Last November, Point Blank teamed up with SARM Music Village for a day-long event featuring masterclasses and workshops from some of the best producers in the game, including by Trevor Horn, who himself deconstructed the classic track ‘Relax’ by Frankie Goes To Hollywood. Along with a Q&A with Trevor Horn, the day also saw Point Blank’s lead course developer Ski Oakenfull deconstruct the 808 State’s Acid House classic ‘Pacific 707’ which was released on ZTT. Watch the remarkable demonstration below.
‘Pacific 707’, and the original version ‘Pacific State’, led by Graham Massey’s iconic saxophone lead, is one of the most revered tracks in dance music history which, in mainstream appeal, aped almost any other tune from the Hacienda era. It was written by 808 State, which at the time was made up of Massey, Martin Price, and Gerald Simpson (better known as A Guy Called Gerald, himself the man behind ‘Voodoo Ray’, another track to rival ‘Pacific 707’ in seminality). A masterpiece of syncopation, no other track embodies the second summer of love in 1989 than ‘Pacific 707’.
In this deconstruction, Ski uses Ableton Live to build each element of the track from scratch (time permitting). We learn what instruments were used, including the Roland TR-909, D-50, SH-101 and Juno-106, the Casio F2-1 and the Akai S-900, before Ski begins with the famously warm chords that open the track. We learn that the track actually straddles two keys, that the famous ‘Loon bird’ sample came from disc 22 of the E-Mu Emulator II library, and that Ski finally learned how 808 State made the piano roll sound at the track’s beginning from Graham Massey himself. For more deconstructions like these, check out our YouTube Channel.
The iconic artwork for 808 State’s ‘Pacific State’
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The post Watch a Deconstruction of 808 State’s ‘Pacific 707’ from Sarm Music Village appeared first on Point Blank’s Online Magazine.