I’ve been asked many a-times about the process of a song, what’s the step by step journey of a single.
I’m going to give you a lil’ behind the scenes today!
1. My own process starts 90 % of the time by either writing down the lyrics or coming up with the top-line (the melody of the song, so to speak.) I sometimes use my piano to compose it, other times I’ll go straight to my DAW (the music work station on my laptop) and I play around with some ideas.
Something I like to do is finishing the track right there and then, give it all of my time and focus but then coming back to it a few days without listening to it. If during that time, I find myself humming or singing the newly made track, I know I’m on the right path. I would then usually go back to it and polish it, sometimes this is when I’d discard it.
2. When the demo is ready, that’s when I go to my producer: this is where things get juicy.
It usually takes up to 2 full days to produce, record and mix a song. Sometimes it took less, other times more (a few of my songs have been revised 10 times!). In the studio, the juice comes out. From the demo, we bring the song to life. References, atmospheres, one-time-wonders and deep meditations all help the process.
After the song is in a good place chez the producer’s studio, the mixing begins.
3. The mixing wants to balance, clean and tidy the song so that volumes, frequencies and the different parts of the song all live in harmony. It’s not an easy task, but producers are wonderful at it. I personally give my own when it comes to mixing, using what I call the "I-Listener" process: if I were the first time listener of this song, what would I want to hear?
4. After the mixing, comes the mastering. Here it’s recommended that an external ear takes over the track and tweaks the mixing done by your producer. A great mix means that there won’t be much to do during the mastering process.
*drum roll* The song is done!!
Now it’s time to distribute it.
5. Distribution is a service that some companies offer to take your song and send it to our famous streaming platforms, such as Spotify, Apple Music, Deezer etc. and also to less well known platforms.
6. Once you’ve sent the song for distribution, you usually wait a couple of weeks before it’s release day! Here you can sit back and enjoy the satisfaction and pride of seeing your baby sent out to the world!
It takes around 2 months to fully release a commercially viable product, and it's not always a smooth process, but the more you do it, the better you get at it!
Thank you for reading xxx