Producing pop music - essentials?

[TLMUSIC]

Hi. Im looking for info and oppinions on what gear is essential for the production of pop music - meaning anything from Britney - Pink - Christina Milian etc etc - i know these people are working with massive Producers like Bloodshy et al - but what gear do you feel is essential for this genre?

Particularly looking at:

Sample Libraries
Virtual Instruments
Synths
Any Hardware
Any plug-ins
Just anything lol

Thanks.

[zkaudio]

lots of bottled evian, more than 4 phone lines, LOTS of sitting room for all the idiots they bring with them, lots of tabloid magazines, and ooh


dont forget the extra computer they can use to browse myspace while you write their album for them.

[TLMUSIC]

Originally Posted by zkaudio

lots of bottled evian, more than 4 phone lines, LOTS of sitting room for all the idiots they bring with them, lots of tabloid magazines, and ooh


dont forget the extra computer they can use to browse myspace while you write their album for them.

Atleast if i dont get any other posts - you've made me laugh

[MichaelT]

In terms of virtual instruments, you'd do well to have any and all of the Spectrasonics ones...Stylus RMX, Atmosphere, and Trilogy.

I'm sure a lot of people would also agree that having a good Eventide effects box is a great addition.

I could recommend lots of stuff, but I'm trying to stay minimal and let other people add their suggestions.

-Mike

[gitarrero]

Originally Posted by TLMUSIC

Particularly looking at:

Sample Libraries
Virtual Instruments
Synths
Any Hardware
Any plug-ins
Just anything lol

Thanks.

it's the knowledge that makes a great record.

according to samples, synths etc: simply think about what you want to achive (what kind of sounds, there are soooo many and pop is a huge field), then go and search synths that offer these sounds (are ask for them).

There is NO "magic" equipment that make great (pop-) records. But there is knowledge that can make great records out of a 10k $ - Homestudio.

[andychamp]

Pop places a lot of weight on the lead vocals (because every listener/buyer is also a singer, but not necessarily a drummer/guitarist/bassist/keyboarder) so you'll need at least 1 good mic (large diaphragm condenser) and 1 good and versatile preamp/channel strip.

Some pitch correction soft- or hardware (antares or melodyne) also seems to be standard nowadays.

The hardware can be very expensive, so don't hesitate to try before you buy.
The big rental co.'s have every interest in helping you make an informed choice, since you're about to hand them over several grand of your hard-earned cash, once you do buy.

Check this forum, and you'll see some brand names mentioned more than others.
There are indeed some industry standards, but they do come at a price.

Can't tell you too much about the software side of things, sorry.

Hope that helps

[indie]

Originally Posted by zkaudio

lots of bottled evian, more than 4 phone lines, LOTS of sitting room for all the idiots they bring with them, lots of tabloid magazines, and ooh


dont forget the extra computer they can use to browse myspace while you write their album for them.

HAHAHAHA..oh man..that's good!!

[TLMUSIC]

Originally Posted by gitarrero

it's the knowledge that makes a great record.

Definitely - im just enquiring about the tools to get it done

[Ruudman]

Originally Posted by zkaudio

lots of bottled evian, more than 4 phone lines, LOTS of sitting room for all the idiots they bring with them, lots of tabloid magazines, and ooh


dont forget the extra computer they can use to browse myspace while you write their album for them.

So true; add a couple of Funk Logic racks to impress even more!

ruudman

[H-Rezz]

80% of the equiment used to make good Pop is also used to make good RnB , Good Dance and Electronica etc, there is no magic equipment and the first thing you will discover if you look at any of those producers rigs is that each are different !

1)You will need a good general midi module for your bread and butter stuff , this can range from $400 Sampletank softsampler , to a $1000 Collosus east west library , to a second hand JV 2080 with some good cards in it...

2) You will need a Softsampler or hardware sampler , software seems to be the order of your day , sampletank can take care of this as well , your other good choices are Machfive Motu , Kontakt or even EXS24 that comes with Logic Pro 7, a lot of pop producers seem to use Logic, from Max Martin to Blood Shy to most of the Swedish producers i know and U.S. ones like Steve Kipner .Although most programs are good .

3) You will need a few specialized Synths to do the left of centre stuff , software or hardware , there is a great choice .

4) A good sound library of drums , a great all in one solution for synthetic drums is Stylus Rmx , for a cost effective solution for Live drums i would get the soon to be released EZdrummer for a start .

5) A decent mic like a AT 4060 , a decent channel like a Pure Path , Mellenia etc , a decent Firewire interface Metric Halo , Rme ....

6)A computer PC/Mac and a program to run it all .....

7)A decent pair of speakers , their is a big choice here.

7)And finally something you cann't buy, a great track that millions of people will like

Hope this helps

[proxy]

Well, since this isn't the low-end forum, I'd say...

A great vocal chain, including a great mic, , a great pre like a 1073, and a great compressor.

Computerwise, I'd want something that doesn't make me stop every 10 seconds because I've run out of power.

Plugins, some bread and butter EQ/Comps like Sony, maybe a convolution verb like Altiverb.

Virtual Instruments... Hmmmm, I personally get a lot of milage out of Reason, but mostly because I'll load up a lot of my own sounds and customize the parameters which is very easy. This is a bigger topic than my knowledge.

Maybe post your budget. Then people can tailor their opinions better for you. From the above if you had to have one thing be really top end, I'd say, make sure the vocal chain is above the board, because that is the centerpiece.

Hope that's helpful,

- Justin

[TLMUSIC]

Cool - Thanks for all the help so far everyone ...

Im currently running:

Dual 2Ghz G5 - Logic Pro 7
RME FIreface 800
API 512C
Distressor
BFD

I'm thinking about getting a Nord Rack 2X - as much as i would like a voyager - havn't got the $ yet lol. SE1-X looks cool too - but they're no different to a rackmount voyager over here in the UK.

Im tring to find some decent sounding electrnic drum samples too. Ultrabeat in Logic is nice - but nothing amazing IMHO.

[Kenny Gioia]

When it comes to Pop music, there are no rules.

It comes down to one thing. Creativity.

Somewhere, some place, some kid is downloading Fruity Loops and writing a hip pop song with it.

That's all you need. Really.

Producing a rock band requires alot of similar gear. Pop music requires your brain. Not gear. Gear just gets in the way.

(I actually re-produced a song that was all don in Fruity Loops and it was awesome. Gear is not always your friend)

Also check out Reason. It's cheap and it's all you'll need.

[TanTan]

there is no right tools for pop music because there are many different pop music productions , if you are looking for the new school midi programing kinda dance\house pop you gotta look for the new (or new retro) sound all the time , in that case you should consider all other people experience in pop sound design as not valid anymore because it has been done already , but if i'm thinking about the gear that producers got back to over the years is not any drums loops sample bank ,
i think the electro pop production hall of fame is :

Roland TB 303
Roland TR 909
Roland TR 808
Moog (minimoog or rouge)
Fender Rodes

the combinations of these synths created many of the electro\dance pop genres
and they (or their samples) can always be manipulated for creating more , which sampler it is you are using is not very important because when working DAW you have so many creative ways to manipulate sound that a sampler should only be a flexible sample player , it wasn't so in the past when you couldn't automate EQ's and the hardware sampler converters were an issue , i think the daddy of them was the Ensoniq ASR-10 for being the first sampler (that i'm familiar with) that had some of the features of a modern sampler and i know of some producer who are retro using it today for the lo-fi punchy digital normalize feature , afterwards the Akai 1000 LPF , who's got that low passing drums loops and slowly open em' up again popular (Madona - hung up filter for example) , afterwards the EMU 6400 for it's converters sound (awful in today's terms) and beat mangler option it had, that was the last sampler i had , sold it five years ago and never looked back , the software samplers are just doing the job now .
as for recording gear i think the approach is like in any other genre of music , means what's working for the specific vocalist and for the specific arrangement .
Lexi 480L will always give pop mixing that "flying high in a larger then life space" sound , and unfortunately (or not) the L2 \ L3 pluggin is a part of today's electro pop music sound

[Sqye]

Originally Posted by zkaudio

lots of bottled evian, more than 4 phone lines, LOTS of sitting room for all the idiots they bring with them, lots of tabloid magazines, and ooh

dont forget the extra computer they can use to browse myspace while you write their album for them.

In my last project, it was Evian AND Perrier - and, unfortunately, the latter statement is sad, but true.

People can be SOOOOOOO lazy, it's UNBELIEVEABLE

Still recovering from that experience.

My advice, FWIW - if you're going to do POP music, GET A BUSINESS PLAN TOGETHER FIRST, GET SOME PARTNERS, AND INVESTMENT. THEN AUDITION PEOPLE, SO YOU GET WHAT YOU ACTUALLY NEED TO MOVE THE PROJECT FORWARD.

SIMULTANEOUSLY, IT MIGHT HELP FOR YOU TO HAVE TO HAVE SOME OTHER BUSINESS RUNNING, SO YOU'RE NOT PUTTING ALL YOUR EGGS IN ONE BASKET. THIS CAN ALSO HELP TO GET YOUR POP MUSIC VENTURE OFF THE GROUND - FUSION MARKETING, ETC.

JMO, but since you're doing pop, you're competing with A LOT OF MONEY, and many VERY UNSCRUPULOUS and HUNGRY COMPETITORS (who very well could be HALF your age - that means, if you're 16, you're competing with 8 year olds who have almost a decade jump on you. If you're 8, you better watch out for them 4 year olds : ) Many of the 2, 4, 8, and 16 year olds have parents/ families who are funding and managing their careers in a MAJOR way - starting with baby modeling, etc.

ABOVE ALL, YOU NEED A BUSINESS PLAN, WITH PROJECTIONS, A SCHEDULE/ TIMELINE, BUDGET AND PERSONNEL, especially a seriously creative group of business team members who all share the same vision for success and career direction, have integrity and an UNDYING work ethic (all I can say is good fr&gg*n luck, considering the fact that pop music doesn't generally attract these kinds of people, and the unfortunate reality is that you, and maybe a few other loyal people around you, will end up doing the bulk of the work, and carrying the weight of the project on your shoulders [while the "artist" surfs myspace and whines about her boyfriend not paying enough attention to her, or whatever] - do I sound BITTER, yet???)