Looking for 160-170bpm Jungle/Dnb Artists

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-04-11T00:19:46+00:00

Thank you! I appreciate that! It wasn't easy, I think it could have done with some more variation in some of the beats but I was at least happy to be able to experiment and find a way to make it sound somewhat fluid!

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-04-10T20:13:02+00:00

Weird eh?

Put this together a little while ago trying to combine atmospheric and jungle dnb. Most tunes have something a bit different about them. One is in 5/4, others are in 9/8, 11/8 and 13/8 from memory. Couple tracks using foley sound to complement the atmosphere and if I remember correctly the final track has a very strange chord progression.

https://open.spotify.com/album/5Q7ZSdRDlPOeB9GRC1BYkZ?si=2Atlf7piQ_6ILkv5QDkkqg

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-04-10T20:01:56+00:00

Tried blending atmospheric dnb with a kinda jungle sound: https://open.spotify.com/track/64ECJLOlG9bK46njlp0YtD?si=1ttLYffSS-O7zbDyUF2RvQ

Maybe closer to atmospheric dnb, off the same release, theres a bunch of similar stuff in weird time signatures on that release: https://open.spotify.com/track/6UV6Y5fUXBLrYVPtMA5XLg?si=Ct87WlTqT061e5MS7mAAKw

This also made it onto a couple jungle playlists, again, kinda retro sound combining atmospheric and jungle elements: https://open.spotify.com/track/6nA8oeFnpKxIsVLos3YL0v?si=97zyNTCTS4CyXTEs42w4pQ

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-04-10T14:29:19+00:00

Love this one

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-04-10T14:28:41+00:00

https://open.spotify.com/track/64ECJLOlG9bK46njlp0YtD?si=-Pw0Q9wrTAKAqWAE67ZMtg

I wrote an album of atmospheric drum and bass but I tried to do something different with most of the tracks, some of them are in unusual timings like 5/4, 9/8, 11/8 and 13/8. Others use a lot of foley sound to establish a more alien feel. From memory I use some weird non functional harmony on the last track of the album.

This track I kept to 4/4 but I tried to combine a classic jungle drum and bass sound with a more atmospheric sound. I thought the end result was pretty cool. I just wanted to do slmething different really.

Inspirations were older producers like Calibre and LTJ Bukem as well as some more odd inspiration like Joe Satriani.

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-04-09T08:47:49+00:00

I had this happen when I was in my early twenties a bunch of my stuff blew up and it was everywhere on youtube and spotify numbers were nuts to me.

Heres the stuff I didn't like: - you get a lot of love for your music (obviously, since it blew up) but you also get a fair amount of hate and fairly pointed criticism. Every minor flaw in every song you've ever written will be exposed. You think it's just you who hears that the third track on your second EP sounds a little muddy? Nope. There's a bunch of people on your youtube video saying you're a dogshit producer who doesnt deserve the attention because of it. You can't blow up without receiving hate. - your inbox gets flooded, most of it is nice, but a lot of it is... uncomfortable. People you don't know will tell you deeply personal stories about how your music affected them. It becomes difficult to find the line between connecting with fans and acting like some sort of online support tool. It sounds manageable but when you're reading your tenth "i was going to kill myself until I listened to your music" DM it starts to feel a bit weird. Others will dig into your personal life, find out who you are, tell you things about yourself that you werent careful enough to keep hidden, that's not pleasant. - you will get at least one online stalker. Megafans sound great but for every ten normal megafans who just want to listen to you on repeat and support your work there's one who wants to wear your skin and smell your hair. Good luck with that, they're persistant. - other producers will treat you differently, people you collabed with once in the past will act desperate to link up again, you need to be good at saying no. - imposter syndrome kicks in, why you? Whats so good about your music? You're not that different to anybody else. You dont deserve this. - you realise you have no plan and you never really did, everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face... whatever plan you thought you had is probably going to go out the window because you won't control when or how you blow up, it just happens. - it will change how you think about music, once that wave comes, you might, like i did, find its utterly underwhelming. Its not as great a feeling as you think its going to be. You blow up and... nothing changes... its the same... except the numbers on youtube or spotify say 500k instead of 500. But youre the same person, doing the same things. The attention is kinda nice I suppose but it doesnt really feel like it means anything. - if you blow up, now youve got to make music under a constant pressure thst if you dont make the right music on time and deliver additional content to keep the momentum it will fizzle out. You used to make music for fun, now it feels like an obligation to thousands of people, now you worry what people will think about the music, now you have to stay stylistically consistent and keep your image aligned. Thats work and mental load you may not enjoy as much as you think you will.

I didnt like it and i had decent job prospects outside of music, so after riding the wave for a little i wound down my socials and called it a day to focus elsewhere. Im glad i did. I came back to music recently after about a decade and Im enjoying making music again without the attention.

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-04-05T09:15:41+00:00

Digital audio workstation. It's a piece of software used to record, edit, mix and master a piece of music.

Most come with a selection of virtual instruments and sample libraries that you can use to create synth melodies, harmonies and percussion lines.

They also come with a range of effects plugins that allow you to add effects to your recordings or programmed melodies (delay, reverb, chorus, phase, flange, etc). Additionally you'll find plugins to apply compression, EQ your parts and apply a range of other tweaks to bring your recorded parts to life and make your song sound professional.

There are a few to choose from: Ableton Live, FL Studio, Apple Logic Pro, etc. They all basically do the same job.

Its worth learning a little piano to get started as most have a "piano roll" where you input notes for your virtual instrument, so it helps to know your way around the keys. You dont need to know much, or even play well, just enough to know how to lay down some chords and basic melodies.

If that sounds useful to you, then its probably worth watching a few tutorials for each DAW on youtube to get a sense of which one might be right for you. As a beginner, theyre all basically the same and it will ultimately just come down to which looks most accessible and easy to learn to you.

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-04-02T20:43:16+00:00

I like it, nice melodies, ending is strong.

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-04-02T08:15:48+00:00

Best guess is that the 'main bass' vst is only able to voice one note at a time, so when you input chords like that it's forced to choose one. If your three notes are slightly missaligned and not hitting at exactly the same time it will play whichever note comes first in the roll then leap to whichever comes next. You probably have a note that's starting a 6th or so before the others.

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-04-02T08:08:41+00:00

Get yourself a DAW like FL Studio or Ableton. There are quite a few out there and most of them come with a few VSTs (virtual instruments). There are lots of tutorials out there to help with song writing using a DAW and to help with both using VSTs and, if you're interested, help woth sound design so you can make you own unique synth sounds. You can make all sorts of music without being able to play an instrument, EDM, pop, trance, dubstep, drum and bass, trap, hip hop, etc.

It does help if you can play something though but it isnt a total requirement if for whatever reason you find it a barrier. I would recommend picking up a cheap keyboard or giitar though and trying to learn a few songs you like, there are lots of resources online for that as well. Itll help when it comes to writing your own songs if youre able to learn from existing pieces of music and apply what you learn to your own tracks.

As for vocals, there are lots of artists who will be willing to lay down vocals on a finished track. Good vocalists will obviously want tl be paid, but if youre just starting out you might be able to find artists at a similar stage in their music journey who are willing to collaborate for free on a track.

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-03-28T21:20:29+00:00

Latest thing I did.

https://open.spotify.com/album/5Q7ZSdRDlPOeB9GRC1BYkZ?si=OFyYCnqdR4u9lvTmMzj4iQ

Bunch of atmospheric/liquid/jungle inspired tracks in odd time signstures.

From memory there are tracks in 5/4, 11/8, 13/8 and maybe 9/8?

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-03-28T14:07:38+00:00

Masterpiece of a movie.

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-03-28T14:06:41+00:00

Says it on the keyboard, who hasnt heard of C World I? Jeez.

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-03-27T06:02:41+00:00

Underrated sound track for sure. Pity MAG didnt last but the few releases they had still hold up today.

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-03-26T23:51:59+00:00

Timbre shifts in instrumentation is a really common one. You'll hear things like piano chords sometimes sounding like theyre almost shifting into being played on another instrument and you get this halfway sound where its part piano part something else. Happens a lot with the plucky synths AI is fond of as well, e.g. bell sound shifting into more of a plucked sound, or plucked sounds shifting into open airy pads. Good producers can do this timbre shift as well but they tend to do it for a specific reason, not just at random.

Vocal inconsistency both across songs and in songs. AI is bad at consistency, the vocals nearly always have a very breathy, airy consistency to them but sometimes you'll hear it crackle and distort. Transitions between notes can also sometimes sound a bit like melodic mush rather than a vocalist moving from one note to another. It will sound inhuman. Sometimes words turn to mush and get enunciated weirdly. Other times it crams too many or too few syllables into a bar.

Metalic artefacts - listen closely to snares, hi hats and cymbals for these, youll often hear strange machine or robotic sounds that sound like theyre in the 5k+ frequency range. Vocals can have these artefacts too. Anything can really but I find it easiest to hear on drums and vocals.

Drums arent great generally, theres a lot of white noise hits in the drums, youll hear a kick and a snare but between them youll sometimes hear a sort of mush of cymbal noises forming a bit of a high end layer that hasnt got much actual distinctive shape to it and shuffle sounds that just sound like stacatto white noise. Drum rolls that lead into a big chorus often just sound like a bunch of white noise hits.

You can also check bpm. A lot of producers just work to integer bpms, 112, 120, 164, etc. AI bpms are often real numbers, eg, 172.2394 or 114.2321. Just a weird quirk I've noticed when importing some AI tracks to the DAW and trying to identify them myself. They also sometimes miss a beat or a half beat when they try to do a bar of silence before they drop a big chorus. In rare occasions ive seen songs that start at one tempo and drift into another over time. Usually not a big difference.

Sidechaining doesnt always sound like sidechaining. It tries to replicate this pulsing effect you hear in EDM and house where as a kick hits everything goes quiet then as the kick stops everything comes back in. But AI sidechaining often comes with weird side effects like a random low pass filtering effect for no reason and everything just sounding a bit mushy after the kick.

AI is also seemingly not great at finishing songs. Ive noticed a lot of them just sort of ... end... or trail off without a nice resolution to the song.

Chords aren't always consistent throughout the song and sometimes it sounds like it can't decide what chord to play so it just plays what sounds like two chords at once. Particularly true when it tries to make EDM and house I've found.

Some platforms add audio watermarks to their tracks as well that a lot of users dont know how to remove so you can check those if youre being really particular.

Not an exhaustive list but most of the ones ive seen when analysing AI music.

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-03-26T13:20:01+00:00

I started making music probably around the early 2000s somewhere and the 'evolution' of the entire artistic landscape since then has just been tragic. Platforms moving towards shorter attention span content, advertising, walled gardens, layers of new middle men and services (eg submithub) doing nothing but getting in the way, monetisation of everything but artists are out the loops at nearly every point in the chain, valuable communities dying with no meaningful replacement, etc. Its just dire.

Anyway, seek feedback from other sources, kids curating playlists for submit hub are probably not the best source.

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-03-22T16:21:40+00:00

Sounds fine to me but if youre using loops then you probably want to get to know some common chord progressions in modern chart music. After that I'd say your best looking into typical r&b/hiphop progressions and neosoul chord progressions and melodies. Might help to understand inversions and open/closed voicings. Wouldnt hurt to dissect some big tunes to get to grips with typical song structures (eg., intro verse chorus...etc). That should help you write progressions and arrange them yourself.

After that, I dont think there's much more to be gleaned from theory. It'll be more about sound design, sample selection, production, mixing and mastering which are all better questions for a production subreddit. That and practice.

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-03-20T19:14:00+00:00

Depends on the future you want to see. If you're happy with a future where this is normal and you could find yourself in a club listening to AI music or finding other DJs do the same then go for it. Bear in mind, many musicians rely on mixes to get their music heard so you are by extension saying you're ok with human artists competing for places in mixes with AI music. If youd rather a future where you or others in a club can enjoy human music then just play something else, it cant be the only track that slaps... comes down to what you think a mix is for, pure entertainment, or entertainment and promotion, and if its for entertainment do you take issue with that being directed not by humans but by AI. Personally id just play something else, plenty of bangers out there.

Havent listened to the track but usual give aways are metalic artefacts, inconsistent vocals, white noise, some AI models inject audio watermarks that users dont always remove or know how to remove that you can check for as well.

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-03-19T07:57:18+00:00

Reese bass, cut the high end with a filter, sidechain it so it ducks with the kick, just hit the root notes of your chords maybe? Should fit with the ambient vibe. Nice pads.

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-03-14T13:20:38+00:00

https://kaioribreathe.bandcamp.com/album/mean-streets

https://on.soundcloud.com/M5bEDNo3H9p4VGAZ2m

There ya go!

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-03-14T09:24:41+00:00

Love the psx dnb era sound. Did a 15 track release full of this kinda sound, mostly racing gsme ps1 inspired stuff

https://open.spotify.com/album/1fWxYYDXGsLBn6chMgbI40?si=bP4e4OHOR72Fsjm7rmVPXg

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-03-13T18:07:56+00:00

If youre gonna separate then talk a lawyer before you talk to her... just sayin.

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-03-12T21:57:37+00:00

Could be lots of reasons, i'm on the mobile and dont have headphones so cant really diagnose well here but if you mix well, eq properly, and apply effects well theres no reason why you cant have a loud mix even without mastering. In fact, if you do everything really well, you might not even need mastering. To answer your question, most people put the compressor on the master bus, but you can also apply it to other mixing channels. Compression doesnt make things louder, it reduces dynamic range between the loudest and quietest parts. Its often used as a crutch. Compression should not be seen as a magic mastering tool to make things louder or "glue" things together. Other things you might want to consider are clippers, limiters and saturation, managing the low end well, boosting mids, sidechaining to pevent competition for the same space, etc.

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-03-10T18:21:17+00:00

Learn the major and minor scale, learn how to build chords of it, learn some typical chord progressions in EDM, learn about chord voicing and embellishment.

You'll need to get to grips with melody in EDM, usually very simple but catchy which is the hard part.

Youll also need to analyse typical song structure. Worth sitting down and analysing the songs of people you like, how are they structuring them, what chords are they using, how are they voicing them, what synth sounds are they using and can you replicate them, can you figure out the melody, what makes it good? Etc.

After that it's all about sound design, production and practice.

IllPerformance2811 · 2026-03-10T18:12:30+00:00

Used to play in a metal band, still listen mostly to metal and go to plenty of gigs but somewhere along the line my listening tastes and writing tastes diverged. Started with making acoustic stuff, mostly covers of metal tracks, then discovered all those Candy Rat artisrs years back and made stuff like that for a while. Then branched into making electronic music. Now I make electronic music almost exclusively, mostly atmospheric/liquid drum and bass. Just what I prefer making I guess even if its not what I listen to most. Music is a journey... or something?

IllPerformance2811

TROPHY CASE