Behind the Board: The Bloody Beetroots Discusses His Second Home, the Recording Studio

Success and notoriety didn’t necessarily come overnight, but through two decades, The Bloody Beetroots has become one of the most fascinating and highly respected electronic music projects in the world. The main musical outlet of Sir Bob Cornelius Rifo, he released the latest Bloody Beetroots record, FOREVER PART ONE, last month. Featuring eight new songs, the album is a culmination of 20 years of hard work. It’s a definitive portrayal of how Rifo has infused a punk rock energy into the mainstream of electronic music.

Despite shifts in style over the years, Rifo has always maintained that spirit throughout his releases and collaborations. Forever is a musical documentation of Rifo’s journey through the ups and downs. Composing it brought him back to his roots, growing up in Bassano del Grappa, Italy. The album is a portrayal of the power of music. It can soothe and heal, but it can also fight and have resilience.

Rifo has become internationally renowned as a DJ, producer, and songwriter. He has released numerous albums and EPs and embarked on many tours. But it’s some of the work he has done with other artists that have helped establish his mainstream credibility. He has previously worked with Paul McCartney, Dan Reynolds of Imagine Dragons, Jet, and Tommy Lee. He has also worked with Tom Morello, who speaks extremely highly of Bloody Beetroots. In recent years, Rifo has displayed a fearlessness in venturing into new musical territory. His live show is unrivalled, featuring multimedia elements that make his performances into wide-ranging, immersive, and emotional experiences. It has made The Bloody Beetroots a highly demanded act at musical festivals around the world.

Today we are joined by The Bloody Beetroots for, what else, but a Behind the Board interview. We discuss the recording studio and learn more about Rifo in one of the places he most likes to spend time creatively.

Describe your most chaotic studio session ever.

Sir Bob Cornelius Rifo: “Not the most chaotic, but the one I remember for the sheer waste of time and money: I was in Los Angeles around 2010/2011, signed to Ultra Records. They booked me with a topliner I’d never met—can’t even remember his name. If I remember right, it was at EastWest Studios. I walk into the room and wonder why I need a massive analog console just to track a few melodies.

“The slot was from 3 pm to 6 pm. Me and my laptop show up on time… and wait. Nobody is there. Thirty minutes—still nobody. I’m watching time and money burn. After an hour, the topliner’s assistant rolls in with a tray and a bag of sativa, starts rolling blunts. Another 30 and the assistant’s assistant shows up, promptly patches his laptop and interfaces into a stereo channel on the big desk—so yeah, my ‘we don’t need this console’ theory checks out.

“At 5 pm, the topliner finally appears (God bless us all), asks for Auto-Tune in the key of the song I’d written, and starts mumbling takes. By the fifth mumble, under a fog of smoke, I ghosted like Batman. From that day on, I decided: if that’s a ‘normal’ toplining session, it’s not for me.”

Analog vs. Digital—pick a side and tell us why.

“My sound lives exactly between the two, so I’m on the ‘both’ side, they coexist as one ecosystem. Example: if I’m cutting a bass line on a Fender Jazz Bass, I’ll hit a Culture Vulture first, then a simple stock Ableton compressor. I might add a touch of digital distortion, and if the grit isn’t right, I’ll re-run it through the Gamechanger Plasma Distortion, then sidechain it with a MIDI trigger.

“Same with drums: if I’m using Superior Drummer to add weight to a programmed groove, I’ll run it into a FATSO for heavy compression, then sidechain to the digital kick. If the glue isn’t there, I’ll swap to a UAD Distressor and shape the transients until it sits.

“On guitars, I like Neural DSP plugins for flexibility, instant recall, and fast tweaks, but underneath, I’ll track a brutally distorted analog pass through the Plasma to blend in for body and grain.

“Another example is when I prep stems for a mix. I like to run them through a Neve Satellite to add analog colour and saturation, then hit the master with hard digital clipping for density and a locked ceiling.

“Analog and digital in conversation, you know. Non-linear colour and feel from hardware; precision, recall, and automation from software. I move back and forth between fixed parameters and instinct to find the right texture. It’s a workflow.”

Share a recording fail that ended up being a surprising win.

“At some point, I had the chance to work with Paul McCartney. After months of back-and-forth between him and Youth from Killing Joke, the real architect of the connection, I’m at Windmill Studio waiting for Sir Paul to walk in. First, I had to scrub my brain clean and ‘forget’ what he represents so I could stay neutral and objective during the vocal session.

“Side note: I’m in the kitchen making coffee when he walks in and asks if I’m the guy who screams like a chicken on stage. I nod, ‘Nice to meet you, Paul.’ He makes a bagel with Vegemite for us to share. That tiny ritual helped me relax and speak to him like an artist, not a monument.

“Back in the room, I push him to redo the vocal take again and again, almost to exhaustion. He’s patient, but I can see the moment he’s done. He stops me: ‘Enough, I’ll do it.’ Silence. Record rolling. He starts building melodies in real-time loops, the ones you hear in the outro of ‘Out of Sight.’ Real win. Pure magic. Off the map in the best way. Sometimes the job is to set the framework, then get out of the way.”

Share your funniest studio mishap.

“Not the funniest, but meaningful to me, and it underlines how hard communication gets when you’re speaking two different languages.

“Around 2011, at RAK Studios, working with Youth and recording a real orchestra for the first time for a song called ‘THE FURIOUS.’ I’m 100 percent Italian, and back then, my English was wrecked, comprehension was worse, and the thick British accents finished me off. We Italians are notoriously terrible at learning languages; it took me years to really express myself in English, and I’m still working on it.

“From the control room, the conductor kept asking, ‘Can I speak to everything?’ Every time he said it, I shrank a little, so did my ears. I was sure he meant everyone, so the confusion was real, and the few reference points I’d set to survive the session just collapsed. End of the day, everyone’s smiling. A lovely musician walks over, shakes my hand: ‘Nice to meet you, I’m Everton.’ Lightbulb. He wasn’t addressing the room; he was paging Everton. I laughed, mostly out of relief. And I promised myself right there to get serious about the language so I wouldn’t rack up more embarrassing moments like that.”

Vinyl resurgence—fad or here to stay?

“I’ve had a deep love for vinyl since I was a kid. I got it from my father, who collected a few records, ran them on a beloved Technics turntable with his own sound system, and treated the whole thing like a ceremony. You pick a record, slide it from the sleeve, brush it clean, set the needle down, and press start. That ritual slows you down. It creates a calm, a quality of thought. One song at a time. It’s a pact between listener and artist, a little act of respect.

“I hope that ritual doesn’t disappear. It can teach new generations to slow the feed, choose the soundtrack of their life with intent, and value something that isn’t driven by an algorithm. Vinyl isn’t perfect—there’s noise and upkeep—but those tradeoffs are part of the meaning. My take is simple. Vinyl is here to stay as long as people want connection over convenience.”

What’s your favourite plugin or software right now?

“I’m glued to Ableton Live; it hosts my whole ecosystem without friction. I’m not into plugin fetishism; the goal is the perfect layer, and whatever serves the shape wins. That said, my current obsessions are Serum 2 and Neural DSP Gojira X. Serum 2 is dangerously deep, Steve Duda is a damn genius, and I don’t know what I’d do without it. Amen.”

What’s the best advice you’ve ever gotten about music production?

“Listen. Let the music talk and serve it. I’ve been guilty of thinking I knew where a track was headed, pushing it down a path because my ego or plan said so. The best work happened when I shut up, listened, and followed the thing I wasn’t seeing yet. That ‘hidden path’ the song keeps hinting at, take it. It’s usually the solution.

“I keep that as a daily check-in with every writing and production session. If I’m too tired to really hear, I close the room and come back tomorrow. Listening over forcing—always.”

If you had to record an entire album with just one instrument, what would it be?

“Piano, no hesitation. It covers harmony and melody at once, lets you run two registers simultaneously, and stretches from percussive attack to long, singing sustain. It can carry orchestral writing on its own, and if you prepare it, mutes, felt, objects, you open a whole other palette without leaving the instrument.

“It’s expressive, complete, and brutally honest. The piano is king. And yes, ‘20:17’ by Nils Frahm and Ólafur Arnalds is a perfect reminder of how a piano can tell a full story by itself.”

What’s the worst thing a producer can do during a session?

“Make the artist feel unsafe or small. I’ve literally seen people cry because a producer or engineer acted like a jerk. Our job is to design and run a session that scans the artist’s strengths and elevates their vision—step into their shoes, push only to help, never to humiliate. Remove fear, don’t add it.

“My rules are simple: no sarcasm in the cans, no weaponizing the talkback, explain the ‘why’ behind every retake, manage the room energy, pace the breaks, keep goals clear, and reset the vibe the second tension spikes. Ego over music is the cardinal sin. Build trust, and the takes get better, every time.”

What’s a controversial recording decision you’ve made that totally paid off?

“I’m fiercely loyal to the sanctity of a finished track. If two people are in the room, share a vision, build a bond, and close the record, that stamp is a story. Once it’s sealed, nobody else gets in.

“In 2008, I wrote ‘Warp 1.9’ in Bassano del Grappa, in my parents’ basement, on a break from a European tour with Steve Aoki. We were cutting raw electronic lines with the spirit of my hardcore side project RIFOKI floating around—chaotic, punk, communal. The track was simple and perfect for that moment, a document of our union and the scene we came from.

“Months later in Australia, Steve texted about adding will.i.am. I said a quick, respectful ‘No.’ Not because I lacked respect, but because he wasn’t part of that original construction. The song was our bond, not a feature slot. That ‘No’ protected the truth of the record, and the record did what it needed to do. Loyalty isn’t nostalgia; it’s craft.”

What’s your favourite non-musical inspiration when producing?

“Visualization. I need to see it before I score it, scene, light, motion, so I can write the story in sound. Photography is my compass for that. I use it to explore the world and the people in it, then I translate those frames into rhythm, space, and tone.

“My father opened that door for me, and it’s still a daily practice. Shooting teaches pacing and restraint; negative space becomes arrangement; contrast becomes distortion; depth of field becomes focus in the mix. When an image clicks, the song usually follows. The camera keeps me honest and gives me a story to serve.”

What’s the most unusual place you’ve recorded audio?

“I’ve done quick-and-dirty takes in basements, garages, all of it, but the one that sticks is a weeklong retreat with Jay Buchanan near Franklin, Tennessee, on a little lake we dubbed ‘Snake Lake.’ We rented a small cabin with two bunk beds and turned it into a lab: speakers, a bit of outboard, one guitar, one mic. We wrote and tracked day and night. Windows open, no neighbours, just dark and silence wrapping the takes. Priceless and a little mystical.

“Midweek, we took a pause, drove down to Alabama to visit Muscle Shoals, soaked up the history, then headed back to the cabin and dove straight back into the work. That place, that rhythm, that focus, it all made the songs feel inevitable.”

Finally, what’s the absolute golden rule of music production in your book?

“If we talk about music, we listen to music. Listening leads to the call. Keep your ears and your heart open; when the song calls, you serve it with humility and dedication. Never rush the process. Don’t sprint, don’t force it, think.”