I get alot of emails from people asking what kind of music-programs I use, and how a mashup is actually made. I also recieve alot of mashup-suggestions ranging from “can you mash this song with that song” to “can you please mash these six songs together”. I don’t make mashups from requests, and it would probably be impossible to mash 99% of all the requests I get. However, I urge those who believe in their idea to try to mash the songs themselves. Hopefully people find out that mixing songs actually is extremely fun!

I am not going to tell you how to make a mashup, but I would recommend everybody to look at the the “Table of content” in Dj Earworms‘ book “Audio Mashup Construction Kit”:

• Chapter 1: Booting Up
• Chapter 2: What Is Mashup?
• Chapter 3: Mashup Checklist
• Chapter 4: How Music Works
• Chapter 5: Using the Software
• Chapter 6: Choosing Your Songs
• Chapter 7: Aligning the Tracks
• Chapter 8: Shifting the Pitch
• Chapter 9: Beyond the Beatmapper:
• Handling Uneven Tempoes
• Chapter 10: Unmixing
• Chapter 11: Arrangment:
• Putting It All Together
• Chapter 12: Finishing Touches
• Chapter 13: Rendering
• Chapter 14: I Fought The Law
• Chapter 15: Distribution

As you can see, making a mashup is more than just mixing two nice songs together. All these topics are essensial and important to understand, and Earworm has done an exceptional job (as always) gathering all this information in one place! If you want to start remixing, buying this book is a no-brainer!

There are especially two music-programs that are popular among remixers and mashup-artists. Sony Acid Pro is the first one (which I favour). And Ableton Live is the second one. Youtube is flourishing of tutorials on mashups and how to use these softwares, and here are a couple of them:

• Ableton Live Tutorials
• Sony Acid Pro Tutorials
• Mashup Tutorials

Are there many aspiring remixers out there?

“In RiP: A remix manifesto, Web activist and filmmaker Brett Gaylor explores issues of copyright in the information age, mashing up the media landscape of the 20th century and shattering the wall between users and producers.”

-IMDB

This is the documentary to watch if you into remixing and mashup culture. It’s an eye-opening contribution to the ongoing debate about copyright, fair use, sampling and remixing. You will also be introduced to the most popular mashup-artist on the planet,Girl Talk, who is more than willing to share his interesting views on the mashup culture. Brett Gaylor even encourage the viewers to participate in the movie by remixing different parts of it. I wanted to be a part of this project so I made my (tiny) contribution which could be seen in the last version of the movie.

Visit the RiP: A Remix Manifesto website to read more about the film, and you can watch the whole movie on Youtube.

Watch the first part of the movie here:

A collection of the mashups I released between October 2008 and September 2010. The amazing coverart was made by Emily Bawn.