Lead Discovery Process. Addendum.

As an afterthought here is a track of Emery's with a vocal component. Catch parts where you think the track starts to stagnate, but then notice how it breaks out of those ruts. Also note how Emery uses the vocals as a tool. For example, he loops the vocals during the buildup, continues them during the drop, and around 2:52 he uses the vocals nearly exclusively with a beat that vanishes; then a new synthetic sound is introduced while the vocals continues creating a moving breakdown.

Lead Discovery Process.

When I was younger I remember I dabbled with sound engineering programs. Specifically, I remember using ACID Pro by Sonic Foundry (now by Sony). It came with loops of instruments and different beats. Basically the user just paints them onto different tracks. In reality using it successfully is much more complex than that, but it got me thinking why do I like certain songs rather than others? What sounds specifically in a song do I find favorable, and why? I recognize the fact that there are certain sounds I abhor, but also their are sounds I like to hear in a song. In the past I have said that I dislike the typical sounds of dubstep. Another thing I usually hate, especially in trance music, is a song that doesn't move. By move, I mean change, I want the song to offer differing sounds and literally "move" through a musical landscape. Where this flaw is most notable is when songs have introductions that are way too long. When the song stagnates it basically takes the power out of it.

A nuance I do like is the "synthesizer buildup sound" characteristic of trance. To me the sound gives an epicness to the song that I favor. That specific sound is what I noticed in Tim Berg's "Bromance" which may explain why I like it. Another element I favor is when most of the tracks in the song go away leaving only one or two sounds (kind of like a breakdown or interlude).

One DJ who favors these sounds is DJ Mag's #7 Gareth Emery. Emery really came on the scene with his song "Mistral" under the moniker GTR. Since then he has been seeing a lot of success and came out with his first artist album "Northern Lights." Personally, I have seen Gareth Emery live, and that was quite a show. I love his style of trance with well timed buildups and subtle breakdowns: which is unbelievable when hearing live. One of the first songs he played at the venue I visited was "Arrival". The song is a good example of song mobility. The minute of intro (which doesn't stagnate as it gradually adds different sounds) leads into a initial buildup, drop, rebuildup, and finally a breakdown all in the first half of the song. Its hard to put something so abstract into words, but thats how I describe it. I'm interested in finding out what sounds, in songs, other people like and very much interested in how they describe them.