Mad Disco
Notes On Mad Disco / Mad Disco LONGMIX
Notation Video on YouTube
Track Data
Composition tool: MuseScore, Studio One 5 Professional
Recording tool (DAW): Studio One 5 Professional
Number of tracks:76
Sound source: Presence XT, Impact XT, Mai-Tai, Mojito (All built-in sound sources of Studio One), TAL-NOIZEMAKER
Composition and Recording period: Oct 30 2020 - Dec 11 2020
[Composition]
(TM writes:)
In the world at the moment that I’m writing this there are many places locked down. We made this “Mad Disco” tracks in order to suggest our listeners to enjoy something like “disco at home.” Often on the media I hear the same sort as this as themes of recently released musical pieces. “Us too!” was the beginning.
But they mostly assume small parties are held at home, whilst I assume you are sitting completely by yourself in your room and listening to Mad Disco, shaking your head and body. I hope you will enjoy it that way or another.
I love the disco music. It’s a 1970s disco but its difference with the typical 1970s disco is being digital, atonal, non-chordal, and non-scale as well as the composer being mad about it within his own world covered by earphones.
(TI writes:)
TM created the rhythm, bass line, and chords that form the backbone of the song, and I created the counter-melody with strings and horns.
In retrospect, I didn't add anything to the song itself in the original version, except for arranging the strings and horns.
I took the motif of TM and used a lot of 9ths, 11ths, etc. on top of it to create a fusion of the 70s and instrumental soul music. Specifically, it has a Salsoul Orchestra/MFSB vibe.
(TM writes:)
Around (or until) November 2020, when I first composed the track, I often listened to The Bar-Kays, Midnight Star, Kool & The Gang, Donald Fagan, Larry Levan and Sam Hollander, etc, who I am not sure if had influences.
As written in the first page of the notation (to be uploaded on YouTube), the tentative title was “Kimagure Disco.” Under that, I wrote a note in Japanese that “2小節（たまに4小節）ごとに作って次にコピーして発展～の繰り返し” meaning “Make every two (or sometimes four) bars, copy them to the next, develop them and repeat these.” Kimagure is a Japanese word meaning impulsive and capricious.
Originally, I intended to release only the LONGMIX version, because I planned to make an every-two-bars composition without thinking about the structure and let TI edit/mix as the DJ. But a mixdown of Mad Disco is so superb that I listened so many times even for no purpose (of anything like checking) and eventually we have released it. Isn’t it fun and funny that a released track has no structure and the composer just adds, adds and adds two- or four-bars phrases?
Thus, at first, I composed the basic bass pattern, leaving a note there “The first and most important motif in this track.” I put a glissando (or slide) in it, which gave me the first enormous excitement in the work.
As for the drums, yes, the rhythm is four-on-the-floor but is arranged variously. I will write on that later.
Then, I wrote phrases for the piano and muted guitar and, next, exchanged the piano and bass phrases. Later, the piano continues the bass motif while the bass follows it, where the two parts sound alternately. I got “mad” at that time.
Next, the piano playing the bass line is developed into somewhat a rhythm piano with odd chords. Then, it goes for a development of the piano/guitar phrases and gets back to the basic pattern. Cutting on the muted guitar is in. This time, the bass is developed into something influenced by the piano bass. Oh, I got madder. Okay, develop it. Chords on the piano join. The drums become 16-beat with the first kit snare and third hihat. It made me even madder.
Oh, I forgot going to Section B. Why not putting another type of 1970s disco? Maybe 8-beat with syncopations is going to be great. Let’s locate sixteenth notes as frills on the bass and guitar alternately.
This is the way I composed (though the description above is still on the halfway).
[Groove]
(TM writes:)
Here, we did not use any rhythm sample or loop; in fact FMT almost have not so far. From conga to kick drums, we write notes on the notation software one by one. From the beginning to the end, we write all the bars one by one, rather than repeat the exactly same pattern.
The beat is simply four on the floor throughout. But the combination of two kick drums and that of three hihats are used to control the stressed beats and momentum. The ways of that vary throughout.
Another important groove point here is the relationship between the bass and kick drums. The two-bar basic pattern of the bass does not have the same timings with the strong kick drum for the four on the floor except beat one.
Instead, there are hidden strong beats off the odd beats (ie, off Beat 1, B3, B5 and B7), which are highlighted in red below. You might have recognised that off beats 1 and 3 have stress to some extent. For instance, a kick is located off beat 1, and hihats and a snare off beats 1 and 3. Off beats 2 and 4, conga comes. Anyway, the essence of this groove is the sounds of the brush kit off the beats.
Besides these, there are even weaker strong beats comprising of quick bass notes and conga (in blue). The orange circles show the notes that sound solely, which are relatively decorative notes.
Also, the oranges increase as it goes, especially in Bar 2. This is the designed contrast of concentration (in the first half of Bar 1) and dilution (or fluctuation in another word).
Another example is the relationship between the above rhythm parts and low tone piano. The piano plays some part (in green) of the above bass pattern and a new strong beat appears in Beat 4 (and B8) with the kick drum.
By the way, I love the wood block played in the track!
[Mixing]
(TI writes:)
For the mix, I aimed for a very conventional dance music sound, but I cut off all the overlapping bands in order to get a more separated sound for remixing. For the horns, however, I was conscious of the live instruments and gave them a live articulation.
I paid the most attention to the bass. I emphasized 200 Hz for the attack part and 50 Hz for the heavy bass, aiming for a more dance music-like sound that would resonate in the dove tail. For the bass, I also played a synchronized bass at one octave below the score.
[LONGMIX]
Track Data
Composition tool: MuseScore, Studio One 5 Professional
Recording tool (DAW): Studio One 5 Professional
Number of tracks:60
Sound source: Presence XT, Impact XT, Mai-Tai, Mojito (All built-in sound sources of Studio One), TAL-NOIZEMAKER
Composition and Recording period: Nov 22 2020 - Dec 24 2020
As I wrote earlier, Mad Disco LONGMIX was supposed to be the complete version of Mad Disco. In other words, I planned to create Mad Disco first and finishing it by DJ TI editing and mixing. Anyhow, I just want to listen to this track for long, long time and asked TI to make it an extremely long version.
(TI writes:)
LONGMIX is totally my thing. It's a tribute to my 90's DJ mixes, and by extension, Larry Levan's mix style.
It's basically a deconstructed and reconstructed version of the original, but I wrote some new phrases in the middle. The new phrases I added were written while remembering funk music and fusion (I didn't know those words at the time) that I used to listen to on the radio and TV when I was in elementary school.
For this version, I wanted to listen to it for a long time, and I aimed for a mix with a story, not just repetition, so that you never know what will happen next. Specifically, I aimed for "a story that changes and expands every eight bars“.*
*This is a quote from Go Hotoda, a mixing engineer.
In the 90s, I was often asked to DJ at parties for foreign students and foreigners living in Japan. They were very good dancers and needed music to dance to. I would take their records and CDs from their home countries (many of them were from South America) and DJ for them.
Their preference was for a style with intonation and flow, rather than just connecting similar types of songs like the so-called club DJs.
The music they brought was not only disco, but also salsa, latin, and other syncopated dance music of various electric and acoustic types. These were mixed in advance on a 4-track MTR, and then sounds were added and balanced live. (I later learned that Frankie Knuckles had done something similar).
When I heard the original "Mad Disco," I thought, "They would have liked this back then," and I mixed it, remembering the "feel" of those days.
At the time, I mixed records, CDs, and tapes using a cassette multi-track recorder, so I couldn't mix every little detail the way I wanted to, but now we have the technology to do almost anything we want. Now we have technology that allows us to do almost anything we want, and we are doing things that we wanted to do back then, but couldn't.
I started with a tape of a Congolese choir, and quoted a few phrases from famous disco music.
For the mix, I used Larry Levan's Paradise Garage pirated mixtape as a reference. When I first heard his style of eccentric mixing of different musical elements, I felt something similar to myself.
Specifically, we emphasize certain bands and effects, include sudden breaks at the height of the music, dub-like processing in places, and scenes with sudden transitions.
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