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Remix Q&A!
We put some of our best questions towards all the artists featuring on the 'Depths & Agrostis Remix EP', to do with all things remixes!
Some excellent answers in here, worth the read!
1) How did you approach the remix process for this track? Did you have a clear vision of what you wanted to do or did you experiment with different ideas?
Marrow & heketa: “The way we approached this remix was definitely slowly and steadily - we wanted to be sure not to miss the deadline this time! We started with the sections that we had an abundance of ideas for and slowly, over time the other sections started falling into place; we had a clear vision for the style since we had already worked together on a remix and wanted to continue along that path and evolve it by incorporating new influences such as breakbeat and halftime. The experimentation mainly lay in getting these new ideas across and using 'Depths' as the vessel worked really well in the end!”
Lingoturbo: “Basically I had a specific idea for this remix, which would be something more "bouncy" and really fun to listen to, this whole process had been in my mind since the remix contest was announced, and i was experimenting with more genre styles, while the main focus is a hyperbounce craziness track!”
SHAZKEI: “For the most part I screw around until something sounds good. Though I have been very inspired by tons of Drum & Bass artists, which is why everything I've been making recently, including the Agrostis remix, is (mostly) DnB. What absolutely made my remix were the vocals that were used throughout the track and the lasery stabs scattered throughout the first drop. When I sliced those up and arranged them in a catchy rhythm within the drop, that's the moment I had the foundation of my remix and managed to make the rest of the track. Afterwards I decided that a Techno-ish second drop would be great as a switch-up and an opportunity to let some of the sparkle and musicality of Agrostis subtly shine through. All that accumulated to this little remix, which is an admittedly fairly heavy DnB and Techno track on the surface, but one that shows a lot of soft spots!”
Kino: “It’s one of the few tracks that I’ve made chronologically and actually completed, I just started at the start and eventually the rest of the song came into being. Going into it I knew that I wanted it to be somewhat ‘guitar-centric’, as that’s a side of my musicianship that I really want to blend with the electronic stuff I do, even more so with future releases, and I think it came out pretty sick. I have to give some credit to Marrow, as he gave me the idea to have the first drop just be guitar, drums and a sub, which I think ended up being one of the coolest parts in the song.”
Skies: “Definitely experimental, actually I didn't start the project to participate in the remix contest, it was just another project that I made to practice flows and face paced sequence and off beat basses like Dyatic and Beutnoise. Come to think of it, this project would have been in my system if I didn't later think about participating.”
SubDoxx: “My process for creating this remix was simple, make a version of the original that had more of my own personal sound. This can be the sound design, flows, and melodic elements. For example I like to change the pitch of the track, and add orchestral instruments.”
2) What inspired you to remix this particular song? Was there something about the original that caught your attention or challenged you creatively?
Marrow & heketa: A challenge that we overcame with 'Depths' was how the flow is very slow and heavy compared with the way drum & bass adjacent tempos usually work so to be able to integrate guns and elements with high spectral detail that favour more drawn out sequences was tough but ended up working in an interesting way - it also allowed us to integrate our own ideas for more detailed sections that didn't rely on reusing existing sections in the song.”
Lingoturbo: “I was listening to a lot of music in this style, specifically in the bounce genre, and my inspirations were mostly from the original artists! and what caught my attention the most were the small melodic details, the progression, and the amazing mid-section! which fits really well into my song style.”
SHAZKEI: “Pretty simple answer, but I've known Sighless for a little while now and I really like their music. It's always fun to try flipping your friends' music on its head and when I found out there were stems for Agrostis available, which is in general such a great song, I was super down to remix it. Because I decided to make something in Drum & Bass speed, It was definitely a little difficult getting something good going. But luckily, as previously stated, when I started playing around with the vocals and little stabs in between, and cut them up, I ended up with this staccato rhythm that I ultimately loved.”
Kino: “The midsection of Agrostis is so cool. THe note choice, as well as arrangement, feels wonderfully jazz influenced and it’s so at home on a compilation like Sui Generis. Working my own influences into a rendition of it was loads of fun, as was setting up the themes of the original in a completely different context. Funnily enough, spending so much time on writing and recording parts for this remix has made hearing the original song at 150BPM strangely disconcerting, it will feel unnaturally slow to me for a second or two!”
Skies: “The original is a masterpiece and my favorite from the EP. The mechanical nature of the track, the dark and sinister atmosphere in the mid sections, and how minimal it is, from a listening standpoint that is. Everything about the track was enough to spark creativity (also I tried imitating the style, but that didn't work out).”
SubDoxx: “This might be funny to say but I didn’t like depths as much as the other tracks on the depths ep, but there was something interesting about Sedami’s sound design, so I tried to find a way of mixing Sedami’s sound design with mine to create something cool.”
3) What is your favourite remix of all time and why? How does it compare to your own remix style and preferences?
Marrow: “This is such a difficult question; I know I'll forget a remix I absolutely love! Currently, remixes I find myself listening to often are the Nitepunk ones (particularly of '1999' by Gentlemen's Club) and the entire 'Phantasmagorical' remix album - so much variety on there! Based on the direction we took with this remix, I actually think the Nitepunk reverence translated somewhat into our remix this time around…”
Heketa: “Best remix of all time is quite a tough one for me; there's a few i can think of, most prevalently a couple specific ones from Noisia's The Resonance series. gyrofield's Banshee remix from The Resonance IV is a very big one - the winding basses and atmosphere it has definitely give it the "Fever Dream" feeling that the title she gave it suggests. Nitepunk's remixes are also more than worth mentioning - the energy of his Witch remix for Apache was a very big inspiration for this remix.”
Lingoturbo: “Uhm, that's a really hard question. but i personally think that the track "grape milk & JUKO - LAST NIGHT (euphorian, Convexity & Chalbért Remix)" is one of my favorite thing that i heard. absolutely mind blowing track for me, and i think this is a really step up on my style, making beautiful soundscapes, detailed, and cool sound design!”
SHAZKEI: “Man, there's so many incredible remixes, but in terms of how legendary a remix is, I think it might go to Barely Alive's remix of Apollo by Astronaut. It's very old but to this day the best Moombahcore track I've ever heard. So insanely impactful and fun while staying beautiful. I will say it is pretty different to my remix style/remix preferences (because Moombahcore isn't very prevalent anymore and it isn't a genre I make/can make lol) but I can safely say it contributed to reigniting my love for EDM back then.”
Kino: What a question. I couldn’t ever definitively say one so I’m gonna name a few that come to mind:
AKOV’s bootleg of Mr Happy, Agony’s remix of Hanging By A Thread, Echidna’s flip of Hive Bounce, and Mylky’s flip of Dominate. Also A.M.C’s remix of Tap Ho. None of them sound anything like each other, or my remix so I’m not sure how they compare to it, but they have probably influenced me in one way or another.”
Skies: “I don't think I have a favorite remix of all time, but I love the Kill The Noise remix to Only Want You by Snails, obviously it has nothing to do with the style of this track.”
SubDoxx: “This question is harder to answer but I’m going to try. I would say probably Jon Casey’s remix of Noisia - My World or Koan Sound - Cosmic Tuba (Frequent Remix). I think these remixes are only really comparable in the energy that they bring, more than the sound design. I feel like my remix more closely matches the style of Sedami and other dubstep type styles than what I personally enjoy more.”
4) If you could collaborate with any artist on a remix, who would it be and what song would you choose?
Marrow: “Again, such a difficult question - so hard to narrow it down! My top picks would be Culprate, voljum, Knoir and SPACE LACES and I would love to remix a song by Desembra; either 'MUG' or 'From Below' would be really interesting, I think.”
Heketa: “Actually quite an easy question, weirdly enough. While I'm not sure about which song, it's definitely gyrofield as the artist for me. Her complex sound design and the way she manages to integrate themes into her songs is something I've loved for ages now and still inspires me and my music a lot. Would definitely love to make a more thematic/conceptual remix with her for someone like Noisia, for example.”
Lingoturbo: “Definitely disphing. He has some amazing ideas and it will be a pleasure to collaborate with him. The song I would choose would have to be "Comfort zone" by alex martian, i love that song so much! It flows very well and I love the swing on it!”
SHAZKEI: “One of my dreams is to collab with IMANU. Dude's been my main inspiration for a while and has influenced how I produce a lot. And- hear me out- I think eugene's "believe me" could be a really damn good track to remix. There's countless possibilities; We could make a melodic, fast house number inspired by Believe Me's melody or an impactful, heavy DnB remix including some of the vocals and the absurd basses eugene threw in that track.”
Kino: “Mick Gordon. He is an an absolute visionary; I basically wish I was him. If anything I would want to collaborate on a remix just to learn from him, but to create something together would also be a surreal experience. I’m not really sure what song we would remix, it probably wouldn’t sound anything like the original regardless, Maybe like an Ed Sheeran song or something, so millions of people would be unsuspectingly baited into listening to the most violent piece of music ever conceived, That would be insane.”
Skies: “Right now, I'm not so sure on who I would like to collaborate with. But the song I would want to at least attempt a remix on is Buck Shots by Riot.”
SubDoxx: “I want Sedami to work with me on something, it doesn’t matter what track I just want Sedami to work with me please I’m begging, please.”
5) What is the most unusual or unexpected thing that you used or did in your remix? How did it affect the final result?
Marrow: “We experimented on this remix over a long period of time but the element that stands out to me is the main electric organ-esque sound in the first drop - this required a lot of patch breaking, saturation stages and suspension writing to create an interestingly textured sound.”
Heketa: “There's quite a lot of new and mostly unusual things i've tried while working on this remix, though none of them are particularly exciting. Trying new sound design with Razor that would normally be unusual for it; resampling random sounds into something entirely different to create subtle ear candy, or just building an atmosphere to surround the song in the intro/outro were some of them.”
Lingoturbo: “Nothing unexpected happened that much on the producing, but i would say that the most unusual thing that i mostly don't do, was taking a "meme" sound, process it a ton, made it melodic, and subtly put it in the drop to fill the emptiness, it sounded cool!”
SHAZKEI: “Well, I guess the high bpm and really staccato nature of the remix is something you wouldn't really expect, simply because the original is low-bpm, kinda jazzy and suuuuper laid-back- Even the heavy switch in the 2nd drop is funky! I don't remember doing anything particularly different or special within the project itself though, I was simply in the mood for some DnB.”
Kino: “The metronome into the midsection was quite funny, I think. THere isn’t actually any easy to record Ableton’s metronome into itself, so I had to sample it off of a video! It did have a purpose too, I wanted to drive home the fact that everything was actually recorded as opposed to MIDI stuff, not that there’s anything wrong with MIDI libraries! I just want to make a point of being the dubstep shred guy. Also there’s a certain drum fill right after the metronome that the astute listener might recognise. The person reading this definitely knows it. You should listening to the remix tomorrow and and spot it!”
Skies: “I would say it was everything about the second drop. It definitely had a different vibe from the first drop and was more minimal. It's something that I rarely do, but I'm glad it turned out to be good.”
SubDoxx: “This is the first track where I made my own colour bass sample, you can’t hear it very well but it is there. I mainly used it as a gun layer to fill empty space.”
The remix EP for Depths and Agrostis drops on the 29th of May!