My first track ever

[kyranmcc]

Hey,

This is also my first post on here. I'm an 18 year old from Australia who love's dubstep! Anyway, I got my hands on a MacBook Pro and bought Logic with the intention of making dubstep. It has always been a passion of mine however I have never really had the time or money. So I've had the mac and logic for about... 4 days now and I've just been playing around trying to learn the controls and the different tools available. I've never had any kind of music production experience so it's all completely new to me.

I thought I would post up a little track I've started to put together and get a bit of feedback which would be awesome! I know it's not much of a track (just a preview) and a lot of work still needs to be done (adding more sounds, sub bass etc etc) and I know the sounds aren't that great and the snare is absolutely terrible haha. But other than all my flaws, it would be sweet to get a few tips off people that are experienced with making dubstep or using logic.

Soundcloud

Cheers!

[kyranmcc]

Look's like no one wants to help me out haha

[MedikProductions]

no one ever does, you gotta learn that bout this forum no one ever wants to help but a lot of people are pretty helpful it's weird. um the levels are all messed up. the way i generally order things when i mix them is (from loudest to quietest) kick, snare, bass, main synths, hats, everything else. for fillers honestly just listen to other artists and kinda copy them until you get your own groove and style and stuff.

http://dubstepforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=210811
check my newest mix? it's the last song on my soundcloud if you'd rather there than here

[kyranmcc]

I agree about the levels haha. I'm totally new to this so I'm slowly learning. I can tell what's wrong with it but learning how to fix/improve it is what's tough.

Thanks

[Rexkt]

its def a good start for sure, levels def important, just remember that your channels for each synth or drums are whatever are NOT how loud it will be, thats all dictated in the master channel, and you then increase loudness there with mastering software or doing it yourself. so you can put those level anywhere you want to balance your track. the sounds i like actually, and structure isnt bad, for sure great start for putting something together for the first time. something to note would be when the high pitch sound comes in, at the very beginning its a little off beat.

[sam_vogel]

This is a great start. I have definitely heard MUCH worse tracks from people who thought that the tracks they asked for opinions on should be treated as if they were made by a famous producer. I appreciate that you realize all of the things that you need to work on; because you will, and you'll only get better and better. As a general rule, I would disregard releasing the first 4-5 tracks you make when you're just beginning to produce. They should be treated more as "practice" tracks, to hone your craft. The structure is definitely there, you have some really solid ideas, and your definitely grasping all the main ideas of producing very quickly.

Once you start figuring out your synths/effects/etc, you'll begin to realize that no matter what you do, the songs never sound good... until you EQ and mix them properly. EQ'ing and mixing your track (to me, at least) is the #1 most important part, and will determine whether it sounds like crap or sounds professional. As you said, you've only been at this for about a week so I don't expect you to be a pro at it, but I would highly suggest spending a TON of time learning how to EQ and mix well. It took me forever to even get decent at it, and I still don't think im good at it at all. Logic has a great EQ built into it, and I would suggest getting into the habit of EQ'ing every single sound in your track, whether its a synth, vocal, drum, sample, etc. Even white noise can be EQ'd to leave headroom for other sounds.

I hope this all helped... If you want (and this isn't me trying to plug my song), you can check out my track (in my sig) and ask me how i did something or what i did to get a certain sound, or just feel free to message me on here or on soundcloud if you want more feedback or have any questions in general. Good luck with your productions, I know you'll fall in love with it as much as I have.


Sam aka Escape

[sam_vogel]

This is a great start. I have definitely heard MUCH worse tracks from people who thought that the tracks they asked for opinions on should be treated as if they were made by a famous producer. I appreciate that you realize all of the things that you need to work on; because you will, and you'll only get better and better. As a general rule, I would disregard releasing the first 4-5 tracks you make when you're just beginning to produce. They should be treated more as "practice" tracks, to hone your craft. The structure is definitely there, you have some really solid ideas, and your definitely grasping all the main ideas of producing very quickly.

Once you start figuring out your synths/effects/etc, you'll begin to realize that no matter what you do, the songs never sound good... until you EQ and mix them properly. EQ'ing and mixing your track (to me, at least) is the #1 most important part, and will determine whether it sounds like crap or sounds professional. As you said, you've only been at this for about a week so I don't expect you to be a pro at it, but I would highly suggest spending a TON of time learning how to EQ and mix well. It took me forever to even get decent at it, and I still don't think im good at it at all. Logic has a great EQ built into it, and I would suggest getting into the habit of EQ'ing every single sound in your track, whether its a synth, vocal, drum, sample, etc. Even white noise can be EQ'd to leave headroom for other sounds.

I hope this all helped... If you want (and this isn't me trying to plug my song), you can check out my track (in my sig) and ask me how i did something or what i did to get a certain sound, or just feel free to message me on here or on soundcloud if you want more feedback or have any questions in general. Good luck with your productions, I know you'll fall in love with it as much as I have.


Sam aka Escape

[Subgore]

For first time it very good. Try looking into compression, compression will help you controle dynamic range of instruments. Also look into reverb and delays. Reverb will help you add a sense of space to the sound, and place the sound in a room. Now you feed all your main elements into a master reverb this is will help gell the sound together and help them work as one, because you creating a sense there all in the same room.

Dubstep is called dubstep for two reason...first dub music relays on heavy use of delays and reverbs, a long with other stuff. Check out King Tubby mixes for a history lesson . Also the step part is linked to UK garage where there is a two step drum patten. Kick on the first beat and a snare on the third beat. But of course add more snares, claps and kicks in there to add spice to your tunes. Anyway mate keep up the good work, I am sure in a few months you will be producing some nice tunes!

Also a quick one, layer up your snare and kicks. For example the last track I was working on my snare was made up of 5 different ones, all adding different sound to it.

[kyranmcc]

Thanks to everyone for replying! And replying with detailed feedback rather than yeah its cool or nah your shit haha.

You've definitely helped me already. I think I am going to just play around with this song using the suggestions you guys have given me rather than just make 4 other shitty tracks before I realise they all just sound like this one and I'm not improving haha.

When your EQing a track, how much is too much or not enough? Or there no limit because it's completely different for every track? Should everything be at a similar level? Like all the main synths and bass? With maybe the kick and snare slightly louder?

Also, when making the bass, should I EQ it so that most of the low frequency bass is just left for the sub bass or crank up the low end of the bass as well?

I've changed my snare now and also layered it with a kick and it sounds pretty good, is that normal? Haha.

Creating sub bass is killing me.........

Is side chaining really advanced or fairly easy to pick up?

And that's all the questions I can think of now.

[kyranmcc]

I'm about to cry. All my sounds reverted back to default. I have no idea why, I saved it and then opened it and now it's like that...

[sam_vogel]

Thanks to everyone for replying! And replying with detailed feedback rather than yeah its cool or nah your shit haha.

You've definitely helped me already. I think I am going to just play around with this song using the suggestions you guys have given me rather than just make 4 other shitty tracks before I realise they all just sound like this one and I'm not improving haha.

When your EQing a track, how much is too much or not enough? Or there no limit because it's completely different for every track? Should everything be at a similar level? Like all the main synths and bass? With maybe the kick and snare slightly louder?

Also, when making the bass, should I EQ it so that most of the low frequency bass is just left for the sub bass or crank up the low end of the bass as well?

I've changed my snare now and also layered it with a kick and it sounds pretty good, is that normal? Haha.

Creating sub bass is killing me.........

Is side chaining really advanced or fairly easy to pick up?

And that's all the questions I can think of now.

These are some very good questions. Firstly, with EQ'ing it should almost ALWAYS be subtractive - as in you focus more on REMOVING frequencies than boosting them . When you do boost frequencies, make it very subtle - no more than 6db.
When Mixing, everything should "sound" like it's at about the same level, but there will definitely be differences - the way I've found most rewarding is to bring ALL my tracks to -inf DB (or silent), then raise the kick drum to the highest level you want the track to be at (this doesn't mean 0db, but a numebr that you specify... it will be different for every song/sample but I normally stick to around -10db as my high point) This may sound like it makes your track very quiet... and it does. All you have to do is turn up your monitor/speaker/headphone volume to compensate. If you mix your tracks low enough, it gives you TONS of headroom to work with when your done with the track, which is much nicer than having to go through when you're all done and re-mix the whole track. ALSO, a general rule of thumb is to put the master level at a value such that it gives your track -6db of headroom (meaning your track never peaks above -6db)... this doesn't mean bring the volume of the master down to -6db, but you will have to figure out based on your track how much you will have to subtract to make it so no sound goes higher than -6db. This is done because in electronic music, your highest point is 0db - anything over that will "clip", which basically means sound super shitty and wreck your speakers... and no one wants that. Putting the track at -6db is basically cutting the possible volume of the track in half, which means when mastering you havre ALOT of room tow ork with. It will make your songs sound 100000 times better.

I hope this was helpful.

Sam