Porter Brook is a DJ and producer based in Sheffield with releases on Trule and Groundwork.

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This track was first head at our Robert Gordon event at Dina in Sheffield.

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"I wrote this track as a companion to another song that I had written called Constant One. They were meant to form part of a long-form LP that I was working on during the tail end of 2022. This project was intended as an exercise to create music that wasn’t conceived purely as a part of a 4 track club record. 

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It all got mothballed due to a massive loss of confidence and belief in my own work. This is something that happens very regularly as I have a tendency to be a complete overthinker and brutal self-critic, to the point that it often cripples my creative projects. 

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The track is built entirely from resampling Constant One and starts with the pad, on which Constant One ends. Resampling is a hugely important part of my practice, both psychologically and technically, since it allows me to recontextualise sounds that I spent hours and hours making for projects that I end up hating. It’s one of the few things that reassure me that I’m not completely wasting my time when I spend ages working on tracks that ultimately get binned. 

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Inspiration-wise, the track wears its heart on its sleeve. I have been unhealthily obsessed with Gqom for a number of years and at the time of writing Omagoqa’s ‘Back To Ebombeni’, Menzi’s ‘Impazamo’, and the ILLUMINATION BOIZ’s eponymous record on HI-NRG were all on heavy rotation for me. This massively influenced the rhythm that drives the track. 

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During the writing process, I chopped all of Constant One’s stems up in Ableton’s Simpler and drummed them out on a midi controller, like I would when chopping a breakbeat. I then reshaped and redesigned a lot of the sounds using Max for Live patches and long FX chains, before writing out the arrangement."

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openCDR is your chance to share with the world your Work In Progress. At each of our in person sessions, there will be opportunity to hear your tracks on the club soundsystem and receive feedback from the music community. 

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Whether you’re just starting your journey as a producer or you’re a seasoned DAW user, contributing to openCDR is a great way to see your development in real time. For details on how to submit before each artist talk, check out the sign up page for each artist.   

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For any questions, advice or just general chit chat, please email info@createdefinerelease.com

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You can follow Porter Brook here