Product Description

HERE ARE SOME SOUND IDEAS.

Wonder what would happen if the Big Band sound crashed into heavy metal? Or what the offspring of a balladeer and a rapper might sound like? How about smooth jazz and acid rock? Stop wondering-this book will take you there. You'll explore hardware and software choices first and select what you need; then you'll sample a little music theory. After that, it's step by step to the big mashup. Do what sounds good.

How to mix & mash.

Cool stuff you'll learn:

• How to use mashup construction software
• Basics of songwriting and music theory
• Insider tips on selecting your songs
• How to get your tracks in key and in sync
• Ways to extract vocals from full songs
• Tricks for arranging your mashup for maximum impact
• How to polish up your mashup with mastering and effects
• Rendering, distribution, and legal considerations

Note: CD-ROM/DVD and other supplementary materials are not included as part of eBook file.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #224954 in Books
• Published on: 2006-06-21
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 338 pages

From the Back Cover
HERE ARE SOME SOUND IDEAS.

Wonder what would happen if the Big Band sound crashed into heavy metal? Or what the offspring of a balladeer and a rapper might sound like? How about smooth jazz and acid rock? Stop wondering-this book will take you there. You'll explore hardware and software choices first and select what you need; then you'll sample a little music theory. After that, it's step by step to the big mashup. Do what sounds good.

How to mix & mash.

Cool stuff you'll learn:

• How to use mashup construction software
• Basics of songwriting and music theory
• Insider tips on selecting your songs
• How to get your tracks in key and in sync
• Ways to extract vocals from full songs
• Tricks for arranging your mashup for maximum impact
• How to polish up your mashup with mastering and effects
• Rendering, distribution, and legal considerations

About the Author
Jordan Roseman aka DJ Earworm, was born into a family of musicians and raised in Eastern Iowa. He earned degrees in music theory and computer science before gravitating toward the West coast. Having developed as a songwriter, music producer, and pianist, and inspired by mashups heard during a stay in London in the early 2000’s, he switched gears toward mashup creation, finding the format able to satisfy his hunger for various genres of music. His productions include wide-ranging genres such as electro, rock, 80’s,Top 40, and even country, blended together into a style that has earned him a global reputation. Most days, he can be heard blasting music out of an artist-filled Victorian mansion in the Pacific Heights neighborhood of San Francisco or deejaying at wild parties and underground events.

Customer Reviews

Good book on Mashup creation! 3.75 stars ;-)
This is a good book by a fairly accomplished Mashup creator. If you haven't heard of Mashups then you've been missing something wonderful. Mashups when created by talented musicians/djs who understand music theory and beat matching are wonderful. Bad mashups are horrible to listen to. This book takes you a long way to making great mashups and I very much liked the chapter on choosing songs (even though I already understand musical keys and tempos). The Excel spreadsheet templates and key matching templates were helpful and great musical refreshers which helped me create my own database of songs to mashup from my collection.

DJ Earworm's chapter on choosing songs was great - and the freeware tONaRT and aufTAKT (which you can throw a WAV file at and have it auto-detect the musical key and tempo in beats per minute) on the book's CD were awesome finds almost worth the price of the book themselves and they're great time savers in choosing tunes to mashup!

The only thing not making this book great is that it too heavily focuses on the specific software Acid Pro. I actually may not have purchased it if I knew that initially - though I'm glad I got it anyway. I just use other softwave like Sonar and Audition and Sound Forge so the pages on Acid specific stuff I just skimmed over. Even though it used Acid as an example, there was plenty to sink your teeth into in this book. I'd recommend it for anyone who wants to create decent mashups!

One big ACID commercial, insightful nonetheless
The Mashup Construction Kit is an insightful look into the world of mashup creations. For beginners in the world of mixing & mashing, DJ Earworm does a wonderful job keeping the material simple - at times, too simple - so you should have no problem with this book.

For intermediate to advanced audio enthusiasts, this book may not have much to offer beyond a look at how DJ Earworm goes about constructing mashups - not necessarily a bad thing.

The book includes a brief history of remixing (neat), some background music theory (a waste of time since people either already know it or will not understand it), and tons of how-to's for Sony ACID and a little bit of information on using Adobe Audition.

For the most part, the book seemed like a commercial for ACID. Earworm didn't consider any other software and sorta left Mac people out in the cold.

Why the 4-stars? Because while this book came across as very "basic," the insight into how someone as accomplished and skilled as DJ Earworm goes about creating mashups is very helpful. Sometimes it all seems so elusive until you actually "see" it done - then it all makes sense.

For those interested in creating mashups and who have a basic to intermediate understanding of mixing, mastering, music theory, etc., I highly recommend this book.

Maybe not so much for the intermediate to advanced folks out there.

Best mashup tutorial out there ... IF you're a PC user
San Francisco mashup producer DJ Earworm has written the definitive book on mashup creation. Not only is this an exhaustive tome on how to create your own mashups - written by an acclaimed master of the craft - it's also (in the first chapter) a bit of a history lesson of the artform itself. Not only does this book meticulously delve into the how's and what's of mashup mixing and production, but also the why's.

It explains (in GREAT detail) all aspects of mashup creation -- which, as any music producer knows, IS a "computer" thing (which apparently one of the 1-star reviewers does NOT understand). Mediocre, one-dimensional mashups can easily be made with two turntables. But well-crafted mashups -- like those of DJ Earworm -- are the result of meticulous production and construction using computer software ... which is why this book was released under the Extreme Tech label.

True, the book is PC-biased, so if you're a Mac user, you are unfortunately out of luck with 80% of the tips and tricks in this book. But if you want learn how to make mashups with Sony Acid (one of the two best pieces of software for mashup creation, the other being Ableton Live), then this is definitely the book you've been looking for.