“Focus on Beat”

The second track in the late summer series is “Focus on Beat” a faster, more aggressive track than the previous week’s “Watch Out.” Check, check it:

What went down

The project was called “Blowback,” named for the unintended consequences of covert action, a choice likely affected by watching “Fauda” on Netflix at the time. The dramatic keys at the intro were the first piece to materialize, and that part drove the entire project.

I started with the Beatskillz Retro Keys for both the chords and the pulsing bassline in the intro, then dropping into a driving, in-your-face drop with a slapping, fuzzy bass and heavy piano using XLN Audio’s Addictive Keys.

The drum line was simple enough, and for whatever reason, adding a steady clap on beat seemed like a good idea. The mess of Latin percussion pieces also helped to instill a sort of wild scene, i.e. a hype battle.

The scratch came from a previously recorded a cappella about freestyle football, as part of the first four bars:

Freestyle football funk fanatic,
Train 'til the reflex automatic,
Focus on beat, don't feel the static,
Crossover, toe bounce, acrobatic.

The scratches seemed to fit the beat well, especially when breaking up the syllables during the breaks between verses, and obviously it inspired the track name “Focus on Beat.”

The artwork started as a modified Snellen chart (no, I did not know what that thing was called before searching online) to show the song title, artist, etc., and after some goofing around with filters and camera angles, the finished product looked good enough to me.

Stay tuned to my Soundcloud and Bandcamp pages for new tracks in this series, mixtapes, and whatever else happens. Check out more “Behind the Beats” here.