Thanks to the web sharing just few days ago we coincided with Humid Trips, an amazing instrumental album produced by James Nolasco aka AiRLOCKE. The San Francisco based beatmaker made a good journey into the sound and the sampling: after a great number of listening sessions - during the work or the home chillin' - we decided to go deeper inside this music, and try to virtually meet James.
After a good response, we asked him something about beatmaking, passing through the sampling, the drum composition and many other information as his joining to Blvnt Records, Just thanks to James for the disposability and the good vibes, don't miss the re-print on cassette of Humid Trips, special joint.
INTERVIEW
1. Which was your first
contact in absolute with Hip Hop culture? (like tags on walls and trains,
b-boy’s dance etc.etc.)
I guess it all started my senior year of highschool when I bought some equipment to record at my house. My friends would come over to record their raps and I’d pick out beats for them, mostly Dilla and 9th Wonder joints. That’s when I really started getting into mixing and getting an ear for it all.
2. Did you start from the
beginning to make beats or did you try to express yourself artistically through
a different way?
I started playing guitar when I was te but it didn’t really catch on till a couple years later when I bought a bass and keyboard. I began making instrumental songs with a drum machine and recording them onto cassette. Then in high school I learned how to record onto computer so me and one of my friends who played drums began arranging instrumentals I composed on guitar/bass. I recorded a ton of songs over the years but got bored with it so I decided to start making beats on my MacBook.
3. Which is your basilar
setup for make a beat currently? How did it change whit the time? Do you have
any basic parts that you can do without?
My setup is pretty basic, I use Logic Pro X on my MacBook with an Akai MPD 26 and M-Audio Oxygen49 as my midi controller. I started with pretty much the same setup minus the MPD. During the first half of 2013 I was making all of my beats on an MPC1000 but I felt limited so I went back to my Logic and also picked up Ableton. You can hear a lot of the beats I made on the 1000 on my first beat tape Under the Sun. Sometimes I’ll go without using any midi controllers thanks to musical typing on Logic on Ableton.
4. About sampling, which
kind of music do you prefer to sample from (genre, year)? Do you like to
describe us any particular technique that you appreciate a lot, or just how do
you cut and modify your samples for a beat which keeps your flavor?
For awhile I was sampling a lot of stuff from whatever looked appealing to me in the soul & jazz dollar crates. Lately though my favorite records to sample are latin/brazilian records from mid to late 60s a lot of bossa nova. When I hear something that catches my hear I chop it up and then throw it onto my MPD. Once I get a steady loop I match it onto tempo and go from there.
5. About drums, do you
sample it or use drum kits? Tell us how do you prepare your drums, if you like
a specific process for layering and modify your kits, compression and
equalization of your breaks and single kicks, snares etc. etc. If possible, explain
us how you create your drum patterns, if you use sometimes directly a
drum break, and how you like to insert it in the song.
I use mostly drum kits that I’ve collected over the years but there are a few instances on Humid Trips where I used drum breaks from some of my old recordings. Usually once I have a good loop arrangement I go through my drum library and pick out whatever catches my ear. Then I put the (kick, snare, hi-hats, etch) onto one sampler track and play with it on the MPD. When it's arranged I split each sound on the drums into their own separate track to EQ and pan.
6. About compression and
equalization of your tracks, do you use any external interfaces? Can you
describe us comp and eq in your tracks, how do you set them and how do you like
that your beats sounds? If you work with external engineers, what you think
about it and where generally you work and produce music.
I use Waves Cla-2 and r-compressor whenever I need to compress any piece of sound. I sometimes put a compressor on a snare to give it that nice attack. An external multiprocessor was used for Humid Trips that gave it the sound I was going after.
7. Which are your main
music influences? Which is the musician who represent your the greatest
inspiration? Currently, who are your favorite producers and musicians (not only
about Hip Hop music)?
When I first heard Dilla I was 16 and I knew instantly that I wanted to start making music like that. If it weren’t for him I’d have never started making beats. The way 9th Wonder would flip beats and arrange his drums also played a huge part when I first started off. And of course Nujabes strengthen my ear for sample selection as well. I’ve been bumping a lot of L’Orange lately I definitely feed off his vibes. I’m always listening to a lot of music on Soundcloud, so many producers coming out with dope shit daily. Lately I’ve been stuck on a lot of post-punks acts from the late 70s/early 80s. Not sure if that reflects onto my music though haha
8. Humid Trips is an amazing instrumental album: recount us how did
you produce those beats, how long time did you spend in the making, why did you
join Blvnt Records for the release, printing the projects only on cassettes.
And whatever else you’d share with our presence.
Thanks for the kind words, it's much appreciated. After I put out my last ep Dusk till Dawn, I made the plan to put out another instrumental project towards the end of summer. I kept making beats almost every day from april until mid june so i was sitting on a lot of work. I asked Blvnt Records if they’d be interested in releasing my next beat tape and they agreed to make it a cassette release. So I came up with the concept of the tape and picked out all the beats that flowed with the idea. The tape is meant to be heard on cassette so I recommend you pick one up. The second pressing of tapes features 4 bonus tracks and comes with some special extras. They’re available over at airlocke.bandcamp.com
9. Do you like to feature
with other producers for a two-headz beat? Can you tell a name of a producer
that you would like to produce with, but you haven’t yet?
I haven’t done very many collabs with other producers but I’m def interested in working with a few cats on Soundcloud. I prefer to work in person when collabing.
10. Which is the last
record that you played and loved, and that you feel to share and advise to
other people?
Frank Sinatra & Tommy Dorsey - The Song is You
11. Leave us your contact to submit and follow your music, to book a show with you. If you like to say something more, feel free to tell what you prefer. And thanks a lot for the attention and good vibes
Follow me on Soundcloud! For news & updates follow me on twitter/instagram/facebook @Airlocke. Check out my past beat tapes at airlocke.bandcamp.com For inquires at AirlockeBeats@gmail.com.
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