Metalcore presents unique production challenges — and few are better placed to meet them than genre veteran Jordan Fish.

As co-songwriter and co-producer with Bring Me The Horizon, Jordan Fish has had a defining role in their success. Late in 2023, he left the band to pursue a production career, since when he’s made successful records with Poppy, House Of Protection, Dutch singer S10 and metalcore band Architects. Fish co-wrote and produced almost the whole of Architects’ 11th album, The Sky, The Earth & All Between, which went to number two on the UK album charts.

Play It Safe

Although he works in genres where virtuosity is highly valued, Jordan Fish cheerfully admits that his own instrumental skills are limited. He chuckles that his impressive BMTH live keyboard rig had “a lot of buttons for not much talent! I can’t play keyboards to save my life. My first instrument is probably guitar, and I used to play trumpet when I was younger, which also gave me some music theory knowledge. Playing a little bit of guitar is helpful for rock music, and I have an understanding of how a drummer plays, which is helpful for programming.

“It’s not that I have a problem with virtuoso players. I would love to be one, but I’m not. I respect anyone who is amazing at their instrument. I often tell myself that one day I’m going to really learn how to play the piano properly, but it’s probably not going to happen because I’m working all the time. My musical mind is my strength, more than my ability to play. Any time I should have dedicated to learning to master an instrument, I spent trying to make things. Producing and writing is a natural fit for me, so I would say that my first instrument is the laptop.

“As a teenager I started messing around with production on a computer using Nuendo, and then I went to the School of Audio Engineering in London for a year, where I learned Pro Tools. After that I worked in a studio called Phoenix Sound, at Pinewood Studios in London, where they were also using Pro Tools.

“I worked there for a couple of years, starting in reception, making tea, and earning the minimum wage and all that stuff. They let me use the studio in the evenings and at night, and eventually they let me run sessions. So I was very much on the trajectory of being a recording studio engineer. Over time, I was working with bands and I would make small suggestions or I would add stuff. That moved me into production. Because I was into engineering, I was into the more techy side of things, and I guess that’s why I ended up being a synth person, but it’s not really where I came from. I was more an engineer going into production.”

Soft Start

Fish spent almost 12 years with Bring Me The Horizon, taking the band’s sound more into electronic music territory, and to some degree bluffing his parts live with a live setup based around Apple’s MainStage software and Arturia’s KeyLab MkII and Beatstep hardware. At the end of 2023, while still in BMTH, Fish connected with Architects, initially in an informal way.

“The first song I had an involvement in was ‘Seeing Red’. Dan [Searle, drummer] and Sam [Carter, singer] from the band sent me the song and I gave some feedback via text, and they took it on board. We also went back and forth a little bit over the vocal melody, just over voice memo with me singing some vocal parts, and they then sent me back another version. I never opened my laptop. It was just a mate giving his opinion, but technically speaking it was to some extent production and writing.

“The song came out really well, and in the beginning of 2024, Sam, Dan and I spent a few days together for writing sessions at the studio of the band Royal Blood in Brighton. They had a bunch of demos, and I had some ideas. Each song was different. Sometimes we’d start from nothing. Sometimes Dan had a riff that I’d pull into my computer. I’d say, ‘Give me half an hour, and I’ll try and find a way to make it a song.’ Maybe I changed the tempo, or added some sounds, or I was tweaking the riff to see if I could make it better. I was just trying to catch a vibe to be able to say, ‘OK, here’s what I’m hearing for this.’

“If we all liked where it was going, we’d work out whether what we had was a post-chorus riff or a chorus, and then build on it and create some other sections. Usually the first few hours were focused on trying to get some music that we were all excited by, and then melodies came pretty quickly. I would get onto top-lining pretty early on. I top-line quite a lot, if it’s something that the artist or band wants. Dan and Sam were open to it, so it was a matter of passing around the mic, and if anyone had an idea, they’d sing it, and then someone else might develop that. The melody writing was very collaborative. At this point the musical parts were all programmed, even though I sometimes added some guitars.”

One DAW Opens...

While Fish works in Pro Tools, Sam Carter and Dan Searle were in Logic. “I don’t mind the different DAWs situation,” comments Fish. “We swapped files using AirDrop and hard drives. It feels a bit messy, but I actually like getting a bunch of audio files. It makes working in Pro Tools like having a collage, which is more interesting for me. I’m ripping through the audio files and find the things that work. Sometimes I change the sounds, or add programming, synths or atmospheres. I’d be doing this in front of Dan and Sam, and they’d be guiding.

“I know people say that Pro Tools is less suited for MIDI, but it’s all I’ve ever known. For me it’s always been OK. I’m so familiar with Pro...