In the Studio: Matrix + Futurebound

The masterminds behind four consecutive chart-topping hits—“All I Know,” “Magnetic Eyes,” “Control” and “Don’t Look Back”—aim for the top of the charts once again with the gritty, funk-infused vibes of “Glow Worm.”

While both have had illustrious careers as solo artists, there is obviously something very special going on when Matrix and Futurebound come together in studio mode, as they seem to be capable of churning out hit after hit with effortless ease. From their own epic originals to turbocharged remixes—for the likes of Swedish House Mafia, Justin Timberlake, Moby, Afrojack, Oliver Heldens, Eric Prydz, Seven Lions and Labrinth—there’s no doubt that the duo’s ability to merge pop-infused melodies with raw drum & bass pressure keeps the heads coming back for more.

So, as they prepare to unleash an unholy number of tunes they’ve been cooking up in the lab since the tail-end of last year, we thought we’d corner Matrix + Futurebound to see if we can’t have a little taste of their hit-making elixir and deconstruct their secret formula for making great records.

Can “making a hit record” actually be taught? Who taught you, or rather, how did you acquire the skills needed to being able to pull this feat off time and time again in your careers?
Like most producers, we just started out as massive music fans and loved it so much that we wanted to get involved in making it ourselves. You absolutely need to love doing this and have a passion for it that makes you want to be in a studio for days and days on end. If you have that, you can learn the rest.

Can making a hit be taught? I guess it can, if you’re being taught by someone who knows their shit inside-out. But you definitely can’t predict a hit. Even though we’ve been passionate about great music since we were kids, we both weren’t trained players of any instrument. So it was a case of DJs becoming producers and learning our craft from scratch.

It doesn’t matter what DAW you’re writing in; it’s all in your head. Try new ideas—there’s no rules—and most of all, write from the heart. If you stick to those parameters, you’ve got a good chance of succeeding.

If we were to take you out of your usual working environment and ask you to sit in on a session with us in our bedroom studio, what basic elements would you need to work your magic?
The essentials would be a fast computer with Cubase and a bunch of nice plugins. We don’t need much more than that in the way of studio gear, but having our drum sample library that we’ve built up over years would be pretty essential. Lately, we’ve been using a synth called Serum a lot. It’s amazing for making twisted bass sounds. We also use Sylenth a lot, because it sounds great and it’s really easy to get the sounds you want quickly.

It’s not vitally important what monitors you have, but it is important that you get to know them inside-out by listening to lots of tracks that are well-produced and mixed, to make sure your tracks sound good compared to those.

“Starting with a blank canvas is one of the toughest parts about producing music, but once you have something going, you just have to let your instincts take over and not overthink things.”

I imagine a huge part of your success has to do with your work habits. Give us a sense of what kind of hours you’re putting in, how long an average studio session lasts, or even what an average day or week looks like schedule-wise when you’re deep into a project.
You definitely have to put in a LOT of hours to get things to sound right, but it varies from track to track. Some tracks come together in a few days, but some of the more complex ones—with vocals and lots of layers of different sounds—can take months. Usually, the main ideas for the track will take a day or two to lay down—that’s the quick bit—but making everything feel 100 percent right in the mixdown department is the bit that can take a very long time. Sometimes we’ve done 50 versions of a track before it feels right. When you’re comparing the latest two or three versions and you can barely tell the difference yourself, that usually means you’re ready to call it finished!

What about at the idea phase? Do you have a way of writing ideas down as they occur, or is it a matter of actually being on the computer and following your instincts as you “play” with sounds?
Starting with a blank canvas is one of the toughest parts about producing music, but once you have something going, you just have to let your instincts take over and not overthink things. If you can get the main ideas down fast, that’s a good thing, because then there’s no time for the doubt to creep in.

We definitely jot ideas down that come into our head. Sometimes you’re in the car and you hear an old track on the radio, and there’s a chord arrangement or even one chord that gets you thinking… so you’ve definitely got to make notes.

What about when you are creatively blocked? What are your strategies for overcoming those moments of doubt?
There’s only one solution for getting over any creative blocks, and that’s to get back in the studio and go again. It’s always worth rendering any idea you’re working on, because sometimes you’re so in the zone and can lose focus on what’s sounding good or bad.

Let’s talk about “Glow Worm” specifically and see if we can deconstruct the making of a hit record! Start at the beginning, and walk us through the process and creative decisions that went into making the tune.
With “Glow Worm,” we just wanted to make something that would be perfect for our DJ sets. So the starting point was to make the drums and bass, which is actually quite unusual for us. We most often start with some melodic elements, but this kind of track is all about sounding big in a club; so it’s best to get the drums and bass sounding great on their own before anything else goes in.
Drums: 80–90 percent of the work is finding the right combination of drum hits to start with, and 10–20 percent is about how you process them. If the starting ingredients aren’t right, no amount of work will ever get you a good result.
Bass: The kind of bassline we used in “Glow Worm” is not so much about the melody, as the movement and tone of the sound. Most of it was made in Serum, which has really great modulation possibilities. We wanted the bassline to be constantly moving and feel like it’s alive. You basically need to have lots of different elements of your synth: modulating filters, changing distortion settings, changing the synth waveforms, that kind of thing. You just want lots of variation in the sound, which turns quite a simple melody into something interesting.

“Don’t try and guess what people want. Just make what YOU want.”

Synth lead/hook: After the drums and bass, the next thing was the twisted synth lead that comes in on the drop. That’s the key sound to the track, really. It was made out of a stab sample from an old rave track that was kicking around in our sample library. We ran it though Kontakt Tone Machine. It’s quite a cool way to make unusual sounds that don’t just sound like another typical synth preset, which is very important if you want your track to stand out.
Intro: Once that was done, the main drop was all in place. So from there, we built an intro which is based around the more melodic kind of sound that we’re known for with the vocal tracks that we do. It’s supposed to contrast with the drop, but it still has to feel like part of the same track, so we used the same melody as the lead synth on the drop. Even though all the sounds are different, it’s got continuity to it.
The Mixdown: The mixdown is not a separate part of the process. It’s something that gradually comes together as the track is being written, and it’s got a lot to do with having the right group of sounds that work well together and don’t fight each other. We can’t stress that enough. Get your sounds right at the beginning, and then the mix processing is just the icing on the cake.

At what point did you start testing it out on the crowd and/or playing it/sending it out for feedback from others? Who are those that you trust to give you honest feedback?
Obviously, we always road-test our own tracks first from an early stage. It’s the only way to gauge how far off from the bull’s-eye you are. But once a track is on the homestretch, we’ll give it to certain artists we work with—and of course, management.

Can you usually tell when you’ve got a hit on your hands, or is there always a bit of uncertainty until it actually starts to chart?
There’s absolutely always uncertainty. You never really know how things are going to go down until you get them out there. That’s why you just have to make music that you like yourself. Don’t try and guess what people want. Just make what YOU want.

With that said, we’ve been getting great reactions on this one from lots of the D&B crews; everyone from Noisia to Marky have been hitting us up, hyped up about the track. We’ve been doing this long enough to know when there’s a buzz happening with a record, and we’re stoked with the response so far.

Before we go, any last words of wisdom for all the future hit-makers out there?
The first golden rule is to just try and do your own thing and not get too hung up on what everyone else is doing. The second golden rule is that there are no rules when it comes to making music.

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