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OMGWTFAOLBBQ posted:Okay, I've given up on hardcore. Don't worry about the mix of the beats and bass just yet. They're a tricky part in every genre to get right. Start off making tracks and once you get the hang of what's behind it musically, you can start working on your mixes.
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Jul 15, 2008 04:22
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| # ? May 11, 2024 18:25 |
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The Fog posted:Don't worry about the mix of the beats and bass just yet. They're a tricky part in every genre to get right. Start off making tracks and once you get the hang of what's behind it musically, you can start working on your mixes. I've tried, but the beat and the bass are so important to it that unless they're totally grooving it sounds like poo poo. I don't even want to post my attempts because they're so horrible.
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Jul 15, 2008 15:03
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That's the whole process of becoming an electronic musician, though. You can't expect them to start sounding right till you knock out at least a half a dozen to a dozen horrible tracks. You can do it, I know you can. I find what makes me grow the most and learn the most as an electronic artist is to just constantly bang out tracks and keep your craft up. All art is a combination of creativity and craft, but I find that craft can carry you a lot of the way. You need those skills in place so that when you are creative as gently caress, you're able to articulate those ideas in your head easily. But you really need to just knock out some tracks, even if they suck, because its the only way to learn.
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Jul 15, 2008 15:25
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Hey guys. A while ago I started making electro type instrumental stuff (which can be checkout here: https://www.myspace.com/xavierelectro) and I showed it to a friend and we've been working pretty hard on getting the arrangements solid and turning it all into proper songs. I know it's all quite poppy stuff but I think what we've got so far is pretty strong. It's all still in the guide vocal stage at the moment and we're not even sure if it will be us singing on the final mixes. We're contracting a few sexy ladies to come in and track it all up in the studio at the end of the summer, but until then I just thought I'd get any thoughts you guys might have. Criticisms are very welcome as we're trying to make this the best we can. First track: Hello.Welcome.Goodbye  Second track: I Didn't Kiss Her  edit: Also, both songs currently have the same drum sounds. This is something we are going to take care of when we are mixing the final tracks.
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Jul 15, 2008 16:09
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OMGWTFAOLBBQ posted:Okay, I've given up on hardcore. wow, it's been years since i've heard UK Hardhouse.
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Jul 15, 2008 17:27
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ManoliIsFat posted:That's the whole process of becoming an electronic musician, though. You can't expect them to start sounding right till you knock out at least a half a dozen to a dozen horrible tracks.
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Jul 15, 2008 17:30
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OMGWTFAOLBBQ posted:Okay, I've given up on hardcore. edit; the hoover confirms this. 1) the volume of the bass sound is not in relation to the volume of the hoover. Am I right in the guess that you have 2.1 computer speakers and your subwoofer makes it sound alright? Replace these ASAP, you could even get passive monitor speakers for cheap and they'll be tons better than Logitech 2.whatevers. 2) A TR-909 has 16 steps. Think in those 16 steps. 4 beats : 16 steps. So, your kick (bassdrum) looks like: code:then your bass could look like this: code:For regular trance: code:or for oldschool UK hardcore (this also depends on the sound: an electric bass sample works good for this code:16 steps is your god. You will worship 16 steps at your altar every day. You will sacrifice small pets, bottles of Mt. Dew and bags of Doritos to 16 steps. OBEY. 16 STEPS RULES. Now, as for your hoover sound, try placing it like this (in a 32-step pattern) code:This is why FL Studio is good at that - one of its interfaces does exactly this. This is why trackers are good at this; they have 4 x 16 steps in each pattern. This is why everyone loves the gently caress out of Reason's ReDrum. Post your stuff, the rest of us'll be the judge. Laserjet 4P fucked around with this message at 18:29 on Jul 15, 2008 |
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Jul 15, 2008 18:27
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wayfinder posted:I agree, and it's also important to GET poo poo DONE and not fiddle and fuzzle until everything is just so. You're just starting out, so it's gonna suck for a while, no matter what. Get songs DONE. Call them finished. Play them to people.
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Jul 15, 2008 19:36
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OMGWTFAOLBBQ posted:Start making... hardcore tracks? Making electronica is like playing an instrument. You start off poo poo and practice at it to get better, making a hardcore bassline is a technique just like sweep picking or something on guitar. When you first try it'll sound horrible, you've just got to keep on at it until it clicks.
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Jul 15, 2008 20:12
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frankthetank posted:First track: I'd say that the arrangements and everything are decent, but what's keeping it down is it really comes of as 80s cheese and not the more mature 80s inspired stuff we have today.
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Jul 15, 2008 20:53
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IanTheM posted:I'd say that the arrangements and everything are decent, but what's keeping it down is it really comes of as 80s cheese and not the more mature 80s inspired stuff we have today. Ok, cheers man. What would you say it is about it that makes it 80s cheese? Is it the choice of the instrumentation, and the fact that it's fairly tame, and not very interesting? I've been feeling it needs to be more musically interesting to listen to, like a lot of the electro stuff that's out there at the moment.
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Jul 15, 2008 21:01
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frankthetank posted:Ok, cheers man. What would you say it is about it that makes it 80s cheese? Is it the choice of the instrumentation, and the fact that it's fairly tame, and not very interesting? I've been feeling it needs to be more musically interesting to listen to, like a lot of the electro stuff that's out there at the moment. I think the timings and rhythm of the piece are reminiscent of electro. Unfortunately the sounds them selves aren't really, I'm not sure how to explain it but, it's really missing a kind of X factor that would bring it to another level. I mean it seems like the notes are there, but the soundscape is a bit barren when you listen to it. I'm not saying you shouldn't be proud of your achievement, but I just think there's potential to push it a bit further still. I guess you can experiment, with the sound, the synths and everything. Hopefully you'll end up with something more.
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Jul 15, 2008 21:17
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IanTheM posted:I think the timings and rhythm of the piece are reminiscent of electro. Unfortunately the sounds them selves aren't really, I'm not sure how to explain it but, it's really missing a kind of X factor that would bring it to another level. I mean it seems like the notes are there, but the soundscape is a bit barren when you listen to it. I'm not saying you shouldn't be proud of your achievement, but I just think there's potential to push it a bit further still. I guess you can experiment, with the sound, the synths and everything. Hopefully you'll end up with something more. Yeah. I know exactly what you mean man, and I've been feeling this since the start of the project. It's good to hear it from someone else, maybe now we can drive ourselves to get it sounding perfect. I feel like the break down section near the end of I Didn't Kiss Her is the only part of those two songs that I think has a pretty nice edge to it, in comparison to the rest. If we can get the rest sounding that good, then it should be banging. Cheers for the comments though dude!
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Jul 15, 2008 21:24
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OMGWTFAOLBBQ posted:Okay, I've given up on hardcore. http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=3D807C61AE9E7F3A
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Jul 15, 2008 21:50
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I'd like to seriously thank everyone for helping me out with this stuff. Okay, so I figure I'll go piece by piece and get feedback on each thing until it all comes together. I'll start with the drums.  I have the VEC packs, so if you guys can point out specific ones to use I'd really appreciate it.
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Jul 16, 2008 01:54
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I was just messing around in garageband for fun and was wondering if there was any way to record in steps (obviously I dont know what I am doing)? I cant play that little loving keyboard.
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Jul 16, 2008 01:58
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Yoozer posted:A bunch of good advice. How do I figure out what keys things are? I know nothing of music theory really. Is there a good book I can read that will explain this to me? I don't understand what you're talking about with the 16 step thing, also. Can you break it down into more simple elements? When you talk about 16 steps are you talking about 4 measures with four beats per measure? Here's the song after those two changes. 
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Jul 16, 2008 02:06
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I made another Hard House song. Enjoy! Please feel free to tell me I suck!
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Jul 16, 2008 03:55
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OMGWTFAOLBBQ posted:Are you talking about that sound that comes in after everything fades out like halfway through? quote:How do I figure out what keys things are? quote:I know nothing of music theory really. Is there a good book I can read that will explain this to me? quote:I don't understand what you're talking about with the 16 step thing, also. Can you break it down into more simple elements? When you talk about 16 steps are you talking about 4 measures with four beats per measure? In all dance music, there's the kick drum. It goes *dunk* *dunk* *dunk* *dunk* If you take a look at this here: http://www.d16.pl/images/drumazon/drumazonBig.jpg you see that there is a row of buttons on the bottom. To get *dunk* *dunk* *dunk* *dunk* on this machine, you make sure buttons nr. 1, 5, 9 and 13 are lit. When you start from zero, it means buttons 0, 4, 8 and 12 are lit. Let's draw this stuff in ASCII code:code:http://www.flstudio.com/help/html/stepsequencer.htm
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Jul 16, 2008 07:23
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Yoozer posted:PURE AWESOME Thank you so much man, ever since I've heard Hardcore I've always wanted to make it and now I'm getting really close. Hey, check this out.  Not bad, eh? I'm so happy I finally pulled this poo poo together into something resembling how I wanted it to sound in my head. A few more days of work and it should be pretty decent. Now I just have to figure out how to get a good lead melody. Holy gently caress this poo poo is fun!! OMGWTFAOLBBQ fucked around with this message at 03:00 on Jul 17, 2008 |
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Jul 17, 2008 02:57
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ManoliIsFat posted:That's great advice because you can so easily get caught up in details that you neglect the rest of the track. You can ALWAYS go back and re-eq those hihats that are pissing you off, but its so much easier to do that when you have a whole song to work with and you're not stuck at square 1. I couldn't agree more. For like 2-3 years I couldn't finish a track cause I just didn't know what to do next once I had my chorus-loop done, so instead of arranging the track, I was fiddling every single knob I could find and it would never get finished. The problem was simple. I was focusing on the mix before I even had a solid musical foundation. That is, the song was essentially boring, so I tried to make it good by ignoring that fact and instead concentrating on the mix. Music is divided into 2 parts, IMO: Music Production If you start worrying about production when the music is poo poo, you'll never finish a good song. A good song with a poo poo mix is better than a poo poo song with a good mix.
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Jul 17, 2008 03:23
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tell that to BT AHAHAHHAHAH ok im done
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Jul 17, 2008 09:11
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Here's what I have so far for that hardcore song I've been working on. I'm really happy where this is going. It's not done yet, not by a long shot, but it's coming along well I think. Advice? Feedback? I'd like to thank everyone who encouraged me to keep at it. Seriously, if it wasn't for these forums and you experts willing to help beginners like me I wouldn't of even made it this far. You guys rule.
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Jul 20, 2008 00:06
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The Fog posted:A good song with a poo poo mix is better than a poo poo song with a good mix. Well, according to album sales, it's the other way around. Most people would rather listen to something that's mixed excellently. Even a really awesome song musically, without a solid mix, the majority of people are going to push it off as amateur work. Even I have a hard time accepting a really awesome song musically, if they can't even mix it reasonably well. Of course, most people here will jump on this with the "Naw, it's all about the MUSIC". gently caress that, recorded music is more than just putting notes down. If nobody gave a poo poo about the mix, we'd all be content listening to MIDI files. An rear end song isn't going to somehow be transformed into an awesome song by a good mix (although it'll make it more appealing), but you'd better believe that an awesome song is going to be brought down by a lovely mix. OMGWTFAOLBBQ posted:Here's what I have so far for that hardcore song I've been working on. Your song is entirely out of key. It's really hard to listen to. It sounds like you took some samples you downloaded, looped some drums, added really stale presets and then randomly pounded away on notes. That break in the middle is awful, it just drops away to nothing. It's bland, and it sounds like a terrible preset, and it feels like you're just walking along and all of the sudden you fall in a pothole. Why did you switch the kick you're using right before it? When the lead comes back, it's completely out of key from the rest of the song. Also, where's the rest of the drums? Are you purposely omitting everything but a kick and a snare? I understand that you're new to the game, so I'm not expecting a Grammy-winning track. I'll just tell you, that your song is terrible, it's not the worst I've heard, but it's still terrible. And not being a dick here, I'm saying that the faster somebody tells you where you suck hard, the faster you'll be able to turn it around and improve in those parts. Everyone's poo poo sucks early on, there's nothing wrong with sucking at something you're new at. I have a disc around here somewhere of all my early mixes, and holy poo poo they're painful to hear. If you're really set on this style, find a song you like, doesn't matter what it is, and piece out the entire thing. Where does it build? Where does it break? When do the leads come in, how does the song progress? Copy that entire structure, and try to re-create your song based off it. EG, 8 bars on kick intro, then add some snare, add some hats, play it for another 8 bars, add the bass, etc. It'll at least give you an idea of how your song should be structured, and hopefully avoid breaks like you've got right now. You need to up a track that's not so work-in-progress-y. I can't tell if you just haven't done the start of the track, or if you're purposely leaving it like it is (which I would change because it's stale and boring). At least to me, it doesn't help to give advice when I don't even know if you've already got these things planned out and just haven't done them yet. PRADA SLUT fucked around with this message at 03:10 on Jul 20, 2008 |
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Jul 20, 2008 02:57
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Kai was taken posted:Your song is entirely out of key. It's really hard to listen to. I don't know how to play keyboards. = ( That's why it's all out of key I guess. I'll work on that, though! I've got some reading to do on music theory. I don't know why I switched the kick up. I brought it back later, though! Yeah, basically I am omitting everything but the kick and snare. I'm going for a style like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJ2r9UCXm6A&feature=related UK Hardcore! But, like I said when I posted it, it is a work in progress! I'm going to post it again in a few days to show how I've progressed with it, and I really appreciate you helping me out with the process. So, things to work on: Better drums. Make the break in the middle better. Make it in key. Don't use presets so much. Any advice on getting away from presets? I bought a book on synthesis today. Hopefully it sheds some light on this stuff because I'm still really lost on programming synths.
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Jul 20, 2008 04:10
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OMGWTFAOLBBQ posted:I don't know how to play keyboards. = ( That's why it's all out of key I guess. I'll work on that, though! I've got some reading to do on music theory. Do this for notes: Find a minor scale online, and pick a root note (G is usually a good choice to start). Now, only use notes that are on those keys, and make sure to come back and hit your root note more often than not. Ignore every other note that's not in that scale. I'd take that track and copy the kick and bass, exactly. The notes don't matter on the bass (EG, A, B, F#, whatever), but hit it exactly when it hits (between the kicks, I know, I mean more when it's not connected to kicks, where it plays). This will give you an idea of how songs are structured. F Even though that track breaks in the middle, you know it's going to drop out because the kick disappears but the bass stays. And no, it's not OMG STEALING MUSIC, there's only so much variation of drums (in any genre, not just dance, but dance moreso), so if you like it, use it yourself. Do this for everything (beat-related), the hats too. There's hats in the offbeats in that track. Note where the leads come in, try and link your leads to where those start. Sure, as time goes on, you'll break away from this design, but at the start, when you know nothing about the genre you're trying to do, the best way to get a feel for where everything sits is to just emulate everything. Use your own leads, your own bassline, your own musical ideas, but to start, align them all with an already established song of a style you're trying to make. To start, I wouldn't read up on synthesis. It's not that it's difficult to understand, it's that synths really sound like rear end. It's all the extra effects on them that make them sound good, which takes time to get used to. There's nothing inherently wrong with using presets, just make sure they don't sound lame, and that it's really the sound you want. Once you really know how all your effects work, then I'd start programming your own sounds. PRADA SLUT fucked around with this message at 04:54 on Jul 20, 2008 |
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Jul 20, 2008 04:44
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Well, gently caress, I already have the book. =( Can't hurt, right? Is there a book I can read of effects that you'd recommend? I learn best by reading books on things. My job basically forces me to sit and read a book for like 7 hours a day and I'd rather read books on music instead of fiction right now.
OMGWTFAOLBBQ fucked around with this message at 06:07 on Jul 20, 2008 |
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Jul 20, 2008 06:05
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at this point theory will help you ALOT more than learning to program synths
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Jul 20, 2008 06:16
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Okay, I'll put that one on hold I guess. Can someone recommend a book that really explains music theory in plain English for people who are just starting out in music?
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Jul 20, 2008 06:48
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OMGWTFAOLBBQ posted:Okay, I'll put that one on hold I guess. Can someone recommend a book that really explains music theory in plain English for people who are just starting out in music? http://www.ravenspiral.com/ravenspiralguide.pdf This is great, apparently enough information to get you to university. Pretty well paced, and written by a guy who just wanted to learn theory to make dance music.
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Jul 20, 2008 07:27
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Dude, this loving NAILS it. Thank you. I'll read it backwards and forwards.
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Jul 20, 2008 07:32
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There's The Dance Music Manual from the Op. There's also a Second Volume coming in October.
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Jul 20, 2008 07:53
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IanTheM posted:http://www.ravenspiral.com/ravenspiralguide.pdf Haha, this is a pretty good beginners guide, but I'm 100% sure that 'unaccidentalated' is not a word. ravenspiralguide posted:The musical symbol for a natural note is ♮, and it's used in common musical notation where a note should be played unaccidentalated where it's otherwise been established that it should be played either sharp or flat.
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Jul 20, 2008 15:27
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Try these videos. Pretty good if you're starting out in hardcore: http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=3D807C61AE9E7F3A
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Jul 20, 2008 15:52
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IanTheM posted:http://www.ravenspiral.com/ravenspiralguide.pdf
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Jul 25, 2008 22:56
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What do people usually do about stuff sounding different between different types of sound systems? I was working on a song and I am setting all the volume levels for the different tracks with a nice set of headphones, but then when I listen to it on my $30 computer speakers the bass isn't as loud and the high pitched string sounds are kind of grating because they are too loud.
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Jul 27, 2008 07:42
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Fortuitous Bumble posted:What do people usually do about stuff sounding different between different types of sound systems? I was working on a song and I am setting all the volume levels for the different tracks with a nice set of headphones, but then when I listen to it on my $30 computer speakers the bass isn't as loud and the high pitched string sounds are kind of grating because they are too loud. You'll want to get monitors for that. Audio monitors give you a flat response so that you can hear how the music actually sounds across the entire spectrum and you can then tune it in a way that will sound good across all sound systems.
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Jul 27, 2008 08:08
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IanTheM posted:You'll want to get monitors for that. Audio monitors give you a flat response so that you can hear how the music actually sounds across the entire spectrum and you can then tune it in a way that will sound good across all sound systems. Could you (or someone) elaborate on what's recommended in terms of monitors? I have no idea what to look for or what to expect price wise with them. I'm pretty sure I need a decent set at this point though.
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Jul 27, 2008 22:21
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Dain22 posted:Could you (or someone) elaborate on what's recommended in terms of monitors? I have no idea what to look for or what to expect price wise with them. I'm pretty sure I need a decent set at this point though. Just look at your price range on musiciansfriend.com, and check the internet for reviews. http://www.musiciansfriend.com/studio-audio-monitors Just remember you'll want powered/active monitors unless you have a proper amp for them. (I don't know anything about passive monitors.)
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Jul 27, 2008 22:29
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| # ? May 11, 2024 18:25 |
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the ONLY book you need is "mixing with your mind" http://www.mixingwithyourmind.com/ FIN
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Jul 28, 2008 01:38
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