In The Studio

In the studio with D3Z & RILL0

This week, we catch up with Los Angeles-based producing duo D3Z & RILL0!

Jaz from the RepostExchange Team

How long have you been producing music and how did you learn?

Both Andy (RILL0) and I, Jose (D3Z) have a combined total of seven years working on music production. Andy has been playing the guitar for many years now he's lost count and I've learned multiple instruments throughout my lifetime. We honestly are both self-learners through the use of YouTube videos and having friends who have taken us under their wings and expanded our knowledge in the EDM production world.

What DAW(s) do you use and why?

Ableton Live is our go-to DAW. It's honestly because when I (D3Z) started learning producing I was able to get my hands on a free demo version of Ableton and that was the only mac software that YouTube tutorials online used besides FL which was only windows based at the time. It's so easy to layout track channels and when I tried other DAW's like Logic Pro,it was more complex. So now we're stuck with Ableton for life because it's very easy for us to use and we can make any genre we want on it.

What are your favourite pieces of gear and why?

Favorite piece of gear for us both has to be our studio headphones. Andy loves his Audio-Technica ATH-M50X and I love the Sennheiser HD 650 open-back headphones. The reason we love the headphones is that we're finally travelling a lot for music and since our laptops are our studio it lets us work on music anywhere we go.

What are your favourite software plugins and why?

Oh, this one is tricky... Andy loves Sausage Fattener by Dada Life, just to give that extra crispy final touch on any sound. But if you ask me, I LOVE T-RackS Stealth limiter and it goes on my master channel. It just gives me the final touch I need and is always the final plugin on any track.

How would you summarise your approach/workflow when creating a track?

Well, that's interesting, it depends on the mood we're feeling that day. Sometimes we have inspiration from something that’s happening in our lives or sometimes we get approached to do remixes and we love trying to come up with something new for songs that are already existing. It’s fun trying to approach something that people already are familiar with and then adding a new twist and sound and changing people's thoughts about that original track.

What resources do you use to improve your craft?

Definitely a lot of YouTube videos... like seriously way too many. We try to view a new tutorial video each day to always keep learning new things or new plugins. We also have a lot of friends who teach us and we always talk about the latest plugins that we like or our favorite sample packs.

What is the last YouTube tutorial you watched that you would recommend to other Re-Ex Members?

Honestly, anything by Reid Stefan, shout out to him for all the amazing tutorials he does because a lot of our mixing and vocals techniques come from his channel.

For anyone starting and wanting to learn Ableton, our biggest thanks go to SadowickProduction. We've never met him in person, but we owe everything we know about Ableton to that man, he's a genius and we just have to say that not all heroes wear capes, haha.

What knowledge or advice do you wish you'd learned earlier?

Oh, this is our favorite. The best advice we would have loved to have learned earlier is to have a strategic marketing plan towards what you want your brand to truly be and stand for when it comes to gaining new fans. When we first started we did this for fun like a hobby and we're so happy for the opportunities it has given us. However, we wish we kind of stuck to a plan about learning what our brand was going to be or what our image and sound were supposed to stand for.

We kind of just winged it as we learned and now we're starting to realize how much an effective plan and brand strategy can take you since we're seeing that with our new music project TWSTD ZOO which we've been focusing on lately since we're debuting soon at a festival.

What challenges related to making music do you face and how do you overcome them?

Definitely finishing a track and I think that's the most common problem every producer faces. We always start a track and finish the whole track, but then trying to add the final details it can be sometimes challenging because our minds race so much that we always want to work on something new and don't want to go back into finishing the old track. Now we've started making our own imaginary deadlines to hold ourselves accountable to each track, but it still occurs at times trying to catch up on multiple tracks we finish.

Can you share any killer tips or techniques?

Simple Delay on Ableton is SO FUN. That is one of our favorite tricks to use when we try to fill in the musical spectrum. It's very easy to grab a one shot sound and come up with creative ways to make the delays work in your favor. You can use it for guitar notes or even vocal shouts for vocalists. It can be a fun tool to include an auto-pan on the channel so the listener can notice small subtle tricks in your track to keep it interesting.

Do you use any online tools to assist with the production process?

We tried looking into online courses and stuff but really, we just use YouTube to learn new techniques. Most of our latest learning has been through our music collective which we formed with a core group of friends and we all share techniques and new plugins.

Do you try and get feedback or suggestions to improve your music? If so, how?

All the time! We have a core group of friends we trust who are also producers that we share our music with and they give us honest feedback. We also send it to labels and really take in their feedback so we can better ourselves. We got really lucky because TommyBoy Records have been looking out for us and have given us opportunities to produce music for many singers and they have really taken a liking to us so it’s nice to have label feedback all the time.

We think it's important to always have a second opinion because it really gives you another perspective and another ear because sometimes your ears get accustomed to the sound and you don't realize if you need to work on the mix or if something is not sounding right.

Which track are you most proud of and why?

Honestly, as D3Z & RILL0 we're most proud of our track 'Are You Ready' and the reason is that we actually didn't think it would be so popular, but we have a lot of people who listen to that track and really like how we sound-designed it.

We even made a YouTube tutorial video on how we did the lead track sound because it wasn't hard and we like to give back and share. However, the new songs we're going to be releasing as TWSTD ZOO are going to be something that will really take people for a fun ride and we're so proud of every track we've been working on lately so stay tuned for those this coming year.

Has RepostExchange affected the way you make music? If so, how?

RepostExchange has really allowed us to gain new listeners and followers. It has also let us discover new producers which we really like and we get to network with them and collaborate with them as well. We've been receiving many requests from people but we're so backed up on music at the time it kind of makes it difficult to try to keep up with everyone. We're very grateful to RepostExchange for making such a fun site to discover new music and sometimes it can inspire us to make new tracks with the stuff we discover on the site.