Wanting to crack on with a tune too much?

[Dropkick_Kid]

Grids

are

for



vaginas.

Grids are essentially a good part of the learning curve in music production, like stabilisers are to a bike.
When you know what you're doing, daddy will take the stabilisers off

[Phigure]

Grids

are

for



vaginas.

sunklo = burial/zomby/god

[mks]

Do you lot just work with a mouse and a grid to make riddims? Serious question, I seem to see this a lot on this board and I'm curious. I guess for me, syncopation and cross rhythms, I just feel them and PLAY them...

EZ

[Phigure]

Do you lot just work with a mouse and a grid to make riddims? Serious question, I seem to see this a lot on this board and I'm curious. I guess for me, syncopation and cross rhythms, I just feel them and PLAY them...

EZ

yup, same here. turn quantization off, reduce latency on my asio drivers, and then record with my mpd. it's the only way i can write rhythms

[SunkLo]

Grids

are

for



vaginas.

sunklo = burial/zomby/god

shh keep it pon de hush

Yeah I draw shit in with my mouse, got no midi controllers n shaz. Means everything is a bit premeditated to a certain extent, but I play the piano roll like it's an instrument. I don't know if it makes my music too cerebral; I've been considering this lately. Things end up being very complicated when I draw them in, compared to if I pick up my guitar, not as much. I still make complicated stuff on guitar but since I'm plinking around familiar chord shapes too, everything doesn't end up being too thought out. Definitely need to go for a simplistic renaissance some time soon.

I really do play the piano roll like an instrument though. I find it's great for writing harmonies as the voice leading is so visual. I think if I got a nice midi keyboard I'd take off like mad as I'd still be able to edit midi but I'd also be able to jam and get down ideas quickly without having to manually edit timing and velocity.

Alas I am a poor student though, maybe if I win the lottery. Think I'm gonna get a part time job during the school year so I can buy cool gizmos n shit/pay for food and tuition.
Sucks that my lack of funds has to limit my progress as an artist...

[Phigure]

Grids

are

for



vaginas.

sunklo = burial/zomby/god

shh keep it pon de hush

Yeah I draw shit in with my mouse, got no midi controllers n shaz. Means everything is a bit premeditated to a certain extent, but I play the piano roll like it's an instrument. I don't know if it makes my music too cerebral; I've been considering this lately. Things end up being very complicated when I draw them in, compared to if I pick up my guitar, not as much. I still make complicated stuff on guitar but since I'm plinking around familiar chord shapes too, everything doesn't end up being too thought out. Definitely need to go for a simplistic renaissance some time soon.

I really do play the piano roll like an instrument though. I find it's great for writing harmonies as the voice leading is so visual. I think if I got a nice midi keyboard I'd take off like mad as I'd still be able to edit midi but I'd also be able to jam and get down ideas quickly without having to manually edit timing and velocity.

Alas I am a poor student though, maybe if I win the lottery. Think I'm gonna get a part time job during the school year so I can buy cool gizmos n shit/pay for food and tuition.
Sucks that my lack of funds has to limit my progress as an artist...

definitely feel you there

i find my creativity dying completely when sitting in front of a piano roll, but give me a real instrument and its a whole different story

[narcissus]

dude... my suggestion is....


if you need inspiration..

that will probably not be found by continue to stare at a screen. listen to something random and go for a walk out in nature.. classical, metal, ambient.. whatever.. and relax.. and then go do a bunch of other shit for like 8 hours. work out or something. by now you will probably be pretty tired, so eat a healthy meal and go to bed..


dream...

now wake up. eat breakfast. or don't.

now go to your daw and think about who you are and what you have to offer people. music is fundamentally about communication .. on a deep level..

so once you understand that.. come up with something that nobody's heard before.. go on a journey through your thoughts. and if you like the result then somebody else probably will to. originality is the key.

[freakah]

To me that tune sounded like it wanted some clapping when the main piano riff comes in and then heading to an old-school amen-ish breakbeat with the piano on top...

[Frodo Bassbins]

nice intro. i could totally see that dropping into something filthy as fuck right at the end there, thats the way i would take it personally. contrast the clean piano vibes at the start. the noise at the end at least for me feels like its gonna drop into some filthyness.

[JayZest]

Im the same, i find it hard to finished tunes. If im having trouble with idea's i go have a mix and just listen to some deep tunes. that gets me going.

Your intro is sick so fair, just need build on that mate!

[nitz]

Please don't put a YAYA shit baseline over that!

Do this, 99.9% to work.

The chords at, 0.41, take the first note of the chord, the root note.

Read this, make the 2nd type of sub, very easy.
http://techno-dnb.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=2246

Move the last note into the sub baseline, you should have something like this now :
http://www.techno-dnb.com/pyro/basstut/method2.wav

Done. this will make you a 2/3 sec drop, work out rest out from there, expand.

BTW, turn down your levels, or you will not be able to hear the sub come thru, it will just be overpowered.

[Dropkick_Kid]

Please don't put a YAYA shit baseline over that!

Do this, 99.9% to work.

The chords at, 0.41, take the first note of the chord, the root note.

Read this, make the 2nd type of sub, very easy.
http://techno-dnb.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=2246

Move the last note into the sub baseline, you should have something like this now :
http://www.techno-dnb.com/pyro/basstut/method2.wav

Done. this will make you a 2/3 sec drop, work out rest out from there, expand.

BTW, turn down your levels, or you will not be able to hear the sub come thru, it will just be overpowered.

Never intended to use a filthy midrange over it, not really my style.
Thanks for the ideas though, I'm gonna load it up later and have a mess see if i can be bothered to carry it on later on not.

[freakah]

Never intended to use a filthy midrange over it, not really my style.
Thanks for the ideas though, I'm gonna load it up later and have a mess see if i can be bothered to carry it on later on not.

Either way - whether you can't carry it on or not, I just re-listened and that piano riff is absolutely sick!! Can I remix it?!

[Clyde Hawkins]

i find it very helpful to buy a cheap $10 microphone from the store, and play out whats in your head with your mouth, and record it. i find that i can come up with an entire song and have it be very creative and have it flow perfectly off the top of my head much easier than i can sitting down and trying to get my ideas into the DAW. once i come up with something and put it down, it's taken so long to do so that i forgot what i wanted to do after that, so it gets difficult.

idk, im good at beat boxing and making sounds with my mouth, so as rediculous as it may sound, i sit in my room and play out a whole song with my mouth and record it, then listen back to it to get the general idea of what i wanted to do and when, and then perfect everything. works wonders for me

[hasezwei]

meh, i wrote a giant post and safari ate it anyway, lets try this again

the intro is really ace. what i did after listening to it was the following:

- go to youtube
- type in "magnetic man i need air"
- mute the video
- hit play on the vid and your intro simultaneously

this is what your intro sounds like to me, like some really euphoric dancefloor anthem that'll make people on drugs cry. and that's what you should go for when continuing it, a lot of tunes build up a certain feeling or atmosphere with their intro just to drop into some totally unrelated gnarly smasher. doing that would really not do your WIP any justice!
personally i think after the intro it should drop into a 4/4 beat with the bassline kinda 'rising' on the pianorolls (dunno how to explain it ) and have kind of a second more house-ish build-up going on, yknow having lots of high frequency content filling out the mix more and more until it all climaxes, which is when you drop in that fucking gorgeous piano again. people will go crazy, i mean just imagining the sound of it as i am writing got me pumped

you could also add some breakbeat percussion, not necessarily jungle-ish but something a little more complex than a housebeat with halftimed snare or whatever you wanna go for, to keep the dancers busy. maybe work that into the buildup as welll, adding more elements or whatever.

but please don't add some wobbly/gnarly/screechy lead-sound, the focus should really lie on those pianos and the mood they create. a vocal sample might work well, but please no synths stealing the show.


okay, this turned out to be longer than the original post feel free to ignore everything i've said, hope it helped

[hasezwei]

c'mon man, i've put so much effort into that post

[Dropkick_Kid]

meh, i wrote a giant post and safari ate it anyway, lets try this again

the intro is really ace. what i did after listening to it was the following:

- go to youtube
- type in "magnetic man i need air"
- mute the video
- hit play on the vid and your intro simultaneously

this is what your intro sounds like to me, like some really euphoric dancefloor anthem that'll make people on drugs cry. and that's what you should go for when continuing it, a lot of tunes build up a certain feeling or atmosphere with their intro just to drop into some totally unrelated gnarly smasher. doing that would really not do your WIP any justice!
personally i think after the intro it should drop into a 4/4 beat with the bassline kinda 'rising' on the pianorolls (dunno how to explain it ) and have kind of a second more house-ish build-up going on, yknow having lots of high frequency content filling out the mix more and more until it all climaxes, which is when you drop in that fucking gorgeous piano again. people will go crazy, i mean just imagining the sound of it as i am writing got me pumped

you could also add some breakbeat percussion, not necessarily jungle-ish but something a little more complex than a housebeat with halftimed snare or whatever you wanna go for, to keep the dancers busy. maybe work that into the buildup as welll, adding more elements or whatever.

but please don't add some wobbly/gnarly/screechy lead-sound, the focus should really lie on those pianos and the mood they create. a vocal sample might work well, but please no synths stealing the show.


okay, this turned out to be longer than the original post feel free to ignore everything i've said, hope it helped

Not gonna be adding any wobble mate don't worry
Gonna start working on it later, should post something up in the feedback thread before next wednesday.
If not, a week after cos I'll be festivalling at Reading
Thanks for all the input aswell, so many things I want to try out with it now.