Pair-A-Dyce- The Man Behind The Mix
Pair-A-Dyce is a rapper, producer and sound engineer from Texas. He is also the man behind the mix for many White Collar Rhymes songs and projects. Pair-A-Dyce began his rap career as strictly a rapper in 2004, recording in his home and sharing his music across different internet forums. Over time Dyce devoted himself to understanding the process behind song making. Much of this was done during an internship he had with hip hop icon Mr. Lee.
In studio sessions with Mr. Lee, Pair-A-Dyce would discover there was both an art and a science to music making, beyond a dope vocal take. When asked about a specific time that lit a spark, Dyce recounted “I remember Mr. Lee had made a beat that was dope as hell. Straight jammin. Then he walked into the booth and sang a lil off pitch hook and we were laughin at him like “yo what is you doin messin up your own beat?” He just laughed and told us to wait and see. That ended up being the second track on Slim Thug’s, Tha Thug Show — The Sky. I wouldn’t say I was in awe cause I watched him do some pretty cool stuff, but I learned that you can have a vision no one else will see but you and sometimes people just have to wait.”.
Beyond making music and engineering for others, Dyce navigates individualized pathways to bring an artists vision to fruition. The “art” of Dyce wearing his engineer hat is that he’s not simply cleaning vocals, and quantizing instrumentation; he’s building a foundation for an artist to flourish with a unique, polished sound. The unabashed honesty that Dyce operates with is truly remarkable in an age of instant gratification and payola. Dyce will not tell you it’s good to get return customers. If it’s wack he will tell you and he’ll provide constructive feedback to improve the track. His transparency is as much about integrity as it is his desire to help people unlock their full potential.
As a businessman, Pair-A-Dyce still holds close the valuable lessons from his time with Mr. Lee. Dyce reminisces, “I learned that making music is not cheap, always get documentation when you work with other people, and always place a value on the work you do. I think those are three standards that should be more present all creative spaces”.
While the music industry has vastly changed over the last 20 years that Pair-A-Dyce has been active, he’s adapted to the change. Dyce states, “The drawback is no one thinks art should cost them and artist have no clue what to charge people. Listener’s have gotten used to a monthly subscription or even just hitting YouTube for free so when you say, “buy my album,” the typical response is going to be “why?” And for artists, so many people are chasing fame and attention that they are just giving away their art for free, so why should fans want to give them money to keep going?”
The changing music industry, coupled with the increase ease of access to basically any artist a person could want to listen to at any time has, as Dyce mentioned, drastically impacted artists and engineers alike. The greatest difficulty today is cyphering through the minutia of so much music. Listeners face fatigue when exploring for new music because so much that is released is of poor quality. Listener to fan conversion rates are low for so many because many don’t invest in someone like Pair-A-Dyce to provide them with quality sound and curated advice to push their music to the next level.
If you would like to work with Dyce you can find him on all major social media platforms as Pairadyce. His rates are as follows: Right now $25 for a basic mix (clean up vocals make them stand out on your song), $50 for more enhanced mixing where creative effects are and pay attention to finer details, and $75 if you have a tracked out beat.
Dyce wants people to know, “I’m negotiable for bulk projects (and the above) are the per song rates. I try to give people the first mix on the house just in case they don’t like my style, cause I’m an artist too, so I know people can be particular about their sound”.
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