“Stay Spinning”

This is the third track in the current series, and a somewhat unlikely addition to the group – or so it seemed. Go ahead and peep:

So what happened?

What was unlikely about this one was that it had been in the works for some time as a project named “Arbaa” (literally the number four in both Hebrew and Arabic) and had stalled in its progress.

When it was clear that the previous two tracks “Watch Out” and “Focus on Beat” had inadvertently launched this series, I was under some pressure to meet the weekly deadline of Friday (and/or Saturday) for posting a track.

So, naturally, I kept going through the dozens of recent incomplete projects, and even back into the hundreds of open projects of recent years, and ended up revisiting this “Arbaa.”

The initial “highlights” of the track were what I would call the breakdown/chorus section and the groove/verse, punctuated by sections of drums only, where the scratches would probably fall in the end.

Logic’s Studio Horns and XLN Audio’s Addictive Keys played a major part, along with a variety of kits I picked up at Loopmasters (one-shots, not loops!), and used through Logic’s EXS sampler.

This track also called in the Strum GS-2 from Applied Acoustic Systems, which has become one of my favorite virtual instruments. While I can play the acoustic and electric guitar, modestly but enough for my purposes, I’ve never been able to get decent recordings of either, and AAS has revolutionized my efforts with the GS-2.

It dawned on me that Stevie Wonder was influencing the evolution of the track, especially as the horns were layered onto the chorus. It particularly made me think of one of my favorite Stevie joints, “Another Star.”

You can’t miss the similarities between the horns around 30 seconds into Stevie’s jam and those in the chorus of this track. I’ve been a big fan of Stevie for many years, and I’m glad his influence is seeping into my own work.

My favorite part of the original project was the transition between the breakdown/chorus and the groove/verse sections, with the build-up associated with each part.

Once I added the intro, it became clear that it could serve as a beat “refresh” and would be a great sort of palate cleanser to shift between the different sections, and when the scratch ideas arrived, this was confirmed.

The scratch comes from a very old verse written as a tribute to the legendary Monday nights at AKA Lounge in Orlando.

Quick backstory: In 2005, while hustling my mix CDs downtown, I passed one off to a guy named Vencent Hodges somewhere on Pine St., who had been hosting “Diversity Beats” Monday nights, which was basically a service industry night that became a haven for bboys and bgirls.

I was lucky to get added to the line-up with Brain Reward (Dj Cyber and M-Chill), Dj Aeon, and Dj Caution, later being joined by Dj Rincon. This was my first experience playing for bboys and bgirls, and years later, it inspired the words:

Battle beats rockin' all night deejays,
In-house tracks, classics to replay,
Stacks on stacks of vinyl LPs stay
Spinnin' had me diggin' each and every weekday.

In the tradition of this series, I chose the title from the scratch itself, and “Stay Spinning” also inspired some artwork ideas immediately.

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.