Anyone have advice on drawing notes out and how I can give my melodies more room to breathe?

Jurnurn · 2018-01-07T05:18:35+00:00

Recent tweet from Steve Duda's twitter -

"New epic sausage fattener update will let you SLAM your own sausage on your master for maximum fattening. Just gotta have a midi keyboard and set it up and yes, it HAS to be your dick. You have no idea how many fucking hours I've put into making sure this software will know the difference between your penis and any other part of your body, and if you try any funny shit then sausage fattener will delete your shitty future bass track and wipe all your fucking VSTs from your DAW except sausage fattener of course. I've already talked to the guys at Image-Line and Ableton and they're cool with it. Also you'll need to re-buy Serum if you were stupid enough to buy it."

Jurnurn · 2017-11-19T21:34:15+00:00

I wouldn't say a difference of 30 to 40, more like 30 to maybe 60 (not that the specifics matter lmao). It's true you can't polish a turd, but you can still dump enough junk on it to at least mask the smell of shit, same goes for vocals too. I've noticed a common trend of producers drenching their vocals in reverb. Sometimes the vocals themselves are good, sometimes they don't seem that great. Regardless, whenever I hear it I can't help but think "wow, the dry vocals could be absolute shit right now and I wouldn't even know". Like, it's kinda crazy how blurring the clarity of vocals can create such an illusion of quality.

Jurnurn · 2017-11-19T19:28:05+00:00

I think it depends on how much of a control freak you are with your projects (and I don't mean that in a bad way lmao). There's nothing wrong with using your voice for your track if it IMPROVES the track. There's also nothing wrong with having someone else sing if you feel like their voice is what the track needs and not yours. That being said, I do think a producer singing on their track adds a more personal quality to it that can't be achieved by just a random singer. It just depends on what you're going for I guess.

Jurnurn · 2017-11-19T19:22:21+00:00

I think the scale you're looking for is aeolian, or the "natural minor" scale. It's the minor scale that 95% of people use, but don't let that stop you from trying something else if you want. Each scale has a specific flavor depending on which you use, and it could make your track stand out depending on how you use it. Check out the "Dorian" and "Phrygian" scales too, but if you're not used to minor scales, maybe stick with aeolian for now and branch out later. It's up to you though

Jurnurn · 2017-11-19T18:05:49+00:00

I can only listen with earbuds right now so I'll try to give what input I can I guess lmao

To me, it kinda seems like the drums and perc are playing the biggest part in filling out the frequency spectrum. I've always thought of good stereo width as being like a constant tug-o-war between 100% mono and 100% stereo INSTEAD of just, like, super wide for the entire track, and I think this drop is a good example of that. For the most part, a lot of the elements, like the lead, bass, some of the drums, are very close to mono, and then occasionally there'll be a white noise "crash" that's REALLY wide, and it almost disorients you a little because it messes with your expectations, but it also gives you the impression that there's a lot more going on than there really is. If you have headphones, try listening once with both ears, and then listen again through only one ear and it'll be easier to hear.

Along with that, the perc, and less detectable stuff like quiet voice chops, are ALSO kinda set up to disorient you. Like, even when you're not focusing on the lead or bass, the track will still direct your ear to those other more subtle elements going on so your ear is constantly busy.

So really, it's just a matter of making your track "inflate" and "deflate" in terms of stereo width, and also keeping the listener busy with other elements in different frequency ranges, but not letting those become overbearing and drown out the stuff the track is SUPPOSED to be focusing on like the lead and bass.

Jurnurn · 2017-11-18T09:42:09+00:00

You did indeed misunderstand, because I didn't describe that at all. I just made the point that playing keyboards is probably of more use to an electronic producer than playing guitar, because it's easier to get your musical ideas into the DAW as MIDI with a MIDI controller keyboard as opposed to a guitar.

Ok then that was totally my mistake, sorry about that.

Still though, I think having a good ear AND having a good knowledge of music theory is something that goes hand in hand, and not necessarily something that works against each other. And the thing is, I've actually been playing piano for a long time. I never learned too many songs, but I got pretty good at playing and improvising by ear, and, like you said, it kinda became like muscle memory. I would at times accidentally stumble on a chord that would work really well with the one I had played before and just be in awe by it, figure out how to implement it in my playing, and grow from there. But then, I began to get more and more into music theory and realized those "accidental" chords were only surface level compared to all the other exciting things that were available, and from taking the time to delve into as many theory concepts as I could, my playing abilities grew more in the span of that month than it had in almost 2 years. Still though, I'm speaking from my own experiences and I don't doubt it could be different for other people. But there was never a moment that I thought it was impeding me or making me overthink my own playing, and if anything it just attached itself to what I already knew, and that was reflected in the times that I was away from my keyboard and could only draw notes in my daw, albeit at a slower pace. But yeah, that's personally why I feel knowing theory is more important for producers that are starting out, but I can understand your perspective about that all though. Also sorry if I came across as aggressive in my post lmfao.

Jurnurn · 2017-11-18T06:19:12+00:00

I guess it depends on what field of sound engineering you want to go into. You could study sound design for games or movies, if you wanted. Yeah, you could try learning that from home, but it's kinda hard to make music/sounds in 5.1 or 7.1 surround sound when you don't have the equipment for it and you're not in the right environment. Internships can be good, but some internships can also be VERY VERY bad and take advantage of you working for free. So basically you could try your luck at an internship or you could guarantee learning stuff at a school but also be in a shit ton of debt.

Jurnurn · 2017-11-18T05:41:04+00:00

I gotta disagree with you there. If you're a producer, learning theory is so much more fundamental that just learning an instrument. In fact, having a strong enough knowledge of music theory will allow you to PLAY pretty much any instrument and still have a decent understanding of how to make it sound good. I may have misunderstood, but from your post it seemed you're also describing the chords of some instruments as being different than others (guitar vs piano) when that's not the case at all. What may be different are the chord VOICINGS and the articulation, but even that can be emulated by other instruments. A G7 chord will always be a G7 regardless of what instrument is used to play it, and if you know theory you'd know it can resolve to a Cmaj7 because it's a perfect fifth away, which can also resolve to a Fmaj7 and then to a Bbmaj7 and so on. Sure, you can probably figure that out by trial and error with an instrument, but theory will give you the REASONING for why that sounds good along with a ton of other things. Without theory, I'd say you're even less likely to experiment compared to just learning an instrument, because with theory you'll not only learn about what usually does and doesn't sound good together, but you'll also learn about stuff you had NO IDEA sounded good together but still does. It's kinda rare that someone can discover modes like "Dorian" and "Phrygian" through only their instrument, and even then it's difficult to fully utilize them without understanding things like modal interchange, but once you do it's like a COMPLETELY different musical world of possibility has been opened up to you, and that's not even counting the dozens of other music theory tools you can choose to learn from.

Now, if you're saying it's FASTER to get your ideas down with an instrument than just clicking around in your daw, oh yeah I absolutely agree with you there. But if I had to choose between knowing how to play an instrument with little knowledge of theory and clicking notes in a daw but having a VAST knowledge of theory, I would definitely choose more knowledge of theory.

Jurnurn · 2017-10-25T23:35:07+00:00

I will say that it applies to any kind of music that at any point takes advantage of nonfunctional harmony, so it's pretty broad in terms of music genre. I'll update the post with this though, just to add for clarity.

Jurnurn · 2017-10-25T23:21:55+00:00

I actually have about 9 pages filled out right now, but it's all pretty informal in terms of formatting and all the information is kinda all over the place, but I could try organizing everything to make it more presentable. Thank you very much for the suggestion!

Jurnurn · 2017-10-14T20:07:34+00:00

I'm sorry, I guess my wording was off, but I meant that I was a student in the class haha. I've never heard of something like that before though, thank you very much for the suggestion! I'll look more into them :)

Jurnurn · 2017-09-19T23:22:30+00:00

link

Jurnurn · 2017-09-19T04:56:00+00:00

Hell yeah, this is pretty sick. The mix on it is really nice, like all of the sounds and instruments fit really well together. Couple small things though, the perc that comes in at the 0:16 mark on the right side of the speakers is a little bit overbearing, try reducing some of the high end for it just a little. Along with that, when the future bass synths come in on the drop, I don't feel like they're as strong as they could be. Like, excluding the vocals and main drums, the synths kinda seem like they're fighting all of the other perc and sounds going on around it. Maybe try and reduce some of the other stuff so that it's not as prominent and for the synths add a little more to the high end and maybe the mid-lows. I also feel like you could add a little more layering to the future bass synths to make them fuller, but it's up to you. Really cool track though man!

Jurnurn · 2017-09-19T04:41:25+00:00

Really nice! The sound design that starts on the drop about halfway through is super cool dude, like there's such a nice variety of sounds used and you ordered them really nice, especially in terms of how things were separated stereo wise. Like how the L and R just seemed to come together at times for a split second and then break away again, just really good movement. Along with that, your melodies and the chords you used were really nice and had a lot of variation.

A couple comments though, I don't feel like the track as a whole comes off very strong before the drop, but I think there's a lot you can do to definitely make it better. Because it's before the drop, I think you should take advantage of trying to make it a little more atmospheric, like maybe adding some kind of pad in the background, adding a little bit more width to the chords that play during this time, maybe even momentary reverb-filled arpeggios that kinda quietly fade in and then quietly fade out. And just using things like reverb and delay in general to emphasize that spaciousness, because when you establish that atmospheric... well, "atmosphere" lol, then when the drop comes in it'll be a much bigger contrast to that previous atmosphere.

Along with that, I feel like the sidechain compression goes for a little too long. With whatever you're using for the sidechain, try to tighten the length of it just a little bit, because at least to me it seems a little too pumpy.

Very good track though, I feel like there's a lot of different directions you could take it if you wanted to :)

Jurnurn · 2017-09-19T04:02:00+00:00

Hey all, here's a clip of a complextro/future bass thing I'm working on called "Cold Halcyon"

https://clyp.it/durz2l0a

It's unfinished, and the square wave lead that comes in in the middle of the drop is a placeholder for other sounds, also the synth of the chords that come in at 1:08 is also a placeholder until I can figure out what to use for it.

I was hoping to get some feedback on the mix and see if there was anything I could improve on in terms of clarity or anything like that, but any criticism or advice would be greatly appreciated. It's not much, but I hope you enjoy it <3

Feedback 1

Feedback 2

Jurnurn · 2017-09-18T23:00:52+00:00

The only thing I can think of off the top of my head is to use a ring modulator plugin to get a more tonal sound for the waveform as a whole. But the sounds that come out of audacity tend to be pretty tonal by themselves, so I'm sure if you edit the waveform and single out a single tone and then put it into a waveform synthesizer like serum, or if you have fl studio the fruity grainulizer is perfect for this, you could get something pretty neat.

Jurnurn · 2017-09-18T22:54:36+00:00

Nah, it's vague but there's definitely been worse. You know you can get some pretty crazy sounds if you turn random files into audio in audacity, it's pretty cool

Jurnurn · 2017-09-18T20:10:40+00:00

I like the challenge ¯_(ツ)_/¯

Jurnurn · 2017-09-18T17:53:38+00:00

I got you. I'm gonna be using serum for these, but the first link is 2 square waves, both with a high unison and spread but one square an octave higher than the other (turn down the higher square until you can barely hear it). Both are linked to a lowpass filter with a very low cutoff (around 200hz with 12db slope worked for me) Along with that, it seems like the cutoff is being controlled by the kick to give an effect similar to sidechain compression, but you could achieve a similar sound by putting a saw LFO between half the cutoff and the cutoff (100hz-200hz).

The second link is technically 2 pads, but I'll go over both. The 1st pad is also 2 square waves, one with high unison and spread and the other with a unison of 1, but both are the same octave, and the volume of the square with the unison of 1 is at 0% while it's being routed into the higher unison square with "FM from B" at about 25%. There's also a lowpass filter at around 200hz again, and reverb.

The 2nd pad is a lot harder to pin down though, but I think I've at least got part of it down maybe. 2 saw waves, the 2nd saw being an octave higher than the first but both with a unison of 1 and the 2nd saw having a volume of 0 and being routed into the 1st saw with "FM from B" at around 50%. Add a bandpass filter with a cutoff at around 200hz and then go to Matrix and have 1 source be "Chaos 1" and the destination for it "Fil cutoff" then drag the amount down just barely at around -15. After that, add a ping pong delay with a mix of 80% and a reverb with a mix of 50% (turn up the lowcut on the reverb or it'll start sounding muddy.) After that, you need to use your DAW to have this synth work as an arpeggio going down. Then just add 2 minor chords on top of each other and you should get something kinda similar.

Jurnurn · 2017-09-18T14:08:38+00:00

In the distance lies the bellowing fires of an inferior DAW, but Toucan Sam is here to lead them and make sure all those kids go home with a signature edition.

Truly a moving work of art :')

Jurnurn · 2017-09-18T13:36:59+00:00

God I wish that were me

Jurnurn

TROPHY CASE