SoundShock: What drew you guys into making music? Were there any specific musicians or non musicians that influenced you in the beginning?
The bands we listened to growing up initially drew us in. We grew up playing instruments before we got into producing so all types of bands played a key role. For Tristan, Oasis, The Strokes, Radiohead, Tom Petty, Depeche Mode and The Cure were huge influences. For Martin, Venga Boys, Aqua, Lou Bega and Slayer were HUGE.
Your guys drops are very full sounding a leave an impact on the listener. Do you have any specific tips for creating these large drops? (Tips on sound selection, mixing in certain elements to make them sound larger than life? Certain automation tips?)
It usually starts with emotion. If we’re not getting goosebumps or at least feel like we’re making something creative and fresh, we take it back to the drawing board. We really try to fuse organic sounding instruments with electronic sounds. Hand drums, flutes, marimbas, airy vocals, and such usually make an appearance. We want our music to take you to another place.
Where do you find inspiration? Also if you are working in the studio and get stuck. How do you get past that point?
We’re very visual people so certain videos, films or places we travel will usually inspire us. We like to have sort of a soundtrack element to our music. When you get stuck you have to find inspiration rather than wait for it to come to you. Listening to music, going to shows, taking walks…it all helps.
What are some of your guys favorite plugins at the moment and how do you use them in your tracks?
One that we’ve used on every track probably for the past year is the Vintage Verb by Valhalla. It just sounds amazing and can bring any sound to life. We’ve been playing with the pre delay a lot more these days to get the reverb timing to match the BPM of the track. It’s a small detail that a lot of listeners wouldn’t notice but it’s just another step in the many steps to making your mix sound cleaner.
Electronic producers have a hard time with music theory. Either they don’t know what to learn or how exactly to apply the theory. If you guys use theory when writing your tracks, what specific parts do you use and what would you topics do you feel producers should know?
We’re terrible with theory but we have a basic understanding and skill level at the piano. Knowing what chords go together definitely speeds up the process which is super helpful when you’re feeling inspired. There’s nothing worse than working at a progression for god knows how long and losing the initial spark that got you excited.
“We’ve been playing with the pre delay to get the reverb timing to match the BPM of the track. It’s a small detail that a lot of listeners wouldn’t notice, but it’s just another step in the many steps to making your mix sound cleaner.”Young Bombs
Your tracks are filled with emotional charged melodies. Do you have any specific techniques for writing these melodies? Also, how do you write in these melodies? On a midi keyboard? Drawing them in on the piano roll?
First off, thanks! This might be the hardest question to answer though because you can’t teach emotion. We’ve always been heavily in debt to intense, uplifting music by artists like Hans Zimmer, Sigur Ros, Explosions in the Sky, M83, etc., even though it may not come across in our sound. With that being said, we try to make our music lift our mood in the studio. Once the song starts feeling like the soundtrack to conquering the world, we know we’re on the right track haha.
You guys make great use of vocal chops in your music. Are there any specific processing techniques you use to get great sounding vocal chops and how do you go about arranging them?
Again, thank you! It’s dicey, no pun intended. But for real, we tend to chop up every word in an acapella and try to find the syllables that have the most character and passion. From there, pitch shifting and playing with the formant helps spring up melodic ideas in our heads. The arranging and placing is the hard part, but also the fun part. When you nail that perfect melody, there isn’t a better feeling.
The last 10% of your track can be the toughest to finish. Are there any specific things you guys do to your track to get that last 10% finished? (Any specific mixing techniques, premastering, arrangement, etc.)
Like we said, we’re terrible with handing our songs in because right up until the deadline we’re adding minor details that probably most listeners wouldn’t notice. Basically just saying “stop” is the challenge for us and it takes a lot of willpower and to know when to pump the brakes. Taking a day off helps too. Hearing your song with fresh ears really puts things into perspective.
For better or for worse, social media is a big part of an artists career. How do you use social media to build your audience and brand?
We fucking love social media. It gives us a chance to interact with our fans and show people our personality. We have a lot of fun on our snapchat and Instagram stories and just try to make each other laugh.
With a ton of killer remixes on your guys soundcloud, you must have big plans for the future! Anything coming up?
Originals, baby! We have a bunch ready to go and we’ll be releasing them once we have all the kinks sorted out like release dates, artwork, etc. We’re very excited to show everyone!
