Ghost Producing: What the EDM Industry Doesn’t Want You to Know | Hacker News Reader

Ghost Producing: What the EDM Industry Doesn’t Want You to Know

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42 pointsbifrost31 comments

Thing is, DJing and producing dance tracks are entirely different crafts. Somehow, when DJs playing other people's records achieved stardom, people started expecting them to release their own tracks, too. Some were good at it, but some weren't, so they hired someone else to help.

It isn't a very big problem, really, in my opinion. Most dance music fans can pick out the good from the bad anytime. An artist who consistently produces good records (acts like deadmau5, laurent garnier, and, yes, skrillex, come to mind, but there's a gazillion more) probably has control over what goes on in the studio. Ibiza deejays who have a dance chart hit or two, well, not so sure.

In fact, the amazement is a good thing. It means we expect dance producers to be original, the real thing. In other genres, most notably pop, we all expect the writing and composing and arrangement and everything else except the singing to have been done by anonymous, behind-the-scenes people.

As an example I was more amazed to discover that Take That actually write their own songs, than to find out that Afrojack hired a studio guy.

ps. As an interesting aside, great reading material is "The Manual" by the KLF[1]. Written in 1988, a big part of it is about how to get hired studio engineers and programmers to basically produce your hit record for you, without any necessary talent from your side. You just sit there and encourage them.

[1] http://www.kirps.com/web/main/resources/music/themanual/

Haha that's an awesome book, thanks for sharing!

This was standard back when I was involved in the UK Hardcore scene. Novice producers would take a rough draft or an idea to a sound engineer and have it made into a song. The engineer was often a big name himself and sometimes the artists would use "engineered by X" when marketing their tracks.

The only reason this is a problem is because, in the EDM scene, "producer" has somehow become confused with "artist"

Or to put it another way:

George Martin didn't write play a note or write a single song on the Beatle's albums but there was no taint attached to him being credited as the producer.

Language is a funny beast.

> George Martin didn't write play a note or write a single song on the Beatle's albums

I believe he wrote orchestrations and played keyboard instruments on a good number of Beatles songs.

In hip hop and electronic music, "producer" is pretty much synonymous with "artist". In hip hop the MC is the one whose voice you hear, and the producer is, well, everything else: the beats and melodies in addition to the more traditional producer stuff like arrangement and mastering. Electronic music also follows this paradigm. As there is typically no live voice (any voice is typically coming from samples), the producer is the entirety of the production.

in dance music the title "producer" has meant song writer / recording artist since the late 70s.

and George Martin wrote an awful lot of notes for the Beatles.

also there are many classic rock producers who don't actually touch the mixing desk or microphones. that's the engineer's job. Geoff Emerick did the mixing for the Beatles and he wasn't even allowed to move the microphones. he had to call in the studio mic engineers to do that. company policy.

I don't see it as a problem. As a consumer and amateur producer of EDM the only surprise that registers is that someone thought this was newsworthy. The practice doesn't bother me and I'm not sure anyone should feel threatened by it. I suppose fans might rightly feel cheated.

The "producer" role in the 1960s was very different from what it is today. It wasn't until Dub Reggae was developed in Jamaica that the producer became more of a creator than someone sitting back and making sure the track sounded good while the band played it. A music producer and a television producer had similar levels of creative control, for example. But when Dub was created, that all changed. The producer became the focus of the track, because dub is just basic reggae that's been re-sampled and bathed in reverb, with some cool space sound effects thrown in. In this paradigm, the producer was also the DJ, sometimes (like in King Tubby's case) running their own soundsystem. Dub created the framework by which hip-hop and EDM are created and performed. But that didn't happen until the late 1970s.

In music the producer traditionally supervises the engineers and to some extent the artist. The producer explains what he/she wants, the engineers just implement it.

For example, artist comes in with guitar, a chord progression, and a song. Producers says 'let's plug your guitar in a Marshall Amp and mike the cab, then we'll double-track that with the direct signal.' Engineers goes and sets everything up, and at most makes suggestions on what sort of microphone to use or that this configuration sounds especially good with a bit of room sound, and takes care of setting up the mixing desk to avoid distortion on the recording and phasing between the direct and amplified signals.

Most producers start out as engineers rather than musicians. Their specialty is tone and mixing, which also feeds into song structure and arrangement.

Original forum thread: http://www.tranceaddict.com/forums/showthread/t-523822.html

First comment: This is hardly new information.

Anyway, nice to see trance making the HackerNews headlines! I just realized 1997 when I first met Assange was about the time Ecuador! came out. Hehehe.

Escucha me!

This has been an open secret for years and years, or so I thought anyway. There's plenty of bedroom producers smashing out EPs, but when you're working on big, stadium hits it requires a production team to get it right. Or, if you're a biggish name DJ you're expected to drop some tracks of your own but being a good DJ doesn't mean you can produce a track for toffee, you just know what works for your sets.

Nothing new here, although I am amazed that it is still considered a 'rumor'. Just fly to Breda, the Netherlands and look around in the EDM-scene. Many, if not most, of the upcoming DJs make and share with Tiesto. It's like a local business clique. Many of those guys even have full-time jobs next to producing, to pay for (lol) their hobbies.

I don't know, I have been working in recording studios and for me the need for a production team is half snake oil half fixing bad tracks with existing fat sounds. Both are the opposite of the original impulse of electronic home made music, where all the good stuff come from.

It's funny he does not seem to mention Milli Vanilli... [1], winners of a Grammy (which was later revoked because, you know, they actually did not sing!).

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milli_Vanilli

This is pretty commonplace and how a lot of producers get started. Danja ghosted a TON of Timbaland's mid-2000s work (think Nelly Fertado, Justin Timberlake, etc.) and was able to land his own gig with Britney Spears shortly thereafter.

I don't really understand the big deal here. It sounds like some artists collaborate or have some help writing parts of hit songs... what am I missing on why this is important?

It creates barriers to entry for new participants in the market. I don't lose lots of sleep over it but as someone who makes electronic music it's quite annoying to see that people with no talent or technical skill can just buy their way to stardom. It's an open secret that many of the top earners don't make their own music, but just trade on their brand or outrageous antics; eg Steve Aoki's party trick is throwing cake into the faces of girls during his live 'performances' - http://www.edmontonjournal.com/entertainment/superstar+Steve....

When I mention that I make electronic music and people ask me 'oh, is it like David Guetta' or suchlike I just want to cringe in embarrassment. Not because I consider myself a musical genius or anything, but being good at it requires years of study and practice like any other musical discipline, so it's depressing to see the market leaders that perpetuate the stereotype of electronic music as pushing a button and waving your hands in the air. I hope the fad either blows over over or audiences wise up a bit and demand a better standard of artistry, but that probably isn't going to happen :-/

Which inspired me to make this: http://i.imgur.com/HwXGDmO.jpg

I technically know what all the buttons and knobs do, have a basic understanding of music theory sufficient to make it sound like I almost know what I'm talking about, and half my friends are DJ's and some of them are producers, actually getting an idea out of my head and into the speakers is not something I care enough about to put the effort in to. I'm a physical infrastructure guy.

When people ask me what kind of music I listen to I'm a little cautious about saying "Minimal Techno, Drum & Bass, Psytrance, Dubstep, Trip Top", so now I just say "I used to listen to Minimal Techno, now I just to nothing", and see if they get the joke.

In my arrogant opinion, many of the "EDM" 'top earners' give 'electronic music'a bad name to those who think "EDM" and "Techno" are synonymous. My audiophile friends and I have introduced lots of people, young and old, to electronic music genres they didn't even know existed, and it's got them on their feet dancing.

Skrillex uses Prime Loops! [1] Anyone with GarageBand can do that. I always say "Skrillex isn't Dubstep, it's 'Commercial Shit-step".

[1] http://primeloops.com/blog/index/post/title/skrillex-uses-pr...

What I like about the more 'underground' genres like in my case Drum & Bass is most artist are not doing it to make a commercial success, but because they love the music.

>Skrillex uses Prime Loops! [1] Anyone with GarageBand can do that. I always say "Skrillex isn't Dubstep, it's 'Commercial Shit-step".

Which means absolutely nothing. Lots of very talented producers use loops and samples, and there's nothing wrong with that. As long as you use them creatively it says nothing about your skill as a musician or producer.

Yes, anyone with Garageband can use loops. But not everyone with Garageband can produce to a professional standard, or write a decent melody, or chord progression, or arrange a song, or create the perfect synth patch, or create something new-sounding etc.

You're entirely right, of course, and I agree. I was indulging in a bit of Skrillex-bashing.

You'll enjoy this: http://afxaventurs.tumblr.com/

I grew up on Detroit techno and Chicago house. Its sad to see all electronic music get lumped into "edm."

This is an observation from where I stand: EDM as a trend looks to the underground dance music-sphere and plucks ideas. Right now Deep/Minimal House has begun to enter the EDM world. All things considered this is an established sound that has been around for a long time. Now, its "new" and "innovative." Of course, it only counts as new if a current "EDM" dj is producing the track.

I have no moral judgement. But, it is an interesting trend. Dance music evolves fast! EDM has sped up the process, they take a popular trend, only a few year old, re-shape to please the masses, and create a movement to backlash to.

Right now techno is huge, in the dance music world. I expect EDM to jump on it not too long from now.

Could not agree more. BTW I see we have similar taste and amused by your handle - drop me a line via gmail if you're in the Bay area. or just anyway :)

As far as I can tell, ghostwriting doesn't really impact the quality of music people are listening to. Sure, frontperson du jour may have no discernible talent, but someone had to have enough to get it played, right?

I'd say they have competence rather than talent. People have pretty low expectations of a mainstream op/dance song, so once you've got a decent hook writing the producing the rest of the track is a by-the-numbers exercise. Bear in mind that the talentless frontman is also backed by a huge marketing budget, whereas the average self-promoting producer has little or none - most labels don't have any significant budget for promotions.

In other news, Dr Dre doesn't build his Beats by Dre in a shed at the end of his garden ;-)

A more serious parallel though, this is true of many artists (fine and modern alike) such as Damien Hirst with his spot paintings of which over 1000 exist and were supposedly mostly produced by other artists he selected. I think in the context of artist as curator, this is quite acceptable.

Upvoted you, but disagree with the concept of artist as curator. That's just marketing, and IMHO highly destructive to art.

GQ did an interesting article related to the topic.

http://www.gq.com/entertainment/music/201304/avicii-tim-berg...

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