Gleeming is a great track and actually one of my first beats that I made that got radio airplay and video airplay.
My name is Oscar Sanchez but my producer name is Affluent Oscar Sanchez. I grew up in this industry working as an A&R. One of the most important factors about being an elite A&R is the ability to be able to diversify at any given moment and create. While working in A&R at Def Jam & at Violator I was involved in music production and recording studios. Working with all the top name urban producers of that era enabled me to absorb everything that I possible could to learn at every given session. I was taught how to produce records I was taught how to create songs. I knew music and I knew records. I understood artist and could relate their visions within.
Along the lines of learning I wanted to conquer the art of creating songs. The whole aspect begins with the beat. So my first aspect graduating from A&R was actually becoming a producer. Choosing the right music for the artist to create a hit single was my forte. It carried me for years in my career and made me not just an A&R executive with a title but a person who excels at creative.
This enabled me to open my label AFFLUENT RECORDS because I was able to create plus produce or executive produce fluidly. Time when on and I went on to produce all kinds of genres but life would soon change when Covid hit the USA. We all got affected and the economy was hit hard during that time. Clients that I had no longer had the financial means to pay for services. The only thing that was slowly gaining speed was the art of creation because everybody was confined to their home during these times.
Alyst was a client that was signed to my label a couple of months pre that and we were on the scale as many searching for those perfect beats to make him a star. This was a nightmare because searching for exclusivity was costly and tedious.
Everything happens for a reason and with me I began to listen to my soul to push myself further. I was living in a small 1 bedroom with my son and I knew we had to do something better for ourselves, the label, the clients our future. I began to interconnect with the beat machines I had purchased for reference. I created a different marriage with the bond and began to self teach myself like many of the greats before me about beat making.
I spent every single minute I could learning my craft and things began to come together. My beats no longer sounded like before. Now I was able to express what I felt from inside in an audible format. My energy speaks without words but instead sounds. Everything fell into pocket and I began to make songs. The songs I became to make became part of my influences I grew up with.
Everyday I would challenge myself to create something with more energy. The best part is that I taught myself to use sounds like other producers used samples. So my music was more mainstream radio friendly. Music producer legends like TRACKMASTERS were heavily my influence in my approach to making music with energy that was clean and commercial sounding. Listening to records they produced made me understand a formula of rap & r&b. Listening and going to Diamond D’s sessions or Mobb Deep session made me understand how to flip samples. Everything from my past was able to translate to my present and future.
Gleeming came about inspired from DMX & Grease “Get at me Dog” song which they used a creeping loops sound over drums and made a hit. I saw the video during Covid and it inspired me how Grease caught so much energy in that track with DMX. I remember Irv Gotti playing that track over and over at the Def jam offices it was a mega hit. So when I hit the studio of course I could not do what they did because it was a different time and era.
Today music is infused with heavy 808 drums trap synths so thats what I used to create ALYST breakout single. I got on the Akai MPC X and began programming my drums. I dont use breakbeats ever since I program my own drums all the time with every song. Thru it I then added the bass line and began flipping some bits and pieces into mixing where I took out the highs and added a deeper bottom to it. I sent it to Alyst and I named the beat GLEEMING. We began working on the lyrics what was needed and when he sent it back to me I heard the beginning of this journey. I was wow’d as an A&R I knew it was a hit and as a music producer I knew it was perfect but as a beat maker I knew this was the biggest start we could begin with. It also gave me a direction for ALYST sound.
Immediately afterwards I then sent the track out to platinum engineer Rich Travali who mixed the record and brought out the best of the tracks elements to give it the feel I wanted. He perfected Alyst’s vocals and married the vocals with the track into perfection, the man is gold a master of his craft and working him on this project with these singles has been an honor. The video was directed by an old school Def Jam friend Michael Gordon. Hot 97 DJ Enuff debut the track on his mixshow THE NEW at 2. BET Jamz played the video and it was circulated everywhere.
The single was the perfect way to begin ALYST career debut. And it began this whole beatmaker journey for me.
