Exactly this!
I guess my ideal workflow would be to make a nice 4 bar sequence on my sequencer and then loop some guitar on top of that with the looper pedal. But then comes the hard part of having to come up with a second part/sequence that goes well with the first one and being able to make them flow into each other. And then a third part etc. Then it would perhaps start to resemble a song.
Nowadays I’m really and truly happy because the technical issues I had previously have been solved. My looper is in perfect sync with my sequencer. When I press play on my MPC Live, the RC-600 starts to play perfectly in sync and everything is beautiful.
My looper is mainly geared towards my guitar playing. It’s my way of having a guitarist in ”my band” without having to play guitar all the way thru.
I’d say that the only way out of my rut is to start to use the DAW to capture the loops I make and start to build songs out of those Lego blocks I make with my sequencer and looper. Otherwise I’ll always just have great building blocks of differing colours but nothing resembling a complete construction.
I also struggle with this. I sometimes find planning my session ahead, deciding what I’m going to achieve and how long to spend on each part can be helpful.
E.g. I know I have 1.5 hours to work on music (toddler having his nap!) I could pre-plan that time and stick to the schedule strictly. Think of it more like a practice routine or exercise.
Get a timer running on your phone and move to the next stage when the timer runs out!
- 15mins creating a groove on ____ (insert device here - important to give yourself limitations in terms of which gear you will use ahead of time for this method to work well in my experience!)
- 15mins tweaking the drum sounds to my liking
- 15mins arranging the drums into a song structure and building a few fills and variations
- 15mins choosing and sequencing a hook sound / melody / sample
- 15mins adding bass and harmonies to the hook/lead
- 15mins to mix and bounce.
You’ll always end up with something if you follow this method strictly. It might not be to your liking, but you’ll have a framework of a full track to develop or discard.
Good luck!
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I advise you work with this in mind:
RECORD MIXES & REVIEW.
I strongly believe that this is the key that most people miss… it doesn’t matter whether you’re recording into a daw or a stereo recorder, the important thing is to RECORD so that you can REVIEW.
Only when it’s recorded can you be critical of what you’re doing and improve… and if you want a 100% genuine critique of what you are doing, play it to someone else, that’s the surefire way of hearing things you want to improve.
When you record stuff, you make it real and stop yourself being stuck in the mindset of imagining the potential of a track you are currently playing with.
Then, compile your tracks.
Whether it’s a folder on your phone with MP3’s, a Cd, tracks on a Soundcloud account, it doesn’t matter… but having them available to play back to back will give you progression and make it all real.
Personally I think Soundcloud is fantastic for this… being able to be in my studio, start jamming, catch it on an SD card, plug it in my Mac and transfer to Soundcloud… then play it in the car on my way home… is stupidly easy/fluid now, and priceless.
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I agree on the recording and learning idea; yet I also think that the joy of doing music in the moment can be extremely fulfilling and way enough in itself. Humans have been making music for thousands of years without any means of recording, finishing and releasing tracks.
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I agree with this, but times have changed… we’re now talking about sitting creating multi-instrumental productions where you genuinely need to get some external perspective or it can feel overwhelming… it’s not the same as sitting at a piano, or with an acoustic guitar, drums, etc, and being in the moment… although obviously this still happens within our setups… I don’t mean record 100% of the time, but it helps get beyond certain barriers.
Also, it’s helpful to be able to enjoy your own music as a listener… if you don’t enjoy it, chances are others won’t either.
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Yeah, that’s a 100% fact. If you are not your own biggest fan, you’re doing something wrong. Why would I ever make/release music that I don’t love myself?
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Hmm, don’t know. When you learn, you know it’s not the best, and not what you want yourself to sound like, but without releasing, no feedback and without feedback slower progression.
This is the perfect time to rehash an old meme:
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To me this sounds like a great work life balance, and a healthy way to pursue a hobby. Maybe you are feeling the paralysis of choice, with having so much stored, and you need some sort of catalyst to replace the band mates input to help you craft these ideas into songs.
Im sure if you took it upon yourself and not go into a session to “jam” but to start and finish a track, you could definitely come up with a riff… “a/b” it… add a variation or two… throw it through a basic mastering chain… and call it a day. It sounds like you’ve been there before, just need to change your approach.
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I also agree with this… its devastatingly easy to record. Just start recording at the jump, and then go through a 20 min track to find the gold. Just scrub through the wav file, find something that sounds good, throw some warp makers to clean up the timing, and then you good money.
Maybe even use a reference track to break you out of this. Pick a dope song you like and make something in the same fashion structurally, not melodically.
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I have a laptop in my studio rooms loaded with a DAW template ready to record my ideas and loops. Make life easier for me after a sketch a concept out in my looper recorders. Other tools like my 1010 Music Bluebox and Tascam recorder are there for when I don’t feel like messing with a DAW and can process stems for later use in tracks. Recently I’m having a blast recording loops into my OB-4 and SP 404 MK2 that can be imported fairly quickly to a DAW. Weekly modular challenges keep me honest and focused to commit to regular process.
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Yeah. I guess taking the time to first pick my preferred DAW and then learning to use it would be my first step. Then making templates on it (and on my MPC) would be the second.
I have Reaper (license paid) and Bitwig (8track) that came free with my Linnstrument, but I’m always thinking of moving to Logic and sometimes also tempted by Ableton.
Reaper feels like “second rate” because it’s basically free and when I first started Bitwig it took me 15 minutes to even find the transport section and play button. The UI seemed really cluttered to my taste. I feel at home with Garageband and for that reason I think Logic would be the “logical” choice.
But yes, I can’t even commit to one DAW.
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Maybe this is where you are more naturally gifted (and also inspiration in literature through your book store). For music you could just continue as you are doing but with record always on.
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Complex issue. For me the challenge is making ideas that I think are strong enough to get a label to release the track. Can be crippling at times.
The way I worked with that was by starting with the melody after making a drum pattern. For years I always started with harmony - chords- pads. Etc. But what I found was mass experimentation with sampling got me to making vocals and leads that I was happy with.
Honestly for me the secret is sampling everything. You get an idea that is good but not great? No problem.run it through some effects like tuners, grainulars, multi effects - whatever you like. Then Chop it up and resequence it until every note and phrase is strong. I think doing this took me down a path of making far more interesting ideas and using those ideas to start a track gets me to the finish line a lot faster than having a really nice chord progression going and trying to find the perfect vocal hook to put on top of it.
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Please dont take this the wrong way, Im only trying to help… but this is the wrong path to follow. i think you should be eliminating road blocks, creatively and mentally, and this seems like you are in danger of creating more.
DAWS don’t matter, and templates can come later after you get out the gate. Just stick to the basics… choose one, it doesn’t matter which one, find out where the record button is, and press it and play music. Let the work dictate what you need to learn in the DAW.
It would be like this,
how do I record? Learn that… Record a bunch of stuff in one track…
Okay, how do I scrub through the track and cut snippits out I like… learn that…
okay, how do I apply effects? learn that…
How do I cut and paste? learn that…
let the end goal dictate what you learn out of necessity… there is too much functionality to grapple with and an ambiguous goal of learning enough to use it.
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I’m liking Logic and Studio One for my DAW platforms.
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If you need a sparrer of sorts hit me up anytime dude! I am super focused of “getting things done” maybe vs doing the best thing ever buuut… it gets stuff done. Big part of it is just the boring sitting front of the computer figuring stuff out but I actually enjoy that maybe even more than actually writing songs. One way to look at it (as we have done with couple of projects with my friends) that the creative process (could be loops on a looper, long recordings to DAW, whatever) is sort of one thing, and then the actually molding of the songs is another thing way, way later. It is like sampling yourself, kinda.
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I disagree that Reaper is second rate because it’s free…, but I often feel the same and think about buying another DAW. I know in my heart of hearts that a shiny new DAW won’t change my habits though. That being said a good mate of mine who has tracked and mixed a heap of bands in Pro Tools as well as his own synth based music has recently started with Logic and raves about it, so… maybe
I can also relate to your original post re being attached to riffs and ideas, wanting to use them and not forget them, but never quite getting there. It can feel a bit trapping sometimes.
A couple of things I’m thinking about currently to get myself ‘out of the loop’:
- critical listening to 80s programmed synth music and taking note of how few parts there actually are in some of the big songs. Maybe I only need two parts and a shaker? Sounds like a martini recipe.
- using the Blackbox more to live jam clips - a couple of drum patterns that go together and then building up a loop over the main one but doing two or three variations of each part. Then jam them by launching them in all sorts of different combos. I find doing this starts to suggest arrangement ideas pretty quick.
- using control-all probability on digitone to create different parts. Get a pattern pumping then copy it, drop the tempo a few bpm and the probability down to around 33% and just listen to what comes out. Feels a bit like cheating but eh.
- using other songs as a template for structure. I read an article recently about the reasons new Christmas songs aren’t often successful, and one of the reasons posited was that most of the classics were written in the 1940s-60s and are structured quite differently. So new Christmas songs might not ‘feel’ right even if they sound right. In short, try a really left field song choice as an arrangement template.
I also can’t remember if I said this in an earlier post or if it came up in another thread, but your comment about planning out an EP, tracks, artwork, ideas, lyrics etc… I’ve done this a few times and really enjoy the creative rush, but somewhere along the way that visualisation of the finished product becomes the finished product and I lose the motivation to keep working on it. It’s also hard to write to a pre-conceived idea.
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This looks like a really good book recommendation, based on the sample I’ve read so far, thank you
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