Production Breakdown Special Edition - “RefinedHype.com: The Beat”

I haven't been sleeping well for the past few weeks, and it's all thanks to one burning question: “What would RefinedHype.com sound like in musical form?” I know, I know, I realize that makes absolutely no sense, but roll with me here – wouldn't it be cool to browse the 'net's premier hip-hop/urban culture blog while vibing out to a beat generated by the site itself? Yeah, I thought so.

So you can imagine how delighted I was to learn about the existence of CodeOrgan.com, an online service that does just as I described above, generating original compositions from the body of any page on the 'net. In the spirit of spinning time wasted messing around on the Internet into hard-hitting journalism, here are my findings:



Hm... definitely refined, but hype? Not so much – it's a little soft for my tastes. I give this composition a 6 out of 10. Definitely room for improvement.

As a hands-down heavyweight in the “online hip-hop magazine arena” (if I do say so myself), DJBooth.net must have a certifiably dope soundtrack to go along with it, right? Let's see...



Ouch. Did I warn you to turn down your speakers for this one? I meant to.. I'll go ahead and give this one a 2/10. Not so hot.

As you may have guessed by the fact that I transferred these to YouTube for posterity, the songs generated from CodeOrgan are about as permanent as Tibetan sand paintings, particularly when you're dealing with sites as ever-changing as DJBooth and RefinedHype.com. When I tried DJBooth again, a few minutes later, CodeOrgan came up with this:



Hey, not bad. The piano adds a nice hint of tension – kinda like something Dre would compose... after suffering multiple concussions. 6/10.

Hmmm... thus far, the results of my explorations have been underwhelming. Even so, I'm confident that some website out there will yield a beat that's the very definition of fresh. Which gives me an idea...



Now this is a step in the right direction! It still has the “mishmash of random notes” vibe, but the distorted drum loop has me nodding along. 8/10.

OK, I'm gonna take one last shot at creating a musical classic through CodeOrgan. And, hey, what could be more classic than the entire text of William Shakespeare's Othello?



I had to cut this one off, because it was going to go on for about as long as the play's running time, but nonetheless, nice effort, Bill. I give this a 5 out of 10. Don't quit your day job.

So, there you have it, My conclusion? I don't think human producers have anything to worry about just yet. If you manage to come up with anything better using CodeOrgan, well, that's what the comment section is there for. Until next time, RefinedHypesters!