Yushh: The Sound of Forward Pressure

Bristol is a hotbed of left-field dance producers with ears for textured sound design and unconventional rhythm. One of the most promising stars rising from the city’s underground is Jennifer Hartley, who crafts dynamic tracks under the moniker Yushh. The Pressure Dome label boss sauntered into the club circuit in the late 2010s. She cut her teeth prolifically behind the decks, sharing bills with beloved DJs ranging from Rhyw to Tom VR to DJ Voices. “In Bristol, I think the freedom to experiment and not feel judged, or a competition, that’s what leads to the most exciting stuff,” Hartley muses on the healthy state of her hometown’s supportive scene.

Hartley was more patient in unveiling her recorded output. She slowly rolled out short-form releases on slithery electronic institutions including Well Street Records and All Centre. Yushh hit an even stronger stride in 2023. “Releasing my first two EPs last year were quite big moments for me. Because with the Wisdom Teeth EP, apart from ‘Same Same,’ I’d written all those tunes a while ago,” Hartley says. “I knew when I wrote them, they were satisfying something in me.” Her knack for seamlessly pairing glittery ambience with shifty, broken-beat rhythms makes Yushh a mesmerizing standout in a sphere of artists typically associated with pummeling disorientation.

We recently caught up with Hartley to chat about her creative background, studio process, and academic command of Ableton.

What was your road into music like? Was Yushh your first project or did you wear other hats before you started producing club music?

Yushh was the first thing that I ever released under. I’ve been making music for quite a long time. But it was really in the last seven years, since I moved to Bristol, that I was, like, “Right, I’m actually gonna try and get good at writing music and be happy enough to release something.”

I started off playing piano as a kid. And then my dad bought a synth and Cubase and a little MIDI interface and I started using a DAW at quite a young age. It was just fun, it was just a hobby. I never really had a clue about how I could ever release anything. I was really into school and wanted to just be normal and go to uni and do a degree. But I’d been working in an office job for quite a while and I was just not very happy and music was making me happy so I was, like, “Fuck it, I’ll give it a go.” I put a lot of time in and work. I seem to be doing okay.

Could you talk about running Pressure Dome and how you juggle being a DJ, producer, and label boss?

I think it’s quite hard, really. I always feel like something’s giving and I’m not able to focus on everything as much as I’d want. Obviously, all of the work is self-driven. So you really have to be able to motivate yourself, even if you’re feeling a little bit down about stuff or if nothing’s really working in the studio or you didn’t have the best gig on the weekend. You have to keep telling yourself, “Go.” I think that’s quite hard sometimes, but you just keep plugging on and something always comes together eventually. 

Could you talk about what your production process is generally like?

A lot of experimenting. If I’m in a rut with things, then I know I need to change my process, whether that’s changing stuff around in my studio or trying to get a new found sound or setting up some new effects chains. It’s all about just constantly evolving my process and keeping it interesting for myself. I do quite a lot of jamming, so not really looking at my computer screen.

Is there any gear or any plugins that you find yourself particularly excited about?

I love Devious Machines’ Infiltrator. It’s super, super versatile. I love using the Ableton LFOs on so many things because of the versatility of being able to map an LFO to whatever parameter you want. I love all of the Unfiltered Audio plugins because they’ve got in-built LFOs.

Download Yushh’s free Live Set with her custom-made devices for Ableton Live 12

*Live 12 Suite required

How much of what you do as a producer happens inside the box versus using external hardware?

I spend a lot of time in the box because I’m an obsessive nerd about getting everything perfect. But I always make sure that I start any session by doing some out of the box jamming. I feel like it’s more of a play state, so you end up in a freer headspace when you’re creating sound. Whereas when you’re looking at things in a box, that’s when the thoughts start creeping in, like, “Who’s gonna like this sound?”

Could you talk a little bit about your relationship with Ableton? What drew you to the DAW and what do you like about it?

I was with a friend of mine and they had a little Ableton pad controller and I was just messing around with it. I was like, “Oh, this is quite fun, actually.” And then I went to uni and they gave you a free copy of Ableton. Within a few months I was like, “Yeah, I’m gonna use Ableton.” I think it was the audio manipulation that I liked first about it: just how easily you could drag a piece of audio into Arrangement View and just, without putting any effects — just using the different warping techniques and Follow Actions and time-stretching and being able to reverse it immediately — all of those things that I wanted to do were just easily done. I was enjoying the workflow a lot more. And with the thought about potentially doing a live set in the future, it made sense. I actually teach Ableton now.

Are there any Ableton features that you find particularly useful?

I use the Convolution Reverb all the time. I love the Wavetable synth, it’s super versatile. The Corpus is really fun. If you have a basic-sounding percussion loop that you know tons of people have used, you can do some really fun stuff to use the rhythm of it and get some interesting results. I use the Echo a lot. I really love putting the feedback on the reverb of the echo, you can get some really cool delay trails. Setting up a load of samples and just setting them all to different Follow Actions can get some crazy rhythmic results.

How do you contrast driving rhythms and light textures?

I think it’s got quite a lot to do with the mix and the choice of sounds. I try not to use sounds that are too obnoxious. I like to have all things working together, and it’s very rare that I have a tune that’s got one very full, driving element. I always try to have a number of things that compliment each other. I think it’s also just because of the influences I have. I love really heavy, in-your-face dance music. But I also love really beautiful, airy, ambient, emotional, deep stuff. When a track manages to do both, but not in an abrasive way, it’s really nice.

Keep up with Yushh on Bandcamp and Instagram

Text and Interview: Ted Davis

Photo: James Harrison