everything i do sounds like total crap (total rant)

[Kes-Es]

I said this to someone else once, but if you're REALLY dissatisfied with your production and it's really affecting the way you feel and work and self respect and stuff, and you don't really come from a musical background to begin with, I reckon' it'd help you and your music alot to take a month or two and learn the basics of another instrument.
The quality boost in your tunes will be huge, especially if like I said you don't already think in musical movements, an ear/pride in your work is something that will take you forever to gain in computer music, I'm not sure why but what can take a few weeks on the piano or the guitar can take years on the computer, So if you're really stressing, for one, smoke some weed and fucking relax because your computer isn't going anywhere and you weren't going to get big or amazingly talented by stressing out and hating your work, and two step back from your computer, in general, like I just said, it's not going anywhere.
You make music music doesn't make you.

[Sharmaji]

def. watch the ira glass vid that someone re-posted.

to me, these threads are analagous to " last week i got a brush and some paint, and my paintings don't look like the sistine chapel!" 4 months is a very, very short amount of time.

let's keep using the painting analogy: besides mastering drawing a straight line (in this corner of the world, that'd be assinging the lfo to the cutoff and putting it over a halfstep beat), you need to learn, AND find your own voice in, perspective, color theory, contrast, character balance, AND gain a knowledge of the history behind it so that you don't keep reinventing the wheel.

if this is indeed something you want to do, keep at it, allow yourself to suck, abandon the shitty projects, archive the ok ones and finish the good ones. The most important thing is that you put in the relevant work-- polish things when you learn new techniques, seek out more knowledge, etc.

[brex]

I said this to someone else once, but if you're REALLY dissatisfied with your production and it's really affecting the way you feel and work and self respect and stuff, and you don't really come from a musical background to begin with, I reckon' it'd help you and your music alot to take a month or two and learn the basics of another instrument.

solid advice

[Widowmaker]

keep at it, never give up

[amphibian]

I really feel like the ability to play the keyboard could shave years off of your development. If you can translate your musical thoughts into physical motions, those motions can be captured and reproduced with technology. A year of dedicated practice, I suppose, should yield results. I would very much like piano lessons myself. I have struggled for years turning musical ideas into an external reality.

On another tangent, I would say keep it simple to a certain extent. The more elaborate and grandiose the project the more skill adn experience is required. Just keep it simple and write the music that comes naturally.

Not even. 1 week of reading up on scales and chords, and practise - and you can start writing shit more than good enough for dubstep.

[nowaysj]

I've been banging on the keyboard for decades and still can't get the music to come out right. Maybe I'm just a little retarded though.

[kHoff]

Yeah I am guessing every producer has gone through this. Producing has a lot to do with troubleshooting so its natural to get frustrated and swear a lot. Like what everyone else is saying, give it time, I've been going about a year and have been getting good feedback, but I know what you mean when you say you can't get your ideas into sounds. The way I see it is that the most successful producers have been doing it for years so they know what they're doing well enough, but you'll get the occasional genius kid who just blows up.