MING & FS



Covering All Bases
Whether They’re DJing Live, Producing or Scoring TV Projects, Ming & FS Remain Men For All Seasons

By Emily Tan
Published in the October 2004 issue of DJ Times Magazine
Volume 17 - Number 10

New York City – If you talk to Ming & FS, you’ll find that navigating the delicate balance between underground street cred and commercial viability is much harder than you’d think. Luckily, they’ve been clever enough to find eager audiences in the club, at the retail shop and with the suits that control what you see on the cathode-ray tube.

As studio artists, the Manhattan-based DJ/production duo offers the most diverse discography you’ll find in all of electronic music—from down-and-dirty original tracks (“Beat Back,” “Hijack the Disco”) to familiar-and-catchy remixes (“All About the Benjamins,” “Sweet Home Alabama”). They produce other artists, like hip-hop crew Northern League. They also speed down TV’s fast track by scoring original music for ABC’s “Wide World Of Sports” and HBO’s “Sex & The City,” plus commercials for AT&T, Victoria’s Secret and, most memorably, the Nissan Altima “Shift.” Working from their own Madhattan Studios on W. 43rd Street in the Hell’s Kitchen district, Ming & FS harness the city’s energy and translate it into potent music.

Following three critically lauded albums on Om Records – Hell’s Kitchen (1999), The Human Condition (2001), and Subway Series (2002) – Ming & FS have released their latest artist full-length, Back To One, on Spun Records (a division of Studio Distribution). A dazzling work of the duo’s signature “junkyard” sound – which combines elements of hip-hop, drum-n-bass, breaks and jazz – Back To One is refreshing and powerful, not to mention devoutly idiosyncratic. It’s another example of why Ming & FS are the production choice for deep-pocketed ad agencies and the model for up-and-coming producers looking to maximize their visibility and earning potential.

How do they do it? Both Ming (Aaron Albano) and FS (Fred Sargolini) started with formal music- and production-related educations. Ming dove into audio engineering at the University of Miami and FS studied jazz piano at The Brooklyn Conservatory. But what makes them special is their never-ending thirst for all things musical. That approach is manifested in the tunes they produce using different monikers: breakbeats as Lead Foot; pop music as Beat Tree; “aggro-rock” (with FS singing and Ming on guitar) as Freddy Churchill; and house music as Uncle Bubble. The beats don’t stop, so we caught up with Ming & FS to find out how they keep it rolling.

DJ Times: You guys have been making music together as Ming & FS since 1996. What was the inspiration for Back To One?
Ming: I think it was basically just to make a good, solid, hip-hop record. I think on our last two records, we were going for something a little bit more single-driven, bigger, and we were a little uncomfortable with where that put us in the realms of with our audience. It was a little strange. We were trying to put…
FS: More choruses…
Ming: More choruses, and just trying to push forward in terms of doing some of the other poppish type stuff that we do for other people. I think, as Ming & FS, we felt that because the label, OM, wasn’t able to push us hard enough, it sort of alienated some of our listeners. At the same time, [the previous albums] didn’t quite coke-out far enough to pull-in a new group of listeners. With [Back To One], we were able to return back to what made Ming & FS comfortable and also go back towards an audience that we were familiar with.

DJ Times: Is Back To One representative of your live sets?
Ming: I think our albums are never representative of our live sets. This album is for listening. What we do at our live show is remix a song and try to have a more creative, exciting, live environment.

DJ Times: Describe your live performance.
Ming: It’s a four-turntable set. We use four [Pioneer] CDJ-1000s. We used to use four Technics 1200 turnables, but we use the CDJ-1000s now, because it allows us the freedom of not having to deal with feedback and we can use music that nobody else has. We can scratch with them. You can’t scratch dub plates. We go into live sections where we’re using guitars, bass, and we’re actually playing instruments. For this new tour, we’ll be bringing MC Napoleon Solo with us, and he’ll be doing the parts that he did on our record. We’ll sample other people’s a cappellas and we’ll probably do other versions of songs and new remixes. For example, Ozzy’s “War Pigs” remix that we’re playing currently is a remix that we did. I think that when you come to a show, it’s like going to see a rock show. The record is supposed to sound a certain way, to evoke a certain feeling. And then we’re gonna take that record and do another version of it, so that when you come to see us live, it’s exciting, it’s new.
FS: The listening format [of a CD] is different from a live setting when you’re in a club. In a club, you want to keep things a little bit quicker [in tempo.]
Ming: Also, from a technical standpoint, what we put into our albums is a little bit more lush. In a live setting, you can’t have as much instrumentation, because it gets too muddy. So we’re able to make the sounds a little bit harder, the kicks and snares a little bit more exciting. And that sonically fills up more space than actually having to have more instrumentation, live.

DJ Times: Let’s talk about the TV commercials that you’ve scored, most notably the commercial for the Nissan Altima, “Shift.” When I first heard the commercial, I noticed immediately how cool it was to have the various car sounds made into a percussive track. How did that TV assignment come to be?
Ming: I think what works well for us is that, that’s what we do; we make music out of anything. So, when [the ad agency] came to us with the concept of, “Hey, could you make music out of car sounds?” We were like, “Yeah, easily!” We’re like, “As long as it doesn’t have to be cheesy! We can just make it cool? “And they’re like, “Yeah, do what you do.” So we made four, five different samples and we sent it to them, and they really liked it. Then, they asked us to be in the commercial, and we said, “Do we have to say anything stupid, like anything about the car?” They said, “No.”
FS: Like, “Great trunk space!” [laughs]
Ming: They basically said, “Do what you’d do if you were making a commercial.”

DJ Times: When you’re recording music for TV, is there a special routine that you have? Does composing music for TV involve adhering to strict requirements?
Ming: It just depends. Either they’re pulling from one of our catalogs—’cos we have a pretty large catalog of music to pull from—or, if they need a 30-second snippet. We just tailor it and work within that realm.

DJ Times: Do these corporate clients specify a lot about what sound they want?
Ming: Sometimes they do, but sometimes they have no idea what they want at all.
FS: Sometimes they say A, but they really mean B. There’s a completely emotional connection between them saying, “hip hop”—they’re saying, “Hip hop! Hip hop! Hip hop! Hip hop!” And you send them a breakbeat track, and they’re like, “Oh, I love it! It’s the best hip-hop track I’ve ever heard!” [laughs] And it’s clearly a breakbeat.
Ming: Have you ever heard someone say, “It would be better if it were faster”? Or, “It would be better if it were louder”? They think that if you speed it up, it’s louder. When we did the Sierra Mist campaign, the ad agency people came in with some suggestions and they wanted to be involved in the creative process. They didn’t know specifically how to speak about things they liked in music. But, once I made them comfortable with how they could talk to me about music, it was a very easy process. I would tell them that no idea they had was bad, and I’d just work on it ’til we found what they were talking about. You may not always know mechanically how to do something, but that doesn’t mean you’re not creative.

DJ Times: So, clients just explain to you emotionally what they’re feeling, and you translate that into specific pieces of music?
FS: Yeah, you just gotta take the vibe and put it up on a board and throw a dart at it.

DJ Times: But, it pays well, right?
Ming: Yeah.
FS: But it’s a hustle. People think you can get a couple of commercials and you’re rich. It’s not easy. You’ve got to keep pluggin’ away.
Ming: We’ve pitched for a shitload of commercials and we’ve not gotten a lot of them. You know, with the music business, I would say that 95-percent of it is failure. Not that what you’ve done is wrong, it’s just that it doesn’t fit. If success, technically, is having a commercial outlet for the music, then most of it’s failure. I think we succeed 99-percent of the time with the creation of our music. And then, getting it out through an avenue, that’s the other part. There are very small holes that you can get yourself through, and if you can do commercials and produce other bands, then that widens the hole for you.

DJ Times: Very few artists are able to successfully straddle the line between being commercially viable and maintaining underground street cred. How do you achieve that difficult balance?
Ming: I don’t think we’re selling out. I think it’s clear what we’re doing. We’re not hocking products we don’t believe in…
FS: Not yet. [laughs]
Ming: We’ve always been behind products that we believe in, like Rane mixers. Rane has always been there for us. My favorite mixer is the Rane TTM56 and…
FS: I use an older one, the [Rane] TTM54i.
Ming: Rane has always been about music first. They’ve always cared about how the product works. They’ve been very dependable in terms of being there for us when we’re on tour and we needed new mixers. We’ve been able to get involved with people who really care about music. If music is what comes first, then that’s what makes you credible.
FS: People starting to produce [a certain style] – like The Neptunes, who have this “throw-the-kitchen-sink” mentality in their music – for whatever reason, are right now in vogue. We have over 300 tracks to pull from. If the right 12 tracks don’t hit the right [ad agency] music supervisor, it’s over. We do so much music in so many different genres, it’s kind of tough to sell out. Something always seems to fit.

DJ Times: You’re just doing what you love?
FS: Yeah, exactly. We have the music, so we’ve just got to get it to the right people.
Ming: Even when we’re producing pop records, we’re still bringing our underground sensibility to the record.
FS: We don’t do shitty music, either. We’ve always had that ideal. When someone is selling out, it’s usually when they stink up the place. We try to stay away from that.
Ming: You want to have a career that has longevity. You don’t need to go for that one seedy [project]. If you pander to that cheesy thing, once you hit it, you can never escape that.
FS: I mean, look at [the song], “I’m a Barbie girl in a Barbie world.”
Ming: Once you make that song, you can’t go and say, “I want to work on the next Alanis Morissette record!”
FS: I understand somebody having the balls to record that song, but seriously. I wouldn’t touch that [song] with a 10-foot pole.
Ming: We actually had an act, a hip-hop group that did a remix of a song – I don’t want to get real specific about it – they were on our label, and they came-up with a remix of a song that was very un-credible.
FS: When you miss with the punch, you’re gonna get knocked out.
Ming: We would not represent that artist. What they did was, they took a pop song from the ’80s and took the chorus and made it the chorus of their song, like something Puffy would do.
FS: Only, Puffy does it well.
Ming: It was a very cheesy version of one of those songs, and the rest of their music was not like this. So we were like, “You’re a very credible underground hip-hop group, and you’re about to use this very cheesy thing ’cos you think this is going to make you big, when this doesn’t work for you!” We wouldn’t get behind it, and actually, their careers have gone down the toilet since they’ve done that. We dropped them and they went and released it with somebody else and nothing happened with it. They got two minutes of fame and then it all fell apart.
FS: It was a quick fix.
Ming: We’ve found that there’s no quick fix in life.
FS: Some labels do consider doing a cover as a quick solution…
Ming: Well, sometimes if you have a very credible record…
FS: Like the Black Crowes coming out with their first single [a cover of Otis Redding’s] “Hard To Handle.” That was a very good tactical move.
Ming: If you’re in a singles-driven environment and you need to introduce a new artist, sometimes you pick a cover because a cover already has a life of its own. If you can do a credible version of that cover, then people become familiar with your name because they already know the song.
FS: Joss Stone just did that.
Ming: Right, Joss Stone just did that with a White Stripes song [“Fell in Love With a Girl”]. That gives you enough time to say, “Do I like this artist? Maybe I should find out more about her music.” A lot of hype has been given to The Grey Album [by Danger Mouse], and I personally think that concept is not very inventive.

DJ Times: The mash-up?
Ming: Well, the whole Jay-Z-vs.-The Beatles concept. I don’t really find it to be that intellectually stimulating. I think the hype that it’s getting is a little bit retarded. But, the music is pretty dope.

DJ Times: I think [Danger Mouse] used The Grey Album as a promotional tool.
Ming: That could have a backlash on him.
FS: When you’re doing that, you’re carrying a very large flag. When you go to hold up another one that says something else, the first thing he’s gonna get is, “Why don’t you do a remix record like this?”

DJ Times: Are we in Madhattan Studios?
FS: Yeah, in its glory. [laughs]

DJ Times: What equipment and software do you use in here?
Ming: That’s an 02R Yamaha digital console. We’ve got a Mac G4 that’s a dual processor, I think it’s an 800 or an 850 dual processor. We’re running Digital Performer 4.0. We use [Propellerhead’s] Reason a lot, version 2.5. Reason has taken over a lot of the keyboards and samplers we used to use—we used to use the [Akai] MPC2000 a lot, and the E-Mu E4XT [Ultra sampler]—and we’ve slowly adopted using Reason, because for us, producing music separately, we can share sound files very easily and it sounds good. It’s very musical.

DJ Times: Do you feel that Reason provides the same quality-of-sound as analog gear?
Ming: Because [Reason] is software and it’s not that expensive, people assume that it’s crap and that it’s a consumer-based product. Back in the day when the [Casio] PD303 [synthesizer] was, they had no idea that it would be the center of dance music for years to come. Propellerhead actually came up with the software version of that, with Reverb. If you can afford a computer and software-based synthesis, I think that’s where it’s going. There’s also a lot of great workstations out there. I’m sure Korg makes a couple of really great ones. We have a two-channel pre-amp and EQs, which all of our live stuff runs through. The mic preamps, the guitar pre’s. It’s a [Neve] 33122A, those are the EQ and pre-amp modules. They’re actual channel strips from the old Neve console. We use the [Fender] Rhodes [electric piano] a lot. We use the Hammond XB2 [keyboard] a lot. We use the Yamaha CS01 [keyboard/synthesizer], and we use the Roland JP-8000 [synthesizer] a lot.

DJ Times: If you had to pick one piece of equipment that you couldn’t live without, what would it be?
FS: It’s too hard to choose one. I’d have to say the computer. Literally.

DJ Times: Is there any piece of recording hardware that you feel cannot be matched with software?
Ming: Guitar is probably the only instrument that I haven’t been able to emulate with software. I have a Fender Stratocaster with a Mesa Boogie amplifier. Fred’s got a Fender bass.

DJ Times: Who were some of your earliest musical influences?
Ming: Growing up, I listened to The Beatles, The Doors, Zeppelin, everything, pretty much. Everything from early rap, Run-DMC, Afrika Bambaataa…
FS: Herbie Hancock was a very large staple in my life, through it all.
Ming: Miles Davis, Chet Atkins, Michael Hedges.

DJ Times: You both have somewhat of a jazz background?
Ming: Yeah, I play [jazz] guitar.
FS: I play keyboard and bass.

DJ Times: Considering your formal music education, do you think that training is essential, or can someone just spend years fooling around with music and teach themselves to be good?
Ming: It depends on the type of music you’re doing and the amount of time it’s going to take. A monkey can make music if you give it enough time. When you have training, you have a much larger palette to pull from, and also you get to the results quicker. It’s less of a wild pitch. You know, if I come in and [Fred is] working on a track that’s 80-percent finished that I know is in a certain key, and he wants me to play a guitar line, it’s going to take me a lot less time to drop a guitar line if I musically know what’s going on.

DJ Times: Do you then recommend that aspiring producers get some formal musical training before they dive into the industry?
FS: I would say go to school the right way, because I went to school for years and it took me a long time to break a lot of the things they tried to teach me in school. So, it’s really a double-edged sword. I have friends who are actually big producers who never went to [music] school, number one, and they’re great musicians. They just naturally can play. If you go to school, make sure you don’t get “Berklee-ized.” Some people get hindered by their [musical] education. Once they went to school, they got trained in a certain way that they really have trouble thinking outside of that box. I’ve run into many, many musicians who’ve had a hard time breaking away.
Ming: I think that to learn instruments is very important—whether you get formal training or not. For me, my better schooling was from private teachers who allowed me to be myself as a musician and helped me in the direction that I wanted to go. I’ve gone through phases of wanting to know [music] theory, and not wanting to know theory. Going back and forth and learning the instruments themselves is what makes you the best producer. The more instruments you know, the more you can get your ideas out.