This was one of the most challenging mixes I have had. And, one that has me questioning how I could ever do something like this live.
Mix spin instructor knows I am learning to DJ (and shamelessly stealing her playlist). So, one day during class, she challenged me to mix Jax Jones’ Breathe. It took a while, but here is what I put together; a combination of 4 Jax Jones tracks. The track are Say a Prayer. Breathe (Boston Bun Remix), Breathe, and Bum Bum Tam Tam.
To mix this, I made my first use of decks 3 and 4. When I start up Breathe, I am working with 3 tracks simultaneously. In the span of 3:44, I also use EQs repeated, the crossfader, volume faders, use the flagger effect, sound colors to play with pitch, and a loop.
There were 5 phases of of development of the track. The first was track selection. Listening to Breathe, I felt it was a good track, but could use a little more energy. After going through a couple of Jax Jones tracks, I felt I could do something cool with just that artists’ work.
The second was breaking down the song structure of Breathe. Since this track was intended to be the star of the mix, I really to perfect how I used the elements of the song. This is the first time I’ve ever actually sat down and broken down the intro, verses, chorus, and bridge of a track. I helped me understand how the different phrases could be leveraged to mix in and out elements of the other tracks.
The third phase was creating the mix in. I got hooked on the section of Say a Prayer that I used. I felt it would be a good intro and add the energy that I was looking for. I then used the remix of Breathe to sustain the energy before moving into the main track.
Phase 4 was the outro. I was pretty sure that I wanted to use
Bum Bum Tam Tam as the outro, but struggled to figure out how. The song as a section where the lyrics are just “Bum bum tam tam” which echos Breathes, “Dum dum da da” sections. I never found a good way to get the two to work togehter. But, the base line of Bum Bum Tam Tam worked well to keep the mix interesting once I had fully transitioned into Breathe.
Phase 5 was mastering. Have spent enough time on this track, I wanted to make it pop. As usual, after completing the mix, I listened to it in its entirety. Along the way, I found little things in the intro, like when to cut the low form the remix. But I spent a lot of time ironing out the outro. First, had Bum Bum Tam Tam‘s baseline going just during the bridge to exit the track. But that felt rushed. Then I put the baseline on during the 2nd verse of Breathe. But that felt like it got old. Then there was the issue with the horn of the Bum Bum Tam Tam clashing with the vocals of Breathe. Ulitimately what I ended up with is a pitched down baseline of Bum Bum Tam Tam for 2nd verse of Breathe, removing it for the 2nd chorus, then bringing it back with lows and half of the mids (so the baseline is more lively and horn quieter). I think it worked out pretty good.
Enjoy!
