Everything is a remix, but you gotta start with something

October 22, 2011 3:18 PM

So you want to try and remix someone else's songs, but all you have are a random collection of instrumentals and acapellas to work with. Fret not! First, you can find inspiration from the folks who share their reworkings at Tea's Björk Remixes, as there aren't many Björk acappelas to start with, but they still find a way. Then check out the Acapella Archives blog, for a lot of indie hip-hop acapellas and more vocal tracks. If you've browsed those archives, you might notice a link to Beastie Remixes, a community for remixers of Beastie Boys. They have an acapellas page which has more than just vocal tracks: there are also copies of show vinyl, with the tracks that the Boys have used to back up their live shows.
posted by filthy light thief (13 comments total)

oh golly! Now all we need to complete the Killer Bz triumvirate is some Beck. Cheers!
posted by brappi at 3:47 PM on October 22, 2011

If the Tea's Bjork Remixes site is anything like Arktikos was back in the day, I'm all over it. I miss that place.
posted by koucha at 3:48 PM on October 22, 2011

I came here to say what koucha said. I still have a bunch of old remixes from that site.
posted by chrominance at 4:01 PM on October 22, 2011

Thanks for this. I love these kinds of tracks.
posted by Sangermaine at 4:22 PM on October 22, 2011

Oh my - I suspect this is going to be quite useful to me. Thanks!
posted by blurker at 4:37 PM on October 22, 2011

I just spent the last hour making and listening to tracks from my library with the center-panned vocals removed. Here's how to do that using Audacity—it's pretty easy to do. (It worked well with "Candy-O" and "I've Just Seen a Face" until the harmonies came in.) Now if I could only do the same in reverse, separating the vocals out... I'd have a cottage industry a-brewing!
posted by not_on_display at 4:46 PM on October 22, 2011 [1 favorite]

If the Tea's Bjork Remixes site is anything like Arktikos was back in the day, I'm all over it. I miss that place.

Keith Kenniff, if I'm not mistaken, is the same Keith Kenniff that is Helios (as well as Goldmund, Sono, and half of Mint Julep). On Bjork remixes, see Reimer Eising's excellent 12" (as Kettel) wherein he remixes a Bjork song and 3 other pieces to make what I would normally consider unlistenable pop pablum into interesting songs.
posted by Inspector.Gadget at 5:04 PM on October 22, 2011

Jesus, filthy, give it a rest maybe. I've got other shit to do in my life than try and keep up with your posts.
posted by OmieWise at 5:08 PM on October 22, 2011

not_on_display, the way some folks are doing it is ripping the content from Rock Band and similar games, where you can isolate instruments and vocals from popular songs within the game. Before that, people had fun with surround sound DVDs. I think there were a slew of Michael Jackson remixes (and a few bootleg acapella records pressed) a couple years back because someone found that trick out.

OmieWise, I regret to inform you I have some longer posts brewing up. I'll try and warn you, so I can post them when you have some free time ;)
posted by filthy light thief at 5:15 PM on October 22, 2011

Bah, I have the opposite problem. There are songs I'd love to make mashups of - but I can't find the separate acapella or vocal tracks. boooooo.
posted by divabat at 7:40 PM on October 22, 2011

My problem when I try to do remixes is that I end up just making a new song that ends up having not very much to do with the original :)
posted by empath at 8:46 PM on October 22, 2011

So you want mooore? Hipstrumentals - pop hip hop instrumentals; Official Instrumentals - all kinds of current pop instrumentals; and there's always searching P2P networks for individual tracks. Yes, you're more likely to find hip-hop or electronic/dance tracks than alternative/classic/etc rock songs, but you could get lucky.

empath - that's not always a bad thing. Example A: James Holden's remixes of Britney Spears' "Breath On Me"
posted by filthy light thief at 8:53 PM on October 22, 2011

Example A: James Holden's remixes of Britney Spears' "Breath On Me"

A friend of mine spent like 6 months working on a bootleg remix of For An Angel, then got asked to remix a different track, couldn't think of what to do with it, changed like 3 notes in his other remix and turned it in as this remix. -- which ended up being way more popular than the song he was actually supposed to be remixing (and actually had nothing to do with it).

(And then Christopher Lawrence got all the credit for it from everyone, because he played it at like every gig for a year so everyone thought it was his).
posted by empath at 9:21 PM on October 22, 2011 [1 favorite]