I recently read "Show Your Work!" by Austin Kleon. This book's introduction says:

a book for people who hate the very idea of self-promotion. An alternative, if you will, to self-promotion.

and I fell in love. "This is what I have been searching for", I said to myself and started reading. By the end, I realized that I shouldn't just think about sharing the final product, but also make it a habit of sharing my process.

That is what this is. Let's go!

Actually, before I get into track specifics, I want to talk about what I do in a bit more detail.

Sample-based music production.

A "sample" can be anything. An instrument melody played by someone, an existing song, a cat sneezing (content incoming here). Anything can be a sample. I take this sample and construct my track around it. This is what I do.

The catch(at least for me) is, I don't play any instruments, nor do I know a good amount of music theory. I pick a sample, see what scale that sample is in, and add the other melodic elements like bass lines or 808s in that key. That is all the theory I know. I felt this used to limit my production. Now I feel it helps me extract more out of the sample.

Now, let's get into this specific track.

my body - ft. chitra

The original sample was a reel created by @thisischitra. I found this reel when I was doom-scrolling and it intrigued me enough to try to do something.

Lots of musical elements going on in the sample. I was excited when I saw a link to the stems in her bio. But they were only vocal stems. The instruments I heard weren't separated from the vocals. I cannot filter them out either, so I just went ahead with what popped into my head after I heard the sample.

This is usually what I do:

1. Choose a sample
2. Open Ableton (i use ableton btw)
3. Pick a part of the sample to loop / chop the sample
4. Add drums
5. Add bass or 808s
6. Fill in the gaps
7. Arrange
8. Mix and Master

The sample I chose is the reel. Now, I have to choose a part of the sample to loop on. I initially picked the part where she sang "my body, my body, my body". I liked that part very much. Very loop-able. Then I checked what the tempo of the sample is (130 BPM) and adjusted my project tempo accordingly.

Now, time to make some music.

Looping

I work in loops. I make a 4-bar loop to begin with and fill it up with elements till it sounds full¹ to my ears.

The first thing I add is drums. I LOVE my drums. I used to start off with a kick and a snare and then work my way to the percussions. Then, I saw a video about OZ's bounce and how he puts the hats first which makes him get to a unique bounce. Since that video, I started to try and adopt that into my production. Really flipped my game around.

This track's hats are simple, but I did start with the hats. I added a hat on each beat and used an AutoPan to put each one on either side. I always liked panning. It's such a simple and fun thing to do! The kick and snare are pretty simple but felt good.

Then I added another layer of hats and put a granular synthesis plugin on that, for unpredictable fun.

Filling the track.

I was able to hear a little tune in that melody, but I couldn't bring it out of it or make it louder. So I had to make my hands dirty, go by ear and identify the notes I was hearing by pressing each one on the piano roll. It took me some time but I did it. Then I decided to use a flute one-shot as its sound. Added some echo to it and it sounded golden. But the beat wasn't full. So I layered it with a wah wah sounding one-shot, same sound, same effects. And the desired fullness was achieved.

The 808s are a different kind of challenge for me. I never know if what I'm doing in this department is too cliche. I always go extra simplistic on this and use mostly the root note and make a melody-ish thing out of it. In this track though, I used 2 notes only. A D# and a C#. It somehow felt sufficient. It's about what takes the stage in the track I guess. The 808s aren't what the track is about.

Arranging.

While arranging the track, I felt only the "my body" part wasn't enough. I needed variation. I then took a break and began again, listening to the sample with fresh ears. Then I found the beginning of the sample interesting. It was right there but I was kinda stuck on the "my body" part, I couldn't notice it. Now that it came to me, I made it the introduction thing, and layered it with a heavily filtered "my body". I needed more for the intro and outro, so I googled "chords in D# minor" and added two chords that sounded interesting together.

At the end, I added a pre-made hat loop for variation purposes. And that was it, arrangement over!

Mixing.

My mixing is largely based on numbers. I make sure that the drums hit -12dB and everything else is at -18 dB. The overall mix at -6 dB and we are golden. Always leaves me satisfied and smiling. This trick, EdTalenti taught me.

For mastering, I throw Ozone on it and use the mastering assistant. If it works, it works. Right?.

Uploading and Sharing.

The hidden part. I upload on SoundCloud, share a link to my producer friend, and that's it. End of story. No one else listens to it, ever again. Now, I decided to change that situation. Will be doing these breakdown blogs every time I make something, and then talk to the people who read these when I'm not writing this. Feels good to imagine that this track will be heard and noticed. Potentially.

Feels good.