If you’ve been following meija, “MAGIC” (feat. JAWNY) is one of those tracks that feels like a peek behind the curtain—off-kilter, rough around the edges, but perfectly dialed in. It’s a highlight off his recent album There’s Always Something, which leans heavier into ’90s alternative influences like Beck and Sparklehorse while pulling from personal struggles, family loss, and starting over. But what makes “MAGIC” stand out isn’t just the writing—it’s how the track was pieced together, layer by layer, through some of the most unpredictable gear choices you’ll hear on a modern alt-pop song.
Instead of leaning on plugins, Jamie built this one through a mess of hardware and sampling—stacking an Ensoniq EPS, a Realistic Concertmate-500, and even a Mellotron to create that post-chorus hook. He ran takes through tape, space echo, and resampled the resamples until the whole thing felt human. And if that wasn’t enough, he mic’d up his own throat, ran it through a fidget-spinner tremolo, and used that as a rhythmic layer. It’s the kind of process that sounds insane until you hear how perfectly it all locks in.
Coming off an album that wrestles with leaving his family band (Echosmith), losing loved ones, and figuring out what’s next, “MAGIC” reflects that push-and-pull. It’s equal parts chaotic and controlled, and it shows how far Jamie’s willing to go to make a track feel alive.
Below, we’re breaking down each piece of gear and exactly how it all came together—floppy disks, reel-to-reel tape, and all.
Ensoniq EPS Sampler + Realistic Concertmate-500
Ok, I’m cheating a bit with two synths, but the main sound in the post chorus of “MAGIC” is not a straight forward synth patch. But first, I’ll describe the two pieces of gear. The Ensoniq EPS is a 13-bit sampler from the 80’s that stores everything on floppy disks. A massively oversized sampler by today’s standards and incredibly lofi. And then you may be familiar with the Casio Sk-1, which has an almost cult like following. The Realistic Concertmate-500 is essentially it’s twin brother with a different name. Radioshack did partnerships with synth companies in the 80’s (Moog did one with the MG-1) and would re brand their synths with their own branding, Realistic.
I arguably could’ve added a third synthesizer (Digital Mellotron) to this, but I feel that I’m already pushing the limits. I’ll explain. This song features a heavy amount of sampling and re-sampling. I first played the melody on a very dry patch on the mellotron. I then wanted to have it feel a bit more lofi so I took that sound and sampled it with the Concertmate-500. I was getting closer to the sound I wanted, but I wanted to add some more delay and reverb to it, so I started playing it with a space echo. I
loved the way the long tail of the delay sounded, but I was starting to lose the actual melody. I then had the idea to try and take one of those really spacey notes and sample it yet again but this time with the Ensoniq. Because there was no release or sustain with this new sample, I could have each note have all the space and echo that I wanted, but it would never bleed into the next note. Problem solved, tons of space AND clarity.
I could’ve gotten a somewhat similar result by taking that initial sample and just sending it to a dedicated FX channel. That’s most producers usual go to (myself included), but I had this admittedly overly complicated idea that I wanted to try. That extra step of sampling a second time gave a really unique sound. It just felt more “sampled.” Not a great description, I know, but I think we all have these musical itches that we want to scratch. And they are sometimes hard to describe and this was one of mine.
Fidget Spinner Controlled Tremolo
This is the first pedal that I’ve ever order from Etsy. It’s a tremolo effect that is controlled by a fidget spinner. It works by having a light sensor on the box and every time part of the fidget spinner passes over it, it reduces the signal. It’s not a consistent tremolo sound, but that’s the point. You could get some really interesting sounds by either having it spin super fast or my favorite effect of spinning it reaaaally slow.
I grabbed a contact microphone, held it to my adam’s apple, and plugged it into the tremolo, and sang along to the entire song while randomly spinning the pedal. I did a couple of passes of this, and by the third take, I felt like I hit the right combination of chaotic ramping up and slowing things way down. I then went though and automated the volume to pop out more at the end of certain phrases where I wanted to accentuate it.
I’m always looking for fun little things to mix up the creative process. My friend Kyle Moore brought this over one day and honestly we were just playing around with it. Some times these types of tools are not actually that useful but happy to report that this does not fall into that category.
Ampex ATR-700
This was the first reel to reel tape recorder that I bought. It’s a two channel tape machine from the 70’s and is stupid heavy. I’ve used Ampex inspired plugins for years and was itching to try the real thing. You can record straight into it’s two built in pre amps or you can send already recorded parts and print them to tape before dumping it back into your DAW.
I use tape machines a lot. And this has been my main go-to for drums. For the last two meija records, there are no outside drum samples to be found. I record them live and then send each track to this machine and push it almost into the red to get a really nice “tape saturation” sound. The ampex is actually pretty high fidelity. A common misconception is that using tape is always going to sound lofi, but these bigger reel to reels don’t have to do that. Especially at the faster recording speeds. I find that whenever I print drums to tape, they actually sound more present and feel extra “punchy” in a mix. I also record all my drums in mono. Which is mostly a result of me having only one condenser mic that I use for an overhead. It’s a limitation that I’ve embraced and have actually found that it lends to a very focused and tight sound, which works well for my music.
Reel to reel tape recorders can be expensive, but I’ve had luck finding some at thrift stores. They tend to be more on the lofi side of things, but that is usually a strength. I use all kinds of tape in my recordings. Cassette recorders are a nice low barrier of entry if you want to get familiar with the process. It just sounds cool, and you tend to do some things differently than you would if you stay in your DAW which I find often leads to really great results.
Roland SP-404SX
Another sampler, I know. But this one is different AND significantly newer than the previously mentioned ones! In face, many producers will make full songs and arrangements on the SP-404. It’s much more high quality that the samplers of the 80’s and has some really cool built in digital effects. The SD memory card allows you to hold a bunch of different ideas and songs all in one relatively small workstation.
For this record, the SP-404 is usually paired with the previously mentioned Ampex ATR-700. For the drums on MAGIC, I was inspired by different sample heavy records from the 80s and 90’s. Especially De La Soul, Primal Scream, Beastie Boys and Beck. I loved the idea of “crate-digging” for samples like they did with James Brown and so many other great soul records from the 60s and 70s. But I did NOT want to deal with clearing samples. I spent a lot of time recording analog drums to tape with my last album, so I figured I could take that experience and give myself some sources to sample. I would record a bunch of jams with a drummer and would print them to tape. Then I would go back and listen and use the SP-404 to sample a particular section that I thought could work for a song. For MAGIC, I found a great loop but it was a little slow. I was able to speed it up with the 404. Now the tempo was right, but the pitch felt too high. Luckily you could also pitch down samples with the 404 without slowing it down like you would with some of the older samplers or tape machines.
MAGIC is built on top of this loop, and because it’s played on the 404 it doesn’t totally line up with the grid. And because of that, I couldn’t use a metronome for any other instruments. I had already recorded the bass before I realized this, but decided to just have everything else follow that rhythm section instead of trying to shift things over. It felt really good by itself and I didn’t want to mess with that feel. I think it contributes to the song feeling looser and maybe more “alive.” Happy accident.
Quick Fire Tips For Making Music Like meija
Tip #1: Learn the process of how your favorite records were made and then take that concept and try to apply that do some of your own ideas. Maybe it’s a technical recording process or maybe it’s the act of getting outside of your routine to find a different perspective.
Tip #2: Not all mistakes are bad! Always be open to different ideas. You might do something the “wrong way,” but if you’re open to it, you’ll often find it to be better than what you intended!
Tip #3: Bring a friend. We all can get stuck in our own heads. There’s this idea that everyone’s gotta be there own producer and do everything. You have to learn when it’s time for you to hone in on something by yourself and when you need to bring some other cooks into the kitchen.
The post How It Was Made: meija – MAGIC (feat. JAWNY) (Nettwerk Music Group) appeared first on Magnetic Magazine.