The Making of… “Smoldering - Dark Cinematic Songs”
The latest release from Gothic Hybrid focuses on dark lyrical themes and smoldering, dramatic instrumentation. An album packed with dark cinematic songs for modern villains and anti-heroes. Created for smoldering, building trailers. We spoke to composers Andrii Yefymov, João Gabriel Rodrigues, JEM and Brooke Mitchell who were charged with writing these powerful cinematic trailer tracks.
This album focuses on dark lyrical themes, how big an influence did the lyrical themes have on composing the music, or was it the other way around?
AY: well… for me music always goes first. I create the atmosphere and the mood, only then I start bringing in the lyrics that can live in that kind of atmosphere.
JGGR: To me everything starts with the sounds. First I would create a dark and tense atmosphere which I thought could work well under lyrics and then come up with the structure and lyrics.
BM: Usually, the music dictates what the lyrical content should be for me. Even in this instance, when I knew the possible themes ahead of time, I still let the music guide what the words would ultimately be. The music first guides what the melody will be and then the words fall into place.
JEM: We wrote these tracks knowing that we wanted the music and lyrics to be dark so the lyrical themes definitely shaped the music. The music has to support the lyrical content and we usually start a small idea with both vocals and a chord progression so we’re sure they work together.
Did composing for lyrics change your process at all? Did you need to leave more melodic space in the music than usual?
AY: I’m not used to writing for lyrics, I have written quite a few songs in my life, so it always lays slightly beyond my normal comfort zone. But I must admit that it didn’t change my workflow at all. The biggest issue with writing a song for me is the lack of opportunity to hear the vocal instantly! I mean, while working on my track I tweak the sound and I hear the result — I tune synths, I edit recordings to shape the desired sound. With vocals it all gets more complicated for me. I am quite a bad singer myself and lack of the ability to record and hear the result instantly drove me crazy, that’s why I brought my friend in who provided me a rough demo recording fast enough so I could finish my work.
JGGR: Not really, my style already relies a lot upon sparse atmospheres — so squeezing lyrics and melodies in there was not a problem.
BM: Composing for lyrics does change the process a bit because there are instances where I might leave out a lead instrument and/or musical melody knowing that the vocals will take care of that space.
JEM: Tom and I often write cinematic music with vocals so have gotten used to the process of leaving space for them. We also usually write them at the same time as the music so we never get to the stage where we’ve over produced and haven’t left enough room. We then try our best to produce around them afterwards.
Can you imagine a perfect trailer/promo usage for your track?
AY: Hard to say… any trailer usage would be great! Today trailer editors and music supervisors are very selective, so if the track will finally land somewhere, I’m sure it will be the perfect match 😅
JGGR: I would say war movies with a darker twist could be a nice fit.
BM: I imagine it would work well for a detective series or dark drama on Netflix or Hulu.
JEM: ‘When did my days turn Bad’ — When writing the lyrics for this I was picturing a ‘Joker’ like character who wasn’t a ‘bad guy’ to begin with but took some wrong turns and turned in to one. So maybe a ‘Joker’ film trailer would be quite fitting, or a trailer for a film where some one turns into a ‘bad guy/girl’.
‘You’re a Killer’ — This we think would really suit any murder or hit man based plot. Perhaps ’No Country For Old Med’ would have been a good one?
Was there a particular musical or cinematic influence you had for your track?
AY: I didn’t have any particular influence for this project. I just read the brief and used my imagination, paint my own virtual picture of the desired atmosphere and use it as inspiration.
JEM: Nothing in particular, we’re both influenced by a lot of different artists and composers but for the cinematic vocal genre we’re massive fans of ‘2WEI’. The stuff they put out is always incredible.
Tell us about the instrumentation on your track, were there any instruments you thought were essential for the style & emotion?
AY: Being a guitarist myself I immediately thought of using a guitar, though I know that guitar on modern trailer music is a kind of risky choice (unless it’s a hybrid rock music) so I’ve implemented it very carefully. Besides this I just used all my normal infinite set of instruments I use for hybrid trailer music :)
JGGR: Yes, working around synths and a thousand effects to come up with unique sounds. I have also added some organic percussion, such as anvils and other sorts of hits to give the whole thing a primitive, war-like atmosphere.
BM: I think the drums are essential for the style and emotion of this track. They are steady and powerful and kind of push the feeling of the protagonist being in pursuit of whomever they are chasing.
JEM: A lot of the instrumentation on our two tracks is typical cinematic hybrid orchestral, however, we wanted to start with a more intimate organic sound on ‘You’re a Killer’ so thought a roomy filtered acoustic guitar would work well.
For ‘When Did My Days Turn Bad’ we wanted to add some strange dark sounds so had a play around with recording the electric guitar part higher up and tuning it down an octave in the DAW which gives it this odd deeper tone with some weird added artefacts.
On both tracks we use a lot of my vocals with a load of reverb in reverse, mostly as transition effects. This works really well on cinematic tracks with vocals in to swell in to the next part or section. It’s an added bonus that they’re unique as no one else has these sounds.
“Smoldering — Dark Cinematic Songs” is available now for industry use, with a full public release coming soon.
