying hard!

I thought it would be fun to looking at these pictures now, a decade later, especially for that generation of ravers who already have kids: “Look, son, that is where your old man used to rave!”. I think Moscow trancers (and some graphic designers, just for lolz) will appreciate these pictures.

Cosmo Horror Party by Insomnia Records (16.12.2005), New Year by Top Secret (31.12.2005), Mad Christmas Gift by Nervoza Planet and Freak Out Pro (07.01.2006)

The History Of Trance IV (November—December 2005), Psykovsky Debut by Vertigo and GlookAround (10.12.2005), Psyvergi Winter Jam by NoiseMakers (08.12.2005), Sunrise Trip by Psypunks Community and Nails Promotion (10.12.2005), Troll Scientists vs. Putskari in Moscow by Butterfly Effect Group (10.12.2005)

New Concept Party by Katapulta Promotion (21.01.2006), Vibe Tribe in Moscow by Tie-Vote Team (28.01.2006), Ostravaganza Birthday Party by Delight Lab (03.02.2006)

Returning in Movement by Refreshing Direction (17.02.2006), X-Dream in Moscow by Psy Detection Group (15.04.2006), Underworld by Nervoza Planet (10.02.2006)

Enlightenment by Delight Lab (03.03.2006), Mimoza by Positive Makers (07.03.2006), Psycoholic in Moscow by Hypnotic Reaction and Restarting Family (29.04.2006)

Nagual Voyage by Indigo Project (17.06.2006), Devil’s Mind Label Night by Sonic Chakras (15.04.2006), To Be Continued by Delight Lab (28.04.2006)

Hello Summer Open Air by Synthetic Dreams and Tie-Vote Team (20.05.2006), Magic Forest by Vastral Katapulta (19.05.2006), Nagual Voyage by Indigo Project (19.05.2006)

Brain Irradiation by Stebators Team and Novaya Psychedelica (17.06.06), Juno Reactor in Moscow by Coma Sound System (08.07.2006), Private Open Air by Night Spirits (24.06.06)

Dynamic Sensation Vol.2 by Night Spirits (15.07.2006); Many-Kaha-Hoo By Sonic Chaktars, Stebators Team, IDM Group, and Shining Lotus (15.07.2006); Psychedelic Trance Open Air by Sun Flower Promo (15.07.2006); Adieu Summer 2 by Tie-Vote Team (26.08.2006)

A series of events by Syntex Lab (June—July 2006)

Comics by Technical Freaks and Nervoza Planet (02.09.2006), Welsh Birthday by Real Stuff Pro (29.09.2006), Psyko Birthday by Syntex Lab (03.11.2006)

Halloween by Coma Sound System (04.11.2006), Gravity Plus Label Party by KPM Club and Electronic Trousers (11.11.2006), Demos & YoYo Birthday by Artfreaktion Records (18.11.2006)

Pajamas Party by Roxbury Club (18.11.2006), Voobrazjenie by Promo Style Group (01.12.2006), ReStart The New Year by Fun People Trance Promo & FullOut Group (29.12.2006)

World Spirit by Sound Spices & Yet Sound System (16.12.2006), First Spring Trip Air by Tutti Fruiti Lab & SubStance Sky Promo (29.04.2006), Private Rave by Psy Matter’s (unknown date), Predpodgotovka by hVP & Phantom (07.04.2006)

Cyber Queen by Sound Spices & Yet Sound System (07.03.2007), Alone in the Dark by Stebators Team (11.11.2005), Dark Factory by Nervoza Planet & Biocom Pro (26.11.2005)

Halloween by Psydivision Promotion (29.10.2005), Beautiful Dead by Nervoza Planet (31.03.2007), Global Cooling by Insomnia Records (16.12.2006)

Intonation in Provocation by Syntex Lab (17.02.2007), Just a Toy (25.11.2005), Red Planet series by Artfreaktion (2006?)

Spring Connection by FTPG & Sostoyanie Project (23.03.2007), Nastroenie by Free Sound Lab & Multivision (02.01.2007), DJ P.A.N. Birthday by Zodiak Sound (10.03.2007)

The Time is Flying by Psy Detection (11.11.2005), Spiritspiraliom by Tie-Vote Team & Re-Aliens Promo (04.11.2005)

Utopia in Moscow by KPM Club Promo (24.02.2007); Wallace Gromit Wrong Trousers by KPM Club Promo, Electronic Trousers, Noise Detection (13.01.2007), pre:Vlublennost by Syntex Lab (09.02.2007)

Bedroom producers be like: “Ok so it’s Wednesday, let’s see what I can post on Facebook today”. Illustration by Alexander Nanitchkov

Before answering these questions, I’d like to make one thing clear first.

There is no one ultimate winning strategy for social media content that would work for everyone. Some people engage their audience by posting funny pictures, others prefer to make it strictly business.

Whatever way you choose, I suggest being genuine. I know words like “be yourself” sound cheesy, but once you accept where you currently are it’ll be much easier than pretending to be someone else. Music producers are different from corporate companies in a way that our communication is much more personal. Behind every alias and track is a real human being, and people feel that too.

Nevertheless, I know where this problem comes from. Look at any successful artist’s social feed and most of the time you’ll see either his upcoming gig announcement or photos and videos from the past gigs. But what if you don’t have twenty gigs a month yet? And obviously you can’t upload a new track every week either, so “I don’t know what to post on social” can be a real issue.

Well, here are some ideas for you. Keep in mind this is not an instruction but rather general categories of a content that you could possibly post as a bedroom producer:

But you can go further and create your own sort of series of content. For example, I host a monthly radio show, run a weekly advice blog, and plus occasionally share “Track of the week”, “Weekend readings” and other blogs. It helps to fill the gap between releases as so I always have some content to share. And people know that too so they have a reason to keep an eye on my updates.

Here are some of my posts just to give an example:

As for you trying to find someone who could post on your behalf, read the advice on artist’s manager if you haven’t yet because it’s a quite similar story. If you have no idea what to post on Facebook, how do you think someone else would know it unless you expect some generic phrases and producer’s memes? It might be a good idea to put social media management on someone’s else shoulders later, but I wouldn’t recommend doing that in the beginning because that’s how the learning curve goes, you have to get that experience from the first hand before hiring someone.

I also highly suggest checking out my experience of managing social media using Amplir. If you have the right tools and know how to use them, it turns out, managing social media isn’t that hard and time-consuming. In fact, you can have several active social accounts just by spending an hour a week if you work efficiently, so time is no excuse even for busiest persons.