Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.) Interview
Posted on: January, 7, 2013, in
DJ Story: Great Music! Are you using Ableton?
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): Yep. All Ableton. Synthesizing, sampling and resampling. A minimalist approach.
DJ Story: Any plugins?
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): Oh yah. FM8, Sylenth, Massive, and many more.
DJ Story: What did you use for the bass?
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): I don’t remember. Either Sylenth or UltraBass MX I think.
DJ Story: What about that vocal stutter? Great production. I love the use of panning.
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): Yeah. It’s a combo. ;p It’s a vocal sample on top of a grained version of the vocal sample delaying, pitching and slowing down the delay as it goes.
DJ Story: So partially granular synthesis using simpler or something?
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): Nope. Just a sample in an audio track. I dont use simpler actually. Hmm.. Maybe i should try it.
DJ Story: I like it. It’s simple as the name implies, but pretty cool. Have you ever considered making tutorial videos?
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): I actually have throught about it.
DJ Story: I’ve been really digging the Zenon sound, and I would love to learn more. I think I’ve been sort of getting the hang of it, but no labels beating down my door yet.
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): ;p Just wait. Haha
DJ Story: Lol, yeah.
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): You need a vision of what you want to create, and you have to hear it before it’s made.
DJ Story: Well, I’m subscribed now.
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): Now i have to make it huh? It’s really simple though. I barely use anything. Hahaha
DJ Story: Yes, yes you do….
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): One thing i do is synthesize out of my ass. Like, I open a synth, and route it to an audio track, and then just mess the fuck out of it with the filters, LFOs, various other mods, etc. All this nonsense is recorded. Then I chop up the audio.
DJ Story: Let me guess… follow actions?
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): What? I didnt get your joke ;p I chop the audio and create grooves
DJ Story: Grooves as in timing templates or grooves as in mixing and matching recorded bits?
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): Mixing and matching. WTF’s a timing template?
DJ Story: Ableton has that thing called the groove pool. You know like adding a little swing to the beat making it almost like 6/8 triplets.
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): Aaahhhh. Haha! Yes. I just discovered that this week.
DJ Story: Cool, thanks for giving some insight regarding your process. I do something similar with resampling audio, but I often use follow actions instead of arranging it myself. You can have them go in order or randomly.
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): Nah man, I do it all manually. You should too.
DJ Story: I’ll have to try it that way more. I do both, but follow actions just get some interesting results sometimes with minimal effort.
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): Sounds gay.
DJ Story: Ha! Is there any other information you’d like to share about your production or performance workflow?
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.):
Like i said, first comes the vision. After that, if the vision is really strong, like if i know exactly what i want to do I can whip out a track within 2-3 days.
DJ Story: I recently started messing with Massive. What a great VST.
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): Yeah, its massive, but sylenth sounds much better in my opinion which makes up for its lack of depth compared to massive.
DJ Story: Have you heard of LinPlug CronoX? Smoke Sign recommended it to me.
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): Yeah, I tried it too. Honestly, I tried a lot of plugins. Recently zeta+ because its free, but I honestly only use FM8 and Sylenth.
DJ Story: I will have to check out Sylenth and Zeta+
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): Can get some crazy sounds out of FM8
DJ Story: I’ve used FM8 before. It’s very cool for sure. Have you tried Automat? Also free.
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): Never heard of it. I’ll try it.
DJ Story: It’s a good one I think, but Massive and CronoX are changing my life.
Mirror Me (Zenon Rec.): Sylenth is extremely simple to use. You’ll see
DJ Story: I used to only use Albino, but I’m certainly looking forward to experimenting with Sylenth and FM8.
Support Mirror Me’s new EP, SOUNDSKRIT, out now on Beatport!