Top 10 Hip House artists

Hip Hop House is the ideal crossover for the clubs - catchy lyrics and danceable beats mean it'll get people shouting and moving.

From its old school "Hip House" roots to the newer Electro House/Rap crossovers, there are plenty of proponents of the style.

But which artists are doing it?   Here are the top 10 best DJs, MCs, groups and collabs, ranging from the old school to the new, which have released house music with that rap flavour!

10. Kid Cudi

Hip House Hit: Day n' Night

Collaborating with Italian producer duo Crookers, Kid Cudi's "Day n' Night" got to number 2 in the UK, introducing the rapper to the world through a catchy electro house tune.

9. Pitbull

Hip House Hit: I Know You Want Me

"I know you want me... You know I wancha..." A painfully catchy hook adorns one of the biggest hits of 2009.   Pitbull has a tendency for 4-on-the-floor beats and catchy synthlines in his choruses.   Meeting Lil' Jon was certainly a stroke of luck, as his house productions have proved as successful as his Crunk ones!

8. Doug Lazy

Hip House Hit: Let the Rhythm Pump

The late 80s and early 90s were the height of the original Hip House movement, with Doug Lazy being one of the first proponents of the genre.   The track "let the rhythm pump" is unforgivingly catchy and he has that cheeky old school hip hop style to his lyrics.

7. David Guetta

Hip House Hit: Sexy Chick

Collaborating with Akon on the song "Sexy Chick" (or "Sexy Bitch" if your parents allowed you to buy the album) shot David Guetta into the limelight as one of the biggest Electro House artists about.

6. Common

Hip House Hit: Universal Mind Control

Collaborating with Armand Van Helden on the track "Full Moon" and more recently with legendary producer Pharrell on "Universal Mind Control", Common doesn't shy away from poppier tracks!

5. DJ Fast Eddie

Hip House Hit: Yo Yo Get Funky

Quite possibly the first popular Hip House producer, with the song "Hip House" being a potential clue.   Several of his tracks became hits on the hot dance music chart in the late 80s and early 90s.

4. Black Eyed Peas

Hip House Hit: I Gotta feeling

Always a group to push the boundaries of hip hop, the black eyed peas first ventured into more electronic genres with the track Boom Boom Pow, then continued on to the predictably Feel-Good Hip House track "I Gotta Feeling".

3. Technotronic

Hip House Hit: Pump Up the Jam

Sometimes the biggest hits come from unexpected places.   The Belgian producer Jo Bogaert got together with Ya Kid K to create the #2 single "Pump Up the Jam" which gave early Hip House a name in the charts.

2. Dizzee Rascal

Hip House Hit: Dance Wiv Me

What a collaboration!   Two of the biggest artists in the UK scene hailing from their respective backgrounds of electro house and grime rap coming together to make a massive number one hit.   Dance wiv me isn't their only collab either, with the single "holiday" taking the clubs by storm the year after.

And it's not the only hit song Dizzee has had with a house producer - Armand Van Helden collaborated with him on the massive Number 1 hit "Bonkers", cementing Dizzee as one of the biggest rappers to rhyme over dance music!

1. Snap

Hip House Hit: The Power

Sometimes the oldies are still the goodies!   I dare anyone to say they haven't danced to this track.   Crossing over more than just genres, this German/American group featuring rapper "Turbo B" spitting his vocals over producers Michael Munzing and Luca Anzilotti's house beats!

Major Label vs. Indie Label

The music industry has undergone a veritable revolution in the past couple of decades.

No longer is the power to reach a global audience in the hands of a few rich CEOs.   No longer is the technology to record your music to a professional level out of the reach of your common household musician.

Things have become a lot easier in many ways to make your music and get it out there.   This article will compare major labels to indie labels - Professional versus DIY - and see how things match up with the technology available today.


Promotion

Take a moment to think - how many bands or artists have you discovered since the internet was born?   I'll bet it's considerably more than before (if you can remember that far back!) - This just goes to show how technology has brought people closer to what they want to hear.

Whereas before a Major Label would choose which music to saturate the world with, now people can be much more specific with their tastes and still enjoy a variety - all they need is to log on to a forum, sign up to a website like Last.fm or Pandora's Box, browse through YouTube or just jump on MySpace and wait for the artists to promote themselves to them.

With people being able to be more specific about their music tastes, the mainstream is not the only path any more.   Increasingly you hear about independent artists jumping into the charts and selling out massive venues - Electronica/Rock band "Enter Shikari" are a prime example, gigging every other day for 3 years straight built them a massive underground fan base with which they launched their debut album to the number 4 spot in the charts and straight into the mainstream limelight.

So combining live shows with heavy internet promotion can result in a solid fan base.   When you have that, it's then up to you if you want to make the move to a major label or keep going it alone and reaping what you sow.


Recording

There are so many bits of kit on the market now for making music from home that it's difficult to keep track.

And now that major labels no longer hold the key to professional sound quality, there's no reason to join one for that - an artist can invest in their own studio and churn out track after track onto the internet until people start to take notice.

If a home producer can grab themselves a computer-based studio they can be making their tunes sound professional with amazing pieces software such as Reason, Pro Tools, Logic and Sonar, and polishing it with similarly amazing plug-ins.   Professional studios just can't compete with this kind of value for money.

The only thing professional studios have up on home producers is experience - and with a wealth of knowledge available online for free in the form of video and text tutorials, interactive communities and dodgy wikipedia articles, so long as the artist has the motivation to learn, the internet will teach.


Conclusion

So what does a Major Label have up on making your own Indie Label?   A massive budget, connections and experience.   But with technology meaning the budget isn't so much of an issue in many ways, the internet providing the opportunity to contact anyone, and offering the experience of everyone connected to it, how long will it be before there's no need for Major labels at all?

Though Majors still have the power to get a band onto every radio show and every TV channel, they can't instil a sense respect for the artists into the general public that they'll get if people know they've achieved their success themselves.   Everyone loves the underdog and everyone loves to see success sprouting from the most unlikely places.

Plus, there's the immortal advantage that if you set up an indie label yourself, it's considerably more likely to accept you than a major label (unless you're unhealthily masochistic.)

In today's musical climate, if you want to succeed you're going to have to take all aspects of your music into your own hands - promotion, recording and performing.   Then when the major labels come a-biting, you'll have the experience to ask the question - "is it worth it?"

7 Heavenly Synths

To counteract last week's 7 deadly synths, let's take a look at something that will make some heavenly sounds - 7 of the best, most impressive and most expensive hardware synths, workstations and in some cases all-in-one-studios about.

So here we go: 7 heavenly synths!

Openlabs NeKo XXL

The Damage: £4200

Are you one of those millionaires that is sick of putting in the effort of patching things together?   The Neko is for you - a concise workstation combining a monitor, qwerty keyboard, mixer, trigger pads, alpha control module (for quick navigation through your DAW program of choice).

As well as having the Full Ableton Live software as standard, 10 inputs and 10 outputs from the inbuilt sound card, 4 terabytes of space and a coffee maker.   Not really, but I'm sure they'd sell more if they had one - y'know, since this doesn't have enough features already.

Korg Oasys

The Damage: £5000

Yet another massive workstation to join the list, this one has an absolutely spectacular orchestral sample kit amongst the thousands of patches.   Combine that with vector synthesis, which allows for really textured, moving sounds, tons of effects, audio recording and too many features to list here without it seeming like a joke and you'll see why this is synth heaven.

But the thing that makes this synth stand out is the "Karma" engine, allowing real-time composition of songs, altering multiple layers and adding in fills at the push of a button, allowing you to make interesting, varied tracks on the spot.   Seriously Fun.

Yamaha MOTIF XS

The Damage: £2700

One of those all-in-one deals that really pulls it off well - integrates with computer-based hardware (Cubase), a massive selection of sampled sounds including extra dynamic control for certain banks, such as a guitar that allows you to play harmonics and have note slides.

This workstation is great for inspiration, with 6000 arpeggiator patterns and over 1000 preset voices.

Roland Fantom G8

The Damage: £2600

Brilliant for Live use - with a bunch of controls specifically designed for expressive performance, such as allowing the pitch bend knob to bend up only the last note in a chord, awesome effects (the unit can actually be used simultaneously as a synth and a multi-effects unit) and the useful ability to use a USB mouse with the backlit LCD screen.

It is awesome when it comes to drum emulation too - with a snazzy 3D interface allowing you to see what the drum you're emulating looks like, controlling things like shell depth, tuning and muting (Roland make the immense "V-Drums" so they've had a lot of practice with synthesizing and sampling percussion).

Nord Stage EX 88

The Damage: £2200

Top-of-the-line quality piano, electric piano and organ sounds, amp simulation (including rotary for organs) and now some sweet sounding synths mean that the Stage EX is definitely the synth of choice when you want to get expressive, authentic piano sounds... but don't actually want a piano (or want more control from the sound!).

The beauty of this synth is its simplicity - it's very easy to use but controls a hell of a lot of power.

Access Virus TI

The Damage: £2000

Whereas a lot of synths have been designed for emulating other instruments, this is one synth that truly shines with it's harsh, dark and powerful electronic sounds.

The options are amazing, the super saw is absolutely massive; so those trance leads will punch like Chuck Norris.

The warping, mental sounds are all categorised nicely and have some sweet functions I'd never thought of, like interpolation control on wavetables, formant tables and grain tables for some freakin' intense, morphing noises!

Alesis A6 Andromeda

The Damage: £2500

Do you like twizzling, fiddling and in general playing with your patches?   Then the Alesis Andromeda is perfect for you - 72 knobs and 144 buttons make this a veritable canvas for any prospective synth-y artists to paint their latest patch on!

The 7-Stage envelopes mean that this synth can make sounds never before possible on an Analog synth.   Analog has never been so accessible!

In The Ring: Trance vs Electro House

It's an all-out popularity contest!

Two intense, pumping genres with designed for repetition and danceability will fight it out in this blog... who will be the winner?

In the red corner; we have the old school standard Trance, bringing its euphoric melodies and immense synths since the early 1990s.

In the blue corner; we have new kid on the block Electro House, trading in euphoria for sexiness with downright slutty basslines and irresistibly catchy hooks.

Let the battle commence!

Roots

Start at the beginning; Trance music evolved from some seriously experimental, melodic Electronica in the 80s, but only began to be referred to as Trance music in the early 90s, when the genres Techno and House crashed into this experimental style.

The result was the start of Acid Trance - where arpeggiated synths had their filter cut-offs and resonance messed with until the producer had Repetitive Strain Injury from turning the knobs on his or her Roland TB-303 Synth.

This was a different take on electronic music, focusing on putting the listener in a - shock horror - trance, from repetitive beats and riffs that were generally more melodic than other conventional electronic music at the time.

Evolution of Trance

By the mid 90s, Trance had begun to go mainstream. The "Intro-break-build-anthem" formula became the convention and immense, unnecessarily epic lead lines joined pretty, often female vocals in defining the new wave of what became known as "Uplifting Trance".

The charts became pelted with trance music from producers such as Tiesto, Paul Van Dyk and Paul Oakenfold to name a few, cementing the genre in the mainstream for years to come.

As the 90s came to a close, Trance was no less popular but it was more diverse - it had had babies with Drum and Bass, Gabba (forming Hard Trance) and even metal, since the world had recognised the mass appeal of the genre.

Enter Electro House...

As 2000 began, the precursors to Electro House music were perfecting their technique. DJs such as Benny Benassi made the clubs shake with tracks like his anthemic "Satisfaction", the start of the portemento driven synthlines.

Dirty basslines began more and more to be put on top of the four-on-the-floor beats and by 2005, Electro House had thoroughly emerged.

2006 saw the first massive commercial success when Bodyrox released their single "Yeah Yeah" with vocalist "Luciana", featuring the sexy synth line doubling as the bass and lead and funky shuffling beat.

By about 2008, it was recognisable as one of the most popular genres of dance music, joining Trance music on the bandwagon of electronic music genres that had made it into the mainstream. It merged with Indie Rock Music in some cases and has blurred the lines between dance and alternative rock.

What's Next for them?

Trance Music continues to both diversify and stay in the limelight, with the biggest artists of the genre still selling out arenas and DJs like Calvin Harris taking to producing the Trance Sound.

However, the opposite is true too - DJs as big as Tiesto have decided to attempt the Electro House sound, with his album Kaleidoscope bringing the funky basslines and staccato lead synths in to replace the monolithic trance leads at times, even incorporating guitar into some tracks as is the current trend for Electro House.


Similarities and Differences

Their biggest similarity is their aim - they aim to get people moving to intense music. Pumping beats, painfully catchy synthlines and mainstream popularity link the genres.

The differences begin when you ask how they achieve their aim. Where Trance attempts to take people higher, with soaring sawtooth synths, Electro House takes people down into the gutter with unrelentingly sexy bass and a shuffle that cannot be resisted.

So who wins this fight? Is it the pure, epic Trance or the new, sexy Electro House?

To answer that you need to ask yourself - Do you want to make Music that's pure, epic and intense... or dirty, sexy and wild?

7 Deadly Synths

Every producer has their vices.

Whether it's using the same preset too much, using the same amount of swing on every song (I'm looking at at certain Swedish producer here) or playing russian roulette, there is sure to be something that tarnishes their image.

This article will take a look at the former.   7 of the most overused synth effects in the industry and the culprits that use them.

Here we go - The Seven Deadly Synths.

"Lust" - The PWM Synth

Synthful Sinner: Benny Benassi

What better synth for lust than the sexy sound of Electro House's self-proclaimed Daddy?

Benny Benassi has turned the knob for the Pulse Width Modulation in almost every one of his tunes and used side chain compression to make them pump more dynamically than those girls in his videos.

"Gluttony" - Vocoder

Synthful Sinner: Daft Punk

Daft Punk positively gorge themselves on formants, using their signature vocoded vocals on the vast majority of their hits.

Their bellies must be full of vowel-sounding synths and you can almost hear them throwing up in synth effects like the bass in "Technologic".

"Greed" - Portamento Sine Synth

Synthful Sinner: Dr Dre

Who better to represent greed than the Doctor that insists on hanging tight in the top 10 wealthiest rappers of all time after so many years.

His synth sound is that whiney portamento sine synth (or sometimes saw synth) that punctuates all his dopest beats, positively screaming out how rich he is.

"Sloth" - Detuned Saws

Synthful Sinner: Lil Jon

A million and one producers use this sound in genres from Trance to Hip Hop, but Lil Jon manages to take the title of sloth since he's just so lazy.

One synth riff, then the same riff an octave higher - that'll do for a song.   Hell, that'll do for an album... or even a career.   A couple of sawtooth waves slightly tuned apart to thicken it up and voila - instant powerful synth.

"Wrath" - Hardcore Kick Drum

Synthful Sinner: Angerfist

The nightmare of migraine sufferers the world over - the hardcore Gabba bass drum is so painfully distorted that it actually produces a clear note....

Yet producers like Angerfist insist on using it percussively to drive their tracks harder than Lewis Hamilton.

Your ears are sure to suffer the wrath of this harsh patch!

"Envy" - Echoey Pure lead

Synthful Sinner: Tiesto

How can you help but feel envious about his success?   He's been #1 DJ in the world, he's sold out massive venues and he's talented enough to write absolutely gorgeous trance music.   And it wouldn't be possible without that simple, pure sine lead he uses time and again in songs like "Just Be" and "Adagio for Strings".

"Pride" - Dirty Electro Bass

Synthful Sinner: Justice

I'm sure that having a crucifix as your logo makes you have at least a bit of a god complex.   Justice have ridden their overly distorted bass sound and their slap-bass funky electro house to success; perhaps they have good reason to be proud!

Analog vs. Digital

It's a battle of the recording titans!

Two audio recording types with a score to settle - it's vinyl versus CD - computers versus... uh... not computers.   Who will be the winner?

In the red corner we have Digital audio - the relative newcomer to the scene, appearing in the mid 1970s.   Weighing in with its affordability, versatility and plenty of other words that end in the suffix "-ility", it's sure to be a tough contender.

In the blue corner we have Analog audio - the old school veteran of the audio reproduction world, having existed since about 1860 in the form of the snappily-named "Phonautograph".   Weighing in with its vintage style, warm sound and physically heavy devices, it's not going down without a fight.

So with the introductions out of the way...

Let the battle commence!


In the beginning...

It all started with a clever man called Edouard-Leon Scott.   He got tired of listening to music and decided he wanted to see it - his efforts produced the "Phonautograph".   This was technically the first ever audio recording device, as it transcribed sound, but it was quite a while before anyone got to hear it, since the first play back from the transcription as audio was in 2008!

But as you probably know, there were some advances in technology between 1860 and 2008.   1880 brought about the Phonograph, an evolved version of Edouard's device thanks to all-around-genius Thomas Edison, giving birth to the recording industry.

As gramophone discs took hold in the 1920s, a convenient invention called a "microphone" came to light.   People stopped having to record by shoving their faces into horns which cut directly onto the discs (The good old days, eh?) and also around this time, polyvinyl chloride began to take precedence over Shellac in the production of the discs and Vinyl was born!

From then 'til the 1980s, vinyl reigned supreme, undergoing several improvements such as stereo recording and the advent of High-Fidelity (Hi-Fi) sound systems making things sound more like a quality audio reproduction and less like a piece of crap.

But then disaster struck for Analog...


The first Digital Recording

The first ever digitally recorded album was "Bop Till You Drop" by Ry Cooder, a Blues-y Rock album produced in 1978 on a spectacular 2-track digital recorder.

Popular digital recordings took off in the late 80s, when Compact Discs decided to come along and try to take over Vinyl's hold on the record industry.   At first, the quality of CDs was, to put it bluntly, rubbish.

It was thin and badly distorted, since the recordings often came from vinyl, but as the technology improved and the creases were smoothed out, CD eclipsed Vinyl in popularity since it had none of the clicks and pops and you didn't have to tread lightly when you were near a CD player.

However, some people still insisted, and still insist that Vinyl is better...


The attraction of vintage gear

The most commonly used descriptor is "Warmth".   Analog sound has a warm tone not found in Digital recordings, believed to be a result of signal compression which saturates the audio in a manner pleasing to your average audiophile's ear.

There is also the novelty, of course - Analog recording equipment is big, clunky, ungainly and, as a result, horrendously fun.

In fact, some popular artists insisted on sticking to Analog gear - Lenny Kravitz recorded his tracks on vintage equipment until 1998, when he first succumbed to the siren-like lure of Pro Tools.


Affordability

As the 90s rolled on and electronic equipment became more and more affordable, people found themselves able to record in their own homes for the first time without having to have the word "Baron" in front of their names and have the good fortune of a recently deceased wealthy uncle.

This was the final nail in the coffin for Analog - it just couldn't compete with the size difference; a computer versus a room full of expensive, complex equipment - not a difficult decision.   The affordability lead to accessibility; Digital recording opened up doors to millions of potential musicians, allowing them to produce music in their own time without Lenny Kravitz constantly telling them to hurry up (Quite possibly the biggest pitfall of Analog studios).


Oldies are Goodies...

Tape Saturation is one thing that Digital audio has been struggling to emulate for years - most people don't seem to think any plug in can offer quite the same warmth in the compression that a traditional Analog compressor, but modern digital tape saturation plug-ins such as the brilliantly named "FATSO" by Universal Audio have got pretty damn close.


The Winner...

Popularity-wise, Digital has quite considerably killed the Audio Star... But which side are you on?   Do you embrace the technological revolution and live for high-quality, low-priced, easy-to-use gear?   Or can't you live without the authentic warmth of a vinyl record?

Save Money in a Home Studio

Okay, it's been over a year and the effects of the credit crunch are still around us - people are starving in the street, unemployment is rife... but most importantly it's hard to buy what we need for a professional sounding home studio.

But do we need to buy it?   Here are 10 ways to save money in your home studio...

1. Sampled live kits - Sounds like an oxymoron, right?   Well you'd have to be an oxymoron to ignore how good some plug-ins have got at emulating live drums.   Who needs to spend thousands on drum mics when you can get the same thing for a fraction of the price with the convenience of a plug in?

2. Re-use old computers - A lot of DAWs now allow you to link up your old computer to take some of the processing strain off your main studio workstation - saves buying a new computer and gives you an excuse to reminisce about back in the old days when they had floppy disks!

3. Your girlfriend/mom won't be too pleased... - Who needs a pop shield when you can stretch a pair of tights over a coat hanger?   Adds that lovely rustic touch to a studio, don't ya think?

4. Amp Simulation plug ins - Why bother spending thousands on a quality amp when you can spend about a hundred and get some amazing amp simulations at your fingertips with the bonus of being able to change the tone easily after having recorded it?

5. Acoustics ashmoustics - Don't spend all that money on expensive acoustic treatment, close-miking is the way to go, and then add space with a plug-in on your DAW; Plug-ins sure are the order of the day!

6. Keep things tidy - How many leads have you broken in the past year?   More than you can count?   If so then stop buying a million new ones - invest in some studio-grade storage (some coat-hooks) and keep your leads tidy when you're not using them so you don't end up treading all over them!

7. Low budget mixing and mastering - Can't afford flat-response speakers?   Don't worry - just try your mix on everything you have access to!   It'll probably give you a better idea of how the track sounds anyway.

8. Brrrrr... - Is your computer still struggling with all these plug-ins?   A lot of new producers don't know they can freeze their tracks so the plug ins are written onto the audio, saving valuable processor time when your computer is desperately trying to show you your latest masterpiece!

9. Upgrade, don't replace - If you do need a better computer, try buying a better processor and some more RAM and fitting it yourself - there are video tutorials all over the internet teaching you how!

10. (No) Sound, mate! - If you want to acoustically treat your studio, try the old classic - egg cartons and carpet.   I know a friend who just asked at the local expo centre and got a warehouse's worth of carpet for free - being a bit resourceful can save a lot of money!