Fairly new to Electronic music, would like to know a little

[Inanimate]

I'm not new to Music production per se (gotta make a good impression using these fancy words), but after a long time of being an idle connoisseur (yeah, I'm making such an impression) of the art of Electronic music. I've been reading up on the techniques around Electronic music, like drum programming, mixing, arrangement and mastering. I've been a musician for a long time now, so I already know the much needed theory, I play bass and piano, and drums I guess -- badly. All my questions are aimed at producing Electronic, Big Beat and Dubstep. My biggest influences are Chemical Brothers, Orbital, Daft Punk, Modjo, Cassius, Prodigy, Crystal Method, Fatboy Slim, Laylo & Bushwack, Kid Creme, Stereo 8, Burial, Hatcha, Benga, James Blake, Lost, Coki, Skream, Kryptic and so many other Dubstep producers. I haven't listened to Dubstep in so long, not even sure what's going on in the scene, or what's "big" anymore. I'll be scavenging through the Dub, Tunes and General section just to get back to my 'roots'. Just a little about my background, just in case anybody gives a fuck

Now onto the questions.

What MIDI keyboard do you recommend for an avid piano player? I'm really used to acoustic pianos, and this will be my first digital keyboard. What brand offers the most realistic keyboards, in feel, capability, and affordability?

My next few questions are about drum programming. I heard pads help you audition and program drums a lot easier, are they capable of complex (breakbeat-esque) patterns? Would I just have to do each element separately? Is it a smart investment in getting one? Because it seems like I could fill that role by just bashing the keys on a MIDI keyboard.

My drums in comparison to a lot of the Electronic artists listed above sound far too loud and really unrealistic. I've seen tonnes of mixing tutorial, and I thought I had it down, but I don't. They sound really loud and overpower all the other elements, but when I turn the main drum channel down, it loses all dynamics. I don't have monitors and headphones yet (I'm working on it, lol) I just use my laptop speakers, so I normally save a piece and see how it sounds on Windows Media Player with my super epic bass enhancement plugins, lol. I don't really know what the problem is, but in comparison to a lot of Chemical Brother's, Orbital's and Burial's drums (which is the dynamics I'm trying to achieve) it's much more life like and sounds so good. What is the key to making such realistic, well mixed drums? Is it in the samples? Any recommendations on acoustic drum kits? :c
If you could analyse this little drum loop I just made and tell me how I could improve, that would be cool. You don't have to, I don't deserve more attention than anyone else here
Soundcloud
Oh, and if you could give me any tips on programming drum rolls. I can do handle them well on a real kit, but programming is much, much harder. A lot harder than I imagined. I just can't get the timing right. The mouse is the worst rhythmical aid.

If you've ever listened to a Daft Punk or Orbital, or any other progressive tracks, you'll know there's a lot of repetition and sound development. How exactly is that done so well? I used to be an animator, and we had a feature called clips. Which is where you basically animate a small portion outside of the project, then you could load it into the project as a single file and it will run through the sequenced animation without any further editing. Is that roughly the same with Electronic music? Just a lot of loops, arranged and developed? This would explain why my little tracks have been sounding awful, they never loop properly (I'm using an Ableton demo and the bassline is always off the grid) :c
Speaking of bassline, any idea how to recreate that original Acid House bassline, or those deep basslines you often hear in Pinch, Skream, and Hatcha tracks? I'm just using presets with built in synthesizers right now. I tried searching for some on YouTube and could only find "dubstep wobble" and "how to sound like..." ones, but there was never any on Skream :< Tonnes on Skrillex and Doctor P though. If I ever need to make those, I know where to turn, lol.

That's pretty much all my queries, MIDI keyboard, drum programming, arrangement. Thank you for reading all the way through here (or skim reading), and thanks in advance for the replies. I'm enjoying making Electronic music, it's really fun and I hope to get better. Feel free to suggest any good Dubstep producers that I wouldn't find browsing through the general forum.

Oh and if you're wondering, I've been at this for two weeks and a bit.

Another question I had while reading through the production bible, are pads similar to sub basses, as you're supposed to feel them rather than hear them? Or do they single-handedly create the atmosphere?

[legend4ry]

About the Piano ; Budget?


Drum pads ; it depends really, I do both! I have a SP808 which I feed into my DAW and record stuff in but sometimes I also build my beats by just dragging audio into the right places, its all workflow dependent!

The reason your drums don't sit right is due to laptop speakers.. The frequency range of them are poor and bring out things like drums and mid-range melody due to these being the most "cluttered" in the audio spectrum. You don't need amazing monitors or amazing headphones...

I worked on £17 headphones for around 5 years, my ears became attuned to them and I struggle mixing down or anything else. So my AKG sit in the draw and I am using the 3rd pair ive bought of these shitty headphones.


Heres some good drum sample packs ; http://www.analoguedrums.com/details-bm.php : http://www.popmusic.dk/hitkit-us.html


Tracks what loop a lot but still sound fresh is all down to having interesting things happening within those loops - groove, melody, vibe - its not one thing but a combination of lots of elements creating rich, thick textures. Then progressing those in a subtle way so you don't notice the change suddenly instead it just trickles into something else.

For that oldschool acid bass sound - Look at VST's moddled on the TB303 synth, the famous roland synth a lot of acid house produced used.



A lot of what you asked about drum programming comes in time.







Heres my advice.

Get some decent-ish headphones.
Get legit Ableton live.
Work on getting a workflow and learning to create grooves instead of jumping into creating tracks.
Make tunes for 6 months; after then if you still wanna make electronic music, get a keyboard.



Keep at it and hope this helps!







p.s - just listened to that drum beat, it sounds fine to me?

[lyons238]

welcome to the forum. glad you came on here with some real questions and have actually put in the effort to reading the bible and such first. sounds like you already have a leg up on production because your so familiar with music. i wish i had a musical background

legendary pretty much answered most of your questions but ill chime in on a few things.

for the keyboard, you should look at the Akai MPK series. they make all the way up to an 88 key for a price though. but it has drum pads built right into it. the pads are a little stiff at first but can be easily modded with electrical tape or you can buy fat pads for it. if you ever have questions about that just pm me. but yeah i just have a little MPK25 (i am no musician, really) but i love it. keys feel solid too.

and about your drum beat. it sounds pretty good as far as the programming goes. but now just try adding subtle things like a bit of delay on the high hats and just a touch of reverb on the high hats and snare. but yes pretty much the samples you start out with are going to play a huge roll in how your drums are going to sound in the end. also once you put your drums in a song your going to have to read up on compression and eqing/mixing to get them to sit right in the mix.

when compressing drum hits start compressing right after the transients in the drum hit. so set the attack accordingly. then really just play around with a ratio and gain that sounds good. oh and set the release so it stops compressing by the end of the drum hit and before the next hit.

heres a good read on eqing
http://www.dnbscene.com/article/88-thin ... tutorial/1

heres a little chart that may help you when eqing/mixing
http://www.independentrecording.net/irn ... splay.htmp

and heres a little read on compression for drums
http://www.recordproducer.com/?a=13

hope that helped.

oh and btw get a decent pair of studio headphones/monitors before anything else.

[mikeyp]

these guys have pretty much answered all your questions pretty well but i'd just like to say get some headphones or monitors! anything you do without them is just not gonna be right. it'd be like painting in the dark. and you don't need to drop hundreds at first. even a $20 pair of sonys from walmart are a million times better than laptop speakers.

[RandoRando]

Quality post lyons, future moderator?

[lyons238]

these guys have pretty much answered all your questions pretty well but i'd just like to say get some headphones or monitors! anything you do without them is just not gonna be right. it'd be like painting in the dark. and you don't need to drop hundreds at first. even a $20 pair of sonys from walmart are a million times better than laptop speakers.

yeah but hes already looking at buying some gear for production. he might as well get a decent pair of headphones.

OP: if your looking in the price range of $100 for headphones (which i recommend, at least) check out these headphones which i listed in order to my personal preference....
- AKG K240 MKII (Check ebay for cheap prices, or get the MKI's if you cant afford the II's) - also remember these are semi-open
- Audio Technica ATH-M50's
- Shure SRH840
- Sennheiser HD280 Pro

Or if you want pure sex headphones...
- Ultrasone Pro 900

Quality post lyons, future moderator?

hah thanks man. i just figured id give the guy a bit of help since he seems like a knowledgable dude and did his research first.

[Inanimate]

About the Piano ; Budget?

I have just under £350 to spend on a keyboard, I was interested in the MPK88 but it was way out of my price range. Now I'm looking into Fatar's keyboard line and I found an 88 keyed, fully weighted, hammer actioned keyboard for £300. I think it's a no brainer :>
But it doesn't have any controls, so I was thinking of buying that little LPK controller for the time being until I have some money for MPD's.

The reason your drums don't sit right is due to laptop speakers.. The frequency range of them are poor and bring out things like drums and mid-range melody due to these being the most "cluttered" in the audio spectrum. You don't need amazing monitors or amazing headphones...

I worked on £17 headphones for around 5 years, my ears became attuned to them and I struggle mixing down or anything else. So my AKG sit in the draw and I am using the 3rd pair ive bought of these shitty headphones.

Heres some good drum sample packs ; http://www.analoguedrums.com/details-bm.php : http://www.popmusic.dk/hitkit-us.html

I thought so, EQ'ing is guess work with Laptop speakers. I was browsing around the forum and saw some great recommendations for headphones around my price range (£150), so I'm thinking of getting one of those. Thanks for those samples! They are quality, I especially like the vocals.

Get some decent-ish headphones.
Get legit Ableton live.
Work on getting a workflow and learning to create grooves instead of jumping into creating tracks.
Make tunes for 6 months; after then if you still wanna make electronic music, get a keyboard.

Thank you so much, really great read and great advice, I see why you're a moderator. I bought Ableton Suite and Lite legitimately (standard )

and about your drum beat. it sounds pretty good as far as the programming goes. but now just try adding subtle things like a bit of delay on the high hats and just a touch of reverb on the high hats and snare. but yes pretty much the samples you start out with are going to play a huge roll in how your drums are going to sound in the end. also once you put your drums in a song your going to have to read up on compression and eqing/mixing to get them to sit right in the mix.

when compressing drum hits start compressing right after the transients in the drum hit. so set the attack accordingly. then really just play around with a ratio and gain that sounds good. oh and set the release so it stops compressing by the end of the drum hit and before the next hit.

heres a good read on eqing
http://www.dnbscene.com/article/88-thin ... tutorial/1

heres a little chart that may help you when eqing/mixing
http://www.independentrecording.net/irn ... splay.htmp

and heres a little read on compression for drums
http://www.recordproducer.com/?a=13

hope that helped.

oh and btw get a decent pair of studio headphones/monitors before anything else.

Blew my mind. So many techniques, so much information. This is fantastic. Thanks for the information and links!

[lyons238]

About the Piano ; Budget?

I have just under £350 to spend on a keyboard, I was interested in the MPK88 but it was way out of my price range. Now I'm looking into Fatar's keyboard line and I found an 88 keyed, fully weighted, hammer actioned keyboard for £300. I think it's a no brainer :>
But it doesn't have any controls, so I was thinking of buying that little LPK controller for the time being until I have some money for MPD's.

The reason your drums don't sit right is due to laptop speakers.. The frequency range of them are poor and bring out things like drums and mid-range melody due to these being the most "cluttered" in the audio spectrum. You don't need amazing monitors or amazing headphones...

I worked on £17 headphones for around 5 years, my ears became attuned to them and I struggle mixing down or anything else. So my AKG sit in the draw and I am using the 3rd pair ive bought of these shitty headphones.

Heres some good drum sample packs ; http://www.analoguedrums.com/details-bm.php : http://www.popmusic.dk/hitkit-us.html

I thought so, EQ'ing is guess work with Laptop speakers. I was browsing around the forum and saw some great recommendations for headphones around my price range (£150), so I'm thinking of getting one of those. Thanks for those samples! They are quality, I especially like the vocals.

Get some decent-ish headphones.
Get legit Ableton live.
Work on getting a workflow and learning to create grooves instead of jumping into creating tracks.
Make tunes for 6 months; after then if you still wanna make electronic music, get a keyboard.

Thank you so much, really great read and great advice, I see why you're a moderator. I bought Ableton Suite and Lite legitimately (standard )

and about your drum beat. it sounds pretty good as far as the programming goes. but now just try adding subtle things like a bit of delay on the high hats and just a touch of reverb on the high hats and snare. but yes pretty much the samples you start out with are going to play a huge roll in how your drums are going to sound in the end. also once you put your drums in a song your going to have to read up on compression and eqing/mixing to get them to sit right in the mix.

when compressing drum hits start compressing right after the transients in the drum hit. so set the attack accordingly. then really just play around with a ratio and gain that sounds good. oh and set the release so it stops compressing by the end of the drum hit and before the next hit.

heres a good read on eqing
http://www.dnbscene.com/article/88-thin ... tutorial/1

heres a little chart that may help you when eqing/mixing
http://www.independentrecording.net/irn ... splay.htmp

and heres a little read on compression for drums
http://www.recordproducer.com/?a=13

hope that helped.

oh and btw get a decent pair of studio headphones/monitors before anything else.

Blew my mind. So many techniques, so much information. This is fantastic. Thanks for the information and links!

no problem. does the keyboard your looking at have transport controls at least ie. play stop etc? if it does then that with an LPK as an addition will treat you just fine.

edit: damn i just checked my frequency chart and the link is broken now

weird it works in my favorites though
http://www.independentrecording.net/irn ... isplay.htm

oh and here is another chart thats a bit easier to read


remember though there are no rules to music so mix to your liking, this is just to give you a general idea.

[Inanimate]

About the Piano ; Budget?

I have just under £350 to spend on a keyboard, I was interested in the MPK88 but it was way out of my price range. Now I'm looking into Fatar's keyboard line and I found an 88 keyed, fully weighted, hammer actioned keyboard for £300. I think it's a no brainer :>
But it doesn't have any controls, so I was thinking of buying that little LPK controller for the time being until I have some money for MPD's.

The reason your drums don't sit right is due to laptop speakers.. The frequency range of them are poor and bring out things like drums and mid-range melody due to these being the most "cluttered" in the audio spectrum. You don't need amazing monitors or amazing headphones...

I worked on £17 headphones for around 5 years, my ears became attuned to them and I struggle mixing down or anything else. So my AKG sit in the draw and I am using the 3rd pair ive bought of these shitty headphones.

Heres some good drum sample packs ; http://www.analoguedrums.com/details-bm.php : http://www.popmusic.dk/hitkit-us.html

I thought so, EQ'ing is guess work with Laptop speakers. I was browsing around the forum and saw some great recommendations for headphones around my price range (£150), so I'm thinking of getting one of those. Thanks for those samples! They are quality, I especially like the vocals.

Get some decent-ish headphones.
Get legit Ableton live.
Work on getting a workflow and learning to create grooves instead of jumping into creating tracks.
Make tunes for 6 months; after then if you still wanna make electronic music, get a keyboard.

Thank you so much, really great read and great advice, I see why you're a moderator. I bought Ableton Suite and Lite legitimately (standard )

and about your drum beat. it sounds pretty good as far as the programming goes. but now just try adding subtle things like a bit of delay on the high hats and just a touch of reverb on the high hats and snare. but yes pretty much the samples you start out with are going to play a huge roll in how your drums are going to sound in the end. also once you put your drums in a song your going to have to read up on compression and eqing/mixing to get them to sit right in the mix.

when compressing drum hits start compressing right after the transients in the drum hit. so set the attack accordingly. then really just play around with a ratio and gain that sounds good. oh and set the release so it stops compressing by the end of the drum hit and before the next hit.

heres a good read on eqing
http://www.dnbscene.com/article/88-thin ... tutorial/1

heres a little chart that may help you when eqing/mixing
http://www.independentrecording.net/irn ... splay.htmp

and heres a little read on compression for drums
http://www.recordproducer.com/?a=13

hope that helped.

oh and btw get a decent pair of studio headphones/monitors before anything else.

Blew my mind. So many techniques, so much information. This is fantastic. Thanks for the information and links!

no problem. does the keyboard your looking at have transport controls at least ie. play stop etc? if it does then that with an LPK as an addition will treat you just fine.

edit: damn i just checked my frequency chart and the link is broken now

weird it works in my favorites though
http://www.independentrecording.net/irn ... isplay.htm

oh and here is another chart thats a bit easier to read


remember though there are no rules to music so mix to your liking, this is just to give yo, u a general idea.

Beautiful. Absolutely fantastic visual display. I never knew bassliens could lie in at 3rd octave.

I do have one question though, about frequency ranges. You see how it says a House/Electro bass lies at 200hz, how exactly do I check that? It says you can adjust it with careful EQ'ing, does that mean you cut everything other than the 200hz mark, or you boost the 200hz with a small band and attenuate the problematic ranges?

Thanks again for the resources and info, man. Lot of help (:

[legend4ry]

It means the general frequencies it will lay is around the 200hz mark.

For house/electroyou may want to isolate it with a parametric EQ cutting the 500hz and above and everything below the 60hz mark to save space for the boomy kick in house/electro. Its really dependent on how YOU work.

[lyons238]

yeah thats why i made it a point to say these are general guidelines and by no means rules. and how it shows the circle icon that means generally where the instrument will be peaking or most prominent at. so the meat of many basses is going to be just above 200hz, but make sure you dont get bass confused with sub bass, even though bass is bass, in electronic music these days basses have even higher frequencies in em...but yeah you get my point

you can check what the majority of an instruments frequencies fall under by using the spectrum analyzer in ableton. you can then eq accordingly. just for an example say you have a sub bass. generally thats 30-100hz. and you have a dubstep bass that sits over that. you'd want to roll off or low pass the sub bass at around 100hz. then you will want to high pass from about 100hz on your dubstep bass (that way your dubstep bass doesnt interfere with your sub bass). the whole point of this is to give your track headroom and to remove any muddiness/clashing so you can hear all the elements of the track. remember though frequencies can overlap. just as a general rule try not to have any two elements of a track peaking in the same frequency range. that eq/mixing guide i linked to you explains all this better than me though.

i hope that made sense. im a little scatter brained right now so