CCR128

Download/Stream/Support: yalc123.bandcamp.com/album/ynm-2-the-re-up-2

All digital sales & $2 from each tape sales of this project on Bandcamp will be donated to Feed the People Dallas a "Black/Latinx, female-led, collective organizing mutual-aid to local communities throughout the DFW metroplex."
feedthepeopledallas.com


I’ve always approached songwriting and production in a pretty linear way; each track would start as a kernel of an idea like a rhythm, chord progression or lyric, and then would be developed into a finished piece. Of course, some songs would change pretty drastically before being finished but once I was done, that was it- whatever choices I made were set in stone and then I would move on to the next track. It’s hard to say exactly why I would write like this; maybe I was just impatient and unwilling to take the time to really experiment and try out different ideas once a rough sketch had been conceived.

This method, tried and true as it may be, is contrasted by the work of a number of artists that I would consider my influences. From Prince to Arthur Russell and even Sophie, there is a history of musicians taking previously recorded and released music and re-imagining, re-interpretting or remixing those records into updated or completely different tracks.

I was deeply inspired by Sophie’s last release, a remix album of her previous record, Oil of Every Pearl's Un-Insides. So much so that I would consider it to be one of the primary reasons why I decided to make YNM 2 in the first place. I think it goes without saying that the original album was a landmark work in electronic music on it’s own but Sophie’s subsequent remixes and reinterpretations took the project to the next level for me. Motives that were established and used heavily in the original album took on a whole new life, mangled and twisted as they were, while the new material featured on that album offered a fresh perspective through which Sophie’s original ideas could flourish.

As for Prince and Arthur Russell, I love listening to all of the different versions they would record of the same track, many of which weren’t even available publicly until they were released posthumously on various archival compilations, and seeing how songs like “Strange Relationship” or “Lucky Cloud” were developed or completely reimagined.

I think that these compositional strategies, even though they’re not particularly novel (obviously, there is a legacy of remix culture within electronic music and I’m sure one would be hard-pressed to find a pop music auteur that has never re-worked a song that they’ve already finished), could potentially allow the composer to end up with a completely new and unique piece of music that they otherwise might not have even come close to conceiving. Of course, sometimes there’s no need to fix something that’s not broken but I found that by going back and seeing how I could reimagine the tracks from Yalc Nitsua Mailliw that I was able, with the help of some collaborators, to make a really cool set of tracks for YNM 2.

Some songs on YNM 2, like “Saturday With Eun (feat. Eunyaaa)” or “Special (Precious Mix)” serve as pretty faithful reinterpretations of their original counterparts, with most lyrical, melodic and harmonic structures still intact, while tracks like “Been Done Gone (YNM 2 Version)” and “Someday (China Club Remix) (feat. The Growth Eternal)” take their respective lyrics into a completely different direction from the source material. The difference between the “Someday” remix and the original version is Iike night and day- I’m forever grateful to Kam and Byron for blessing me with such a cool rendition of my track.

“Free Throw Freestyle” was actually an idea I had for Yalc Nitsua Mailliw that I never got around to where the synth melody in the chorus of “Free Throw” was reused as the foundation for a loop that I could rap over. Lyrically, the freestyle has a different thematic angle from the original track- they’re both about basketball on the surface but the first version also works as an allegory for community support initiatives like mutual aid while “Free Throw Freestyle” is just me trying to make a commercially viable hook and verse just to see if I could!

I feel like the idea of trying to make music that’s fun, simple and catchy while still using the compositional tricks I’ve used in the past like metric modulation and non-diatonicism is something that came up a lot while making this record. On “They’re Not Thinking About That Tho” and “Circle (Cross That Line)” I thought a lot about the melody and lyrics, trying to come up with vocal parts that would be easy to pick up and repeat while still staying true to the themes expressed in their original versions. The instrumentals for both of these tracks draw heavily from pop and dance music- two styles that I’ve experimented with in the past but was never able to really emulate until I focused more on sound design, arrangement and mixing instead of trying to make something that is compositionally complex.

“Up 2 U”, a reinterpretation of “2 Be Fine” from Yalc Nitsua Mailliw that I produced with Spencer Kenny, and “Copy + Paste (Witch Shawty Remix)” are actually the first two times that I’ve ever written and sang to someone else’s beat for my own music! I love both of these tracks because I really feel like Spencer, Rosa and Luke came up with some amazing instrumentals that I never would have been able to make on my own, allowing me to experiment with different singing styles that I hadn’t really had a chance to explore before. I used a lot of the same lyrics from their original versions but felt like I was able to be really expressive with my voice, whether it be hitting RnB style runs or an aggressive whisper-yell.

Overall, I had a lot of fun working on this record and am glad that I gave this new compositional style a try. Big big big thank you to Eun, Kam, Byron, Rosa, Luke, Spencer, Michael and Manny for helping me with this project and to you for taking the time to read this and listen to YNM 2!

Best,
Yalc