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More sound design than musical arrangement and melody.

You're not looking deep enough, or the title of this thread is poorly worded.

But yeah I see what you mean.

Relabel it today's Beatport Top 10.

But yea, I'm sick of the sound design circle jerk.

And the sound design has to be almost identical to whoever is currently flavour of the month else it's shit

What a coincidence.

I was just thinking the exact same thing a few minutes ago. So many of the more younger (?) producers seem to focus more on getting the craziest sounds and modulations, meanwhile they have a one note bassline and not much going on in the composition and arrangement department.

You just have to dig more, but that has always been the case even back in the old vinyl days.

^ One note basslines... TOTALLY.

Or the same little half step riff over and over... F/F# for 6 minutes except a dropout in the breakdown.

I miss songs with parts and progression.

fragments wrote:Relabel it today's Beatport Top 10.

alphacat wrote: Or the same little half step riff over and over... F/F# for 6 minutes except a dropout in the breakdown.

Pssssst You're letting all my secrets out

Modulation and sound design can be rhythmic and arrangement tools. I like a good tune, I dont'care how it's made.

Genevieve wrote:Modulation and sound design can be rhythmic and arrangement tools. I like a good tune, I dont'care how it's made.

I agree. Although I do get excited when I hear an actual chord change in electronic music.

mks wrote:

Genevieve wrote:Modulation and sound design can be rhythmic and arrangement tools. I like a good tune, I dont'care how it's made.

I agree. Although I do get excited when I hear an actual chord change in electronic music.

Allow the chord change, nowadays I will just settle for a chord.

Back to the music theory books before I start feeling too much a hypocrite

alphacat wrote:^ One note basslines... TOTALLY.

Or the same little half step riff over and over... F/F# for 6 minutes except a dropout in the breakdown.

Don't forget all the drums/percussion sounding the same.
And the even ambiences/samples are played out.

Mad EP wrote:

alphacat wrote:^ One note basslines... TOTALLY.

Or the same little half step riff over and over... F/F# for 6 minutes except a dropout in the breakdown.

Don't forget all the drums/percussion sounding the same.
And the even ambiences/samples are played out.

I used to not think this way...but if you aren't crate digging AND recording your own samples, I don't know why people are wasting their time TBH. Even the good sample packs are rinsed x1000. I mean, I still use some stuff from Gold Baby, because sometimes you just need an 808 kick ...but otherwise I try to do something unique.

Had Maschine about six months...I even stay away from it's library.

sampling/recording sounds + also actually writing music = tunes I want to listen to. Anything else...meh...

Maybe I'm alone on this but I don't think that all music has to have intricate melodies or complicated chords in order to be worthwhile.

I mean there's plenty of electronic music that does have these elements, it's just that the popular stuff is for clubs, and people who are dancing care more about the beat than about how many different notes the baseline is made out of. You gotta know your audience. I mean it's not like all these people are going to the club so they can try and hear when the neopolitan chord comes up or to marvel at clever tritone substitutions or anything like that.

I sample most of my 'fx', guitar stabs, vocal samples, drumfills etc, from tunes that I like. But it's all laziness. I don't feel like going through large sample libraries if my memory has a big enough library for tunes. If I want dark pads I'll just sample some noise from some drone metal band, highpass and put reverb on it.

At the end of the day, I just want to do something the way it works in my mind. How I get there doesn't matter. What I WANT to do just happens to need a ton of effort haha. But if I could afford to cut corners I would. I'm about the end product, because I'm def no engineer.

Add9 wrote:Maybe I'm alone on this but I don't think that all music has to have intricate melodies or complicated chords in order to be worthwhile.

I mean there's plenty of electronic music that does have these elements, it's just that the popular stuff is for clubs, and people who are dancing care more about the beat than about how many different notes the baseline is made out of. You gotta know your audience. I mean it's not like all these people are going to the club so they can try and hear when the neopolitan chord comes up or to marvel at clever tritone substitutions or anything like that.

I get you, but a lot of popular dance music is just really, really, dumbed down these days. But you can ignore me as I'm an old geezer who doesn't go out to clubs anymore and is pretty much done with "the scene". So, for me, I'm wanting some at least a little sophisticated in my beat oriented music ;p

I had been going to a weekly for a while, but I got tired of the younger kids who immediately abandoned the dance floor when someone wasn't playing a (stupid) filthy banger. I'd see their faces, some of them would get all disgusted and pissed. Meanwhile, the older folks hung around for everyone's set no matter what they were playing.

Either things are really different or I need to start doing hard drugs again.

I went to a slammmmmmmmmed all-house-or-deep house-for-6-hours party in the park on Sunday and every tune was pretty much awesome. Granted, it was on a rude system, with top notch selectors, and a completely packed dancefloor-- so the fun element was egged up- but still, great music.

Currently istening to a friend's summer DJ mix right now and it's totally putting a smile on my face. speaking of: https://soundcloud.com/mndr/summertime- ... ix/s-N0tkb

there's lots of good music out there. One key is to let other folks find it for you-- this is what DJ's do best. When i was dj'ing a bunch i loved turning other heads onto tunes i was into-- sometimes in a competetive, i've got this dub before you do way, but mostly just because the vibe is good.

but truth be told it's even more enjoyable to be turned onto stuff you'd otherwise miss. Joe Nice's radio shows were and are endlessly inspiring. I listen to internet radio, and rinse a couple of times a week, to find really, really fresh tunes.

There's great stuff out there.

mks wrote:So many of the more younger (?) producers seem to focus more on getting the craziest sounds and modulations, meanwhile they have a one note bassline and not much going on in the composition and arrangement department.

Not to blatantly self promote but that was one of the things I hoped to break in this tune

https://soundcloud.com/claude-defaren/dear-friend

@ around 1:30

But yo, as much as I agree that there is overall a lack of "caring" about MUSIC from a lot of bro-y producers today, I feel like you're expecting more out of this stuff than you should. What's wrong with a one-note bassline? Music is the change in sound over time, not "as many notes as possible." If you want the latter, go listen to some Bach (who is amazing). In fact, listen to him anyway. But look at deep or minimal house. There's a beauty in the musical simplicity and repetition.