This week's interview is bringing some serious heat! Was that a little corny? Maybe… But we went to the Diamond District to go visit our friend Rsonist! He had a lot of great things to say, so I’ll leave the talking and mixing sick beats to him.
Rsonist talked about the importance of delivering feeling in music, hitting that creative wall, how far being selfish will get you, what AI should and shouldn’t be, and why rushing the process won’t help you.
It’s All the Feelings!
“I strictly make music off of emotions! When we buy music now, what do you get? You don’t get a CD, you don't get a case anymore. You don’t get the inserts. You can buy vinyl, but nine out of ten people don’t buy vinyl. They’re buying digital downloads. So all they’re downloading is this file that you can't see, touch or taste. So what does that let you know. It’s a feel. That’s it. So if you don’t treat it as a feeling you’re treating something that’s not tangible like something tangible. You have to treat it like a feeling because that’s all it is.”
“When I send you a file to your email all you can do is download and listen. If it doesn’t give you a feeling all I did was send you white noise… I’m strictly emotion based when it comes to music. Because I think that’s what music is. So if you make music with this feeling but you're going through a different feeling, it won't coincide with each other. It’s easier to tap into an emotion when I am going through it.”
So how does that work when you’re collaborating with other artists? “If an artist needs this type of record, but I’m in this type of mood, they’ll never get it until I shift back into that type of mood.”
“If I don't make any music. Whatever I would have made today is gone forever. Idea wise, tomorrow will come with a whole new set of ideas. So I’m a strong believer in ‘you work in the moment.’ It’s almost like divine intervention.”
We All Hit the Wall
“When you start searching for ideas, that's when you know you’re in no man’s land. I won’t try to force ideas because that kills creativity. When you start, I know this sounds backwards again, but the more you think the more you ruin creativity.”
Rsonist says, “Creativity is like a place with no walls. The minute you start to put up walls, that’s thinking... The more you are thinking about something the more you are ruining the product... You’re mixing ingredients that’s actually twisting up the recipe. So I learned to step away. Some of my best music has been made in 15 minutes.”
“Sometimes you've hit your limit for the day creatively with a record. I’ve seen people in the studio working on the same beat for eight, nine, hours. I’m like, what are you doing? You’re making it worse by the hour.”
You Can’t Mix a Selfish Attitude into Success
“You can’t be a creator and be selfish to the point that the music is all about you. Yes I make music based on what I like. I’m not just out here making anything that I want to make at any given time. I kind of cater towards my fans because I know that they’ve grown accustomed to a certain sound and a certain feel.”
“That's lost on a lot of producers nowadays. I think a lot of producers are selfish in the sense of ‘I just want to make the best beat possible.’ It’s not about making the best experience possible for the fans that are going to listen to the song. Like if you're making an instrumental album fine. But if you’re making a project, there has to be a give and take.”
“Relationships are the real currency in this industry. They try to tie success to your accomplishments or your money. That's the biggest misconception in the music industry. If you have great relationships you can never be at a disadvantage. You can win at a high level with bad relationships but the minute you start to dip, you’ll always dip because you don’t have relationships to build you back up.”
“I wish somebody would have told me like when I first came in, just make sure your relationships are 100 percent solid. I have managed to keep relationships, but I wish I knew the importance of it because I would have treated it differently. Like there’s people that I came in contact with that were good people and we just kind of drifted apart and I let it happen. To me that was the currency I let slip away because you don’t know where someone’s going to be in the next 4 to 5 years.”
"Real true success is being able to pick up the phone and solve what you consider a problem in one phone call.”
Art-ificial Intelligence
Dan the cameraman asked Rsonist about the tech advancements in the past 3 years. Rsonist was quick to jump into talking about AI. “Stems is a form of AI! Because Stems are just mimicking what they think should be there in the open spaces when they are giving you just the horns or just the bass. Especially if you’re up to date with technology when it comes to making music, AI has to play a role in this somehow, whether you love it or hate it. As long as you understand that it’s not a crutch. It’s a tool. That’s the difference. AI is the elephant in the room.”
“You can act like it doesn’t exist or you can learn it. It’s one of the two. I think with technology now and knowing what I know, it makes it so much easier. It’s almost a cheat code. You press one button now and the machine will strip the record apart into stems. You know how many samples I wanted to do that to in the early 2000’s that I couldn’t do that to? Now it’s just a press of a button.”
“When I first started, there was a certain amount of sampling time. So you have to get creative on how to sample, maybe speed the record up as fast as you could and when you get it in the machine slow it back down. You know I don't look at it like the tools that I have are giving me superpower, it's just speeding up the process of what would have taken two hours will take an hour now.”
“Now you got them in the Pro Tools, we didn’t have the same plugins it just took forever. Now it’s a press of a button, explode sounds. Separate everything you drag and drop, airdrop it into whatever you want. You have all your sounds laid out and now you mix it and you’re done.”
Don’t Rush the Process
“I know how to do all the tricks of the trade that now you can press one button for. What I would tell a new producer is, even though you’re improving, you’ll know when you are there. When you’re constantly getting better every day, you’re not ready yet, because when I fully understand it, I’ll learn new things probably every 30 days.”
“It makes it hard that we have social media, because somebody will do something and they’ll post it because they just want approval. Meanwhile, they don’t understand that they’re doing themselves a disjustice by playing it for people that can’t necessarily help them.”
“You’re the only person that can help yourself when it comes to getting better, because you have to want to get better. So I would just say, man dont rush the process. I said all that to say don’t rush the process. Take your time and just get better at your speed.”
Rsonist and AKAI - Here at AMS
We had a blast talking to Rsonist — and we learned a lot along the way. A huge thanks to Rsonist for taking time out of his busy schedule to chat, and another thanks to Akai for setting it up.
If you want more Rsonist — or maybe some sick Akai controllers — shop Akai products here at AMS and find more videos of Rsonist on the AMS Youtube channel! Perhaps your producing journey awaits.
