The landscape of recorded music continues to change year after year. Some of those changes come by way of technology, and some come because of the evolution of artists. The personnel needed to create music however has remained somewhat the same. There is still a need for an engineer and some technical staff. More importantly, there is a need for music production. The post for this week gives me an opportunity to write about the necessity of the music producer. This week Weekly Music Commentary will feature one of the great young producers of our day, London On Da Track. We will discuss what the music producer does, and what has happened to his role over the years.
London Tyler Holmes was born in Atlanta, GA March 27, 1991, and is known professionally as London on da Track. London began rapping at the age of sixteen with the group Dem Guyz. As a way to save money, London drew upon his experience playing piano arrangements in church and began making beats for rappers. With the help of online software he was able to refine his craft. He gained local acclaim when he began producing beats for the Rich Kidz. Early on in his career, London would give away his beats for free as a means to build connections and garner more publicity. The first song he produced that received radio play was “Pieon” by Rich Kidz. The success of “Pieon” motivated London to continue producing. In 2011, he recorded his first of many collaborations with Young Thug, “Curtains.” London continued to give his beats away for free before signing his first label deal with Cash Money Records.
In August 2014, American rapper and Cash Money Records chief executive officer (CEO) Bryan “Birdman” Williams, called London “the best producer in the business. London’s frequent collaborator, Atlanta-based rapper Young Thug has stated London is his favorite producer to work with and will go down as “the greatest producer ever”. Complex included him on their 2013 list of “25 New Producers To Watch For”.
Well, since those early accolades London has certainly delivered and is very responsible for much of the hit music from today’s young artists. As I stated earlier in this post, it is important to understand the role of the producer, historically and today. Now we can define the roles and then explain what has changed today.
A record producer or music producer is a recording project’s creative and technical leader, commanding studio time and coaching artists, and in popular genres typically creates the song’s very sound and structure. The record producer, or simply the producer, is likened to a film director. The executive producer, on the other hand, enables the recording project through entrepreneurship, and an audio engineer operates the technology.
Varying by project, the producer may also choose all of the artists, or openly perform vocals with them. If employing only synthesized or sampled instrumentation, the producer may be the sole artist. Conversely, some artists do their own production. And some producers are their own engineers, operating the technology across the project: preproduction, recording, mixing, and mastering. Record producers’ precursors were “A&R men,” who likewise could blend entrepreneurial, creative, and technical roles, but often exercised scant creative influence, as record production still focused, into the 1950s, on simply improving the record’s sonic match to the artists’ own live performance.
It would be a little while before I started to recognize record producers and their laundry list of duties. There were only a handful of well-known producers in years past. George Martin and Phil Spector were able to operate without hindrance. Years later a very familiar name made his way into the discussion by way of superstar Michael Jackson. Yes, Quincy Jones provided me with a blueprint of the responsibilities of a record producer. As a music major who desired to get involved in recorded music, Jones showed me the importance of a musician sitting in the producer chair.
From that point forward, the music producer began to be widely known among non-musicians. The producer became almost as much of a star as the performer. Of course, as mentioned earlier, the performer more frequently started to act as their own producer.
In the 1990s, digital production reached affordable home computers via production software. By now, recording and mixing are often centralized in DAWs, digital audio workstations—for example, Pro Tools, Logic Pro, Ableton, Cubase, Reason, and FL Studio—for which plugins, by third parties, effect virtual studio technology. DAWs fairly standard in the industry are Logic Pro and Pro Tools. Physical devices involved include the main mixer, MIDI controllers to communicate among equipment, the recording device itself, and perhaps effects gear that is outboard.
I had the opportunity to work with Pro Tools, Reason and FL Studio extensively for pre-production work. They all were effective for one reason or another, but it made recording easier, and cost-effective. It also started to put music production in the hands of many people. Today, it brings music production to “beat making”. Nevertheless, creativity is still a huge part of creating music.
For London On Da Track, his discography of records produced from 2015 until today is truly pages long. The top names in rap, R & B and Pop music all line up to work with London. The thing that makes him an important part of the recording process is that he understands what it takes to deliver hit music. In a nutshell that’s what has been the main ingredient for hit music throughout the years.
What’s in store for London On Da Track in the future? Well, it’s easy to predict more music because there has been no evidence of him slowing down. If he is still working with a great ear for music, it means we all will have hit music for years to come.