Endor launches his new label Ruff Cutz with the inaugural release ‘Mammals’. Since his 2019 breakthrough Platinum hit ‘Pump It Up’, two-time Beatport chart-topper Endor’s profile has surged via releases on Repopulate Mars, Solid Grooves, and Kaluki. Now, in response to the demand for the Brighton-based producer’s unreleased DJ tools comes the birth of Ruff Cutz, offering up the label’s fierce first release, ‘Mammals’.
“Rugged, raw, and always for the dancefloor. Ruff Cutz is an imprint born of a desire to release unfiltered, uncensored, and uncompromised music. Beats that found their feet in the club.” – Endor
A hard-hitting production combining chasmic basslines, teasing vocal samples, and steamy percussion, ‘Mammals’ works in twisted synths and timely claps across this piece of dancefloor artillery.
To celebrate the occasion, Endor tells us his Top 5 Studio tips to help all the producers out there.
“Producing is a bit of a dark art – you have to catch it on the right day. It can go very well or terribly, and there’s often no way of knowing which it will be. Some of the better tracks I’ve made have come from hungover, rainy-day sessions, and some of the less good tracks I’ve made (of which there are plenty) have come when I’ve had weeks of stress-free time. With that said, there’s not much you can do but get in the studio and start trying!” – Endor
1. EQ everything. And also, EQ nothing. I’ve often found that after painstakingly EQing every element of my track with high cuts, low cuts, peaks, and subtractions, the result has sounded less good than it did, to begin with. That’s perhaps because by removing the bad frequencies or “fluff”, you begin to lose the strange and intricate sounds that give your elements character. It’s those frequency spikes and little bits of low-end grit that are possibly the reason you reached for those samples in the first place.
2. Save and save again. There’s nothing more demoralising than coming to the realisation that your track has worsened since you worked on it. This happens to everyone. Progression is not always linear; it rarely is. So just make a copy every so often, giving you the option to return.
3. Keep your old ideas. It’s very nostalgic going back through project files and listening to stuff you were working on years ago – it takes you back to the moment. You’re also likely to find some gems. There are numerous tracks that I’ve finished that were born of old ideas that I revisited. Chances are you’ve now got the final element a track needed that you didn’t have at the time.
4.Strip it back. A wise DJ, whom I will not name-drop, told me that when a track is complete, try and remove as many unnecessary elements as possible. If you can distil the essence of your way into as few components as possible, the result will probably be more potent and compelling.
5. There’s an adage you’ve probably heard; “Give a chimp a typewriter, and eventually they’ll write Shakespear”. It’s the Infinite Monkey Theorem, and it states that with enough attempts, you’re going to succeed eventually. It applies well to producing music. It means you should make many tracks – as many as you can muster – and by the law of averages, sooner or later, you’re going to make an undeniable banger. I explain this to all new and young producers.
“Finally, this isn’t a tip, but… try and have fun with it. There are no rules here; disregard everything and do what you enjoy. Good luck!” – Endor