Roosevelt,

Greco-Roman, 2016

Wait Up. Marius Lauber talks us through the creation of his ’70s-influenced album opener

Since his debut on the ultra-trendy Greco-Roman in 2012 Roosevelt (aka Marius Lauber) has released a swathe of groovy, Funk-infused Synthpop singles and EPs, culminating in the launch of his eponymous debut album in the summer of last year. He’s also remixed a variety of acts including Glass Animals and Coma. FM caught up with Marius at his studio in Germany’s cultural hotbed Cologne to find out he created the ’70s-influenced sounds of album opener Wait Up.

What’s the idea behind Wait Up?

“The track is the intro for my album; what I wanted to achieve with it was a broader sound. It was really suited to being the first track on the album with that kind of statement – I moved away from loops and cutting up drum samples and used more classic band production. The guitars drums and bass are like the fundamentals of the track. The style of the production probably is from a ’70s Disco kind of dry drums, big layered bassline with guitars, but I still wanted to bring in my own style on the production. It’s definitely the most tracks I’ve ever had in one project!

“Another reason I chose this track to show you is that it was one of the few tracks that was done completely in my studio. Some of the other tracks I started in different studios or I went in another studio to vocal, but this track is 100% from this studio. It actually started as a test track to record some drums! A lot of the time I’ll open a project to test a new instrument, a new mic, then that turns into a track. The project is even called ‘drums test’ because I bought a bunch of new mics and wanted to test the drum sound, and that developed into the full track. So it was quite an impulsive and naive process, and the writing happened without me forcing it; it happened really naturally.”

What inspired the song?

“I don’t really have an idea about a song before I write it. The hard part is just to be able to get into the right mood to achieve writing the full track. I guess Wait Up was like kind of a mellow track, but

I didn’t really have an idea about the songwriting – that’s something that happens really impulsively.”

Did you play the drum parts?

“I played everything myself.”

What a show off! What kit did you play on the track?

“It’s mostly my ‘go to’ instruments; the drums are a Pearl President kit from ’69 with Zildjian Avedis cymbals. I deadened the drums so they hit really short and this way you don’t really have to put a lot of processing on them so you can keep them quite natural. You can see in the project I don’t really have any gates, even on the drums. I don’t really like it when stuff rings, so it’s really dead, and that way I can have a punchy, almost electronic sound. I like to have acoustic drums that feel like electronic drums.

“The bass is a Höfner short scale from the ’70s which weighs like 2g; it’s light but it has this punchy sound I like that fits above the drums. It almost feels compressed already; you don’t have to put a lot of effects on. The guitar is probably the Fender ’60s Strat. I also have a Duo-Sonic from the ’90s and sometimes I layer things up with that one as it’s a bit more twangy and has more funk in it; but the Strat is so diverse most things are played with that one.

“Over the last years I’ve realised when you can go for the easy way and use instrument emulations, and when you actually have to play authentic instruments, like when the song is depending on a certain sound and it’s really in the foreground.”

“Synth wise it was mostly Roland Juno-60 for the chords, layered like crazy; I think there were five different chords on the Juno doing different stuff. You probably don’t need them, but when I play a chord in one sound, when I hear something’s missing instead of going for a different sound, I try to add something to it so it fits more with the sort of sound I have in mind. It’s hard for me to move away from a sound I already have, so I mostly just put a certain sound down and add another layer, especially when it’s mellow chords like on this track.”

What about ‘in-the-box’ sounds?

“Here and there I use software synths and drum samples; the claps for example are samples. Over the last years I’ve realised when you can go for the easy way and use instrument emulations, and when you actually have to play authentic instruments, like when the song is depending on a certain sound and it’s really in the foreground.”

Do you use a lot of plug-in processing?

“I use mostly the Logic plug-ins for basic channel strips because that’s what I’m used to, but then when I want to colour the track and move it into a different direction I’ll use a lot of Waves stuff, and I love the SoundToys stuff.”