It's already half done.
Everything you need lives right here in our shared Dropbox: Hydrofonix/Strange Session 1/. Four song folders inside — 01_Psycho, 02_Devil, 03_Bonkers, 04_Box.
I already renamed every stem into the format the engineer at Strange wants, so when you load them into Ableton your track names come up clean from the jump. The Freek-export caps style for instruments, with track-number prefixes signaling what family the sound belongs to.
If you ever want the source → renamed cross-reference, it's in NAMING-MAP.md in this folder. Originals at Hydrofonix/Songs/{song}/ are untouched — everything in here is a copy. Work freely.
Per song. Five steps.
- Add a 2-bar count-in at the head of the arrangement. (See "What's a 2-bar count-in?" below if it's a new term.)
-
Load the renamed stems from the song's
Stems/folder. Track names come up clean automatically. -
Align the stems against
INSTRUMENTAL-REF.wavat the song folder root. Confirm the stems sum to the instrumental cleanly so my vocals stay in time. - Delete the instrumental track from the Ableton arrangement. (Except for Bonkers and Box — see per-song notes. The deletion rule is NOT uniform.)
-
Save the Ableton session back into the song folder right here in
Strange Session 1/so I can pick it up.
From there I take it: SFX onto 1–2 tracks, trim my rough vocal references down to a single track, then bounce the engineer-facing WAVs.
Two bars of silence (with the click still running) at the very start of the arrangement, before bar 1 of the song actually plays.
- The Strangeland engineer is loading the bounce into Pro Tools. The 2-bar lead-in gives him a clean tempo reference and timing anchor to line the file up to his grid.
- Gives me a beat to breathe before the song hits during tracking — no clipped first syllables.
- Industry standard. Engineers expect it. A WAV that starts cold on bar 1 with no count is a small "this person hasn't done this before" tell.
In Ableton: select all clips, shift everything 2 bars right so bar 1 of the song lands at bar 3 of the project. Make sure the metronome is on (or drop a clean click on a separate mutable track for those 2 bars). Bounce range starts at bar 1 of the project.
Per-song spec at a glance.
| Song | Stems | Delete instrumental? |
|---|---|---|
| 01 Psycho | 26 | Yes — after alignment |
| 02 Devil | 23 + chorus vocal | Yes — after alignment |
| 03 Bonkers | None — no stems exist | No — keep it, it IS the audio |
| 04 Box | 14 beat + 4 vox | No — Ducoh's verse is baked in |
I Am Psycho
- Folder:
01_Psycho/ - Stems:
01_Psycho/Stems/— drums, bass, brass section (lots of brass parts), strings, vinyl & scratches, hooks, vox topline - Reference:
INSTRUMENTAL-REF.wav(Valdy's master "PSYCHO w_Hook 100 bpm") - Standard rule: delete instrumental track after alignment is confirmed
Devil On My Shoulder
- Folder:
02_Devil/ - Stems:
02_Devil/Stems/— Freek's clean export. Includes40_Devil_HOOK-VOCAL.wavwhich is the female chorus a-cappella. - Reference:
INSTRUMENTAL-REF.wav(Freek's "Stereo Out" master) - Standard rule: delete instrumental track after alignment is confirmed
The chorus vocal stays in. I'm not tracking the chorus at Strange — Freek's hook vocalist sings it. The whispered intro is on me to track separately (clean, dry, close-mic — engineer formant-shifts it in the mix), so that part won't be on the stems.
Bonkers
- Folder:
03_Bonkers/ - No stems — Riddick X Unlimited tier didn't include them
- Only file:
INSTRUMENTAL.wav - Workflow is just: 2-bar count-in on the instrumental, save the Ableton session
The outro is currently a [Slow Guitar riff] placeholder. I'm deciding whether to lock that or replace it with a "talking shit at end" concept. Hold on saving the final Bonkers session until I confirm the outro plan. The count-in and arrangement work can happen now — just don't lock it.
In My Box
- Folder:
04_Box/ - Stems:
04_Box/Stems/— 14 beat stems (DJ Pain 1 / IkeThaWrita) plus 4 vox stems from Ducoh (lead, harmonies 1, harmonies 2, adlibs) - Reference:
INSTRUMENTAL-REF.wav(the With-Hook master, Travis Scott type beat)
Ducoh's verse is baked into the master instrumental. If you delete the instrumental track, his verse goes with it. Keep both options live in the Ableton session — the stems AND the all-in-one instrumental — so the engineer at Strange has the choice on the day.
Where they go.
Save each Ableton session into its corresponding folder under Hydrofonix/Strange Session 1/ — same parent as the stems and the master ref.
How the naming works.
Format: ##_SongShort_INSTRUMENT.wav — track number signals family band, song shortname keeps things from pooling, instrument in caps.
01-09Drums & Percussion10-19Bass · 808 · Sub20-29Melody · Keys · Brass · Strings30-39Textures · FX · Pads · Vinyl40-49Hooks · Hook vocals · Vox samples50-59Reference vocals
Full source-to-renamed map is in NAMING-MAP.md in this folder if you ever need to cross-reference what something used to be called.