|
well why not posted:I liked it quite a lot, but I kinda agree it's not as clear or full sounding as it could be. I'm really focussed on mixing right now, so I'm probably really sensitive to it - so take this with a grain of salt - but it seems that there's kick, synth chords, the pluck and then the other perc kinda sits on top of that. It doesn't feel like they're combined together, like there's a gap below the percussion. Thank you so much for the kind words and especially the feedback. It's great to hear that your focus has been on mixing, as I have been really trying to get better at that aspect, while also writing all of the music. Your observation about there being a gap below the percussion is very interesting for a couple reasons. First, I originally had a snare track in this mix, hitting on every 2nd and 4th beat (pretty typical), but I couldn't find the right sample at the time that really fit with the feeling of the track so I removed the snare completely for the time being and it never got added back in. I think I want to go in and play around with some different snare samples to see if I can find one that fits. Another possibility is to use a different percussive element in a similar frequency range that maybe fits better, but the only thing I can think of would be Claps. Those might fit better than a snare drum but I will have to play around with that. If you have any other ideas on what I could use to fill this gap, let me know. When you say "gap", do you mean that there is a range of frequencies that are missing from the mix? Like I have a high percussion and then nothing between that and the kick? In terms of clarity, is there a particular spot that could use some work? I will readily admit that this song is on the simpler side in terms of number of tracks in the mix because I really wanted to focus on good techniques and making something simple sound good so any tips here would be great for when I start to add more complexity.
|
#
?
Jan 10, 2017 18:04
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 15, 2024 21:32 |
|
|
So I took about a four-year hiatus from producing and recently got back into it. I've gotten some really good feedback on this track, including someone who wanted to license it for an ad, so I figured I'd post it here: https://soundcloud.com/lush-runner/last-stop Not sure what to call this in terms of genre. It's definitely hip hop inspired, but... Eh?
|
|
#
?
Jan 10, 2017 23:44
|
|
|
Chitin posted:So I took about a four-year hiatus from producing and recently got back into it. I've gotten some really good feedback on this track, including someone who wanted to license it for an ad, so I figured I'd post it here: This is awesome and your production is really good dude. Followed!
|
|
#
?
Jan 10, 2017 23:55
|
|
|
As I'm a total FNG to the point I'm actually trying to learn music theory in order to compose my own songs, I have a question for you veterans: One of the stunts I'm trying to pull is to take what I've learned and try to duplicate an existing song that I like. I am essentially trying to reverse engineer it. Now, in spite of getting thrown for a few loops with using out-of-key notes (which made for figuring out the key a bit more difficult), I'm actually getting the components of the song figured out. What I'm fighting with, is the fact that sound design is near enough an equal art to composition/production. As a consequence, my sounds are "kind of close" but it's like the difference between a soundblaster and a Roland MT32 playing old dos games. The actual question: Is there an advised path? Should I focus on just figuring out the musical components of the song (since I'm after being able to make my own), and not stress over the sounds? Or, is it better in the long run to actually try and refine both at the same time? Speed isn't the important thing for me, learning how to do things correctly is.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2017 02:36
|
|
|
FormulaXFD posted:As I'm a total FNG to the point I'm actually trying to learn music theory in order to compose my own songs, I have a question for you veterans: My personal opinion is that you are going to want to learn the sound design aspects at the same time as you try to figure out the musical components. One of the things I have found is that as I gain more experience with production techniques, sound design, and synthesis, I am able to recognize these techniques in songs that I listen to. For example, I can easily hear side-chain compression in dance music now and can even make a reasonable guess as to the ratio/threshold settings based on how much it pumps. This isn't something I had any clue about a year or two ago. I would absolutely start becoming familiar with basic concepts sooner to help train your ear to recognize them.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2017 03:41
|
|
|
MrSargent posted:My personal opinion is that you are going to want to learn the sound design aspects at the same time as you try to figure out the musical components. One of the things I have found is that as I gain more experience with production techniques, sound design, and synthesis, I am able to recognize these techniques in songs that I listen to. For example, I can easily hear side-chain compression in dance music now and can even make a reasonable guess as to the ratio/threshold settings based on how much it pumps. This isn't something I had any clue about a year or two ago. I would absolutely start becoming familiar with basic concepts sooner to help train your ear to recognize them. Thanks, I'll keep at it then. Part of the pisser is that I can guess my way to what I would say is a 50% mark; it's still failing, but on a given sound design I can pickup a lot of the fundamentals - general types of waveforms used, effects, unison, etc. It's just that there are aspects which are juuuuuust a little off and I can't figure out. So it was say 'gently caress it' and just go on with the reverse engineering of the song itself, or keep pushing right up front. I'll do the latter.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2017 03:52
|
|
|
FormulaXFD posted:Thanks, I'll keep at it then. Part of the pisser is that I can guess my way to what I would say is a 50% mark; it's still failing, but on a given sound design I can pickup a lot of the fundamentals - general types of waveforms used, effects, unison, etc. It's just that there are aspects which are juuuuuust a little off and I can't figure out. So it was say 'gently caress it' and just go on with the reverse engineering of the song itself, or keep pushing right up front. I'll do the latter. Hmmm, based on this info, I wouldn't bang your head against the wall for hours trying to get the sound just right. That will be frustrating as poo poo. You can always ask for advice here on a particular sound. A lot of time someone has made that sound before and would know what's missing. Unless it's something where you want to do it all on your own. I wouldn't spend more than a couple hours at a time working on a single sound. Break it up and come back to it. Sometimes after listening to one thing for a long time, I lose all perspective.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2017 04:40
|
|
|
MrSargent posted:This is awesome and your production is really good dude. Followed! Thanks so much! A couple of other recent productions that people seem to like: https://soundcloud.com/lush-runner/ill-chill Is in a similar hip hop vein. https://soundcloud.com/lush-runner/kernel Is some kind of house.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2017 05:42
|
|
|
Chitin posted:Thanks so much! A couple of other recent productions that people seem to like: These are also great, I think the first one you posted is my favorite though. What DAW do you use for producing? What are some of your go-to VST's / synths? Would be curious to know more about your process!
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2017 06:21
|
|
|
MrSargent posted:
Yeah, I feel like there's a full high and low end, but the upper mid area of the spectrum is a bit empty feeling. Like I said, it's probably not a huge deal, but if it were I working on it, I'd try and find something to fill it out - vocals would work, like you said you were planning.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2017 10:21
|
|
|
FormulaXFD posted:As I'm a total FNG to the point I'm actually trying to learn music theory in order to compose my own songs, I have a question for you veterans: I'm pretty new too to production myself, but back when I played guitar consistently I tried to study and replicated the techniques that the artist used to make the sounds. I think reverse engineering is the right way to do things especially if you have a particular sound you're going for. It may also be a good idea for you to watch some Youtube tutorials on synth programming and general sound design. It may not teach you exactly how to replicate sounds but it will give you a solid base and vocabulary to use when you need to ask for assistance. Biggest thing is to just start writing and keep working at it. Experimentation often yields good results and you learn something about your DAW every time you produce. Question for the thread: When I'm initially tracking a song, what level should I set my volume to for each track? I recall somebody saying that -6 was a good starting point, but I feel like a lot of my track sound to quiet. Should I increase the master volume to amplify loudness or just do it in the track mix? I'm not even sure I post stuff here that matches the Electronic/Club/DJ tag, but the stuff I write is somewhere between rock/electronic/VGM. I've got some ideas floating in my head with an R&B/Electro tinge but I need to find the right sounds to make it true to life. I guess I'm stuck in between genres a bit. I don't listen to much house or dance music, but I do really enjoy chiptune and vaporwave type stuff. But I think as I listen to different styles it will give me more material to work with.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2017 15:32
|
|
|
Mix quiet and turn up your speakers until you hit the "mastering" stage, even if thats just a compressor or limiter on the master buss.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2017 17:46
|
|
|
-6dB is a general guideline for mixing because it gives good headroom for the Mastering Engineer to do his thing. As I mentioned before though, this is just a guideline and you will likely (and should) have tracks that are above and below -6dB depending a lot on the genre. For example, the kick drum in House Music might be a little higher than -6dB since it is the most prominent part. You should watch a few tutorials on mastering to listen to the before/after of a master chain. You will notice a pretty significant difference in the overall "loudness" of the track. Without proper mastering, you won't be able to get your track as loud as commercial music, but without first putting together a proper mix, mastering won't magically fix it. Mixing "quiet" is a recommendation that I consistently hear from mixing engineers.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2017 17:58
|
|
|
MrSargent posted:These are also great, I think the first one you posted is my favorite though. What DAW do you use for producing? What are some of your go-to VST's / synths? Would be curious to know more about your process! I'm using Reason, mostly because I was halfway through writing a track that I liked on the demo and didn't want to lose it. All stock plugins, the only thing I've bought is a hardware emulated high/low pass filter. For mastering I export to Adobe Audition. I tend to stick to Thor and Subtractor when I'm designing sounds, depending on if I'm going for simplicity or flexibility. I'm thinking of switching to Logic, the lack of VST support is starting to really annoy me, though I do like the incredibly flexible routing. I ended up finishing a new thing last night: https://soundcloud.com/lush-runner/tribe
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2017 18:22
|
|
|
-6dB on a peak meter says close to jack poo poo about how loud your track is. Perception of loudness aligns closer to average level over some reasonable interval. I recommend reading up on metering and using a decent loudness metering plugin during your "mastering" stage. This guy gets it though: NonzeroCircle posted:Mix quiet and turn up your speakers until you hit the "mastering" stage, even if thats just a compressor or limiter on the master buss. Absolute level matters during tracking (actual recording ie. when you're converting an analogue signal to digital) and you want to optimize signal to noise levels. And not even all that much if you record at 24 bit -again, within reason. And it somewhat matters during mastering, if you want to get it in line with commercial tracks of similar genre. Outside of that, don't worry about it at all.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2017 18:31
|
|
|
Flipperwaldt posted:-6dB on a peak meter says close to jack poo poo about how loud your track is. Perception of loudness aligns closer to average level over some reasonable interval. I recommend reading up on metering and using a decent loudness metering plugin during your "mastering" stage. Were you talking to me? I don't think I said the dB directly relates to loudness but -6 is simply a guideline level for each track to give it headroom for the master. Completely agree that perceived loudness is a much more complex concept.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2017 19:08
|
|
|
Whilst not strictly electronic I played a punkish tune i did yesterday with a halfassed ozone preset on the master buss and then Alkaline Trio after it to show one of my clients with autism the difference mastering makes. The very first thing he noticed was the latter track was 'louder' and sounded 'fuller' despite me not alternating the volume on my phone at all. Its a dark art that, whilst somewhat blurring with mixing nowadays with the improvements in consumer tech, should still IMO be done separately and definitely requires a different skillset. My advice is once you are happy with your mix and the relative levels between tracks, render/export it all out as a stereo file and then shelve it for a day (or two). Come back to it with fresh ears and then apply any final generalised eq, compression/limiting and whathaveyou to get it 'Loud'. If you try to mix with poo poo on the master buss (except perhaps a very gentle compressor, maybe) and the buss is nearing the red at that point, you have nowhere to go after that. It's worth bearing in mind that when mixing into a compressor, every little thing will affect everything else, especially at the low end. As stated by the last poster, relative levels are what you're after, not specific numbers. I make a lot of use of group tracks, on the whole i try not to let any of these go above -6 but sometimes it does, sometimes its at -12, its what is needed for the tune more than a formula. When mixing, imagine an existing song you like, you'll crank it if you put it on in the car/at home regardless of how 'loud' its been mastered; don't be afraid to turn them speakers up rather than fiddling with sliders. NonzeroCircle fucked around with this message at 19:21 on Jan 11, 2017 |
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2017 19:16
|
|
|
Thanks for all the good information. I'll do some further research on the mastering process. Hopefully I'll be underway in the production of another track this weekend and will have some new material to work with.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2017 19:33
|
|
|
MrSargent posted:Were you talking to me? Vargatron posted:Question for the thread: When I'm initially tracking a song, what level should I set my volume to for each track? I recall somebody saying that -6 was a good starting point, but I feel like a lot of my track sound to quiet. Should I increase the master volume to amplify loudness or just do it in the track mix?
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2017 19:59
|
|
|
Ahh my fault. Thanks for the explanation! Between you and Nonzero, those are some concepts that I need to keep hammering home.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2017 20:10
|
|
|
Anybody have an opinion on the Deadmau5 masterclass? I've heard really good things and I'm considering dropping the $90 to get the we series.
|
|
#
?
Jan 12, 2017 15:37
|
|
|
Vargatron posted:Anybody have an opinion on the Deadmau5 masterclass? I've heard really good things and I'm considering dropping the $90 to get the we series. I have been taking this Masterclass for a few weeks now and think it is well worth the $90 price tag. I should note a couple things for you before taking the class. 1. It is aimed at people just starting out or with minimal knowledge of music production. He will likely go over a good amount of stuff you already know in the first few lessons. 2. Even though he will review stuff you already know, you get to hear his take on things which can be pretty valuable. 3. At first I was slightly disappointed in the lack of a lot of advanced content. But then I remembered I only paid $90 and for that price, I feel you get a ton of value as a beginner-intermediate producer. 4. I happen to find deadmau5's personality to be hilarious so the entertainment value was pretty high for me. I have probably watched all of the course videos at least twice, and will refer back to specific ones as needed. In my opinion it is well worth the $90 I spent and I personally learned a lot. On his live stream he talked a little about the class and said that if this one does well that he would like to do a more advanced one where he doesn't have to spend a lot of time introducing people to music production.
|
|
#
?
Jan 12, 2017 17:55
|
|
|
MrSargent posted:I have been taking this Masterclass for a few weeks now and think it is well worth the $90 price tag. I should note a couple things for you before taking the class. I also agree with this. What is also nice to have is someone else lay down a process (which he shows much more than he tells), so you can get some basic structure. There are actually a fair amount of subtle pieces of information that you'll pick up through rewatching a few things. One thing I've found interesting is that he really creates a core ~8 Measure chunk, and then grows a song around it as his method. He goes into his philosophy of composition (I still don't know why it's called producing instead of composing) which can at least provide you with a process. My biggest concern originally, was that he uses Ableton while I use FLStudio, and I figured there was going to be a lot of tightly coupled content to Abelton. There isn't. I could do everything needed within my own tool. An actual complaint I do have, however, is the absence of real 'coursework.' I would have liked a bit of structure on the assignments where there was more than one actual assignment, and there was a feedback/grading scheme. I do recognize that this is basically asking the impossible just due to the spread of skills from those who are taking the course. As MrSargent said, it's a class for $90. I personally think it was absolutely worth it.
|
|
#
?
Jan 12, 2017 19:11
|
|
|
https://soundcloud.com/swanconnley/ppl Still slowly getting closer towards my goal of making good house music. It's hard for me to have the inspiration to sit down and make something, it's even harder for whatever I start making to be good enough to become a song.
|
|
#
?
Jan 15, 2017 13:14
|
|
|
can anyone recommend youtube channels / sites that regularly release info about composition and arrangement? Ideally EDM focussed but I'm not too choosy. There's a million and one people doing synth recipes and sound design, but I specifically want info on building melodies, chord progressions, that sort of thing.
|
|
#
?
Jan 16, 2017 14:40
|
|
|
well why not posted:can anyone recommend youtube channels / sites that regularly release info about composition and arrangement? Ideally EDM focussed but I'm not too choosy. There's a million and one people doing synth recipes and sound design, but I specifically want info on building melodies, chord progressions, that sort of thing. I look for tutorial videos (specifically related to EDM) on a pretty regular basis and composition/arrangement are really few and far between. The videos I have seen seem to either be "guy fiddles around with drawing notes until it sounds right" or "guy with great musical theory explaining things way too technically for most people" with nothing in between. Funny enough, the best video I have watched for composition and arrangement came from Deadmau5's MasterClass. He doesn't play an instrument so his process translated well for me. Here are some of the highlights: -Most of the songs he creates start with a 4-8 bar chord progression. He will take that 4-8 bar loop once it is complete and start to deconstruct it to create bass lines, leads, drum breaks, introductions, and everything else. He uses one of his songs as an example, shows the loop that the song was created from and then starts to talk about how he deconstructs it. -Example: To make a lead, he zooms in on the notes making up the chords in his progression and starts to highlight various "middle" notes in the chord. HE copies those middle notes to a new MIDI track and then starts to tweak them slightly to make his leads. -He will take copy the low notes to another MIDI track, usually drop them an octave (or double them up across two octaves) and create a bassline. For arrangement, if you are talking about intro-buildup-drop-breakdown-drop-outro type stuff, one thing that I have found useful is to create a MIDI track at the top of your project. Using the structure of a track you already like, insert a MIDI clip that's length is equal to the intro and so on until you basically have blank MIDI tracks at the top representing each of the sections of your track. This has helped me a lot in terms of structuring my tracks and is a good guideline that can be modified as the song demands. Sorry for the long-winded reply without providing a good video series for this stuff but it is definitely a hard thing to find. MrSargent fucked around with this message at 22:44 on Jan 17, 2017 |
|
#
?
Jan 17, 2017 20:58
|
|
|
I do something similar to the blank midi clips thing but use track markers in Cubase instead, it helps with finding my way round.
|
|
#
?
Jan 17, 2017 22:00
|
|
|
Sounds pretty close to how I compose actually. I break everything down into 4 bar segments and mix and match as needed. Once I have the general flow down I'll go into each segment and do some tweaking to add variation. But yeah, I'm pretty much sold on taking the Deadmau5 class now.
|
|
#
?
Jan 17, 2017 22:06
|
|
|
new minimal techno track: 
|
|
#
?
Jan 18, 2017 10:33
|
|
|
How can I re-create this deep subby bass from this track. Does it sound like the Kick and Sub are separate tracks? https://soundcloud.com/lidogotsongs/recruit
|
|
#
?
Jan 23, 2017 20:55
|
|
|
Been making some synthwave stuff lately and I was wondering what you guys thought. I have noticed similar themes that I'm trying to break away from so everything doesn't sound the same yet trying to balance it to develop my own style. I'm wondering how the mix is, I'm always unsure of the balance as whenever I pan one way it just feels weird to my ear. I tried making 2 mono tracks for the same instruments and panning one hard left and one hard right. My thinking is I have a stereo sound but space in the middle so it doesn't interfere as much with the center panned stuff. Is this a thing people do? Anyway here are some of the cinematic retrowave type tracks I've made recently, including a remix. https://soundcloud.com/spokelee/meat-space-9mm https://soundcloud.com/spokelee/robert-parker-85-again-remix-a-spoke-lee-joint https://soundcloud.com/spokelee/megacity-in-ruins You can poke around the rest if you'd like, I have some nu-disco, rnb, dnb, hip-hop, and some orchestral stuff I made on there too.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2017 06:08
|
|
|
Spoke Lee posted:I tried making 2 mono tracks for the same instruments and panning one hard left and one hard right. My thinking is I have a stereo sound but space in the middle so it doesn't interfere as much with the center panned stuff. Is this a thing people do? The maximum they can differ is to have both tracks identical, sample accurately time-synced but have one of them inverted. This has the downside of completely losing mono compatibility (ie. when they get summed, the result is silence). You can have them in phase, but offset one of them by a couple of samples or even milliseconds and have a wide sound and lose less mono compatibility. Some stereo wideners work this way. The most natural sounding option, if you are a consistent player, is to use two different takes left and right. If you're not a good player, you can use two tracks based on midi that is humanised/quantised to different degrees. You don't specify, but maybe you already do something similar, because there's a fair bit of wide-sounding stuff in your music. As for feeling weird when doing regular panning, I feel ya. The secret is balancing stuff out. You pan a thing left, you balance it out by panning something else with similar weight right. Things that contribute to weight are how loud something is, what part of the frequency spectrum it occupies and its importance in the music. And like on regular scales, you can compensate for lack of weight by panning farther out. A snare at eleven o'clock may be balanced out by an open hat at three if both appear with regularity. Modulating pan position can be great for pads or arpeggiated sounds or stabbed chords, which is something I often forget myself. Whereas the heaviest stuff (kick, bass) you want to keep near the middle. Things do sound weird with everything center except for one thing, but once a lot of elements are being shifted around, things fall into place most often. Really, just don't be shy. It's easy enough to dial back something that is too out there or to flip something to the other side if poo poo gets lopsided. If you've got synths that output stereo sound that is wide already, narrowing their sound certainly shouldn't be out of the question (eg. using stereo dual panner if you DAW has one). You can create the neatest panoramas starting from mono sources -mixing a bunch of wide-ish stereo sources can complicate stuff and even make you equalize stuff a lot more than needed.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2017 22:12
|
|
|
Thank you so much! Really good tips that are really helping me out. Sometimes I gotta just wait till later in the process when I have more sounds to balance against each other. Sometimes I have this urge to perfect a sound when I have to go back and tweak it anyway to mesh better with stuff I added later.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2017 23:42
|
|
|
Anyone else just give the gently caress up sometimes? I haven't touched any of my gear in almost a year now
|
|
#
?
Jan 26, 2017 00:24
|
|
|
Just change it up if you aren't feeling it, after months of metal I'm currently making binaural meditation music. If it's fun then its worth doing even if you never finish a tune.
|
|
#
?
Jan 26, 2017 00:29
|
|
|
bad posts ahead!!! posted:Anyone else just give the gently caress up sometimes? I haven't touched any of my gear in almost a year now This is how I felt yesterday. I have been trying to complete my first track that is so close for months now. I added/modified just a few elements and completed the arrangement and now my mix sounds like poo poo compared to before. I spent 2 hours trying to look at what I did and get it back to where it was but couldn't and gave up for the night. I ended up working on a new song with my wife and that helped to "reset" myself so I feel ready to go back and tackle the mix this weekend. My advice is try something fresh and new, even if you have no intention of finishing it, like NonzeroCircle mentioned. I wish I had another producer I could work with because as a newbie I haven't quite developed my ear to the point where I trust it 100% and know how to approach "fixing" things.
|
|
#
?
Jan 27, 2017 17:54
|
|
|
If I'm not feeling it, I'll ditch a project and start a new one. This computer is about two years old and I have 200+ projects on here. Sometimes I start two in one day. My workflow is pretty fast at this point. Obsessing over 'your first track' is weird to me, your 'first track' should be an 8 bar loop in C major with a square wave as a synth. Second track might be 16 bars. At least, that's how it was for me.
|
|
#
?
Jan 27, 2017 21:03
|
|
|
poo poo I'd estimate I have like over 1500 little 4-8 bar loops saved on various hard drives. Whenever I can't find inspiration I go back through old ideas and usually one will peak my interest again.
|
|
#
?
Jan 27, 2017 21:55
|
|
|
well why not posted:If I'm not feeling it, I'll ditch a project and start a new one. This computer is about two years old and I have 200+ projects on here. Sometimes I start two in one day. My workflow is pretty fast at this point. Obsessing over 'your first track' is weird to me, your 'first track' should be an 8 bar loop in C major with a square wave as a synth. Second track might be 16 bars. At least, that's how it was for me. By "first track" I meant the first complete track. I have about 50 projects I have started and done nothing of note with before this one. This one is an actual complete musical idea that just needs to be mixed and mastered at this point.
|
|
#
?
Jan 27, 2017 22:20
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 15, 2024 21:32 |
|
|
Tracks don't get finished, you just get sick of working on them. Mix and master the drat thing, it doesn't have to be perfect.
|
|
#
?
Jan 27, 2017 22:27
|
|