Viral dance trends have seemingly overtaken social media. Anyone can create a dance, and anyone can learn a dance. Viral dance trends have especially taken off since the beginning of the pandemic as millions of people have been stuck at home under lockdown mandates.
One of the latest dance trends that have gone completely viral comes from Young Thug and Gunna’s new song “Ski.” The song has over 26 million views on YouTube and is one of the hit singles from the album “Slime Language 2.” The track debuted on April 16 as part of Thug and Gunna's compilation album with YSL Records, "Slime Language 2." Not long after it dropped, "Ski" peaked at No. 1.
The song’s accompanying dance is simple, and all one has to do to master it is swing their arms like they’re using ski poles. Many have added their own flair into the dance, but it really is as simple as imitating the motion of skiing.
Young Thug & Gunna - Ski Challenge [Compilation] | Young Stoner Life
The Rise of the #SkiChallenge
The release of Young Thug and Young Stoner Life Records' Slime Language 2 album came with much more than A-list rapper features and a 24-song tracklist. Young Thug getting snowed on.
Launched by Young Thug himself in late March, the viral dance has been performed by celebrities such as Drake, Chris Brown, Future, Diddy, and many others. The clip, which was also uploaded to his Instagram Stories and the Young Stoner Life Records IG page on March 28, is captioned, "What’s the name of this challenge?" The challenge later adopted the name #SkiChallenge.
Over two weeks after Young Thug showcased the dance online, it began to take a life of its own. Diddy was one of the first artists to do the #SkiChallenge and post it on his IG page.
In his clip, which was uploaded just before SL2 arrived, the mogul is seen doing his own variation of the dance in which he later leans forward and is pulled back by his son Christian Combs, who tightly grips onto Diddy's hoodie so the Bad Boy Records founder doesn't face plant onto the ground. His other son, Justin Combs, enters the frame of the video shortly after.
Diddy captioned the clip, "Soundtrack for the week - Skiii 🖤⛷ It hit different with take two! Slime Language 2 out now!!!" Unlike the moves Thugger and Diddy displayed, Hendrix puts a different type of sauce on the soon-to-be viral dance while rocking a cream robe.
While Diddy and Future are members of the hip-hop community who have engaged in Young Thug's challenge, which Thugger has been pushing via social media and encouraging others to join, celebrities outside of the rap space are joining in on the fun.
Actor and comedian Kevin Hart posted a video of himself trying his hand at the #SkiChallenge on Monday (April 19). Hart captioned his post, "Decided to go skiing tonight.....
What is "Ski" All About?
But what is Young Thug and Gunna's new song all about? As with many rap songs nowadays, "Ski" sees Young Thug and Gunna boasting about their riches, romantic interests, and the amount of marijuana in their possession.
For example, Gunna brags about how much weed he packs in a Backwood: "All this Biscotti I got in my 'Wood, need somebody grow me a tree (Tree)." According to Genius, "Biscotti" is an indica-dominant strain of marijuana.
Meanwhile, Gunna discussed what he thinks about the track in a recent Billboard interview. "I feel like ['Ski'] is like an everybody song so I feel like it's going to reach everybody," he said. "You know how many people in the world?
Justin A. "Ski" is a song by American record label Young Stoner Life and American rappers Young Thug and Gunna. The song was released on April 16, 2021, along the listed artists' compilation album Slime Language 2 (2021). The official music video for the song was released on April 16, 2021, the same day as the track's release. The video was directed by Omar Jones. "Ski" was the second highest debut on the US Rolling Stone Top 100, entering at number nine with 16.4 million streams.
Behind the Scenes: The Making of "Ski"
Angad Bains, aka Bainz, works primarily in the Atlanta rap scene. Traditionally educated in the art of recording, Bainz has had to adapt to Atlanta rap’s studio culture. “The process is always the same. Young Thug, Gunna or another rapper from YSL Records comes into the studio, and they choose a beat to work with. The beat is loaded as a 2‑track into my Pro Tools recording template, and they start improvising over it.
There used to be a time when the red light ruled - make a noise or enter a studio when it is on and you’re dead meat - and artists would come into the studio with carefully prepared songs, with chords and lyrics written down and laboured over for weeks or months. But Atlanta rap culture completely ignores the old paradigm.
“Thug or the other rappers work out their rap in the control room, which usually is full of people, because it adds to the vibe,” Bainz explains. “No words get written down or entered into a phone ever, by anyone. You will be surprised at how fast the rappers move! Sometimes the entire vocal is laid down in less than an hour. It’s about the energy in that moment.
“A lot of the time people will be talking to each other or on their phone during the takes, so it’s not an ideal acoustic environment. Once when we were working in Atlanta, we didn’t have space for the gobo, so the studio assistant stood behind Gunna and held up the gobo in his hand, while Gunna’s engineer, Flo Ongonga, was recording him. It was crazy!
Based in Los Angeles, where he has his own studio, Bainz has been working for Young Thug and his YSL Records since 2017. Deep in the middle of 2020 and of the pandemic, YSL hatched a plan for another Slime Language album.
The concept of the Slime Language compilations is to showcase YSL’s artists, as well as a large collection of guest artists and Thug’s close friends. According to Bainz, working on the album made little difference to his daily rhythm, apart from the complications of the epidemic.
“Since I started to work for YSL, I have barely had any days off. I am Thug’s and YSL’s full‑time engineer, and they are in the studio every day. Because YSL is such a big camp, as a team and as a label, somebody is always working. They operate like a big family. I do mixes for others as well, sometimes, but I am on call all the time as an engineer.
“When the Covid crisis first happened last year, all studios in LA had to shut down. So we did the Slime & B album of Thug and Chris Brown, at Chris’s house. Eventually we went to Atlanta to work on Slime Language 2, and then we came back here. We continued working throughout the pandemic, but with fewer people in the control room, and everybody was constantly getting tested. Because there were no tours last year, I recorded and mixed more than I have in a long time.
Born in New Delhi, India, Bainz got to his position as chief engineer and mixer at YSL in Los Angeles via Australia, Florida and New York. He recalls, “I never played an instrument, but got into DJ’ing and I was into electronic music. I went to Melbourne to do a bachelor degree in something, I can’t remember what it was, but I hated it. I dropped out and then enrolled in the School of Audio Engineering Institute in Melbourne.
“After that I went to Full Sail in Florida. This was in 2006. I graduated valedictorian. I then moved to New York City, where I became an intern at Dubway Studios, which was an indie rock studio, with multiple rooms and analogue equipment. I learned a lot about handling analogue gear there. I became general engineer soon afterwards.
“Blast Off built another room - I got to see how studios were built - which became my room. I worked with Wiz Khalifa there, and a whole bunch of Atlantic artists. Soon after that I met up with Michael Brian, and we started our own studio in SoHo. We got bigger and bigger and after eight years, in 2016, we decided to move the studios to LA.
Bainz has an impressive credit list. In addition to the artists already mentioned, he has worked with Juice WRLD, Sia, Mac Miller, Quavo, Machine Gun Kelly, Prateek Kuhad and many others. When asked why he thinks he managed to be so successful in a relatively short space of time, he reflects: “I guess I’m really fast on Pro Tools, but also, I’m very adaptable. When I met Young Thug, I really immersed myself in his culture. This is really important. When you work with an artist every day, you have to know where they’re coming from, and how they move.
As Bainz already outlined, work on Slime Language 2 started in Atlanta, at the YSL studio there, which has an SSL in the control room. “That desk was barely used,” elaborates Bainz. “I used it once in the six months that I was in Atlanta, to record a horn section. But I would not in any case use an SSL as my main vocal preamp, because I don’t like the sound of an SSL on vocals. A lot of the vocal recordings were done in the SSL room using a Sony C800G, Neve 1073, dbx 902 de‑esser and a Summit Audio TLA.
“I have recorded lots of things, but my job for YSL is mostly recording vocals. The beats tend to come in ready made. Sometimes the producer is there and you’re tracking their production from an MPC or synths or other instruments into Pro Tools. While that occasionally happens, I’m not the producer’s engineer, I’m the artist’s engineer. And when I’m not the artist’s engineer, I’m the artist’s mixer.
“I’m Thug’s full‑time engineer, but also sometimes record Gunna, though he has his own engineer, Flo Ongonga. In the past, when Thug and Gunna were in Atlanta, Flo would record them, and here in LA I’d record them, and neither of us would sleep for days.
From a technical perspective, given the amount of sessions Bainz conducts, he almost unavoidably starts from a recording template. “You have to have it. Essentially the template is built for speed and low latency. It’s got two record tracks, with Antares AutoTune, a playlist track, a bunch of vocal audio tracks, and a dozen aux effects tracks.
“While we are recording, Thug is his own vocal producer. He will pick the takes, or even the bars, he wants to use. Sometimes I will do the comps, but often he gets on the computer and does the comps himself. He knows his way around Pro Tools. We go back and forth. It is like a dance we do.
“Both Thug and Gunna listen back for timing a lot. That’s a big part of what they do. Almost every part gets nudged around, forwards or backwards. Someone who is punched in may come in a bit late, in which case you nudge them forwards, but for the most part we’re nudging vocals back a little bit, because it’s the feel they want.
Once the vocals are recorded and comped, Bainz does a rough mix and the tracks are shelved. Given that complete vocals for each track can be written and recorded in less than an hour, hundreds of tracks end up being recorded.
“How many tracks we record is impossible to say, because we’re recording every day. Whenever everyone really liked a particular song for a few days straight it gets added to a mix album shortlist.
“Once I enter the mix world, I start with cleaning up the vocals, because of all the background noises that usually are on them,” Bainz continues. “I’ll be doing small fades and processing with iZotope RX and also use Clip Effects a lot for the in‑built EQ for every clip, option 6. I don’t use the Zoom presets 1‑5. Instead I have them as Clip Effects presets, which really helps me fly through to the editing. If there is harshness, or something else that needs to be de‑essed, I hit one button and it is going to be notched. It is super‑easy, super‑fast, I don’t even have to open the window.
“A piece of gear that comes in really handy here is the Elgato Stream Deck XL, with Soundflow software. In terms of my workflow this has been a game changer. You can have all sorts of presets. After cleaning up the vocal recordings, Bainz gets down to the actual mixes, which involves loading the recording session into a mix template, and also chasing the individual tracks of the beat. As has also become clear from previous Inside Tracks, the latter is increasingly an issue in the hip‑hop world, and some mixers end up having to mix the vocals to a stereo mix of the beat.
‘Ski’ was written by three producers, Wheezy, Outtatown and BabyWave, and rappers Young Thug and Gunna.“Hell yeah,” agrees Bainz, “that’s often my biggest thing! Some rappers get so married to the demo, knowing every sound, that there’s not much you can do. Thug spends a lot of time making sure that everything is the way it was when he was working with the roughs. So my job is to clean things up and make the beat sound better.
“This happened with the song ‘Ski.’ After I mixed it, Thug said, ‘That 808 needs to be way bigger.’ In the rough it had been really loud and clipped. So I had to go back and try a few things. Bringing in a crazy amount of low end without the rest of the mix collapsing was a bit of a struggle. But it worked out. And you know what? Thug pushed me to do things I would not normally do, and now many people say that mix sounds amazing and they are using it as a mix reference. So Thug brings out the best in people.
“Getting the stems is a problem, though. Once we know that a track is earmarked for mixing, either myself or Geoff Ogunlesi get on the phone and chase the stems. I’m now an established engineer and when I get the producer on the phone I can go, ‘Yo, I’m calling to ask for the stems of your beat, and this means this record may well be used, so it’s in your best interest to get me the stems.’ They agree, but they just don’t like doing it.
“Once the stems do arrive, my assistant is tasked with loading them in the session, lining them up, and replicating each one of Thug’s sometimes crazy edits of the 2‑track of the beat. On top, there may be clicks and pops on the stems. Sometimes they are intentional, but more often than not they’re not meant to be there.
When Bainz mixed in Atlanta, he was in a small, untreated backroom, working just on his laptop, with a McDSP ABP‑16 signal processor, Yamaha HS8 monitors and a pair of Amphion Two15s he borrowed from fellow Atlanta engineer, Slice.
“I then sent the mixes to my assistant in LA, Aresh Banaji, who would load them into the computer here, and run it through my analogue master chain, with summing from the Neve Satellite 5059, and the signal going through an SSL Fusion master processor and a Neve Portico Master bus.
Bainz eventually arrived back in LA, where he conducted more mixes and finished all the mixes he started in Atlanta. He illustrates his mix approach with his mix session of ‘Ski’, a track written by three producers, Wheezy, Outtatown and BabyWave, and rappers Young Thug and Gunna.
“I started using folders because it’s easier to organise the session, and I can collapse everything into one screen. The orange tracks (2‑5) are the 808s that came with the session, and the two brown tracks underneath are parallels. One of which, called VOG.cm is an analogue Little Labs Voice of God effect on an 808 that was committed.
“Below this is the kick track, and the Kick Top is a duplicate, with a filter, the McDSP Filterbank F202, and the Analogue Design Black Box HG‑2 for some analogue tube effect. I really like using plug‑ins that add an analogue vibe, and that’s complemented by the analogue gear in the studio. The clap track has the BDE by DJ Swivel for some dirt, and the beta version of a new plug‑in by him called Knocktonal which doesn’t even have a GUI yet.
“The snare and the snare roll tracks each have the Brainworx bx_console SSL 9000J Series plug‑in, and the Hat and Open Hat tracks have the Oeksound Soothe 2, to get some of the harshness out. The same with the FabFilter Pro‑Q 3 on the hats. Many producers love their hats loud and a little bit too bright, and I have to tuck them in. Another problem is that there often is bleed from the hats via the vocalist’s headphones. You can get away with the snare, but not with the hats.
“I didn’t get the individual elements of the instruments on this beat. Sometimes I’m lucky enough to get them separated, but in this case they’re all on the Melody track. It was a bit sterile sounding, so I ran the track out to the Acustica Camel Pre for some saturation and the SSL Fusion, cranking up the Drive knob, for some distortion.
“Underneath the Melody track are two drums aux tracks, called DrumsTop&Percussion and All Drums. This is a short song and it stays pretty consistent, and most of what I was working on was to get enough energy from the 808s, and getting the other percussion stuff to hit harder. The UAD Studer A800 helped with that, and on the All Drums bus there is a UAD 33609, and again a Black Box.
“Thug’s main lead vocal track is greyed out, because I deactivated it after I printed it on the track below. There’s a long plug‑in chain on the inserts of the lead track, which is: FabFilter Pro‑Q 3, AutoTune Pro, Tokyo Dawn Labs DeEdger (x2), Oeksound Soothe 2, Oeksound Spiff, Pro‑Q 3, Waves C6, SPL De‑Esser and UAD Tube‑Tech CL‑1BN.
“On the printed track below I have the Kazrog True Iron for some transformer saturation, McDSP 404 multiband compressor taking off 2dB in the upper mids and some lows for any leftover plosives and proximity stuff, the Acustica Ruby 2 and Ultra Marine 4, and the iZotope Neutron 3. I love the Acustica stuff, it’s my secret weapon! I get a lot of my vocal tone from the Ruby, which is an emulation of the classic DW Fearn VT‑5 vacuum‑tube EQ.
“By the way, the above vocal treatments are not part of a template. Every song is different. I cannot stress this enough. Vocals are different, and in general I like to change tools with every song. I might have gotten a new plug‑in that I like.