Emerging Netherlands-based pairing Parallells lands on Damian Lazarus’ Crosstown Rebels imprint for the first time with an emotive offering in ‘Ashes of Snow (The Rebirth Of The Phoenix)’, which acts as a tribute to their favorite Portuguese beach club, Yamba, tragically destroyed by a fire last year.
“In May 2021 a devastating fire destroyed Yamba, one of our favorite beach clubs in Caparica, Lisbon, where we often performed. Yamba’s journey through the flames has become an inspiration to us and so we decided to compose ‘Ashes of Snow’. It represents the story of the phoenix as it finally rises from its ashes and morphs into a new form, with renewed wings, taking flight towards a new adventure. ‘On The Banks of The River’ is a continuation of ‘Ashes of Snow’, where love flows from Lisbon’s river to the Atlantic Ocean for a night full of emotions in Caparica.” say Parallells about the inspiration behind their latest drop.
To celebrate the drop of ‘Ashes of Snow (The Rebirth Of The Phoenix)’, Parallells invited EG into the studio for 5 advanced studio tips to take your game to the next level:
1. Get your DAW organized
First things first. We recommend having your collections well organized as it will save you so much time. Our collections consist of drum loops, drum shots, sounds FX, melody racks (including all synths and own presets), sound design, and effects.
2. Don’t be afraid to record your own samples
You can use anything in the studio to create rhythmics, including your own vocals. Use your metronome, and start recording and playing with your pens, fingers, shakers, and your voice. If you have a good recorder (we were personally using Tascam to start with and are now using Mixpre with Sennheiser mics to have the best quality). Small compressor, EQ, and you’re good to go!
3. Use the predominant element for the rest of the tracks
Turn your melodic hook into MIDI to get both the rhythm and the notes of it. Then use that groove/notes for your bass and other melodic stems, use the groove/rhythm for percussion. Extract the predominant groove of your rhythmics and apply it to some of the elements. It will create a whole that is coherent and that fits the groove of the track to perfection.
4. Automations
Record your automation on a Bus track. Like, to play with the cut-off of a MIDI pad, for example. Create a new Bus, and assign it (audio from) to your pad. Create a mapping to play with resonance, cut-off, and more effects, and hard record through the entire track.
5. Play with your vocals
Record 3 exact vocal lines (use the metronome for accuracy) so that you can pan differently and group them. Put an echo on a return channel as a send, and create a new audio track and record the vocal group. Play with the sync, time, and feedback of the echo. You will get a new audio track full of cool effects.
‘Parallells – Ashes of Snow (The Rebirth Of The Phoenix) with Clive Henry Remix’ will be out June 10th via Crosstown Rebels. Purchase your copy here.
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