Alan Nieves has built his name on a steady stream of house records that carry both groove and precision, and his latest release continues that streak. Landing for the first time on Ilario Alicante’s Sound D’Elite, his new three-track EP Bareso shows the evolution of a producer who has spent over a decade refining his sound. With support already coming from major names like Marco Carola, Jamie Jones, and The Martinez Brothers, this record marks another step forward in his career.
The title track Bareso balances chopped R&B vocals with crisp percussion, while Bronx Shh Happens digs into the grit of his New York roots. Yeah 3x rounds out the EP with hypnotic synth work and a driving low end, highlighting the range of ideas Nieves is willing to bring to the table. Each track reflects both technical experimentation and a dedication to club-focused energy, something that has defined his catalog from early releases on elrow and Deeperfect through to this moment.
Alan Nieves
Instagram / Soundcloud / Spotify
Sound D’Elite
Instagram / Soundcloud
For this How It Was Made feature, Alan opens up his studio to break down the tools that shaped the EP. From the plugins that built the low-end foundation to the effects and mastering choices that kept the tracks polished for dancefloors, he shares a direct look at his process.
The goal here is practical insight – the kind that producers can immediately apply to their own sessions while seeing how these techniques translate into a release already moving across global house circles.
Sub boom
Sub boom bass is one of the most well know plug-ins and I use it almost exclusively for my basslines.
It has some amazing presets and also has very easy customization to allow you to generate almost any style of bass noise. In this track, I’ve used the plugin to generate a nice synthy plucky bassline while still having a deep low rumbling sub groove that will also have some harmonic frequencies that you can hear on headphones. I also try to keep enough focus on the low end (below 100hz).
You will mostly feel the low end on a proper club system with subwoofers. This delivers the impact and energy of the track.
My recommendation for using this plugin is to always try to find a way to make sure you can feel the sub frequencies while making them somewhat audible on headphones as well, as many listeners will be using those to listen. If I must prioritize, though, I always prioritize making things sound best on a club system as first and foremost, I make music for the clubs and festivals 🙂
Echoboy
Echoboy is one of my favorite plugins for mixing.
It has easily manipulable controls, and it also sounds amazing. I use it on my vocal bus to add a bit of depth and chorus effect to any vocals I work with which helps them sit back and blend into the mix. It’s an essential part of my process as I always think most vocals sound quite dry and stick out, and with a little echo and reverb, you can help them to sit in the mix better.
This will give your tracks that nicely polished professional production sound versus more of a rough draft or work in progress. I’ve used it on the vocals here to generate the delaying echo sounds that permeate throughout.
Little Plate
Little Plate is a very simple reverb plugin from soundtoys that I think makes for an excellent mixing tool as well as an effects tool. With just a little bit of dry/wet in the mix and a reasonable decay time, you can make a nice, well-rounded and rich reverb sound that helps glue almost any sound to your mix with more clarity and detail.
It can also be used gently or a bit more heavily depending on your goal, but I always try to use it with vocals and have done so here to give the vocals in this track a little bit of richness and depth.
Lastly, I love the built-in filter, so you don’t have to worry about reverbing those pesky low frequencies that can muddy and drag down your mix.
Ozone
I love using Izotope Ozone as a quick mastering tool. While this track has been mastered by the label as most of my releases are, I am mentioning it here specifically because I think it is extremely important for producers to be mastering (even quickly) their demos before sending them out.
At the end of the day, your favorite artists and DJs are not going to be signing much of your music without testing it out themselves first in their shows. In order to do that, the music has to be mixed and mastered close to a commercial volume level, so that it will sound good when played live and feel full enough to give them an idea of how the production will work as a release and also be received by the audience both in the venue and upon release by the record label.
I always do a bit of mid/side mastering and also use multi band compressors to isolate different parts of the track and give them a bit of a boost and also curb peaks where necessary to maintain a full and well balanced track that will have clarity. Lastly in use a limiter to increase the gain (volume) of the track while being careful to avoid any clipping or distortion.
This also allows all parts of the track to breathe in their own frequency range, while still being cohesive and loud enough to pack a punch when played live.
Will Vance is a professional music producer who has been involved in the industry for the better part of a decade and has been the managing editor at Magnetic Magazine since mid-2022. In that time period, he has published thousands of articles on music production, industry think pieces and educational articles about the music industry. Over the last decade as a professional music producer, Will Vance has also ran multiple successful and highly respected record labels in the industry, including Where The Heart Is Records as well as having launched a new label with a focus on community through Magnetic Magazine. When not running these labels or producing his own music, Vance is likely writing for other top industry sites like Waves or the Hyperbits Masterclass or working on his upcoming book on mindfulness in music production. On the rare chance he's not thinking about music production, he's probably running a game of Dungeons and Dragons with his friends which he has been the dungeon master for for many years.
