Studio Case Studies 1 - The Return of the Teardown...

Ladies and gentlemen, it has a been a hot minute since I've done one of these but without further ado, I present to you yet another track teardown for the viewing pleasure/disgust off my audio friends/nerds (:P) out there! Today's analysis will be a remix of one of Illenium's previous songs known as 'Fortress' by the main man Mr FijiWiji, lets get to it!

Basic Track Information

Name: Illenium feat. Joni Fatora - Fortress (Mr FijiWiji Remix)

Label/s: Kasaya & Seeking Blue

Format: File, mp3, wav, 320kbps

Country: USA

Release Date: 16th December, 2016

Genre: Electronic - Chill/Trap BPM: 142 Duration: 3:56min

Key: Dm

Time Signature: 4/4

Listen to the full track here!

Illenium feat. Joni Fatora - Fortress (Mr FijiWiji Remix), posted by UKF Dubstep on December 15th 2016

Background information

'Fortress' is an electronic future bass song written by Nicholas Miller aka Illenium which was then remixed by Mr FijiWiji to be a part of his Remixes curation duplicate of his previous album 'Ashes' in 2016. Compared to the original song however, this track was nowhere near as successful in terms of play counts on well known music platforms such as SoundCloud and Spotify. This was mainly due to the significant difference in sound between the remix and original song. Mr FijiWiji has a rather strange and dark sound to his music but at the same time, it is rather chilled and relaxing, making it very unique and likeable to specific listeners. If it was to be pinned down by genre it would seem to be a deep dub-like sound or post/alt dubstep track.

Song Structure

Song Structure laid out and marked in Ableton Live 10 Suite

Unlike the original song, Mr FijiWiji only uses the first verse of the stems given to him whilst the rest of the track mainly consists of the prechorus and chorus repeated after being spaced by multiple interludes (considering the word 'drop' is doesn't exactly suite this track). This allows for the dark and ominous post dubstep feel to remain consistent throughout the track. However, as you can clearly see by the size variation of the waveform, there are points in the track where it gets slightly more intense as the bass and low end elements (i.e kick etc) come in and out.

Critical Analysis

Something that really stands out in this track are the interlude and breakdown sections as a lot of vocal manipulation occurs in this time. This combined with the dark synths and drums Mr FijiWiji has incorporated really gives off a unique sound. But lets dive a little deeper...

Vocal Manipulation

Most of this is rather simple chopping and tuning adjustments however, if you pay close attention the vocals in this track they are also slightly saturated (distortion) and wet with chorus effects respectively. This combined with a very heavy filter and reverb to give big tales to vocal phrases creates a very moody and emotional sound which he has pulled off perfectly in this instance.

Synthesis

Being a producer who focuses mainly on creating dark low end based synths myself, the synthesis in this track is rather natural to me. Although it may seem complicated to some or regular listeners, the synthesis in this track is mostly just multiple detuned variants of saw type waves combined with a LOT of sidechain compression to give it a huge dip when the kick comes in. In terms of the actual processing on the synth itself, it mainly consists of filters and large amounts of distortion (different types for different layers). Other effects that make sneaky little impacts on the synths in this track are time based effects such as reverb, delay and chorus to name a few. White noise risers also make appearances in order to aid the transition between different sections. Of course, these are also sidechained to maintain the constant groove and/or slow bounce of the song.

Drums

The drums in this track are also rather simple consisting of the generic electronic structure of the kick, snare, clap, hi hats and other percussion. However, Mr FijiWiji has taken a page out of Illenium's book in this instance and added very subtle foley samples into his track to give it a more human feel.

groove

Similarly to most current lo-fi/trap electronic music, this track has a very human-like groove, sounding like the drums on this track could have potentially been played by Mr FijiWiji himself. However, it is highly possible that this is not the case as if this track was produced in Ableton Live, the groove pool it grants can generate multiple patterns similar to this to make tracks sound less 'computer generated'.

To wrap up

Overall, I personally find this track very intriguing and interesting and I hope that one day I get a chance to make something just like it when I advance a little further in electronic music production. Although this track is quite repetitive and long, it seems to go unnoticed most of the time as the way that Mr FijiWiji has altered and twisted the track keeps the viewer entertained and captured. This track, unlike the original song is more of a style of music one would listen to while studying or relaxing with friends rather than rave to and I believe this was kept in mind when it was in production.

Works Cited:

- UKF Dubstep, 2016, 'Illenium feat. Joni Fatora - Fortress (Mr FijiWiji Remix)', Last Date Viewed: 7th October 2018 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NhRN2i-foro