I've always considered myself a leftist when it comes to music appreciation. During the nu-wave metal age of '96-'00 I have distanced myself away from our local radio due to excessive plays of pointless r&b and siti-ish ballads. Although tiring efforts were put in downloading mp3s using a super-slow tmnet dial-up account and buying cassetes from campbell shopping complex via LRT, I still refused to enjoy mainstream music which in my opinion at that time was diminishing creativity and redundantly ugly. I can easily compare its rate of progression to Malaysia's plan to enter the World Cup.. yikes!
Now my interest in music explored from genre to genre which led to my curious exploration of music production. In this field, the sky is the limit to their achievements. Silver, gold, platinum, and multi-platinum records are the benchmarks for music producers. To get to this stage, they MUST hit the mainstream with many many big hits. Behind the volumes of top charting artists, their fashion sense, and the paparazzi infused tabloids lies creative music producers who plays an instrumental role in bringing these artists to fame.
The likes of Dr. Dre, Chad Hugo and Pharrell Williams of The Neptunes, Kanye West, will.i.am, Timbaland, and Wyclef Jean dominated the '00-'10 decade with countless contributions of producing innovative hip-hop and r&b tracks. The style of the genre changed and left us with fewer depressing tunes on the radio.
Now the battle is set at center stage. Do you recall debut tracks from Lady Gaga, Ke$ha, 3OH!3, and even Miley Cyrus? Have you ever thought how these tracks sound good enough to compete with other chart-topping hits? Below are list of producers behind those songs repeated heavily on the radio. If you jumble their respective material together you will realize that these guys are good. They're creative individuals unsung from the nature of their profession but are raking in millions from every airplay!
Dr Luke produced Britney Spears's Circus, Miley Cyrus's Party in the USA, Adam Lambert's For Your Entertainment and Ke$ha's Tik Tok to name a few. He started off in the entertainment scene as a guitarist for Saturday Night Live in 1997.
RedOne (real name Nadir Khayat) produced many tracks for Mika, Usher, Enrique Iglesias as well as Lady Gaga's Just Dance, Poker Face, and Bad Romance which was named as one of the biggest hits in the past decade. He was dubbed to be responsible for Lady Gaga's futuristic sounds.
Last but not least is my favourite Mr. Benny Blanco. This dude is only 22 years old and has already produced numerous tracks for Katy Perry, 3OH!3, Taoi Cruz, Ke$ha, Flo Rida and even Justin Beiber! Discovered by Spank Rock and encountered frequent collaborations with Dr Luke, Benny Blanco has a dozen of remixes only available online and also a myspace account with only 8000+ friends. The thing I respect about his work is his ability to cultivate Crunkcore in the mainstream. Check out his interview.
Benny Blanco Interview with Kiwibox.com
It'll be interesting to see how far this kid can go. What I would like to see happen in the future are more attention given to credible, talented producers such as Santogold, Amanda Blank, Jai Pol, M.I.A. I'm glad to see electro music producers like LMFAO, Justice, Steve Aoki, and surfacing and experimenting with different genres.
This fascinating evolution of pop music has now opened doors to deserving, creative, and talented individuals and will continue to do so to entertain the world and not just singers with face value. Major record labels will of course pursue the same producers for the same artists who occupy the same radio stations as an approach to reduce risk. The same goes for their approach in inserting sex in music videos to make sure they hit a certain target. These shallow methods of business can bring doom to new sounds. However with anticipation of newer sounds and more attention towards youthful producers who bring fresh tunes on air, the depletion of charismatic compositions are no longer a worry and will diminish the threats of greedy corporate empires by fine-tuning the market and complying to the demands of every party.
~ k i d k a p i t a l ~
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