Blawan: Q&A

Sarah808 · Post by **Sarah808** » Mon Oct 10, 2011 1:51 pm

Those riddims!
Dat vibe!
The clarity in his tracks is special.

Pretty pretty please DubstepforumBossMen!n

Promise One · Post by **Promise One** » Mon Oct 10, 2011 2:23 pm

Him and his friend Ste Shine used to put on a night in Scarborough called "Monday Sub" when he studied at Hull Uni Scarborough campus doing creative music production. He uses Ableton Live for his tracks and plays drums too. Thats all I know.

hutyluty · Post by **hutyluty** » Mon Oct 10, 2011 2:24 pm

+! ye

http://www.dummymag.com/new-music/2011/ ... interview/

this is pretty good though in the meantime

komanderkin · Post by **komanderkin** » Mon Oct 10, 2011 6:43 pm

hutyluty wrote:+!

hutyluty · Post by **hutyluty** » Mon Oct 10, 2011 7:59 pm

komanderkin wrote:
hutyluty wrote:+!

point still stands!

Praya · Post by **Praya** » Mon Oct 10, 2011 9:19 pm

I would really love to see this q&a happen, but i can imagine what it would be like:

Q. So what's your set up like?

B. It ain't what you got, it's what you do with what you have.

Q. Err ok, what can i do to get my drums as thick and heavy as yours?

B. It ain't what you do, its how you do it.

Q. Sooo... like how do I do it?

B. Listen, this is getting me down.

Thread locked.

hutyluty · Post by **hutyluty** » Mon Oct 10, 2011 9:23 pm

hhahahaha

what you do with what you have was actually sampled from a production type interview aswell, with moodyman

Praya · Post by **Praya** » Mon Oct 10, 2011 9:51 pm

Yeah i've seen it, in that 2 hour talk there's not alot of production advice, but there's a hell off a lot of good samples.

hutyluty · Post by **hutyluty** » Mon Oct 10, 2011 10:10 pm

haha some people just have naturally sample friendly voices

Sarah808 · Post by **Sarah808** » Tue Oct 11, 2011 5:49 pm

Blaaaawwaaaan! I summon thee!

dopocc · Post by **dopocc** » Thu Oct 13, 2011 4:22 pm

you're the man!

Ldizzy · Post by **Ldizzy** » Thu Oct 13, 2011 5:12 pm

FINALLY. a hype on the forum about the dude....

ive been a total groupie for the past year and i remember requesting a q&a...

meanwhile ive succeeded in finding the basic recipe for his stuff...

try to warp every single sound you have in ur drumline in ableton... seriously... i drag sounds in the arrange window, construct a basic groove... and then warp the shit out of them... shaping their transients and shit...

it gives it that blawan grit... but i aint no blawan at constructing grooves.. its something u develop with pratcice and he apparently throws a lot of his tunes to the garbabe... (he also used to think everything he made was garbage and was very shy about his stuff according to interviews)

Praya · Post by **Praya** » Thu Oct 13, 2011 7:33 pm

Ldizzy wrote:
try to warp every single sound you have in ur drumline in ableton... seriously... i drag sounds in the arrange window, construct a basic groove... and then warp the shit out of them... shaping their transients and shit...

Cool, will try this later, when you say shaping the transients, do you mean like putting more than one warp marker per hit?

I've found layering beats with hits from jungle breaks slowed down in beats warp mode gives some nice grit, particularly on the hats.
Its getting those kick sounds that trouble me, they're like hollow yet still really weighty.

Also the reverb on the drums sounds unusual, quite dry with strange reflections?

I agree with you, it's surprising theres not been more posts about his production on here.

Ldizzy · Post by **Ldizzy** » Sat Oct 15, 2011 10:02 am

praya, yes... warp markers everywhere along one hit will lead you to a similar control over dynamics

i kno for a fact that he uses ableton

and uses ozone as well.

AllNightDayDream · Post by **AllNightDayDream** » Sat Oct 15, 2011 10:40 am

I just wanna know when's the next karenn release!

skimpi · Post by **skimpi** » Sat Oct 15, 2011 3:10 pm

i aint got a clue about ableton, so i dont know how this warping would sound, but i always get the feeling from his drums that he likes samples weird things and turns them into percussion, sound like he pitches them too, like in potchla vee, just sounds like he has taken a hit, done whatever to it, then creates a beat with that hit at different pitches.

Praya · Post by **Praya** » Sat Oct 15, 2011 6:58 pm

@Ldizzy, yeah been tryin that, its a really good technique in general for getting more percussive punch, though i think i need to be more extreme with it to get the grit you're talkin about, cheers for the tip, that'll become a regular part of my production arsenal!
I've seen that interview where he rates ozone as his fave plugin, dont know what he uses it for though as its mainly a mastering plug, perhaps the exciter and the multiband compression?

@skimpi yeah there's def found sounds pitched up and down, which probably accounts for the strange ambience on his drums, they sound heavily layered with other hits as well though, like on potchla vee, there sounds like a gated clap accenting the 'snare'.
I don't reckon his technique is anything new, but somehow his beats sound 3 or 4 times bigger than everyone elses!
Like what the fuck is that kick on the bloom remix?!!

dublerium · Post by **dublerium** » Sat Oct 15, 2011 8:18 pm

skimpi wrote:i aint got a clue about ableton, so i dont know how this warping would sound, but i always get the feeling from his drums that he likes samples weird things and turns them into percussion, sound like he pitches them too, like in potchla vee, just sounds like he has taken a hit, done whatever to it, then creates a beat with that hit at different pitches.

Yeah me niether i don't have a clue about it but would love to know how these sort of sounds are created, i gather warpings ableton specific? what is it and how does it apply to other DAW's ?

Praya · Post by **Praya** » Sat Oct 15, 2011 8:39 pm

warping is basically just time stretching, ableton allows you to put markers anywhere on an audio loop and you can stretch or shrink the audio between the markers. this obviously causes some sound degradation and artifacts, hence adding grit.

i don't know about other daws, i suppose for this technique you would have to zoom right in onto individual hits and highlight small parts of the hit, then time stretch it, then do this again and again on different parts of the hit.

reckon it would be pretty tedious and hit and miss.

Ldizzy · Post by **Ldizzy** » Sun Oct 16, 2011 6:12 pm

i think it would be virtually impossible ... i mean... its simply microsampling, but the algorythms in live are pretty cool.. u have different styles.. and u decide on whether u want to preserve the transients or the longer bits more... dj wise i still think it sounds like shit compared to a real set of twindecks with actual vinyls.. but thats just me.. its a SICK creative tool.

logic has its own warping method called flextime.. and there are time stretching plugins... but the workflow in live is what it is and to me its incredibly easier...

but blawan isnt just warping (well if we assume he does it like that, which sounds like it)... its a lot of field recording, minimalist approach in melody... some offbeatness... and chopped and screwed rnb vocals... he has his own typical flavor but the basis of it is similar to the whole james xx and friends fraction of beatmakers..

james blake does his shit with logic ive read... and i think he has better control over his transients and dynamics...

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