Hi everyone,
I’ve just listened to an old track I made a few years back and it made me realise how much I’ve lost faith in my own music. I used to finish whole tracks sometimes in one session, but now I’m lucky if I get a loop finished that I like. Problem is that when I’m writing I think it sounds great, then after a few hours away from the track I load it back up and wonder what I was thinking.
I’m in the middle of writing some stuff for a series of short films, the deadline is fast approaching and I’m having a serious confidence crisis.
Anyone else have this? What do you do to keep positive?
What keeps me positive about my music is hearing when people enjoy it.
I’ve only been producing about 10 months now but when i listen to my old prductions over the course of that time compared to now. it makes me realise how much i progress each week. maybe set yourself some goals? because for me producing is something that i naturally enjoy and want to further my skills.
dont feel too down though mate
The irony is the more experience you have the higher expectations you put on your self and the less you are happy with your own work which can lead to frustration.
When you frist start off basic tracks can take a day to finish but when you raise the bar you know there is a lot more work to do until you are happy with it.
You ned to seperate the writing from the production… they require 2 completely different sets of skills.
Try to throw everything in in the first few hours of starting a track… dont restrict yourself, just let the creativity flow… I throw in loads ore riffs or loops than ill ever need.
Then when your tapped out start the production process.
When listening back to your stuff make notes on anything you want to fix or change and work through them methodically.
Try to get a basic arrangement as soon as possible or you could end up playing about with scenes forever. This is the biggest positive and negative thing with live that the arranging part is separated from the creation part… it can lead to a lot of loops and ideas and no finished tracks.
Just a few ideas to get you going!
Agreed on the Live session view comments.
It’s a great creative tool, but as phil points out - for me at least - it can be a creative curse too. I have loads of half baked projects saved on my hard drive, that are basically casualties of spending too long in session view.
Hop over to arrange and start commiting yourself as soon as you can I say, making more full tunes will lead to more development over time than tons of loops and ideas.
Don’t put too much pressure on yourself for quality, just keep at it and progress, then the quality will come more naturally.
Thats what I keep telling myself anyway 
Just as a little addition to what Phil said, which by the way is a very well said post that I too suffered from. One thing I do now to overcome that though is start throwing ideas into arrangement after I’ve gotten basic riff ideas in session view. This I feel, for me personally maybe others it’s not the case but it just works for me and helps me come up with new ideas counter melody’s, drum fill’s, one shots… etc.
booh , i have over 100 ableton projects each depict another track or another idea . But i don’t want to send none to a label or anything because i’m a perfectionist and that got to my head. I suggest you abandon perfectionism, i can’t do it , maybe you can.
Wow - thanks guys. Your comments really mean a lot to me and make a lot of sense. I think I need to just pull up my boot straps and get on with it. You’ve all reminded me of why I love this site so much - thanks a million everyone.
[quote]phil johnston (06/03/2011)[hr]The irony is the more experience you have the higher expectations you put on your self and the less you are happy with your own work which can lead to frustration.[/quote]
Or in many other cases, the more experience you have, the more styles you learn, the more techniques you grasp the more confident you get. A track can take 4 hours to make from beginning to end 
[quote]phil johnston (06/03/2011)
You ned to seperate the writing from the production… they require 2 completely different sets of skills.[/quote]
I disagree, writing and production are one and the same these days.
[quote]phil johnston (06/03/2011)Try to throw everything in in the first few hours of starting a track… dont restrict yourself, just let the creativity flow… I throw in loads ore riffs or loops than ill ever need.
Then when your tapped out start the production process.[/quote]
Very inefficient use of your time. Throwing in loops only leads to the danger of the fact that you grow attached to them sonically and find it difficult to replace them with something of your own at a later stage.
[quote]phil johnston (06/03/2011)Try to get a basic arrangement as soon as possible or you could end up playing about with scenes forever. This is the biggest positive and negative thing with live that the arranging part is separated from the creation part… it can lead to a lot of loops and ideas and no finished tracks.[/quote]
Here lies another problem - what if you are working with Logic or Cubase or Sonar or FL Studio? Scenes? only ableton users know what you are on about Phil. Oh, I forgot, you tell all the other subscribers who have other DAWs to watch and learn from the Ableton videos.
Success = motivation
Its a harsh frustrating truth tbh…
[quote][b]phil johnston (06/03/2011)[/b]Try to get a basic arrangement as soon as possible or you could end up playing about with scenes forever. This is the biggest positive and negative thing with live that the arranging part is separated from the creation part... it can lead to a lot of loops and ideas and no finished tracks.[/quote]
Here lies another problem - what if you are working with Logic or Cubase or Sonar or FL Studio? Scenes? only ableton users know what you are on about Phil. Oh, I forgot, you tell all the other subscribers who have other DAWs to watch and learn from the Ableton videos.[/quote]
iI think that Phill worked in cubase before
I am sure that not everybody writes music this way… But I will explain my method if anybody cares…
When I start writing a track… 95% of the time. I know what kind of track I am writing. Is it a trance track? Is it an electro track? Is it a prog, house… blah blah blah. Figure it out!
When you know what your trying to do… It makes it easier to get to arrangement.
Get your drums done first. From there figure out the melody & what key the track is in.
Once I have a melody & my drums. I always do a basic arrangement. You can do a basic arrangement with just your drums and some Ableton Locators. Keep yourself moving & organized at the same time. Do a ghost arrangement if it makes it easier for you at first. Once you get it down, its easier to write. I might not know at this point in the track, what every sound or note playing is going to be, and it’s definitely not set in stone. But I know at what bar I want my bass to kick in, because I know what type of track I am making. I know a-round-about when I want the first breakdown to happen… Same with a DROP. So I do a ghetto arrangement. Add markers into arrangement view to help you have a visual representation of your song. I also color code sections to take the extra organization step and make it look easy on the eye. You can always add or remove “TIME” in ableton later, so just setting up the basic structure of a dance track is a pretty easy thing to do. Practice makes perfect. Everytime I do it… I get better at it and I learn something new.
Once you have the basic or “ghetto” arrangement, as I call it… Then you can go back to creating sounds, riffs and all the fun stuff. But each time you create something that you want to hold on to… You can throw it into the arrangement window. As you continue to refine it and add more things… Eventually the pieces start coming together and it looks & sounds like a real song.
I love to mess with sounds & create riffs in session view as much as the next person. I could spend weeks doing nothing but that. But writing a song is so much more then just coming up with a cool bass & lead sound. Everybody wants to sound original and do something new… but understanding the basics of songwriting helps tremendously. Intro, Verse, Bridge, Chorus… Rinse & Repeat. Knowing what these things are in relation to writing songs for dance music (intro, breakdown, drop, verse, chorus, outro) and then thinking about these things as you write is essential in my opinion.
I think a lot of music probably gets lost on people because your working on a specific idea or sound that you had and not enough time or thought given to … OK now how do I write a song around that idea. Thats what most tracks are. Just an idea that you turned into a song. It’s understanding how to get from nothing to something that we all need to practice on. I am sure that anybody on the boards here could come up with some half-way decent riff and a few cool sounds. It’s taking those ideas and understanding how to expand on them to make them into a complete song that separates the men from the DJs.
[quote]UnitedVision (07/03/2011)[hr]OK now how do I write a song around that idea. Thats what most tracks are. Just an idea that you turned into a song.
[/quote]
You’ve nailed a crucial part of songwriting here, and yet one that I think becomes a bit of an albatross (for me at least anyway). I’ve tried to write systematically but have always failed as I tend to write from a single idea, be it a riff, a drum part or an elaborate phrase. The most skilled songwriters are the ones who can then keep that idea interesting, and I’m slowly realising the amount of time this involves. I think I need more patience and the willingness to keep going with something once I’ve heard it a thousand times.
Thanks again everyone for your advice - you’ve all taught me a lot in your replies and really given me a new lease of life, as well as plenty to think about. After all my moaning I somehow then finished (or thereabouts) TWO full tracks! I played them to the film-maker today and he’s made up with them, so I’m over the moon. It has been a direct result of all the posts above that helped me get out of a major rut, so thanks everyone. I really appreciate all the time you’ve taken to help out - thanks!
:)
I think if you avoid conspiracy sites and anything to do with David Icke and stop watching the news and reading the metro and particularly the evening standard and the daily mail and the sun and country life will have a more positive outlook than if you didn’t. I also think going to lunch with Bryan and Phil would leave you with an overwhelmingly positive feeling all round too. It’s not all production techniques you know. If all that fails though try church.
[quote]lorddarthfader (07/03/2011)[hr]I think if you avoid conspiracy sites and anything to do with David Icke and stop watching the news and reading the metro and particularly the evening standard and the daily mail and the sun and country life will have a more positive outlook than if you didn’t. I also think going to lunch with Bryan and Phil would leave you with an overwhelmingly positive feeling all round too. It’s not all production techniques you know. If all that fails though try church.[/quote]
Actually LDF thats all true
[quote]slender (07/03/2011)[hr][quote]lorddarthfader (07/03/2011)[hr]I think if you avoid conspiracy sites and anything to do with David Icke and stop watching the news and reading the metro and particularly the evening standard and the daily mail and the sun and country life will have a more positive outlook than if you didn’t. I also think going to lunch with Bryan and Phil would leave you with an overwhelmingly positive feeling all round too. It’s not all production techniques you know. If all that fails though try church.[/quote]
Actually LDF thats all true :)[/quote]
You get me bruv. Finally someone agrees with me. Now that’s positive.
So slender - are you? or are you telling porkies and you’ve got moobs?
[quote]lorddarthfader (07/03/2011)[hr]I think if you avoid conspiracy sites and anything to do with David Icke and stop watching the news and reading the metro and particularly the evening standard and the daily mail and the sun and country life will have a more positive outlook than if you didn’t.[/quote]
But then how would I know what to think?
[quote]Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.[/quote]
I have non-expert music production skills (let alone positivity-keeping skills), but I think this quote from Ira Glass sums up positivity and “fight[ing] your way through” it pretty nicely. Replace “story” with “track” 
I’ve actually been getting a bit of stuff finished recently.
Certainly 85% finished. Full arrangement - about 6 1/2 - 7mins long.
All down to scenes, making variations… then going back & playing with faders live. Then tweak stuff afterwards.
Its a great feeling, just need to concentrate on the music now & getting the best sounds out of the tools.
Saying that, I listened to a load of stuff just before I went to bed & thought it was dreadful sh!t. But I tought it was pretty cool for the last time I heard it. I’ll probably listen to it all again later & think its brilliant once more - thats the way it goes!
Think sometimes your brain / ears & mood can play tricks on ya. I’ll usually recgonise that, have a chat with meself & stop the music right then.
even if you track sucks, im sure i doesn’t but even if it does or did, there are many hings you like about it. jsut stay focused , eat good, sleep well. Read forums watch turorials, everthing is right in front of you right now. just feel it…
you’ll be good.:discuss: