Tuesday, June 2, 2009

Solange Knowles Remix (Intern’s Perspective)


Slang MusicGroup takes a simple song from any genre and changes up the tempo, beat, and rhythm to make hot dance music. This makes the artist more popular in today’s culture. Brian Gaynor, Head engineer, said that these remixes are “for marketing the single.” They can be played at clubs and other places where the regular single doesn’t fit.. Remixes of songs are very popular and help the artist reach different types of people and make more money with downloads.

I learned The Slang MusicGroup doesn’t just create remixes of popular music. They are there to help musical artists in any way they can.. If an artist needs help in advertising their music, Slang is there. Connections with radio, iTunes, street teams, videos, whatever. Sometimes the artist wants to just come in and record a new original track. Slang does that as well.

One example of this is with an artist wanting to do a music video of their song. Slang either helps the artist find the right people to produce and direct it or just does it their self.

Artists have come in wanting to create a sound that they are thinking about such as an R&B/Hip-Hop artist wanting to remix their song into a more dance club kind of song. An example of one of these artists is Solange Knowles, Beyonce’s sister.

Under the direction of noted producer and legendary house music originator, Vince Lawrence, the Slang MusicGroup team has been creating remixes for Solange. One of these remixes, I got to sit in on. Slang was remixing Solange’s song “Would’ve Been The One” off her studio album, Sol-Angel and the Hadley St. Dreams. Slang made the song more up-tempo and added a powerful drumbeat to make it more of a dance club song. This remix will hopefully make the song more popular among people that don’t like the original song hence giving Solange a wider audience.

While Vince is the head producer/remixer, he has several producers working with & helping him. These producers include Jere McAllister, Brett Owsley, Angel Alanis, and the Milk Bros. Each of them has helped create remixes of Solange for their particular audience.

Eric Ley from Milk Brothers has done two remixes for Solange and says that they are “fresh as hell.” He is all about the energy of the music and has put that energy into the remixes. He explained that he does the drums on some of the tracks and then uses the a cappella to add more to the track. Once a remix is done, he sends the demo to Vince and then Vince selects the best ideas to be submitted to the artist. These are finished in Slangs studio, adding the latest bells and whistles. In the words of Eric Ley, “Vince is my Ari Gold.” “ He really makes it happen for us, bringing our ideas to fruition.”

Angel Alanis, one of the three members from Noise Floor Crew, ran the controls for one of the remixes: “Would’ve Been The One.” He described the kind of sound as “electro house” and that “everything was changed but the vocals. The tempo, feel, and arrangement have changed.” He described the original song as “amazing” and that “we had fun with it.” The process seems to be working out great and in my opinion, the remixes sound amazing.

Julian Seidel
intern