Skip to main content
Making Mashups with Stem Separation

Learn how to use DJ.Studio's Stem Separation tools to make cool mashups!

Noah Feasey-Kemp avatar
Written by Noah Feasey-Kemp
Updated over 7 months ago

Follow these instructions for a demo on using DJ.Studio's Stem tools to make mashups.

Step One - Initial Setup

Tracks:

- Bob Musella - Baby Hot Stuff (Original Mix)

- Sgt Slick - Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (Sg Slick's Melbourne Recut)

- Star The Party - I feel Love (Kevin McKay Remix)

Not sure why my tracks are in totally different keys.

- Baby Hot Stuff: 6A instead of 9B

- Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!: 7A instead of 10B

- I Feel Love - 5A instead of 9B

Transition:

- Crossfade 50%

- Swap 0

- Baby Hot Stuff: 121 -> 137 and Gimme Gimme Gimme: 25->41

- Gimme Gimme Gimme: 129->145 and Start the Party: 25-> 41

Step Two

Gimme Gimme Gimme -> Start The Party transition

- Turn on stems

- Take Start the Party stems to 37 with melody coming in from 33

- Take Gimme Gimme stopping at 37 except for vocals

Step Three

Giving Donna Summer a big reverb on her voice

- Right-click on Start the Party and choose "Split Acapella and Instrumental

Which will leave you with acapella in the sample 1 track

Select the track, click Effects at the bottom, and set Reverb to 70% Size / 50% Mix

Step Four

Stem separated transition from Hot Love to Gimme Gimme

Get rid of the equalizer transitions

Turn on stems

Baby Hot Stuff: Pull red back to 131.5, drums (blue) back to 129.5

Gimme Gimme: Push green and yellow out to 36.5, bring in red from 35.5 to 36.75

Step Five

Borrow a beat from Hot Love to spice up Gimme Gimme

Zoom in on the early part of Baby Hot Stuff

Shift-Click and drag _inside the track_ to select bars 21-23, and choose "Copy drums"

Which should give you this

(Not sure why sometimes the waveform doesn't show, but the pure drum sample is there)

Now move it to the second sample lane, drag it over to the right until it starts at measure 41 from

Gimme Gimme Gimme, and extend it to 145 (the end of the ABBA track)

Step Six

Spice up the transition with some vocal teasers

Remove the vocals from Hot Stuff completely

Select bars 40-> 52.5 from Gimme Gimme Gimme and choose "Copy Vocals"

Now, shrink it to 41 -> 45 (or just do that from the start lol)

Pull it back to the start of the transition (121 Hot Stuff / 25 Gimme Gimme Gimme)

Now we Option/Alt-Click on the vocal track from Hot Stuff and drag it into Sample 1

***For some reason I have to drag it to _Before_ where the current sample 1 is for Gimme Gimme

Gimme, otherwise it chooses the wrong vocals (or so it seems)

Grab 126.5 -> 129.5

Drag it to Sample 2

Move it back to start at 124.75 (you may have to listen to this to get it to the right position)

Step Seven

Let's make a good intro

Select bars 40.75 -> 44 of Baby Hot Stuff and choose "Extract vocals" which will move it to the Sample 1 track Click on Effects and set Echo to 3/4 Time, 50% Dry/Wet and Reverb to 80% Size / 50% Mix

Now move the sample back to start on bar 24.75

(I'm not sure what the keyboard shortcut is to duplicate and drag a sample)

Duplicate the Gimme Gimme Gimme Sample in The Sample 1 Track and drag it back to bar 33. Then expand it so it repeats once, ending on bar 41. I couldn't quite get this transition to sound perfect though.

Select 196-197 on I Feel Love, Right-click, and choose "Copy Sample". If it shows up at the end of the Sample 1 track, drag it to Sample 2. Either way, position it starting on 17 and ending on 41.

Did this answer your question?