The Directors Cut: EXHALE VA004

The day is finally here. The fourth VA comp via EXHALE has arrived and we have the exclusive break-down on each of the fifteen tracks by each of the artists that made them.

Order the compilation today: exhale.fanlink.to/va004

DLV ‘Der Pakt’

I created this track almost a year ago when a close friend from Vienna visited me for some gigs. He asked me to show him what I was working on, and at that time I had only made the kick drum and some percussion. We ended up having a big live jam, and during that jam, I came up with the main synths and overall theme of the track. ‘Der Pakt’ was intended to be a follow-up to my previous track, ‘Der Teufel’ which was released two years prior. The vocal sample that made this track stand out was from a movie I had watched a few days earlier. I am thrilled with how it turned out and I don’t think it would have happened without my friend’s visit and encouragement.

WarinD – ‘Techno Memories’

I started developing my track from the groove, because I preferred the track to accompany the dance-floor in the best way. Then I inserted the three fundamental components: the lead that indicated my state of mind at that moment, accompanied by the vocal “No One Listen To Techno” and then restarting strongly in the part with the “rave” synth that ends the peaceful mood of the lead and initiates the aggressive mood. The track therefore represents two moods of mine during that period, accompanied by my favorite basis of my musical life, the groove, and the vocals.

Joey Ridson – ‘LSD Reaction’

I know that I’m usually expected to produce acid techno tracks, but I really wanted to do something different this time. The track is intended to create a darker and more minimalist rhythm. It is heavily inspired by the industrial tracks of Mython or Jønas with hard techno influences. The main element, which is revealed in the second break, was created using a simple pitch modulation. Then, I used Ableton’s resonator plug-in to give it a metallic and dark tone that is in line with the rest of the elements.

Rudosa & Blicz – ‘Split Your Love’

The bass-line was written with a Saw Wave on a 1/16 arp pattern using three notes changing keys over four bars (G#, A#, F). I added a pad that could be used in the intro and breaks which sit on top of the bass-line using the same notes. I then created a main hook line using a sequencer inside Synthmaster using again the same midi but a totally random sequence this sound is the foundation of the full record. Within Synth Master, the cut-off has an LFO on it so as the notes change the cut-off opens and closes giving it a wah-wah kind of sound. The counter-melody/stabs were actually taken from a vengeance sample which just happened to fit in the key and work perfectly with the body of the rest of the record. Blicz then tweaked the arrangement and added vocals and extra drums and Split Your Love was born.

The Blackmailer ‘The Queen Has Arrived’

I always liked to mix hip hop and techno. I find that it immediately gives an energy that makes you want to dance. With the queen has arrived, it’s my starting point with this kick drum that I like a lot because it has this extra bass-line that has the same impact. The recipe is quite simple but very effective, the hip-hop vocal, the kick bass-line with filter passages on the drops do the job. I added an arpeggiator synthesizer “devil’s side” so that it is not too far from hard techno, and a screech for the rave side. I like to mix genres, with simple ingredients. It has stay in your head, when you listen to it, your body moves.

Flour – ‘Invasion’

I started building Invasion from the backing vocals, trying to build everything around them, since they are the main element of the track. I tried to create an ethereal mood through the synths but energetic at the same time, and to give power with the drums. The intention was to create a track that could be emotional and powerful at the same time.

Carla Schmitt – ‘Red Ambition’

The title ‘Red Ambition’ represents the overcoming of oneself in artistic creativity and how the mind and soul are affected in the creativity of an artist. It is a sonic journey between various industrial, high-pitched, groovy and eclectic sounds.

Farrago & Part Time Killer – The Keymaster

The sound-effects in ‘The Keymaster’ were crafted using mostly Serum and cinematic sample libraries with tons of processing, mostly high-resonance filter modulations to give the laser-like high pitched sound. The signature bass-variation was made in Serum, followed by lots of layering, eq, and saturation. The psy-bass is basically a Saw with filter envelope and was built through modulating both the filter cut-off and the attack and sustain to make some notes open slowly and other notes end quickly. The played notes were the root and an octave up, those were then pitch bent through slides in the note expression section in the midi clip in Ableton. The Bass variation was then printed multiple time with slight variations in the tone and then layered with effects, making high short eq peaks in the lower-mid-area before strong saturation to let this frequency area distort and give it unique character and full tone.

Nineted ‘Euphoric Expression’

Producing a track involves a lot of creativity and attention to detail. Firstly we start with our kick making it as fat and punchy as possible with a lot of layering and processing such as drum buss, saturation, amps and crazy EQ’ing with the one and only Fab Filter Pro-Q3 then we brought in our unique drums with multiple layers to make them sound to our style. Once the foundations of the kick and drums were made then came the synths and after multiple trial and errors it was then the magical accident happened. With euphoria and emotion being felt through the synths all that was left was a vocal, but this wasn’t an easy job to find something that lived up to the energy of these synths but when the chosen vocal was found it was a match made in heaven and there it was, the components of this heart touching track were born.

Once a clear vision was created that is when the arrangement stage began with big intros, tension building breakdowns and immense levels of emotion articulated into this track. After the arrangement and automations were completed the mix down then took place and this track was then ready for mastering. When we received the mastered version, the emotions could be felt flowing strong throughout whilst listening and that is exactly what the intention was.

Chemtrailz ‘The Future Is Matriarchy’

‘The Future is Matriarchy’ has a much more “feminine” sound than anything I’ve put out thus far. To accomplish this, I spent a lot of time digging up and chopping samples. I’m a big fan of Splice for browsing free use samples to chop up, but I also love using my phone as an instrument. I still use an old iPhone SE for my mainline because it has a 1/8-inch headphone output and I always lose adapters. You can find magic by recording the outside world and in this case TikTok, which is where I found one of the main samples in the drop of this track. It was a short clip of an amazing vocalist on her webcam, but after some editing, distortion, and effects the results were amazing.

AIROD ‘Nemesis’

I created this track the day after an EXHALE party, I wanted to transcribe a track that is typically played during a peak-time set. I’m quite happy with the result and I hope people will feel the mood I wanted to convey.

Vizionn ‘Future Energy’

For me, this track was an interesting experiment in combining several influences that I find important for today’s scene, old-school rave, drum n bass and classic trance. From a more technical standpoint, I was able to try out new compression techniques, more specifically in the treatment of the vocal, the drums and the kick/bass. Interestingly enough, I found that multi band compressing these elements together, though uncommon, gives the track a whole new level of depth.

Caravel ‘Echoes Of You’

When producing Echoes of you, I came up with this idea of going somewhere else, a different path than what I’m used to making. I wanted to explore something new for myself and push the boundaries of my production skills. When I started the production process the main focus was based on the melody, but I felt something was missing. Adding vocals to the track where the missing part for it to be pushed to its full potential. Echoes of you all about an atmosphere.

Tigerhead ‘Looking Glass’

I usually write tracks by feelings. It’s like telling a story. First, I choose a current subject of interest, a theme which I dive into the most. Then I start to write the music and search for an equivalent sound to my story. It’s like an abstract relationship where the essence of the song stays mostly unrevealed.

ACOR ‘Eat Sleep Rave Repeat’

The idea of the track came from its vocals. Wanted to express something new into a techno scene by mixing reverse bass kicks, early hard style melodies, driving vocals, and acid lines. A bit lower amount of percussion than my previous tracks to this day. As I mentioned on my Instagram post, track was finished exactly two years ago before it’s release day.