Melbourne Bounce

What it is

There is a dance that goes with this one. The Melbourne shuffle had been happening in Australian clubs since the nineties, and by about 2012 a set of local producers, Will Sparks and Joel Fletcher and Timmy Trumpet among them, were making records specifically for the people doing it: fast footwork over a kick that hits half as often again as it should. The trick is on the grid rather than in the sound design. A bounce kick takes the four beats and the and of 2 and the and of 4 as well, so the low end pulses six times a bar, and a detuned saw answers it in the gaps. Everything else is stripped out to keep the floor clear. It went global on a run of remixes in 2013 and 2014 and then fed into the harder end of Dutch festival music.

What it sounds like

Sparse on top, relentless underneath. The kick is the record: short, punchy, pitched, and playing six times a bar. Above it there is very little. A clap on 2 and 4, a single closed hat ticking the last sixteenth of each beat, and an open hat that turns up twice in two bars. The lead is a detuned saw or a squelchy pluck playing a two note figure, ducked so hard it disappears every time the kick lands. Vocals are usually one shouted phrase repeated. The mix is deliberately thin between 200Hz and 2kHz, because anything living down there would blunt the kick, and the kick is what people are dancing to.

Key elements

• The bounce kickFour on the floor plus the and of 2 and the and of 4, at 96 to 100 against 118 to 124 on the beats. The offbeat hits are quieter, which is what makes them read as a bounce rather than as plain eighth notes.
• Almost no hi-hatOne closed hit on the a of beats 1, 2 and 3 and very little else. Seven closed hits across the two bars, in a style running at 128.
• The two note leadA detuned saw playing two pitches with a fast filter envelope, ducked 15dB by the kick. It exists to fill the eighth notes the kick has not already taken.
• An open hat you can countTwo in the whole loop, both on the a of 4. They mark the barline, and no other part does that job for them.
• No percussion laneThere is no shaker, no tambourine and no ride. If a record of this kind has a percussion part, the kick has stopped being audible enough to carry the room.

How to get them

• KickShort, around 160ms, with a pitch envelope dropping a fourth over the first 25ms. Program the offbeat hits about 20 velocity points below the beats and shorten their decay so they do not smear.
• BassTwo saws detuned 20 cents through a low-pass with a 90ms decay, playing two notes. Duck it 15dB from the kick with a 90ms release, which at this tempo means full level for barely a sixteenth.
• Clear the midrangeHigh-pass the lead at 250Hz and notch 400Hz to 800Hz out of everything except the vocal. The kick has to be the only thing in the mix with weight in the low mids.
• HatsOne closed hat on the a of each of the first three beats, and let beat four go to the open hat. Adding sixteenths here makes the kick sound slower, which is the opposite of the intention.
• Write for the danceTwo bars, one idea, and a change every eight. The people this is for are watching their own feet, and an arrangement that keeps moving underneath them is a nuisance rather than a bonus.

Reference points

Will Sparks, Joel Fletcher, Timmy Trumpet, Deorro, Uberjak'd, and the Hussle and Ultra Australia catalogues. Named as reference points for the sound, not as endorsements.