What does it mean to you to be a part of the Firepower 200 release?

To me, being on Firepower 200 is unbelievable. I never thought I’d be signed, to begin with, let alone the label featuring one of my releases as an all-time favorite. I am honored and humbled to be a part of the label’s history!

How did you initially get involved with Firepower?

Initially, I started by submitting to the labels demo email in 2015. One day they replied saying that I had good tracks but needed to work on my mix downs. In 2017, I met Zetta online and we became really good friends and he kind of became my teacher! We then worked on our collaboration “Sedona” that was later released on Shellshock Annihilation, as my first official Firepower Records release.

Your track “I.D.” is on the release. What was the production of approach for this track like?

Honestly, I never really liked “I.D.” because I felt it wasn’t up to par with some of my other tunes at the time. I started it from playing this game Crysis. As I was playing the game, I heard a voice say “Warning” in a really cool robotic tone. The game can be fairly fast-paced, so I made “I.D.” mid-tempo. I first started the intro and built the rest entirely around that while trying to visualize the game within my sounds. The track took about 3 to 4 months to finish because I’d get writer’s block constantly on it when I went to Zetta for some help. He threw the third drop together with my sounds, then did a quick master for me.

Where do you see the future of bass music progressing and how do you think Firepower will play a part in that?

I feel that the bass music industry will definitely grow. But to be completely honest, I can’t imagine what all could happen with it in the future. With the right support and the constant releases of massive tunes, Firepower will remain as one of the best labels out there by far. I plan on sticking around for a long while, so I’ll be here to help build the label, too!

Do you have any advice to share with up and coming producers?

This is a pretty common question I get from many upcoming producers. The biggest thing is that you need a strong brand that makes you different from everyone else – something that makes you unique, but also something fans can connect with. The second thing, is you have to have music that matches your brand entirely while keeping every release constant with “your sound”. For example, Kompany uses the same methods within his work and you can hear when his track is played just by the way it flows and sounds. After that, all I’d have to say is that you have to make friends, not fans. Every supporter is family to me, so I make sure to reach out and reply to everyone I can!

What’s next for Rettchit in 2019?

I’m not quite sure what’s to come in 2019 yet, but I feel this year will be big for growth. I’ll be working extra hard on new music and hopefully giving everyone a first look at the new merch my team and I have been working on. Plus, of course, playing shows here and there with hopefully a few festivals!

Check out Rettchit’s latest release “Firepower 200” here:  LISTEN/DOWNLOAD

So many of our fans are aspiring producers. What was the first step you took to becoming a producer of bass music?

I started making music properly around 5 years ago, probably a bit longer than that now even! I remember hearing Skrillex – “First Of The Year” on the radio while I was in the car and i couldn’t quite understand or believe what I was hearing. These days it’s like 90% of what I listen to but back then there had never really been anything that sounded like that before. I went straight home that evening and opened up my old copy of Fruity Loops and started trying to learn how to create music like that! I quickly moved into Ableton and found it much easier to use for me personally. I think in terms of my first steps, I learned pretty much everything I know online, from youtube tutorials mostly or from lurking on music production forums. I think there’s a huge amount of information out there these days–you can learn a great deal if you’re willing to put in the hours of scouring the web!

What was your most important production tool you used on this EP?

The most important thing I have when it comes to making music in general is Sonnox Inflator. Not many people have heard of this, and, when I’m doing a collab, it tends to cause problems because I seem to be the only one who has it, but for me its absolutely essential! I’m not even sure exactly what it does, I think its some kind of exciter/distortion plugin. Its basically a magic plugin that makes things sound a lot louder without raising the actual volume and without compromising audio quality (within reason).

What would you say to critics of bass music who feel it has strayed too far away from its roots?

There certainly was that attitude here in London when America got hold of Dubstep and morphed it into the crazy noisy beast that it is today. But to be honest there’s no need to get yourself annoyed about it, things change, especially music and that’s definitely a good thing. The old school sound of Dubstep still has its place in the world, Caspa & Rusko are still making music and the DMZ lot are still about every now and then playing shows. Yes Skream left to make disco or whatever he does now but you can still go and listen to his old filthy tunes from back in the day if you want, he’s not going to stop you!

If bass music is to innovate, what needs to happen?

I think Virtual Riot needs to stop making preset packs. Just kidding haha, shout out Virtual Riot… But seriously I hear a lot of new producers coming through who are clearly talented and their music is well produced, but sometimes the ideas and the sound design isn’t anything new or exciting and it sounds a little bit contrived. I think it’s important for people to switch it up and experiment with different tempos and styles. It’s easy to fall into a trap of making a certain style because you feel its what people want to hear, we’ve all been there I think. But lately I’ve been having a lot of fun making Breakbeat at House tempo (around 125-135bpm) for instance my track ‘The Discoteque’ . Breakbeat was pretty popular in the UK in the late 90’s early 00’s and i think with a bit of modern production and some heavy bass and crazy sound design it could potentially be reborn.

What is the best way to waste time?

I think the best way to waste time is social media. Sometimes i quickly check my twitter & facebook for 5 minutes and when i’m done i realize an hour as passed and i’ve started 5 different online beefs with people i don’t know.