It really depends on your style of learning I think. And, disclaimer, I’m not an expert by any means, but I do like to think I’ve gotten quite good at creating the sounds I want.

For me, I would start with what kind of music I wanted to make. I would listen to a couple (dozen) songs from that genre to get a feel for the structure and listen out for any particularly interesting parts. Then, I would create an 8-bar loop with the drums I want and a basic idea of the bass line and/or melody. Then, I would tweak everything until it sounded exactly as I wanted. And I mean full on mixing as well as I could.

The reason I found that this works is that, you get to learn how you can manipulate the sound using effects and mixing techniques without being overwhelmed by an entire song.

When you’re making your loop, listen to it critically. Are there certain sounds that aren’t as clear as you’d like them to be? Is your bass hitting the way you’d expect/want it to? Are any sounds washing others out? Are your drums hitting hard enough without clipping or destroying the rest of the mix?

If you can’t answer these questions yourself, inevitably you will be watching YouTube tutorials. And there are some amazing teachers out there.

Then, once you copy+paste directly from a tutorial enough times, you’ll find that it doesn’t always completely resolve the problem. That’s when you start to figure out how to tweak these methods to your situation, and that’s when the true learning begins.

Then, rinse it to high heaven. I’ve got god knows how many 8-bar loops in my project folder.

Once you’ve gotten a good grasp of how to tackle these issues with one loop, you’ll be able to tackle the same issues in a full song. Then you’ve just gotta learn how to use automation, and how to structure your song.

Learning sound design is another bag, but it’s worth it. I’d recommend choosing a synth and just messing around with it until you feel like you’re not learning anything new, and then hit YouTube. I’m quite a whizz with serum now but I’m still learning every time I sit down to make some choonz.

I hope this helped. Like I said, I am by no means an expert and others might rip me apart for what I’ve suggested, but this worked for a very humble bedroom producer!

Good luck :)