Justice's Production

[Guest Tekk]

So recently I've been listening to the Justice - Cross album (probably one of my top 5 favorite albums) in a lot of depth trying to highlight their production secrets and I just can't pin my fingers on anything (besides the huge amounts of side chaining lol//New Jack//lol). But seriously, it seems the whole Ed Banger crowd is so into sampling everything and then distorting the shit out of it. So I was wondering, what percentage do you think of the entire album was created with samples and what percentage do you think was created with in-DAW programs?

 

I started to question this because of the difference I noticed between the basslines of

Let There Be Light:

and

Death From Above 1979 - Blood On Our Hands (Justice Remix)

 

I know that the DFA remix wasn't on Cross, but that bassline seems almost midi'd in comparison from the Let There Be Light bassline.

 

I've read in various places that Justice used things like GarageBand and Cubase for their production but I mean, they really keep their production secrets quiet.

 

Anyone have some professional insight?

 

On another note, how much of your mixes are sample based? Because I've grown tired of how fake MIDI sounds sometimes.

[Guest RadarJammer]

I've read in various places that Justice used things like GarageBand and Cubase for their production but I mean, they really keep their production secrets quiet.

 

Anyone have some professional insight?

 

they make great sounding music but I bet it didn't sound so great before they sent it off to the mixing and mastering engineers. I could be wrong but I bet nobody would be asking "how'd they do that?" if they heard the original DAW projects. I don't fully trust bands like these that have such a tediously refined persona attached to them, it's all just so manufactured and too good to be real seeming.

[Goiter Sanchez]

[jhonny]

lolz

[stockfish]

you may already know this: http://www.attackmagazine.com/features/justice-tell-the-story-of-d-a-n-c-e/

[ryancolecreate]

So recently I've been listening to the Justice - Cross album (probably one of my top 5 favorite albums) in a lot of depth trying to highlight their production secrets and I just can't pin my fingers on anything (besides the huge amounts of side chaining lol//New Jack//lol). But seriously, it seems the whole Ed Banger crowd is so into sampling everything and then distorting the shit out of it. So I was wondering, what percentage do you think of the entire album was created with samples and what percentage do you think was created with in-DAW programs?

 

I started to question this because of the difference I noticed between the basslines of

Let There Be Light:

and

Death From Above 1979 - Blood On Our Hands (Justice Remix)

 

I know that the DFA remix wasn't on Cross, but that bassline seems almost midi'd in comparison from the Let There Be Light bassline.

 

I've read in various places that Justice used things like GarageBand and Cubase for their production but I mean, they really keep their production secrets quiet.

 

Anyone have some professional insight?

 

On another note, how much of your mixes are sample based? Because I've grown tired of how fake MIDI sounds sometimes.

 

Midi makes no sound at all. Saying midi sounds fake, is like saying that sheet music sounds thin. If productions are sample based, then they are most likely being played by a sampler, which is being triggered by Midi...

 

I'd say Justice is 100% sample based. Maybe with a synth thrown in for a bassline or something, but the rest is all samples.

[Stock]

That was true for Cross but not for Audio Video Disco which was more "written" and "played" (with the guitars and stuff being played by Justice themselves I think).
I once read an interview ca. 2008 in which they explained that they weren't great producers and basically put massive amounts of distorsion on anything in their DAW (Cubase I guess). Pretty simple, but efficient in my opinion.

[futureimage]

I read something about them playing everything for Audio Video Disco live, then taking the recordings and chopping/stretching them up so the audio itself was quantised to the extreme. Not sure how serious that comment was, but it's pretty OTT if true.

[chassis]

 

I know that the DFA remix wasn't on Cross, but that bassline seems almost midi'd in comparison from the Let There Be Light bassline.

 

 

I don't know what you mean by this. I think you mean that there's probably an arpeggiator on the bass line in the Death From Above remix.

[awepittance]

to me it sounds like Mr Oizo taught everyone how to do his style of production on Ed Banger, i might be wrong but they all sound too similar to have all come up with that sound organically.

I'd say Justice is 80% plundered samples, including all the one hit drums and stuff and maybe 20% live synthesis from a vst or a hardware synth. I think they put wow & flutter VST effects on their melodic layers too, to make them sound more old and as if they were recorded on tape. I wouldn't be surprised if they ran the whole mix through this effect.

[YEK]

i read that the drums from cross were taken from heavy metal music.

[Guest Tekk]

 

 

I know that the DFA remix wasn't on Cross, but that bassline seems almost midi'd in comparison from the Let There Be Light bassline.

 

 

I don't know what you mean by this. I think you mean that there's probably an arpeggiator on the bass line in the Death From Above remix.

 

 

 

So recently I've been listening to the Justice - Cross album (probably one of my top 5 favorite albums) in a lot of depth trying to highlight their production secrets and I just can't pin my fingers on anything (besides the huge amounts of side chaining lol//New Jack//lol). But seriously, it seems the whole Ed Banger crowd is so into sampling everything and then distorting the shit out of it. So I was wondering, what percentage do you think of the entire album was created with samples and what percentage do you think was created with in-DAW programs?

 

I started to question this because of the difference I noticed between the basslines of

Let There Be Light:

and

Death From Above 1979 - Blood On Our Hands (Justice Remix)

 

I know that the DFA remix wasn't on Cross, but that bassline seems almost midi'd in comparison from the Let There Be Light bassline.

 

I've read in various places that Justice used things like GarageBand and Cubase for their production but I mean, they really keep their production secrets quiet.

 

Anyone have some professional insight?

 

On another note, how much of your mixes are sample based? Because I've grown tired of how fake MIDI sounds sometimes.

 

Midi makes no sound at all. Saying midi sounds fake, is like saying that sheet music sounds thin. If productions are sample based, then they are most likely being played by a sampler, which is being triggered by Midi...

 

I'd say Justice is 100% sample based. Maybe with a synth thrown in for a bassline or something, but the rest is all samples.

What I mean when I say it sounds "Midi'd" Is that it feels much more quantized than say, a live recording of someone actually playing a bass.

 

And when I say "sampled" I mean the VST synthesis with MIDI vs. Recorded Audio from a bass and then put through effect chains

[kcinsu]

It sounds as fake as you let it sound. Turn off the grid, slide things around, or if you have any playing chops play into the sequencer.

 

I used to draw all my music into the piano editor (now its a mix of playing and drawing). When I took an orchestral mockup class in college (producing orchestral music on the computer and making it sound as real as possible) my teacher said we had to play a keyboard to make it sound real. Well at the time I had no keyboard chops so I turned off the grid and drew it in. I then moved things off of the beat to make it sound human. I just used my ears to known when it sounded good. I had some of the best projects in the class and after that he didn't tell students that they had to use a keyboard to play it in and cited me as the student that showed him it could be done by hand.

 

Tldr: midi takes more effort. How much do you want to put in?

[awepittance]

these days the difference between triggering samples in a midi controlled VST or cutting up and putting 'on grid' a raw audio track of drums or a bassline is pretty much the same. A Vst will give you more real-time control, doing it by hand with a cutting tool and using audio regions in the same way you can achieve the exact same results. Ableton for instance has had a quantize audio clips mode for a while now, as well as a 'slice to midi'. Different method of basically achieving the same end