Record Producers

[Sylph]

Is there anyone in particular you admire, follow, respect, adore? What is it that you like about their music?

Could you also name a favourite work of his or hers?

[Toups]

Max Martin and Dr. Luke. I like their songs because they're catchy and singable. I can't name one favorite song, there's too many.

Max Martin: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Martin%27s_Songwriting_and_Production_Credits

Dr. Luke: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luke_Gottwald

I basically their songs for Britney Spears, Pink, Backstreet Boys, Nsync, Avril Lavigne, Kelly Clarkson, Katy Perry, The Veronicas.

Dr. Dre: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dr._Dre_production_discography

I love his beats. Songs I like are mostly from Tupac, Snoop Dogg, Eminem. His rap music still has some 90's flare - the "hard core" rap sound....I don't really know how to describe. It's mostly different from today's rap (which I like too).

[Sylph]

I love Max Martin! 'N Sync song It's Gonna Be Me must be my all time favourite of his! He co.wrote it with Yacoub and Carlsson and it's so catchy and fun, even after all these years, it hasn't lost it's appeal!

And even though today's mainstream music scene is basically a very closed, small pool of people, I can find things I like about each of them. And I'll try to write about it later.

[Toups]

Yeah, those Swedes rule! No wonder so many American artists go to them to create hits. They know how to create popular songs.....song like you said, that doesn't lose its appeal.

[alphanguy74]

Oh, yes... there are several producers I ADORE:

Frank Wilson:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyWaZXk25ZY

Dusty Springfield and Ivor Raymonde:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyWaZXk25ZY

Jack White

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NTXt2tMzhOk

[Chris B]

Well, I couldn't go without mentioning Burt Bacharach and Hal David. IMO, his best work is with Dionne Warwick. His pop compositions were so classy, intricate and difficult for many singers to sing. Dionne was just the perfect vocalist for his work and they were magic together. When she left him she still did some good, but not well remembered work.

Don't laugh, but I also loved the SAW productions in the 80s and 90s. My favorite work of theirs was with Kylie and reviving Donna Summer's career. I understand they were cheesy and repetative, but when they were good they were great. I especially loved Kylie's final album with them, Let's Get To It. It got mixed reviews, but I thought it was more mature and well executed. The singers were poorly chosen which hurt the album.

Xenomania are pop music gods who've shown such versatility IMO. Of course they're responsible for just about all of Girls Aloud's back catalog and it shocks me considering how diverse it is, that they're one production team behind them. Other notable acts they've worked with are the Minogue sisters, Sugababes and Sophie Ellis Bextor. They can do all types of pop and really find something that suits the artist well.

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Jon Brion is another genius best known for his work with Kanye West and Fiona Apple. Everyone found it odd when Kanye hooked up with him, but it was a perfect fit and Brion brought such depth and texture to West's songs. He produced probably all the singles and most of Kanye's Late Registration album. He also produced Rufus Wainwright's first album, which was his best produced, IMO. Brion has spoken about how he likes to play around with new instruments and use them in different ways which always makes his songs exciting to listen to.

Sylph if you love strings, I can't see how you wouldn't love this...

There are other well produced songs I love, but those are the few producers that I will follow and give a song or artist a chance simply because of who is producing it.

[Sylph]

I love those strings in Fiona's song, Chris.

Kanye kind of dropped Brion later. His arranger of choice now is Larry Gold (I like his Flashing Lights strings), and Jon went on to arrange others - I've listened to his work for Dido (Safe Trip Home), who also dropped her previous arranger (Ingman) and brought in Brion.

[Sylph]

I presume many will laugh, but I've grown to love Timbaland. Most of his productions and all owing to his beautifully designed, addictive, on the surface simple drums: the kicks, the snares, toms, cymbals, ethnic drums. Which brings us to his fascination with Middle East, also a big plus in my book (although he shouldn't have sampled those songs without crediting).

[bellcurve]

LOL. I'm shocked. I for sure thought you would have said Phil Spector, given your flair for all things retro.

[EricMontreal22]

Bacharach was one of the first really important examples of a songwriter laying his vision in the production of his tracks too (something he learned from Lieber/Stoller) Of course back then they called what he did arranging andwhat they called priducer was more the engineer, but... The Rhino CChronological 3 disc box set, which mainly focuses on Bacharach's best work from the 60s but covers his whole career is essential to any pop music collection (btu I have all his Dionne albums, many soudntrack etc too as like Chris I'm pretty obsessed--was especially as a teen). Thanks to Rhino Handmade's limited edition releases of his albums from the 60s for Dionne you really realize how brilliant his production work was as many songs on those are ones he didn't write, just arranged but because of that they have his sound.

Someone who learned from Bacharach is Jimmy Webb who likewise had production control on most of the songs he wrote--nad it showed.

Sylph I don't find timbaland a funny choice--at his best his production work is gorgeous--I do think his sound has become overplayed and he hasn't developed it enough to get past that (part of that is because he's spread himself so thin, part of it is his protoge Danja has become a huge producer in his own right with a similar sound, and part of it is due to other clones)

Now if you want people to laugh everyone here know smy love for Disco, the more ornate, and often obscure the better. Euro Disco was a producers medium (which is why, with the exception of some stars like Donna Summer who started co writing and writing her own stuff, it was producers who drove it and often would jsut create made up names for the artists on their projects which were just random session singers). Alec Costandinos, Boris Midney, and the brilliant Cerrone were the top of the EuroDisco heap, and worked with some big names but are most famous for their orchestral/synth combo euro disco opuses.

But my fave, prob sicne I was 13 or so is Girogio Moroder who, like him or hate him has become a massive influence on any music with a beat, since the 70s. He started off in Germany doing beyond cheesy bubblegum pop until he basically had a fluke novelty hit with a singer he befriended, Donna Summer and Love to Love You Baby (they had already done a pretty awful folk/pop album earlier together)--which isntantly got him into disco and his love of using innovative new synth techniques with traditional instruments. Besides basically producing everything Donna Summer did from 1975 to 1981 (on 7 albums that combined masive chart hits with always more experimental tracks--like this bizarrely hypnotic synth track Now I Need You/Working the Midnight Shift from the disco Cinderella concept album they did, Once Upon a TIme LOL http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dft6lIBSUVI ) he had a slew of other projects going on, solo disco work he did under the name Munich Machine, producing for acts from the Three Degrees (the sublime disco groove of Giving Up Giving In) to unknowns like Suzi Lane, tons of hidden disco gems.

he then became particularly in demand--Alan Parker heard I Feel Love and wanted him to do the score for his film Midnight Express--which seemed an odd pairing especially as back then synth scores for movies were still rare--btu Moroder did a haunting, hypnotic score for the movie, won the oscar AND took one of the cues and had a huge disco instrumental hit with it, The Chase. For the American Gigolo soundtrack Debbie Harry from Blondie approached him as she was a big fan and they did Call Me (the 8 minute full mix is still the best), even avant garde pop group Sparks were huge fans and did a great, bizarro disco concept album with him No 1 Song in Heaven. Because of his diversity he managed to escape the disco curse and have some major new wave dance and soudntrack hits in the 80s == Scarface, Cat people with Bowie, Neverending Story, Thief of Hearts, Metropolis, foxes, Flashdance, his huge theme for Flashdance--still a slew of great songs (some kinda forgotten like the song he did with Freddie Mercury, Love Kills), Top Gun, etc etc (Take My Breath Away being one of the least subtle things he did in a career of nonsublety, and I love it lol). It wasn't till the late 80s he started to lose interest in music. I think his combination of pop catchniess, an interest in a huge background of music, lack of pretention and williness to experiment is what I find so interesting about his productions. For a good decade he was pretyt much the best man at what he did. I mean he could be a millionaire alone on the number of songs (by everyone from Madonna to Kiss) have ripped off his I Feel Love bassline. And his much more experimental film scores are some fo gthe rare non orchestral film scores I find often truly beautiful. Moroder's protoge Harold faltermeyer had some similar success in the 80s (he's rich from his movie theme for Beverly Hills Cop, Azel F alone) and some hidden gems.

I think I've said in other threads my fave modern producers, from the Pet Shop Boys (their 1989 camp album for Liza Minelli is still a fave of mine--it's just so lush), Xenomania are brilliant (and will probably never have massive hits in the US which doesn't appreciate the camp tongue of cheek of their act Girls Aloud lol), Greg Kurstin is maybe my fave current up and comer, he's worked with everyone from experimental jazz groups, his own 60s pop group Bird and the Bee, to kylie, Stuart Price of course (check out his new album with frankmusik for b rilliant synth production), speaking of Kylie my fave producers of hers fromt he last decade are Biffco, Trevor Horn, Metro in the late 90s and early 00s were brilliant at disco inspired dance pop (and not just for Cher and Enrique lol their big hits), topham/twigg came from the ultra cheesy Stock/Aitken/Waterman tradition which I have a love hate thing for but there's no denying that SAW's record brekaing string of hits in the 80s is impressive as is the catchiness of their stuff, Richard X....\\

big fan of French singer Mylene Farmer and her teen creation Alizee and of course all their stuff is co written and produced by the spooky Laurent Bouttonant who considers himself first and foremost a film director lol. I've said before how much I love Anders Hansson's cheesy disco with strings throwbacks with his Swedish acts Agnes Carlsson, Alcazar, Bodies Without Organs, etc... Going further back like or hate them it's hard to deny how brilliant Benny/Bjorn were from ABBA as producers, not just songwriters.

I can provide examples of fave tracks by any of these if needed

Hrmm

[alphanguy74]

Well, when it comes to Phil Spector productions, I like a quite a few of them... but I also find his productions to sound muddy and formulaic. And of course, he's completely off his rocker:

[alphanguy74]

Oh, Eric... I think "Thief Of Hearts" is one of the best Moroder productions from the 80's. I think it should have been a much bigger hit than it was. I FLOVED the video... one of the sexiest videos ever made, IMO... him standing in front of that mirror, combing his hair with his pants unbuttoned... JUST AWESOME!

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[EricMontreal22]

Thief of Hearts has a great 12" mix. The rest of the score was by Moroder's protoge Faltermeyer and has one of my fave dance songs from the 80s--Love in the Shadows http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEdry80Ovgs which is sung by EG Daily maybe more famous as the voice of Babe the Pig and the Rugrats LOL

Great soundtrack, awful movie but you're right, Steven Bauer was hot

Was Thief of Hearts a hit? I was 3 when the movie came out, but had never heard of it till I started collecting everything Moroder had done and became obsessed with the 12" club mix of Love in the Shadows. I know it's how Moroder and Jerry Bruckheimer became friendly and what led to Moroder and Faltermeyer doing the Top Gun soundtrack. Funny that Bauer staredin it since he had just been in Moroder's Scar Face

[EricMontreal22]

I have to agree--I love lots of the songs he was involved with but find his wall of sound production muddy. "Shadow" Morton who produced and co wrote for The Shangri-Las took the sound and did it much better IMHO.

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[Sylph]

My problem with Moroder are - synths.