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"Traffic"
is a fabulous film directed by Steven Soderbergh with music by Cliff Martinez.
My role on Traffic was complex and intertwined with the composer, who
has done most of Soderbergh's films and whose approach to film music is
unique and intensely creative. Unlike many film composers, Martinez, original
drummer for the Red Hot Chili Peppers, prefers to get involved with a
project even before it begins filming. He develops sounds and ideas which
then grow as the film comes together. He has honed his technique in a
way that is uniquelysuited for collaboration with a director whose approach
is experimental. Many concepts are tested and tossed before the right
one is discovered. This involves a lot more time and effort that few directors
will allow.
Traffic has a highly electronic score, and careful sound design and programming
became my first task. When I started, Martinez had a few sketches, but
didn't know which ones would become part of the score. To allow for the
maximum amount of creativity he first asked me to come up with sounds,
rhythms and any ideas that would fit into the ambient vocabulary he was
seeking. He could then use those sounds and other materials as inspiration
for his cues. After watching a rough cut of the film together, and listening
to some album of influential ambient music, I returned to my studio to
begin working.
I decided that the most music way to work would not be to simply come
up with a bunch of synth programs or samples. Instead I wrote six short
compositions as a way to come up with sound designs and rhythmic ideas
that I knew would be the most useful. One aspect of these ideas involved
something I had not done in a long time: I relied on layering a number
of syntheisizers together in order to come up with sounds that were complex,
textural and evolving. AS I played them, I tweaked parameters in real
time and recorded my movements.
Having the resonance of a filter rise and fall in slow rhythmic cycles,
opening and closing a filter's frequency, jittering the FM mod for gentle
shifts of harmonics, creating glassy and bell like sounds were all important
aspects of the programming. I recorded the results of these mini performances
onto audio tracks of my sequencer, and stored each patch. The synths that
got the most use were the Roland JP8000 and JD800, the Access Virus, and
the Nord Lead. The latter was used in conjunction with the fantastic Waves
Multi-Tap plug-in for the rhythmic effects heard in Example
1 at www.reelworld-online.com.
Each of my ideas was recorded as a six or eight track audio file. I then
burned them all onto a CD ROM as AIFF files and took them to Cliff's studio
to see what he thought. We loaded them into his sequencer (we both use
Logic Audio) in order to play them back. He listened to each one a few
times, and felt that certain elements from several of these pieces were
on the right track. He would simply have to begin to play with them to
know. He spent several days seeing what he could incorporate into his
music. In the meantime Cliff engaged the services of guitar/noisemeister
David Torn (akasPlAtTeRcElL) to develop a vocabulary of sweeping drones
and grunge to use in a similar manner to my own bits and pieces. While
I live pretty near Cliff, making collaboration pretty simple, Torn hides
out in upstate New York. Cliff sent David scenes from the film and explained
what he thought would work. Within a day or two a CD would show up filled
with astonishing sound. Cliff placed a number of Torn's sounds into a
sampler so that he could further manipulate the sound. He took sustained
notes from Torn and used the samples to play chord progressions used throughout
the film, which you can hear in Example
2 online.
Many of the rhythmic elements in Traffic come from drum loops that were
mangled in some significant way. Cliff used a couple of beats from Ilio's
fantastic "Groove Control" series, which allows for not only
easy sonic manipulation, but the tempos can be changed at any time without
affected any parameters of the sound. By this time I was set up at Martinez's
studio. I had developed some special beat mangling software using MAX
and MSP from Cycling 74 (www.cycling74.com) and used my system in a sort
of modified DJ style for a
number of rhythms and textured in the film, such as the one in
Example 3. We used audio plug-ins as much as possible for sculpting
sounds, but also fed some things through the Elextrix Filter Factory and
Mo FX for further
distressing.
While the majority of the score was done with synthesizers, including
the signature massive bass notes done with a Studio Electronics SE-1,
one element that began to take hold was the use of electric guitar through
DDL. While samples were used for composing, it was important to replace
them with a player for a more organic sound. When it comes to creative
DDL guitar, there is only one person to turn to, and that's Michael Brook,
also a fantastic composer and producer in his own right. We took tracks
as they were finished over to Michael's house, and loaded them into his
computer. He is also a Logic User, so we created demo files for him to
play over, burned them on CD and moved into Michael's studio. In fact,
CD burning became the main form of inter-studio communication. Michael's
work was done in two days and the results were amazing, and you can hear
an excerpt in Example 4 online.
Finally, as the score came close to completion, a jazz-flavored cue was
written, and as a special guest Herbie Hancock agreed to perform on electric
piano. Once again we went to his studio in Hollywood with Logic files
burned to CD ROM. The cue was rather short, and I helped create an extended
version for possible use on the soundtrack CD. That cue also has 2 live
percussionists playing Latin Percussion and Flea, of Chili Peppers fame
came in to play bass on that one track.
As cues were completed we began the arduous process of printing everything
to audio tracks in order to mix with engineer Alan Meyerson on ProTools
at Media Ventures. Each track had to be printed as a single file from
beginning to end. Along the way Alan came up with a novel and bizarre
idea. To create a unique ambience for the surround channels, he took rough
mixes over to the famous Capitol Records studios in Hollywood. There they
have the reverb chambers that Frank Sinatra used for his vocals in all
his classic records. Alan pumped the
entire score through the chamber and recorded the results onto two tracks
of a ProTools system.
The score was mixed in about five long days. A bit of one my original
concepts was used in a spot in the film as well, which was a pleasant
surprise. Those of you who have seen traffic will notice the unique way
the score was mixed into the film, with dialogue and sound effects gone
during musical moments. Also, the film was mixed in mono, perhaps to enhance
the documentary style of it, except for the music which is in glorious
surround. The soundtrack, which is in stereo, is available at the website.
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