Production Diary: MoM Progress in 3 Oblique Strategies

Gardening, not architecture

When I started this project (a concept album called The Mechanics of Mysticism), more than a year ago, it was supposed to take roughly 5 months. But sometimes things just take longer to grow, and this thing definitely was a slow grower. I’ve covered those early days and why it took so much longer than planned in some detail in a past production diary but it’s worth briefly revisiting, and perhaps expanding on a tiny bit.

While I was happy with the core of these pieces from nearly the beginning, I just felt like they needed more to really become what they could be. I definitely could have pushed out some passable versions of these tunes 10 months ago, but they just as definitely would not have been all that much like what I am closing in on now. As I mentioned in that production diary I linked above, I am an iterative composer, and “Gardening, not architecture” is such a core tenet of my process I ought to take that card out of my box of Oblique Strategies and just tattoo it on my wrist.

A year of gardening these pieces has resulted in versions of them that are, to my mind, much more complete, much more complex and, frankly, a lot less boring. I still stand by all my previous work, but one legitimate criticism that can be leveled at a lot of it is that I lean into repetition too much — I frequently just let things go on and on, usually because I am in love with it at the time I am making it.

This time out, I tried to curb that impulse quite a bit. Repetition is still a component (as it is in all music, but especially in electronic music) but now most parts shift, mutate and grow as they repeat. And while one element repeats, other elements around them switch out, or drop out, or get turned inside out. The end result of tending to the growth of these musical “plants” for a year instead of forcing them out right away is they ended up with a lot more depth and variety, and that’s a good thing!

Honour thy error as a hidden intention

As I worked on these tracks I found a lot of fuckups in them! One thing I found in several tracks is that when I went to cut up the jams that I started with, I misjudged where they began/ended, and so shifted one or more of the parts around — for example, the chord loop starting in the middle instead of its putative beginning. But then I didn’t necessarily make the same mistake with another part — say a bass line — so all of a sudden, the bass and chords were relating to each other in weird ways… And even if it all matched up, it was unusual to start a chord progression on the IV chord or whatever.

Once I realized this, months into the process, I had a decision to make: rework the songs from the ground up to stick to my original vision, or let them lie. In most cases, I chose to let them lie. After all, there’s no rule saying that the bass always has to play the root of the chord, it just usually does. But sometimes it’s cool if it doesn’t, and so if it sounded cool, I let it be!

Of course, this was all if it sounded cool. In one case, a track I was struggling and fighting with turned out to have somehow gotten its tempo switched from 102 bpm to 73 bpm when I transferred the files from the MPC to Ableton without me realizing it. And WOW did everything I tried to do in that track end up fucked up and terrible sounding! Once I realized what had happened and made the necessary tempo adjustments, everything worked 1000% better, so in that case, at least, my error was not a hidden intention and I left the fix fixed. (And let me say, it was such a relief finally understanding why nothing was quite working/lining up right once I figured it out!)

Where’s the edge? Where does the frame start?

And now, at long last, we are coming to the edge — i.e. the finish line. About ten days ago I decided on a few last things that needed done (some final drum parts to add and a few missing samples, mostly) before I called it complete and as of yesterday, I am near enough to finished to call it. As of July 31 I will be done with production of this album and will move on to mixing. The frame is coming into focus at last.

I may still end up dipping back into the production process to tweak some elements as I mix (generally, I allow myself to move back into the previous phase to fix/tweak things that aren’t working) but all the major pieces and 95% of the minor pieces are in place as I type this. I still need to find a couple samples, figure out a couple little effects things and maybe do some reamping, but otherwise, I am ready to mix (and I have 9 days as of now to finish those last few tasks).

Last album took me 2+ months to mix, but a) I learned a lot in the process, which should speed this one up to some degree and b) I am mixing in Ableton Live this time, rather than on the MPC, so it should be a bit more straightforward… maybe. That said, I am planning on it taking at least a month, which would mean mastering would start in September. No deadlines tho! I will get there when I get there. I can see the edge, but I haven’t reached it yet.

That’s all for this one. Thanks for reading and, as always, feel free to reach out with any questions or comments you have.