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The Producer Series: Dallas Austin

Twenty-nine tracks from an Atlanta producer who shaped TLC, launched Boyz II Men and then made records with Madonna and Gwen Stefani.

Dallas Austin

Dallas Austin is from Columbus, Georgia, moved to Atlanta as a teenager, and was producing hits before he was twenty. He is one of the small group of people — with Jermaine Dupri, L.A. Reid and Babyface — who turned Atlanta into the centre of American Black music in the 1990s.

His range is the notable thing. Austin produced hard-edged new jack swing, glossy pop-R&B, and later straight pop and rock for white artists, without any obvious change in method. He is also a genuine multi-instrumentalist who plays much of what is on his records.

He founded Rowdy Records and, later, the Dallas Austin Foundation, and has worked extensively in music education in Atlanta.

What to listen for

The TLC material is the core. "Creep" won a Grammy and is one of the strangest hit records of the decade — a song about retaliatory infidelity, built on a muted trumpet loop. "What About Your Friends," "Diggin' On You" and "Get It Up" complete the run.

Boyz II Men's "Motownphilly" is the record that launched them, and Austin produced it when the group were still teenagers.

Monica's "Don't Take It Personal" made a fourteen-year-old singer a star and remains one of the best R&B records of 1995.

Blu Cantrell's "Hit 'Em Up Style" is the most purely enjoyable thing here — a revenge song with a harpsichord on it.

The Madonna tracks come from Bedtime Stories, the album where she moved toward R&B, and "Secret" is the best of them.

Gwen Stefani's "Cool" is the pop peak — a genuinely lovely song about an ex-partner you are still fond of, which almost nobody writes.

Michael Jackson's "This Time Around" and the "I Wanna Be Where You Are" remix are the biggest credits, and Rahsaan Patterson's "Where You Are" is the deep cut.

Go deeper

TLC's CrazySexyCool (1994) is the album — one of the best-selling records ever made by a girl group, and considerably weirder than its sales suggest.

Rahsaan Patterson is the under-heard artist in this orbit and has a genuinely excellent catalogue.

For the Atlanta production world: Jermaine Dupri, Organized Noize, Bryan-Michael Cox and Polow da Don.

Listening note: follow the drums across these tracks and the signature gives itself away. Austin builds around a pocket that sits a hair behind where you expect it, which is why records he touched feel relaxed even at tempo — a producer's fingerprint hiding in plain sight.

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