introduction to music production

In this week’s workshop, Kabir and I explored the production process of Moor Mother’s work through various techniques. Key features across her discography include improvisation, genre fusion, lyricism, experimental soundscapes, and rhythmic complexity. To achieve this, we began by laying down an interesting drum pattern. I selected an electronic 808 drum kit within Logic so Kabir could record a one-take, as we wanted the percussion to be as natural and improvisatory as possible. We then found a protest rally clip on YouTube and extracted the audio to use as a continuous layer of sound to mimic Moor Mother’s soundscaping. The drums from the protest audio added another textural layer to the beat. Using the same recording technique, we added an electric piano playing continuous chords with a steady harmonic rhythm, avoiding repetition and keeping it harmonically ambiguous. We then inserted the speech recordings for the task, altering them by laying down three copies, offsetting them slightly, panning two left and right, while applying echo and reverb to one, and pitching another 12 semitones down for added textural interest. All recordings had the lower EQs removed and mid-to-high frequencies slightly increased for clarity. To give the main vocal recording more bite, we added bitcrusher and increased the attack. Still, I felt the woman’s voice was getting lost, so I shortened the delay’s cutoff, which helped. It was important to get the vocals right, as Moor Mother places emphasis on lyrics as part of her political activism. I also added a trumpet part, which was re-recorded a few times, as creating a melody against off-key chords proved challenging. I suggested adding the sound of mourning women, so we found a recording off YouTube and Kabir began cutting up and reverbing the recording. My final contribution was a bass synth playing long sustained notes to fill any textural gaps and add an ominous edge. Kabir’s final idea was to insert Robert Johnson’s “Crossroads,” at the end of the piece as he felt he had heard similar elements in Moor Mother’s work. Johnson, a key figure in the American blues tradition, reflects the cultural reclamation in Moor Mother’s work.

Moor Mothers musical identity is embedded in powerful political storytelling and spoken word poetry that tackles political issues such as police brutality, slavery, domestic violence and many more. In “Death by Longitude,” from her album The Great Bailout, Moor Mother critiques the economic exploitation and historical injustices caused by capitalism and colonialism and how the black community is continuing to be exploited. A key feature of Moor Mothers work being spoken word poetry is evident in this track as she speaks on the history of transatlantic slavery through a harsh and urgent delivery. The song comments on how black people have and are continuously being dehumanised, as she says “Europe is God, and everything else is the devil”. In the beginning of the song you can hear the creaking of what’s reminiscent of a slave ship along with continuous harsh wind sounds throughout that evokes the merciless crimes that were committed. The message is further emphasised by the eerie sounds of chains and screaming underlying vocal layering and distortion creating a haunting soundscape. Towards the end of the song, her voice picks up in pace, and functions as a rhythmic addition to the turbulent chaos of dissonant horns, heavy basslines, and harsh electronic elements that summons the feeling of discomfort. These musical elements display Moor Mothers use of experimental jazz elements and afro-futurism which may also double up as a way of reclaiming the identity and history for Black people, to rewrite futures and narratives that refuse to be defined by racial oppression and create alternative histories. “Death by Longitude,” lists the locations of where many enslaved Africans perished during the transatlantic slave trade as well as the multitude of colonialists responsible for the historical atrocities “The Portuguese, the Dutch, the French, the Spanish, the Americans … all aboard”. Despite it being the enslaved Africans “all aboard”, Moor Mother turns the historical narrative on its head to push the evident blame onto the collective of colonialist countries. 

In Lori Burns and Alyssa Woods chapter on Rap Gods and Monsters, Justin A. Williams (2013, 1) has suggested, “The fundamental element of hip-­ hop culture and aesthetics is the overt use of preexisting material to new ends”(Burns, L and Woods, 2018 p. 215). The process of creating a beat in RZAs production style kept drawing me back to this quote that emphasises the use of pre-existing material. In my group with Yasmin and Sarah we started by researching action scenes from Enter the Dragon. As we haven’t watched the movie we discovered quite early on that blindly searching for a scene to use for the akai sampler was proving to be quite difficult. We eventually ended up going with Bruce Lee and O’haras fight scene from Enter the Dragon and proceeded to attempt to capture a punch to sample as potentially a kick topper. This took multiple attempts which none resulted with the punch being captured as the akai unfortunately only records 1 second of audio and with the group turnovers being every 20 mins we ended up running out of time. This made me consider how much technology with music has progressed over the years and how time consuming and technically agile someone like RZA must’ve been in the studios, let alone the amount of patience required to sit in front of the machine and perform endless takes. After we had transferred the audio recording to logic we set about selecting a soul/R&B track to sample just as RZA does – for example in my last blog post where I studied ‘Tearz’ he sampled Wendy Renes ‘after laughter comes tears’. We ended up choosing Nina Simone’s I put a spell on you as we felt that the first 4 bars would provide an interesting hook to loop. Unfortunately we didn’t manage to get much further with the task as we were struggling to get the sample from I put a spell on you in tempo with the metronome in logic. I think that this production process makes you think consciously about where you source your samples from and how you use them. It is clear that RZA chooses to make mindful decisions when sourcing the media and music he uses to tell a moral or a story that provides us with a plethora of material when researching his use of intertextuality.

Burns, L., and Woods, A., (2018) “Rap Gods and Monsters: Words, Music, and Images in the Hip-Hop Intertexts of Eminem, Jay-Z, and Kanye West”, in Burns, L., and Lacasse, S., The Pop Palimpsest: Intertextuality in Recorded Popular Music, Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, pp. 215

The song ‘Tearz’, from The Wu- Tang Clans 1993 album Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) highlights themes of loss, violence and street life as well as socio economic issues during the 90’s. This song in particular stands out from the rest of their dischoreography as it explores sensitive matters of grief that sit in juxtaposition to their other songs that display their image of pride and toughness with references to RZAs love for Kung – Fu cinema throughout. 

Like many of the songs RZA has produced, Wendy Renes song after laughter comes tears provides the tracks main sample and choral hook ‘after laughter comes tears’ that is heard several times over. RZA takes the first bar of the sampled song and pitches it up then loops it under his trademark lo-fi, gritty laid back beats. A core identity of Wu-Tang’s musical personality is through their referencing to Kung Fu films as heard In Tearz, where their lyrics take on similar themes. In Tearz, themes of emotional loss are prevalent. However, they still highlight the importance of resilience and the need to face loss and adversity. 

In contrast to most rappers’ take on gun violence and bloodshed, RZA adopts the POV from his first hand experience of having his brother shot as the victims family by emphasising the consequences of these actions – ‘how do I say goodbye?.’ During Ghostface Killah’s second verse he tackles the issues of promiscuity from a girl named Thelma ‘Every girl from Shaolin dissed her respect’ who advances on his friend Big Moe who refused to take his condom. Consequently, later on Big Moe catches HIV as said in the lyrics ‘Now no life to live, doc says two more years’. This line goes against the norms of typical rap music of the era to be promoting safe sex whilst most rappers will boast about the opposite to this day making it a track that stands out. In both RZA and Ghostface’s verse, they mention how after the tragedies of RZA’s brother getting shot and Moe contracting HIV respectively, laughter is the first feeling they experience with sadness and tears following after. This shows similarities in their reference to Shaolin predominately seen in their colouring of their logo. Shaolin is a martial arts temple that symbolises discipline and suffering, and also later became an even more significant identity of their music in their seventh studio album “Once Upon a Time in Shaolin”. The contrast of the Shaolin practices and Wendy Renes song sampled in the production help listeners understand the contrast of the difficulties in their life and how they embrace certain mindsets in order to navigate through street life.

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