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How I make music: When I bought my first soundcard,
a Digidesign M-box, and first launched Reason, I liked the program's virtual simplicity, the mixing desk, the cables,
made it easy to understand what I did and I soon realised grooves could be made in any shape and sound
if I just learned how to use the program. First I record vocals with a cuetrack. Then I delete the cuetrack, having
only the vocals as referance, and begin to program drums and synths all over again, finding the sounds and
beat to surround the vocals. So there are no "original tracks" at Stuilui. Every version, every mix of a certain
melody has a point. I just have to like it. And therefore, I release it. The web statistic shows that certain versions
are more popular than others, and that gives me some interesting insight about the taste the listeners have. While
mixing, I usually use Reason as a rewire slave to Cubase and during the process, I try not to think of the
mix as a number of tracks. It's more like a shape. One trap I can fall in when I record vocals with a cuetrack, is
that the timing can get strange when I start to program new beats to the vocals, it sort of gets
rigid or wrong. After all, timing is one of the four things I have to pay attention to, just like I pay attention to
the melody, arrangements and the mix itself. And these four must always be glued together, as a whole. The main
priority the last years has been trying to find the sound I like, and now, since I'm more content with
that part of the production, I will move to the arrangements. One of my musical influences is the British artist
Tricky and his earliest recordings. I listened a lot to his music when it first came out and I am still amazed about
the fact that he, at such a young age, really did something different when it came to musicproduction. And when I say
different I mean the way the arrangements are supporting (or not supporting) a melodyline. My musical idea is sort
of like this: If you have a fine melodyline, why give it all this support and help with the arrangements? It will only predict
something usual. And usual is quite often boring, and everybody does the same thing. Why should you? It is beautiful as it
is; The melody. So the singing of Martina Topley Bird, the vocalist Tricky worked with on Maxinquaye, has shaped
some of my musical taste. It is the way she sang, and most important, where she sang it, and the fact that the mix
has a lot of air around the vocals, they are not a small line in the poplayers, but has all this space, dynamic and strange
arrangements around them. So the goal is to make my music, with these ideas in mind. And to do it all in the box. Only
with a computer and vocaltakes. I do not make music for the radio, but for monitors. I have not heard one Tricky production
on the radio. Another producer I listen to is Zomby. He has the talent to make a tristesse in a simple way. I like the
atmosphere in his tracks. Wise Blood is another musician I listen to, a lot. He makes simple and wonderful melodies in
a landscape I usually don't expect to find those. In January 2012 Stuilui released a free app for Android and (soon) Apple. The app can
reach an audience that usually don't use the wepage, and is easier to control and update than other streaminservices.
In the future this app will contain at least twelve tracks, and the moment a mixdown is done and released here, I will update
the app, so new mixes can be streamed in a mobile device at once. And when I feel a track has been in the app long enough,
or I make a new version of it, it is possible to delete the old, at once. I like the idea of that direct way of reaching an
audience on a mobile.
The
melodies: I have made melodies for many years. I have sort of three boxes I can get them from. It's the old guitar box: Songs I
made with a guitar many years ago, where the songs are saved on old mc cassettes. I have a bunch of dustcovered tapes, and
from time to time I listen through them to find old songs. Many of these melodies are not recorded yet. And I have the
zip box: That's a box full of zips formatted to a Roland home studio. I guess I have almost 30 zips with songs from
that period in my life. These melodies are made with a cheap el guitar and a casio synth. Many of these are
not recorded either. And then I have the computerbox: That's all the songs I have made since I bought a soundcard and the
three computers I work with. I dont know how many, but too many are waiting in line to be finished. And that's
my dilemma and luxury problem. I usually go to the computerbox to find new songs to finish. Because that's the box that's
close to me when I work. But I have not forgotten the first two boxes! Many of my finest melodies are hidden there you see.
But as long as they stay in the box, they do not disappear. January
2012, Tove Nilsen.
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