Etsy sells secondhand clothing marketplace Depop to eBay for $1.2BThe deal comes nearly five years after Etsy purchased Depop for $1.62 billion, at a time when secondhand clothing apps were gaining traction during the pandemic.

BEE GEES LIMITED EDITION 4 LP COLLECTION DUE FEBRUARY 27UMe has announced the release of a new limited-edition box set by one of the biggest and most beloved acts in popular music history, the Bee Gees.     

Out February 27, You Should Be Dancing is a four-disc collectors’ item featuring the highly sought-after original 12-inch versions of some of Barry, Robin and Maurice Gibb’s most iconic dancefloor-fillers, plus previously unreleased extended versions of five further Gibb brothers’ classics. Additionally, the set also includes the previously hidden 90’s UK club hit, Decadance, as well the long-awaited physical debut of SG Lewis’s viral 2021 remix of More Than A Woman.     

Limited to just 1,000 units, the You Should Be Dancing box set will be a prized possession for music fans the world over.     

You Should Be Dancing boasts the 12-inch versions of the Bee Gees’ era-defining late 70s masterworks Stayin’ Alive, More Than A Woman, Night Fever, and You Should Be Dancing. 

The brothers’ signature R&B-influenced sound is also represented with the inclusion of unreleased extended versions of the smash hits Jive Talkin’, Nights On Broadway, Tragedy, and Love You Inside Out. Elsewhere, there’s the group’s thrilling original take on Yvonne Elliman’s 1978 global chart-topper If I Can’t Have You, the pre-Saturday Night Fever funk of the US top 20 Boogie Child, and the fan-favorite album track You Stepped Into My Life.    

Bridging the gap in the Bee Gees’ astonishing multi-decade career is the inclusion of SG Lewis’s TikTok-conquering Paradise Edit of More Than A Woman, pressed on vinyl for the very first time as part of this collection. And rounding out the set is the group’s ultra-rare update of their own You Should Be Dancing, reimagined as the bonus track Decadance for the brothers’ 1993 album Size Isn’t Everything. Previously only available outside of the US, Decadance is featured in both its original incarnation as well as the Ben Liebrand Vocal Mix.      

The Bee Gees’ impact on popular music and popular culture is undeniable, both as performers as well as songwriters with no less than 21 different Gibb-written songs topping either the US or the UK charts going back to the 1960s. Add to that global record sales approaching a quarter-of-a-billion, nine GRAMMY® Awards, over a dozen Ivor Novello awards, the only songwriters to place five songs simultaneously in the US Billboard top 10, Kennedy Center honors, a knighthood for Barry Gibb, Brit and American Music Awards lifetime achievements and secured spots in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame®, Songwriters Hall of Fame®, and Vocal Group Hall of Fame®, and a picture is painted of why this band of brothers have long been such an extraordinary phenomenon.      

That record-breaking legacy continues into the 21st Century with over 26-million monthly listeners on Spotify, including a staggering near two billion total streams for the band’s signature blockbuster, Stayin’ Alive. Most recently, SG Lewis’ Paradise Edit of More Than A Woman clocked north of 115 million Spotify streams, boosting the original’s popularity to where it’s now also closing in on a billion streams.   

TRACKLISTING LP 1 A1: You Should Be Dancing B2: Boogie Child B3: You Stepped Into My Life   LP 2 A1: Stayin’ Alive A2: If I Can’t Have You B1: Night Fever B2: More Than A Woman   LP 3 A1: Jive Talkin’* A2: Nights On Broadway* B1: Tragedy* B2: Love You Inside Out*   LP 4 A1: More Than A Woman - SG’s Paradise Edit B1: Decadance B2: Decadance - Ben Liebrand Vocal Mix   

“I see the Bee Gees in the tradition of the great songwriting teams of the 20th century–Goffin/King, Lennon/McCartney, Fagen/Becker,” summarized writer and novelist Daniel Weizmann in a 2002 email communication.

“Had they merely been a singing group, an ‘Aussie boy band that went disco’ as they’re sometimes portrayed with scorn, then half of Western civilization wouldn’t know at least three Bee Gees songs by heart. They wrote as they sang, with gusto, subtext, heart, and surprise. And when they cast a foreigner’s shocked innocent eye on the urban chaos of ’70s NYC, they captured modern times for all time–it was magical.

“Give them vanguard credit, too–when the whole culture seemed to gravitate West, the Bee Gees had the good sense to go East, to Miami, with Arif Mardin, and embrace dance music. Only the deepest respect for the genre could have allowed them to pull it off as they did. Like Teena Marie, (and unlike so many other blue-eyed soulsters) the Bee Gees disco actually made it to the dance floor.

“Not bad for three lads raised on the Isle of Man. In the five years that followed Main Course, it seemed like every other white rock act tried to make a disco record–some more cringe-worthy than others, very few as natural.

“Legend has it that the brothers wrote most of the material for a low-budget movie called Tribal Rights of the Saturday Night, for which they only had the roughest idea of a plotline, in under a week, holed up in the village of Hérouville in France. Can you imagine the task being handed to any other songwriting team? I’m guessing the results would have been disastrous. But because the Bee Gees had the spirit of dance music, of hustle, of the New York Times effect on man, deep in their blood, they brought the whole operation to life.

‘‘Sometimes super fame has this embalming effect. Like Elizabeth Taylor and Michael Jackson, the very real artistry gets lost in the shuffle, the phenomenon takes over. But the Bee Gees continued to write unforgettable hooky, moving songs.It’s no wonder so many idiots hated them. They were that good.”

“Any list of the greatest groups in music history has to include the Bee Gees:  their harmonies, the sheer quality and quantity of their songs,” stressed author David Leaf, currently an adjunct professor, UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music in a 2020 interview I conducted with him.   

“I’ve been a fan since 1967 and so fortunate to have worked with them writing their authorized biography, creating the retrospective packages for the Grammy tribute to the group and, probably best of all, being entrusted to tell their story in the feature documentary, This Is Where I Came In.” 

I spoke with Leaf in 2020 and asked about the authorized biography he wrote on the Bee Gees.

“When my Brian Wilson biography, The Beach Boys and The California Myth, was still in galleys, in spring 1978, Jay Levy, an executive at RSO Records (the Bee Gees label then), read it because they were looking for somebody to write the authorized biography of the Bee Gees.

“I got the job and flew to Miami that summer to begin work on it. I spent time interviewing all three Bee Gees, their wives, Robert Stigwood, Andy Gibb and their parents, wrote the book and it came out in 1979. Throughout the rest of the century, I worked with the Bee Gees on various projects, including, perhaps most significantly, their Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction,” underscored Leaf.

In the January 21, 1978 issue of the now defunct Melody Maker, I interviewed the Bee Gees for an article, How The Bee Gees Captured America. In the seventies I saw the group in concert, with an orchestra in 1971, and at The Midnight Special NBC television show tapings in Burbank, California.

“One of the reasons for the Bee Gees’ success,” explained Robin Gibb at their rented Benedict Canyon home, “is that we’ve never used music as soap box,” he underlined.

“Music, I’ve always believed, can take you away from reality and you have the option to identify with the music. Something happens when people are bound together through a song.

“Like, ‘How Deep is Your Love.’ Personalities are examined in that tune, but female or male aren’t even mentioned. It has universal connotations and it clicks with everyone. Before we cut that song, we knew we could fuse some of our own personalities into the track. Love is an anchor, it’s a foundation. Not all our songs are light and breezy. I’ve said it before, but we write our songs. We’re not interpreters. Ten years ago, most music was a social outcry, and we never subscribed to that pattern. We didn’t jump on trends and we’ve seen a lot of them the last decade. Flower power. Glitter… I think the Bee Gees have always realized that there is so much love to bring out in songs that it is a catalyst to bring people together.”

“Maurice is singing harder parts, falsettos,” offered Barry Gibb. “Before, we played it safe and strict. We used the orchestra as a cushion. It was beautiful, but we weren’t taxing our abilities. When I look back at the days when we toured with 30 pieces, I know we were on display and opposed to communicating with the audience. Going to a bigger band and leaving the orchestra at home was a logical extension. We didn’t want to cling on to something that didn’t make us feel comfortable. I think our stage act improved 100 per cent. The orchestra was beautiful, but restrictive at times.

“I think the kids and younger people want to open up a bit more at concerts. We’re now more self-contained on stage and I really dig working with our band. Looking back, the orchestra did colour many of our songs. But at times we might have overused the strings and some of our work became mushy. Strings are beautiful tools to work with. They can break your heart.”

During my handful of group interviews with the Bee Gees, in 1978 I visited the set of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band which Michael Schultz directed.

I spent part of the entire afternoon walking around the yellow brick road at the fabled Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer movie studio in Culver City with Barry Gibb and Peter Frampton, who also appeared in the film.

Del Shannon, Bobby Womack, George Benson, Helen Reddy, Johnny Rivers, Minnie Riperton, Mark Lindsay, Jack Bruce, Monte Rock III, Al Stewart, John Mayall, Alan White, Jose Feliciano, Tina Turner, Peter Noone, Carol Channing, Keith Carradine, Etta James, Leif Garrett, Sha-Na-Na, the Paley Brothers, Kim Fowley, Margaret Whiting, Gwen Verdon and others appeared in a celebrity-driven finale conducted by George Martin.

It was the last movie to be made at M-G-M under the guidance of the studio’s existing management.

A security guard at the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer main entrance lot gate recognized me from the nearby El Marino elementary school we had attended in Culver City. He handed me an all-access pass and parking permit for a space once reserved for Elvis Presley when he did Speedway.

On his lunch break my childhood friend insisted on taking me on a tour inside the M-G-M universe, including the dressing rooms of Judy Garland, Clark Gable and Frank Sinatra. We both marveled at a huge lobby poster of director Alfred Hitchcock’s North by Northwest, starring Cary Grant, Eva Marie Saint, and James Mason.

On the M-G-M lot, I asked Maurice Gibb about their last studio album, Children of the World, which yielded the hit single ‘You Should Be Dancing’. The LP was much harder-sounding than its predecessor, Main Course.

“We wanted an album that was more nervous,” underlined Maurice. “We felt Main Course was a little too varied. There were too many directions. We wanted to take the R&B flavour in Main Course a step further with Children of the world. We are always trying to establish a direction. Groups should have guidelines, but also be open for experimentation. When we did Mr. Natural we didn’t have a positive direction. We were thrashing about and some good things came out of that album.”

All three Gibbs were quick to credit Arif Mardin, producer of Mr. Natural and Main Course, for showing them new studio tricks and techniques.

“Our studio tactics had become lazy,” admitted Barry. “We had to own up and Jerry Wexler recommended Arif.”

They had some meetings with producers Thom Bell and Richard Perry but nothing came out of these discussions.

“Arif was incredible to work with,” disclosed Robin, “especially with Maurice. He changed our style of recording. We would start with one instrument and build up from there, as opposed to all playing at once. It is a clearer process.”

“Arif was a producer and a referee. He organized sound around a creative base,” Maurice acknowledged.

When the Gibbs recorded Main Course, they knew of previous problems and the result was three hit singles. Olivia Newton-John covered “Come On Over,” “Fanny (Be Tender with My Love)” was a huge hit in the US and “Jive Talkin’” was another at the top of the hit parade. “Nights on Broadway” was a top ten smash.

There was charted R&B airplay for “Jive Talkin’” and some compared the Bee Gees to the Average White Band, another Mardin-produced group.

“I can’t believe what a rush we’re all in. Things have never been better,” exclaimed Barry.  

“We were nervous wrecks at the end of the Sixties: touring, recording, promotion. I was living in Eaton Square and my neighbors must have thought I was a bit freaky. I can remember a time when I walked out of my front door and there were six cars and they all belonged to me. That’s madness,” he confessed.

“I feel very close to my family. We are all living in this house and planning for the future. There was an adjustment period five years ago, but all the little hassles and hang-ups have disappeared. We began to relate to each other as brothers.

“We don’t want to sit on our laurels. We knew we always had a lot more to offer to people than they thought we had. Right now, the family is throbbing. No one is looking out for himself and all are looking in.

“We’re working faster and I feel I can write a song in a minute with Maurice and Robin. I’m really happy that people are acknowledging our influence on popular music. You have no idea what a thrill it is to have a top five single in England. With all the new wave and punk rock out, I would have thought something like ‘How Deep Is Your Love’ wouldn’t have a chance. We always kept going forward and we’re getting stronger every day.”

“We’ve never been inclined to follow other people’s ideas,” reinforced Robin. “If anybody’s gonna follow an idea they’re gonna follow ours. Even though the Beatles influenced a lot of our music, we never aimed to follow what they were doing. We’re still very young as far as I’m concerned and there’s a lot of work around the corner, like films. In a way, we’re just starting.

“We’ve been through all the stages, struggling, and then hitting it big, we’ve split and re-formed, had number ones, toured the world. Of course, we want to continue improving in all areas, but our main concern now is strong albums.”

Robin has changed over the last few years. He appears more confident and far from the insecure figure that toured the US in the last part of the sixties.

“I know what people think of me,” he sighs. “I used to be very insecure. There was a lot of pressure around me and I had trouble coping with initial stardom and touring. That’s changed, as I’ve come from this boy-to-man period the last five years. A new era has started. I feel great about the people around me. I know the Bee Gees have touched people. I can see that by our fan mail and questions fans ask when they want me to sign an autograph. The most typical question we receive through the post is ‘When are you visiting again?’”

(Harvey Kubernik is the author of 20 books, including 2009’s Canyon Of Dreams: The Magic And The Music Of Laurel Canyon, 2014’s Turn Up The Radio! Rock, Pop and Roll In Los Angeles 1956-1972, 2015's Every Body Knows: Leonard Cohen, 2016's Heart of Gold Neil Young and 2017's 1967: A Complete Rock Music History of the Summer of Love.

Sterling/Barnes and Noble in 2018 published Harvey and Kenneth Kubernik’s The Story Of The Band: From Big Pink To The Last Waltz. In 2021 they wrote Jimi Hendrix: Voodoo Child for Sterling/Barnes and Noble. 

Otherworld Cottage Industries in 2020 published Harvey’s Docs That Rock, Music That Matters. His Screen Gems: (Pop Music Documentaries and Rock ‘n’ Roll TV Scenes) was published on February 6, 2026 by BearManor Media.

Harvey spoke at the special hearings in 2006 initiated by the Library of Congress held in Hollywood, California, discussing archiving practices and audiotape preservation.

In 2017, he appeared at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio, in its heralded Distinguished Speakers Series, and as a panelist where he discussed the forty-fifth anniversary of The Last Waltz at the Grammy Museum in Los Angeles in 2023.

During 2025, Kubernik was interviewed in the Siobhan Logue-written and -directed documentary The Sound of Protest,airing on the Apple TVOD TV broadcasting service. The film also features Smokey Robinson, Hozier, Skin (Skunk Anansie), Two-Tone's Jerry Dammers, Angélique Kidjo, Holly Johnson, David McAlmont, Rhiannon Giddens, and more.

Harvey was an interview subject along with Iggy Pop, the Beach Boys’ Bruce Johnston, Love’s Johnny Echols, the Bangles' Susanna Hoffs, Victoria, Debbi Peterson, and founding members of the Seeds for director/producer Neil Norman’s documentary The Seeds: Pushin' Too Hard. In summer 2026, the GNP Crescendo company will release it on DVD/Blu-ray.

Kubernik is a featured interview in the Alex Rotaru directed documentary Elvis, Rocky and Me: The Carol Connors Story that premiered in January 2026 at the 37th Palm Springs International Film Festival. She was Elvis Presley’s lover, and Rocky Balboa’s lyricist. The twice Academy Award nominated songwriter’s career is captured in interviews with friends Dionne Warwick, Dianne Warren, Bill Conti, Talia Shire, David Shire, Barbi Benton, Mike Tyson and Irwin Winkler. Her songwriting credits include the Rip Chords 1964 hit “Hey Little Cobra,” and Billy Preston & Syreeta Wright duet “With You I’m Born Again.”  During 1977, Carol Connors co-wrote “Gonna Fly Now (Theme from Rocky”).  The post BEE GEES LIMITED EDITION 4 LP COLLECTION DUE FEBRUARY 27 first appeared on Music Connection Magazine.

Bitcoin bottom signal that preceded 1,900% rally flashes againBitcoin’s “short-term holder stress” metric has fallen to lows not seen since 2018, suggesting the market has capitulated and possibly bottomed.

Get free haunting strings for Splice INSTRUMENT
Download our free haunting strings preset for Splice INSTRUMENT—grab these presets during the drop window and they’re yours to keep forever.

Creating the World’s Most Efficient Quadcopter DroneKeeping an eye on remaining battery charge. (credit: Luke Maximo Bell, YouTube)
Although not a typical focus of people who fly quadcopter drones for a hobby or living, endurance flying has a certain appeal to it for the challenge it offers. Thus, as part of his efforts to collect all the world records pertaining to quadcopter drones, [Luke Maximo Bell] has been working on a design that would allow him to beat the record set by SiFly Aviation at 3 hours and 11 minutes.
By using knowledge gained from his PV solar-powered quadcopter, [Luke] set about to take it all a few steps further. The goal was to get as much performance out of a single Watt, which requires careful balancing of weight, power output and many other parameters.
Crucial is that power usage goes up drastically when you increase the RPM of the propellers, ergo massive 40″ propellers were picked to minimize the required RPM to achieve sufficient lift, necessitating a very large, but lightweight frame.
The battery packs are another major factor since they make up so much of the weight. By picking high-density Tattu batteries and stripping these down even more this was optimized for as well, before even the wire gauge of the power wires running to the motors were investigated to not waste a single Watt or gram.
All of this seems to have paid off, as a first serious test flight resulted in a 3 hour, 31 minutes result, making it quite feasible that [Luke] will succeed with his upcoming attempt at the world’s longest flying electric multirotor record. Another ace up his sleeve here is that of forward movement as well as wind provides effectively free lift, massively reducing power usage and possibly putting the 4 hour endurance score within easy reach.

Spotify says it has ‘helped artists generate’ $1bn+ in ticket sales to date. Now it’s teaming up with SeatGeek to drive even moreSeatGeek becomes the latest ticketing platform to join Spotify's growing live events ecosystem.
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ivoschi NoteWarpNoteWarp generates melodies, basslines, chord progressions and variations from your MIDI input – right inside your DAW. Key Features: - VST3/AU plugin for macOS & Windows. - Easy Mode for quick results, Pro Mode for full control. - 9 built-in algorithms: melody variation, chord generation, bassline creation & more. - AI generation: describe what you want in plain text and let the AI write it*. - Chord Fit: snap any melody to your chord progression. - Audio-to-MIDI transcription: drop WAV file or record from DAW – NoteWarp converts it to MIDI. - Built-in piano roll with loop markers. - Record or load/drag files for import or export. - NoteWarp Receiver: route MIDI to multiple instruments/tracks in your DAW. *for AI: Own LLM-API key needed (BYOK) or AI credits to buy (via homepage). 10 credits=generations included in initial buy. Perfect for: Producers who need instant inspiration, melody ideas, or harmonic variations without leaving their DAW. Try it FREE – download installer from homepage - Full functionality, no time limit or buy now. No subscription, no BS • Own it forever • Install on all your computers. Built by a producer, for producers. More info on homepage NoteWarp on YouTube Read More

DAWJunkie releases Padness 2 Jr, a FREE lush pad synth for macOS and Windows
Developer DAWJunkie has released Padness 2 Jr, a free lush pad synth for macOS and Windows. We checked out DAWJunkie’s Padness Jr in September 2025, and by all accounts, it’s a simple freebie that packs a bigger punch than expected, which is the DAWJunkie way. Now, the developer is back with a bigger and better [...]
View post: DAWJunkie releases Padness 2 Jr, a FREE lush pad synth for macOS and Windows

Sonnox releases followup to its flagship Oxford Drum Gate pluginSix years on, Sonnox has released a fresh version of its Oxford Drum Gate plugin. The Oxford Drum Gate 2 update comes as a huge step up, improving on sound quality, workflow and adding a slew of features to provide a “comprehensive” toolkit to clean up your drum recordings.
Back in 2020, MusicTech awarded Sonnox’s original drum tidying plugin top marks at 10/10. To build on the previous release, the company has added new time, polarity and phase alignment features, as well as an improved classification model to detect your kicks, snares, toms and hi hats with accuracy.

READ MORE: Six synths that define Radiohead’s sound

The alignment improvements should make tidying up multi-track drum recordings a piece of cake. Rather than having to suffer through phase coherence issues that come with tracking on multiple mics, Oxford Drum Gate 2’s new Align tab has an “intelligent algorithm” to refine your tone, punch and regain clarity. And Sonnox has made every effort to minimise timing artifacts, a pesky downside of other alignment tools.
Elsewhere, the new Adaptive Resonant Decay algorithm also lends from Sonnox’s Claro EQ plugin, adopting its resonance detection in order to detect and separate resonant decay from your drums. The algorithm is able to separate the initial drum hit form the corresponding spill, while still maintaining transients.
Users can also tweak their parameters of Gain Reduction, Decay, High-Frequency Damping and High and Low cutoffs.

Sonnox has also added an external sidechain input, making Oxford Drum Gate 2 more versatile than its predecessor. There are three input modes to allow flexibility, with Internal input, the External sidechain, and MIDI triggering.
Elsewhere, there’s also the new Hit Clip leveller clipper, another effort to maintain punch and clarity within your drum track. Hit Clip consults a hit’s post-leveller peak level and calculates the ceiling for each hit following hit. The tool also provides separate controls for Soft Hits and Loud Hits, to aid with your transient shaping.
To make the UI experience clear and intuitive, Oxford Drum Gate 2 also automatically groups tracks by name, as well as providing visual feedback. The plugin also offers stereo linking for overheads and room mics.
Of course, if you do miss the previous Oxford Drum Gate instalment, you can flick on Standard mode. The option to hop back to the original version allows a sense of familiarity, allowing you to pick and choose between the newer features and the tried-and-true original Oxford Drum Gate experience.
Existing Oxford Drum Gate owners can upgrade for £41.66, while customers who purchased Oxford Drum Gate on or after 1st September 2025 will receive Oxford Drum Gate 2 as a complimentary upgrade.
Sonnox Oxford Drum Gate 2 supports both Windows and macOS in VST3, Audio Unit, and AAX plug-in formats.
Oxford Drum Gate 2 is available now at an introductory price of £99.99 until 31 March (normal price £149.99). For more info, head to Sonnox.
The post Sonnox releases followup to its flagship Oxford Drum Gate plugin appeared first on MusicTech.

Sonible releases puffer:fish, a playful FREE saturation plugin with three modes
Sonible has released puffer:fish, a free saturation plugin for macOS and Windows that wraps harmonic distortion in a colorful, character-driven interface. We’ve seen plenty of one-knob saturation tools over the years, including the super popular Softube Saturation Knob, among countless other freebies. puffer:fish follows the same concept but approaches it from a different angle, at [...]
View post: Sonible releases puffer:fish, a playful FREE saturation plugin with three modes

Poly Flanger is an “intelligent” flanger plugin from Minimal Audio that moves musically with your trackMinimal Audio has unveiled Poly Flanger, a new “intelligent” and harmonically aware flanger plugin which modulates in line with your track’s pitch, scale, rhythm and other parameters.
While traditional flangers often move independently of the music itself, Poly Flanger works in tandem with your tracks, aligning with these global parameters for a more musical result.

READ MORE: Suno says “accessibility” is the reason for its success — but I think accessibility is the problem with AI music

Thanks to its intelligent design, Poly Flanger can also add in-key arpeggiated movement to your synth or lead lines. And Minimal Audio has made every effort to make it simple – simply set a scale and the Poly Flanger aligns itself with the closest in-key note, snapping into tune and working musically with your track.
You can also stack multiple flanger voices – up to eight – to build “rich, layered” textures. “Each voice adds depth and dimension, letting you go from subtle thickening to full harmonic weight,” Minimal says.
Elsewhere, you can choose from multiple LFO shapes or add randomisation to create stereo movement, to further evolve your tracks. You can also adjust how dry or wet you want your flanging to sound.
Whether you’re keen to take advantage of its scale-aware pitch snapping, want to build multi-voice harmonies or add wider stereo depth and movement to your tracks, Poly Flanger has plenty to offer. It even comes with 80 presets to get the ball rolling.
Poly Flanger is fully compatible with all major DAWs with macOS 10.11 and higher, as well as Windows 10 and higher.

Poly Flanger is available now at an introductory price of $29 (normal price $49). For more info, head to Minimal Audio.

The post Poly Flanger is an “intelligent” flanger plugin from Minimal Audio that moves musically with your track appeared first on MusicTech.

Margo XS on producing “pop music as noise music”“I like to imagine a song as a planet; you have to use its resources to construct it,” begins pop’s latest in-demand producer, Margo XS. When she catches up with MusicTech from Los Angeles, she’s heading to a studio session to work on the deluxe edition and remix album of Zara Larsson’s Midnight Sun, the Swedish popstar’s Grammy-nominated reinvention LP, for which she co-produced nine songs, including bangers Blue Moon and Crush. Arguably instrumental to its success has been Margo’s bold electronic production, where she makes minimalism sound and feel maximal.
“My philosophy with producing is to have sound overlap as little as possible”, the Michigan-born producer says. “People might think about that as using EQs and sidechain compression to remove space and create room for another element but, for me, it’s not the more elements you add, the bigger it gets, but rather making each element as big as it can possibly be”.
How, though, does she achieve this? “Allow a bass, synth or drum to take up the entire frequency spectrum and let it exist individually in that moment. So while the composition is minimal, it can be the biggest 808 you’ve ever heard because it’s holding way more space than if it were competing with a bunch of synthesisers and drums.”

Margo learned this from her love for Skrillex, realising that the iconic producer’s gritty music is a series of one “maxed-out” sound after another. More recently, she’s analysed pop production similarly: “The less elements you have, the more room you can make for a big vocal.”
She recognises this isn’t always possible, however. “With a lot of songs, you need to have multiple things going on at once. But when I can get away with having one really big sound be the primary focus, I try to prioritise that”. This is how Margo fuses a variety of bass and drum sounds that would, in theory, clash in the low frequencies — wide, full-spectrum bass sounds and snare drums with lots of low-end information, for example.
This was true of the experimental sonics that she helped bring to the core of Midnight Sun: “There are a lot of weird sounds and weird moments — from the plugins I used from independent developers, to the varying MP3 codecs”. She also notes the custom sounds – “there are many songs where all the drums are synthesised” – as well as “playing with form”; the track Hot & Sexy is four different songs combined over a year.
She adds that, thanks to co-producer MNEK, there is a lot of varispeeding, detuned synthesisers, some songs “not in 440Hz” and lots of different methods of pitch shifting. The overarching idea, Margo says, was to “create interest and excitement”.
Margo XS. Image: Press
Contrastingly, when she gets in the studio with frequent collaborator Kim Petras – with whom she has crafted multiple speaker-blowing hyperpop bangers – they give themselves strict restrictions. “We’re always obsessed with the idea of ‘what is a synth line that can repeat over and over that you’ll never get sick of?’, and to not crowd that up with counter melody as a way to hide the catchiness.”
Instead, they embrace it and place them in different contexts. The beats for Freak It, for example, were borne out of Margo’s desire to make the loudest ending to a pop song ever. “It’s fucking ridiculous,” she laughs.
All this ties in perfectly with Margo’s ethos as a producer who started in the noise and industrial scenes. “Pop music as the most extreme it can be,” she says, adding that what drew her to the disparate genre was “how extreme saturation can be used, and how upfront and unforgiving it is”.
Of her credits so far, this applies most obviously to the aforementioned Freak It. “We wanted to make an EDM-pop song that is uncompromising in its use of compression limiting, almost as if it’s completely experimental music.” For Margo, it’s all “a fun challenge — and to still make it catchy and listenable”.
Take her upcoming production work for masked viral sensation horsegiirL: “I realised that what I could add to her harder, cheeky donk tunes was my pop vocal producing background,” she enthuses. “It’s been fun helping to find the threads between those worlds with her, because I’m just as in love with obscure underground dance music as I am the most basic bitch pop”.
Margo XS. Image: Press
Margo’s biggest commercial breakthrough could be right around the corner, though. She recently had “a really good session” with pop megastar Demi Lovato. “She’s really sweet and I hope there’s a song that comes out with this two-step new-school UKG drop that I’m really stoked about,” Margo teases.
Considering the vast array of names that Margo works with, it’s fair to say she switches her technique or style depending on the genre. “One thing that attracted me to being a producer was that I don’t have to feel locked into a specific sound,” she says. “Whereas, with being an artist, there’s pressure to evolve, but in a way that still stays true to the original concept or style of the record…”
Being a producer, then, is freeing. “I don’t want to deal with that,” she says bluntly. “If I want to make a rock record, I want to make a rock record. If I want to make a dubstep record, I want to make a dubstep record.” Hopping between projects has therefore allowed Margo to “go through all of these different phases without any guilt”.
These varying aspects of her artistry have culminated in deBasement, Margo’s electro-punk project with Alli Logout (vocalist of New Orleans post-punk group Special Interest), which started around the time the pair moved to LA. “The rave community is strange and not very gelled, and I was missing great DJs, great systems, great lights… that’s the thing that keeps me going.” Feeling the same way, they became “a haven for each other” to make and explore that music in a city that “we were still trying to figure out how to exist in”.
Margo XS. Image: Press
Exploration and experimentation have long been key to Margo’s productions — and the same can be said of her vision for the future of pop. “I hope that it continues to surprise people,” she says, describing the genre as traditionally “very forward-thinking.
“Pre-DAW and home studio pop artists and producers were some of the only people to have access to new and expensive technology back then,” she continues, citing David Bowie being responsible for some of the first uses of digital pitch shifting, The Beatles with ADT (Artificial Double Tracking), Kate Bush the Fairlight CMI… “and all the crazy shit that happens on [Michael Jackson’s] ‘Thriller’ that had never existed before”.
In light of the democratisation of music in more recent years – which Margo partly puts down to the rise of streaming – she’s confident about where things could be heading. “I would really love a song that goes up the charts where people are like ‘I did not know something this weird can be this catchy!’”
With Margo XS consistently pushing sonic barriers and breaking new ground, bold new sounds will be infiltrating the mainstream for years to come.
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Hvoya Audio releases Sand, a FREE differential compander for macOS and Windows
Sand is the latest release from Hvoya Audio, a sound design tool for macOS and Windows that compands the derivative of the original signal. It expands the quietest signals and adds some soft limiting to the loud signals, adding grit and texture. Working on the derivative rather than the original signal yields some interesting side [...]
View post: Hvoya Audio releases Sand, a FREE differential compander for macOS and Windows

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