Have you heard of the Moombahton movement ? this is a new electronic music style which has grown like crazy in only a couple of month… mainly composed by core internet addicts, it is now heavily supported by Toodla T on Radio 1 or Diplo to only name a few.
I’ve first heard of Moombahton through GenerationBass and the unescapable Munchi. It is a proper worldwide online community, most of the tunes are free and most of them are illegal remixes. Pure pirate & fun action :)
Here the wikipedia story of Moombahton. To explain quickly how Moombahton sounds like imagine a slow reggaeton tune (around 105/108BPM) with « dutch house » synth, or « fidget » ones. Add some acapellas or famous musical themes to it and you got MOOMBAHTON!! sexy isn’t it ? :)
I personnally like it a lot. I like the spirit of it, and i love adore some of the tunes, it is quite irresistible. But i also think it now needs to have proper original tunes to make it serious, and also a better quality of production. Some of the tracks are too heavily compressed and it sounds like some samples which are used are in MP3…. but i think it is only the proof of the excitment & the rage of this movement :)
Lately, i’ve met a VERY productiv guy, called NEKI STRANAC. He’s from Belgrade and has done some pretty good free remixes & mixtapes, so i wanted to know more….
Hi Neki, i don’t know much about you, can you let me know where you’re from, and how you’ve been into music ?
I`m Milan Djuric from Belgrade, Serbia and I use the name NEKI STRANAC when i DJ and make bootleg edits. I`ve been into music since i was 6 years old, into electronic music since 1998. But i`ve been switching from genre to genre quite often…and one year ago I have discovered moombahton. I really liked its slow rhythm so I`ve tried it in the club last summer for some 45 minutes and it was absolute success.
Nevertheless, I haven`t found enough quality stuff for my whole-night moombahton/core set despite a multitude of tracks, edits and remixes that pop up at the Soundcloud every day, so two months ago I decided to do my own edits and now i have 36 of them (grab all those edits here and there ). I even have one official edit that will be released for Ministry of Sound label as a promo for Malente and Azzido Da Bass `Hunting` EP (the edit of Tom Piper`s remix).
You’re a Moombahton core producer. Can you explain this style to people who might never heard about it ?
Moombahton is (or sounds like) slowed down dutch house with the addition of reggaeton snare, latin percussion loops and maybe some chopped vocals. Moombahcore is the same, with fidget instead of dutch house. It`s so simple, and the simplicity always works perfectly well. Especially in the club :)
How’s the scene like in Belgrade ? is there any other crews or producers you work with ?
Belgrade serves as regional distribution center for western ideas in general, so the music is no exception. Thus, you may hear latest mainstream genres as dubstep, minimal, house (etc) from London, Berlin, New York, Paris, (etc).. but outside mainstream the situation is quite bad – for instance not more than 100 people have a clue what global bass music might be.
Government 4000 and me are trying to establish the global bass scene and soon we`ll launch a series of parties called Sour Mango… so God help us ;)
Besides, I am a member and founder of Shazalakazoo, electronic band doing mostly Balkan bass with the ethnic spices from all over the world (Brazil, Angola, Antilles, Colombia, etc). When i make my own music and official remixes I use the name Shazalakazoo. We already have some moombahton tracks and we have a plan to release a moombahton-oriented EP later this year for Generation Bass label, so stay tuned!
what kind of equipment to you use to produce ?
When i do the bootleg edits, I use a laptop, a soundcard, two monitor speakers and headphones, I need no more than that really. I do it like this: I have created a moombahton preset in Steinberg Nuendo`s software:
-1st channel: I import someone`s track, find the bpm and stretch (MPEX 3, poly complex) it to 108 bpm. It takes approx. 10 minutes.
-2nd channel: MIDI, Native Instruments Battery with the snares and maybe some open hi hats. With punchers and inflators on it. Takes 3 minutes to find the right snare and put it in the right position.
-3rd channel: Latin percussion loop 1. Usually with shakers. Takes 3 minutes to find, import and tune it.
-4th channel: Latin percussion loop 2. Usually with cowbell. Takes 3 minutes as well.
-5th channel: NEKI STRANAC synth voice tag, using the one and only SHIT TALKER. Takes 1 minute to import and tune it.
Then I rearrange it a bit (up to 10 minutes), export, compress a bit and it`s done. Takes approx. 30 minutes for and edit in total. Easy. Try it at home. :)
But when i really make music in Shazalakazoo, I go to the studio which has some nice hardware as well…
what should we expect from you in the future ? :)
The future is unclear. :)
LISTEN TO THE LAST PUREMIX RADIO SHOW WITH GUEST NEKI STRANAC
PUREMIX Flore & Neki Stranac mars 2011 by Flore
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