Back in 1998, Fatboy Slim released an album that would rock the electronic music world to its core, the seminal You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby. Over 20 years later, the lead single, The Rockafeller Skank, sees a fresh new remix from rising talent Jay Robinson. To celebrate the remix’s release, we asked Jay to break it down in the latest edition of How It Was Made.
ROLAND TB-03
For anyone who hasn’t heard my music – I love the 303. The strange thing about the modern use of the 303 is that nobody really uses it for basslines. It’s usually used as a top synth over other things, which is cool but sometimes misses the real reason the 303 has always stood the test of time. The oscillators on it are some of the best-sounding ever made. I used it to underpin my entire remix for Fatboy Slim, I really love the almost organic sound it has – it just sounds like it’s a real piece of hardware and not just totally electronic.
FABFILTER PRO Q3
The Fabfilter Pro Q3 is quite possibly the most perfect EQ ever made. It can quite literally do everything – the surgical precision on it is incredible. It’s on pretty much every single element of my remix. I used the dynamic mode on the main vocal quite heavily to control some of the top end when I really pushed it in the mix. It’s one of those plug-ins that just never ever loses its usefulness.
UAD EMPIRICAL LABS DISTRESSOR
For a lot of my music, I try to emulate the sonics of late 90s early 00s dance music – I don’t want things to sound perfect. A lot of modern dance music sounds quite soulless and flat in my opinion. Maybe it’s because I grew up listening mainly to tapes, I just love raw-sounding music that sounds a bit degraded or compromised in some way. The UAD version of Empirical Labs Distressor is on my drum bus 100% of the time. The sound you get through it is just so authentic to hardware compression. I used this heavily on the drums for my remix and I think it gives them a really gluey, solid sound. I love the way it made the drums sound like they are one solid loop rather than just a collection of generic drum hits all kept completely dry and perfect sounding.
XFER SERUM
I think many people view Serum as a dubstep vst, but it can do literally everything. Serum is a masterpiece in synth design. I used it to make the main lead on the last drop of the remix, the preset I made almost sounds like a sampled rave stab, completely with gritty imperfections. The power of this synth will take a long time to beat in my opinion.
KLARK TEKNIK EQP-KT PROGRAM EQUALISER
I absolutely love this EQ. I feed a lot of my synth lines through it, including the main synth in the remix. It gives such a beautiful tone when you boost and cut the right places. It’s really simple to use and program, but when used just right it really does beef everything up in just the right way. It’s a clone of the infamous (and heinously expensive) Pultec EQP-1A and it honestly sounds pretty close. The fact that it’s 100x cheaper makes it a must-have for anyone who wants to get that authentic analog warmth in their music.
ROTH AIR
There is no way on earth this plug-in should be free! I use the Roth Air on virtually every track I make. In the remix I used it to just give the drums a bit of a lift after the heavy compression and saturation I used. It’s a bit of a secret weapon – you could probably do the same thing with EQ but there’s something about this plug-in that just makes adding that top-end air so unbelievably simple and satisfying. I never ever hear anyone talking about this plug-in and it really is a shame, because it’s free and it works flawlessly.
