So well I’m having this problem since quite some time and i just want to hear other peoples experiences post this. I have been producing music for a little more than a year now. Though in this time i have only managed to produce 21 songs. Now realistically speaking i genuinely know a lot about how to produce..my mixes are i believe 90% there i know how to make pads basses lead etc. so i have gone through a lot of reading and learning in this time.
But what is frustrating me is that i really really want to work hard but like it doesn’t happen. Whenever i sit to produce i don’t know what to start with. Everytime i have to start a new song i literally am scared and i have no clue why..i have all the time in the world..and i want to put in like 13 to 14 hours a day in this but like i get stagnant within like 4 or 5 hours..my only aim is to like just work a lot and like be able to produce a good track…thats it! neither have i found my sound and style..so i get stuck on what to add next..and this is really annoying..shouldn’t it just come to me what to add next in the song What do i do?!?!
if u want to hear my work..its here…which i think is pretty average (not putting myself down but just being realistic) btw the song isn’t mastered..
I know the feeling, but it comes with having to work a full time job and having another demanding hobby like playing hockey. I listen to a lot of music from my favorite artists on a daily basis and that usually gives me the inspiration I need to move forward. I’ll listen to something from Dubfire and catch something really minute like a smooth transition or just a hat pattern and from there I can just start pumping out some work for a bit. Once I get to the point to where I lost my touch on the track, I save and open another one to see if I can spark any creativity.
“It’s not mastered yet” is my pet peeve lol… You’re song should sound pretty damn good before the mastering process even takes place. I used to say that all the time, but “it’s not mastered yet” really means “my mixdown is pretty mediocre”
it sounds cool, the sounds are pretty preset sounding but its a good work in progress.
I produce too and I am never one of those people that spends loong ass time trying to come up with stuff. I only open my DAW when I actually have an idea and then go from there, so putting stuff together takes a very short time.
First off, 2 songs / month isn’t that bad IMO. I don’t get the people that can put out a song a week or less. It takes me a week just to get the mix where I want it. For instance, my last song took me all of about eight hours to arrange it and do the sound design. Obviously I tweaked it from there, but it was two weeks to get the mix where I liked it.
In your scenario, I’d have a few songs going at any given time. One might not provoke inspiration whereas another may. I always come up with new concepts while doing sound design/arrangement for a song, so I try to save them to another project to come back to - or to work on when I’m just not feeling my latest song.
Regarding this song of yours…claps and hats were too quiet to me. They should help drive the song along, but they were too off in the distance to do that. You’re also missing some mid-highs on almost all your instruments and overall, which makes the sounds kind of closed, not open is the best way for me to explain it. Take that bassline that’s prominent through most of the song - add a db or two or three somewhere between 3 - 8 kHz with a mid to low Q level. A/B with what you have vs that and see if there’s a difference. Your bass that came in at 2 minutes was a lot more open. Overall, the song was lacking energy, probably from the low volume claps and hats and the too much low end in the song. Try again adding some dbs to the 3 - 8 kHz on your 2 bus and see what kind of difference that makes. Musically and arrangement, I dug it, and I’m in your shoes - at about a year of trying this. But those are the things that popped out immediately to me.
Ahh thanks mate..though I’ve designed all the sounds by myself…i hate using presets…hopefully soon enough ill be able to design more interesting and different sounds.
Thanks for you tips!
Yeah now to hear the song with all your tips i do too feel the claps and the hats were kindoff distant…they could definitely have been a bit more upfront. Well, i dint know there was too much low end guess its my untreated room causing this low end and mid high’s issue. will have to start checking on some monitor headphones
Ahh well at least you liked it musically. Im glad. Thanks for the help!
That’s actually better than me. In the first 12 months of producing, I managed to turn out about 100 minutes of content…but nothing was a “finished” song. This was all bits & pieces and odds & ends.
I am currently able to produce the best “5 minute elevator music loop” you can imagine in just a long weekend.
The tyranny of the blank page.
If the blank page is too hard, then provide yourself some constraint, any constraint. Inspiration comes from many sources.
Take a music class. Build something around the weekly assignments or lesson examples.
Record yourself doing anything with a rhythm (messing with a piano keyboard, playing a shaker, actual finger drumming, typing on a computer keyboard, etc). That will set a timbre, rhythm, and tempo. Build something around that.
Go to the discount bin at a used music store. Buy the first three discs you find with the letter “N” in the title. Do something with the music between minute 11 and 12 on each disc.
The “tappers and listeners” experiment is fun to play around with. Record someone else tapping out (actual finger drumming) a song. Do NOT let them tell you what song they are tapping. Build something around that. Curse of knowledge - Wikipedia
And on, and on, and on.
If you don’t like the results…blame the “arbitrary” constraint…and pick another constraint for the next song.
It’s not necessarily that there’s too much low end to me, so much as it is there isn’t enough high end - presence EQ bands showing through. Give my sweeping from 2K - 8 or 9K on some of the instruments and then overall and A/Bing what you currently have to the added presence and see what a difference it makes. Once you’ve found the place it sounds best, play with the Q and increase in db level to find what really fits the sound, then fine tune for the overall mix.
limits inspire creativity. In the computer world there’s too many options! When I was putting tracks out I had an all analog studio, moving to the computer seemed like a godsend until I realized the overload that happens.
it’s amazing how much you can dial a mix in with the hi/band/low pass filters on the synths themselves. I rarely add EQ to tracks unless I want to add artifacts from it. If you put each sound in it’s place it’s a lot easier to get a clean mix.
It’s why less is more.
Anytime I feel the desire to just start buying a bunch of crap, I remember how dudes in the late 80s and 90s we’re busting out tracks on almost nothing. If they could do it, so can I. It also inspires a producer to be more creative and that’s obviously very important.
i think, you cannot force your brain and yourself to get good ideas for sitting down longer and longer…
for example: i play piano and very often i take the chords from a song (e.g. river flows in you with: F#m, D, A, E) and play some melodies along these chords, and if there is one which sounds nice, i try to improve this with tiny bits and pieces like chords in stead of single tones or just multiple tones instead of the single tone…
i hope you understand what i mean but the only thing i wanted to say is: don’t force yourself to get ideas, just let the ideas come from themselfes
What do i do?!?!
guess its my untreated room causing this low end and mid high’s issue. will have to start checking on some monitor headphones 
