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I want to get some goon insight into the creative process for musicians. I'm not entirely sure what my question ought to be, so I'll give you a few to play with and we'll see what happens. I'll also throw in a bit of my own thoughts about this stuff after each question. You can totally rob the formula of the following, or run with it. Up to you. Might add more questions as the thread progresses, too. 1. How do you approach composition? Inspiration? Motivation? I'm a multi-instrumentalist and i'm constantly reevaluating my writing methods. Right now I'm falling back to the bass guitar and forcing myself to work with simpler and simpler patterns, focusing on this instrument as the core to my writing and building around the space I can create with it. I've set a goal of writing around 9 complete, no-filler tracks, each between 3-7ish minutes in length, working with absolute simplicity (though not minimalism). My primary inspiration right now is, in typical cliche insufferable internet person fashion, Pink Floyd's "Dark Side Of The Moon", especially the tracks "Breathe" and "Time". It's the absolute simplicity of the progressions and the lack of virtuoso instrumentals producing an incredibly emotive and powerful result that interests me the most, along with the theme of the album and melancholy of the sound. 2. What are your biggest roadblocks to writing original music? I'd say for me right now, It's negatively comparing my own work to my favorite artists... a mixture of perfectionism and holding those artists on an unattainable pedestal. If I can't write something as good as [insert huge influential piece of music / album here], then why am I bothering at all? I don't want to make mediocre tracks or finish something and say "that'll do, maybe someone will like it". I wanna listen back over what I've made and say "wow, I've really done something different here." 3. What do you think makes a piece of music "good"? I Guess this question might be a bit more like "why do you have the taste you have", not sure. But I find that I generally like to feel the music has a certain number of qualities - integrity, originality, deliberate and progressive non-vocal emotion and ... well I guess I like to hear a piece of music and say "how... just HOW did they make this..." I like to be utterly gobsmacked by the effect the music has on me; whether it's because it's so complex that every time i listen to it I hear something new, or that it's brutally simple and incredibly effective. I guess it's a bit like the "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic" thing, except replaced "advanced technology" with "beautiful music". edit: NEW QUESTION - 4. Once you have written a "bit" that you like (a riff, lick, phrase, whatever), how do you grow that into a full piece? This is a real sticking point for me; I have a huge stockpile of what i consider great "bits" which I don't seem to be able to progress from, and patching them together makes a real ugly quilt instead of a finely woven tapestry. les fleurs du mall fucked around with this message at 15:03 on Jul 28, 2014 |
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Jul 26, 2014 22:50
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This is my kind of thread.Quickscope420dad posted:1. How do you approach composition? Inspiration? Motivation? Quickscope420dad posted:2. What are your biggest roadblocks to writing original music? Quickscope420dad posted:3. What do you think makes a piece of music "good"?  I think art is all about emotion. If a creative work makes you feel something, no matter what feeling that may be, or for whatever reason, regardless of intent, it is artistically valid. I suppose this means I have a very broad definition of what art is. That's my first hurdle for what makes a song 'good', whether it is artistically valid. My second is, god dammit, does it sound good? At first glance, or does it take a bit of warming up to do so? (Both are great!) This id-like parameter I suppose is due to my lust for/appreciation of pop music, the three-minute single, the hook. Whatever characteristics or personal baggage the artists involved may possess, whatever methods of creation were used, the cultural and historical status quo when and where the piece was produced, ultimately all fall away around what matters, the final product. I guess this means a good piece is rather universal and timeless as well. Hope my answers were sufficient!
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Jul 27, 2014 01:12
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quote:1. How do you approach composition? Inspiration? Motivation? The best results happen when I'm feeling enthusiastic about the idea of music, or feeling the urge to create something unique. You have to want to do it. You have to be motivated. The other element is the willingness to work at it. Sometimes composition takes awhile. Sometimes it takes days or weeks to make sure you've taken a song as far as it should go. Sometimes I sit down with a guitar and hit a random strange chord (putting my fingers on random frets). The dissonance might set off a melody in my mind. Other times it helps to think of a sound I want; maybe like Pink Floyd, maybe like The Byrds - or I think of a specific song that I like, and try to compose something with the same feeling. A lot of it is just letting your brain go and not over-thinking things. Just follow what feels good to you. Don't think about pleasing other people. quote:2. What are your biggest roadblocks to writing original music? Getting complacent. Procrastination. Having too much happening in real life to be able to give it the focus it needs. Also as I mentioned, falling into the trap of pleasing people, ie "so and so would be impressed with this". Also, too much self-judgement. quote:3. What do you think makes a piece of music "good"? It's too subjective to definitively spell out. But generally if the writer is being honest and open and expressive, and has a good sense of what makes good melody, what's pleasing to the ear. You can tell when someone is phoning it in, or hasn't put enough work into it. Also a basic ability to craft. Writing is a lot like being a carpenter or stone mason. If you have the basic craft down, your work will always be impressive at some level. How do you develop craft? Work. Write lots of songs. Hone it - figure out what works and what doesn't. beatlegs fucked around with this message at 04:44 on Jul 27, 2014 |
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Jul 27, 2014 04:42
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quote:1. How do you approach composition? Inspiration? Motivation? Usually I find a seed of inspiration, whether it's a riff, a lyric or a rhythm, and the rest of the song flows out pretty easily from that point. The times I try to force myself to write songs without a seed like this end up being (what I consider to be) trite and rather lovely, just songs for the sake of songs instead of being something that reaches out from me. Annoyingly, the stuff that I write and hate always seems to strike a chord with my drummer (2 piece) so we often butt heads over what songs to take forward, but I can't sell a product I don't believe in so they often get left behind with the occasional concession for his sake. quote:2. What are your biggest roadblocks to writing original music? Time. I have so many different musical aspects to focus on that it's tricky to set aside a dedicated songwriting period when I have so much on my (self filled) plate. I got into music quite late, didn't get my first guitar until 23, and now in my early 30's I'm juggling guitar, bass, drums, singing, recording and production of all that as well as beatmaking and electronic music production (and I want to work on my raps as well). I have basically no other hobbies since (mostly) giving up on gaming so I can fit it all in and a lot of aspects flow from one to the other, but it's a lot of work. When I write songs I'll usually jam around on a riff or rhythm idea until I have it solidified (or bring one back from jamming in my band), and then for lyrics I generally lock myself in my vocal booth (yeah I built a vocal booth what up) for a couple of hours and improvise until I have either the whole song or most of it, and then do touch ups later after the initial production. Writing lyrics on their own to fit music later on has yet to yield successful results (in my eyes), so I usually need large brackets of time to focus on making a song. quote:3. What do you think makes a piece of music "good"? Either a feeling of increased energy or getting goosebumps. A song has to connect with me on a physical level for me to really consider it good, and if it makes me want to stand up and jump around/get poo poo done/destroy the world (like punk stuff) or makes my hair stand on end at certain points of the song then I consider it to be a great song, this applies to both my own and all external music. A lot of songs I still like if they don't have that connection with me, I listen to the radio (Triple J) at work everyday and always enjoy what I am hearing, but unless it strikes me in a particular way then I am unlikely to acquire that music for later consumption at home and am happy to leave it as pleasant ear-filling throughout the course of my day.
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Jul 27, 2014 10:14
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Quickscope420dad posted:1. How do you approach composition? Inspiration? Motivation? Most of the time when I start work on a song I start with an interesting musical or lyrical idea. I've been at work many times and had thoughts connect themselves, found the image interesting, so I'll grab a piece of paper and write it down to see if anything takes shape. Sometimes it flows out effortlessly, sometimes I have to tweak and think about it a lot. I've learned over the years to trust my instincts. If I think an idea is solid, there's probably something there. Once I've gotten the song put together to where it forms a cohesive whole I let it sit for a few days to a week without working on it. Then when I come back to it I see if I still think it's a good idea. I've thrown out a lot of songs because I come back to them and I don't find the idea nearly as strong on a second look as I did when I was working on it. At that point I look it over, play it again, to see what I can use and rework it into something else. Quickscope420dad posted:2. What are your biggest roadblocks to writing original music? Lack of focus, self-doubt, laziness. I can get distracted with other things that cause me to lose focus on writing or getting ready for a show, which is something I'm working on since I live closer to musically inclined friends who are helping to keep me motivated and focused. I also have a lot of anxiety about playing my songs for people. It's odd because most people who I play for really enjoy my music. It's never stopped me from seeking out shows and playing though, but it makes it hard to write a song if I have an idea that I find interesting but my self-doubt tells me nobody else is going to like this/it's not good/you don't have the skill to pull this off. Quickscope420dad posted:3. What do you think makes a piece of music "good"? When I'm writing I think of a song as good if it has interesting lyrics, memorable music, basically if it makes me want to hear it again as soon as it is done. It doesn't have to be weird or experimental, most of my music is pretty simple after all. Just an unexpected turn of phrase, an unusual chord, switching up the phrasing, anything to make it sound unique to the songwriter. I also tend to focus on a solid hook for my own music, since I tend to write on the poppier end of singer/songwriter music. I have friends who don't focus on hooks as much, but their songs are memorable for the incredible lyrics and gorgeous music. In the end it comes back to trusting your instincts. If I think one of my songs is good then other people probably will. If I think one of my songs is trite and boring, why should anyone else think otherwise?
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Jul 27, 2014 12:32
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Quickscope420dad posted:1. How do you approach composition? Inspiration? Motivation? Inspiration - 'Everything' is my easy answer. But I'm primarily a guitarist, so to me Hendrix will always be the king of kings, by a landslide. The most common thing I hear about him is "He was ahead of his time." and from my perspective he still is. He's gained a lot more attention over the past few decades, but when you look at what he did back then, and compare it to his contemporaries and then to the best of today, I still don't see anyone who compares. Honorable mention to David Gilmour, Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page and dudes who can shred. Motivation - Much like the strings of a guitar, we are all simply a small vibration in the grandeur of the universe. I'm just looking to vibe. quote:2. What are your biggest roadblocks to writing original music? quote:3. What do you think makes a piece of music "good"? Or, if the bass line has side-chained compression to the kick drum.
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Jul 28, 2014 04:12
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R3M posted:This is my kind of thread. Yeah, setting limitations for yourself is always good... defines the boundaries and stops you going "UGHH TOO MUCH CHOICE". But how do you stop yourself just rehashing old stuff? I really don't like feeling a piece i'm working on confining itself strictly to one genre or formula, that really bugs me and makes me not like it / feel like my own work is lacking integrity. R3M posted:Getting down to it. I'm a huge procrastinator. I can't count the number of times I've told myself "In 15 minutes I'll work on this lyric..." or "After I'm done with the laundry I'll flesh out this chord progression..." and then have not done it. I don't quite understand this proto-block, however, since I really do enjoy the writing once it actually starts happening. Yeah i think there's room to use procrastination to a strength though - procrastinate from other stuff by doing your music, procrastinate from your music by doing other important stuff. Seems like procrastination is the big theme for answers to this question in the thread so far. R3M posted:Let me start this answer off with the fact that I am totally not qualified to make quality judgements on art, or even entertainment. You have been warned. I'm not sure any measure of qualification is valid when it comes to judging art, though maybe. I go back and forth in my aesthetic philosophy with this - can a non-musician judge music properly? Not sure, really not sure. I'd like to think so, but evidence is to the contrary if i let myself slip into kinda elitist ways of thinking. You say " a good piece is rather universal and timeless" - does that mean that, for example, jazz metal (which is totally inaccessible to the vast majority of listeners) is necessarily NOT good? I don't think that would be fair, but i'm also not sure that's what you're saying so.. Also yeah, great answers! and lol, I think having a Roger Waters avatar post the very first reply to this thread was about as good as i could've ever hoped for. So welcome.
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Jul 28, 2014 14:24
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beatlegs posted:The best results happen when I'm feeling enthusiastic about the idea of music, or feeling the urge to create something unique. You have to want to do it. You have to be motivated. The other element is the willingness to work at it. Sometimes composition takes awhile. Sometimes it takes days or weeks to make sure you've taken a song as far as it should go. Sometimes I sit down with a guitar and hit a random strange chord (putting my fingers on random frets). The dissonance might set off a melody in my mind. Other times it helps to think of a sound I want; maybe like Pink Floyd, maybe like The Byrds - or I think of a specific song that I like, and try to compose something with the same feeling. A lot of it is just letting your brain go and not over-thinking things. Just follow what feels good to you. Don't think about pleasing other people. Do you find that when you use that method of thinking of a song that you want, that you struggle to stop your work from sounding derivative? And if so, how do you overcome this without reducing the sense of integrity you feel about your work by just slapping on some wacky distortion/ using a gimmick to overcome the issue? beatlegs posted:Getting complacent. Procrastination. Having too much happening in real life to be able to give it the focus it needs. Also as I mentioned, falling into the trap of pleasing people, ie "so and so would be impressed with this". Also, too much self-judgement. Yeah again procrastination comes up... I relate more to the self-judgement, personally. I think also the "would so and so be impressed" with this is a blessing and a curse because it can be a great motivator as well as huge limiter. I am familiar with it too, and sometimes you have to stop and say "well gently caress them for now, because i actually LIKE this piece, and appeasing their evaluation isn't really relevant to it". beatlegs posted:It's too subjective to definitively spell out. But generally if the writer is being honest and open and expressive, and has a good sense of what makes good melody, what's pleasing to the ear. You can tell when someone is phoning it in, or hasn't put enough work into it. Also a basic ability to craft. Writing is a lot like being a carpenter or stone mason. If you have the basic craft down, your work will always be impressive at some level. How do you develop craft? Work. Write lots of songs. Hone it - figure out what works and what doesn't. Sounds like the whole integrity thing is a big deal to you too. So i guess i put the question to you again; aside from knowing you've worked your rear end off on a piece, how do you ensure your own sense of .."sonic integrity"(??) regarding the sound itself?
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Jul 28, 2014 14:30
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RandomCheese posted:Usually I find a seed of inspiration, whether it's a riff, a lyric or a rhythm, and the rest of the song flows out pretty easily from that point. The times I try to force myself to write songs without a seed like this end up being (what I consider to be) trite and rather lovely, just songs for the sake of songs instead of being something that reaches out from me. Annoyingly, the stuff that I write and hate always seems to strike a chord with my drummer (2 piece) so we often butt heads over what songs to take forward, but I can't sell a product I don't believe in so they often get left behind with the occasional concession for his sake. You find it easy to move on from a "bit"? I really don't, it's probably my second biggest roadblock - progressing from whatever riff or "bit" i've figured out and like, in a way that's consistent with what i like about that "bit" and doesn't feel like a cop-out. How do you manage that? That's the kinda insight I might be after with this thread, not sure yet. Also two-pieces are interesting - Lightning Bolt inspired? and lol it would be interesting to know which kinds of things your drummer likes and you hate, and vice versa. RandomCheese posted:Time. I have so many different musical aspects to focus on that it's tricky to set aside a dedicated songwriting period when I have so much on my (self filled) plate. I got into music quite late, didn't get my first guitar until 23, and now in my early 30's I'm juggling guitar, bass, drums, singing, recording and production of all that as well as beatmaking and electronic music production (and I want to work on my raps as well). I have basically no other hobbies since (mostly) giving up on gaming so I can fit it all in and a lot of aspects flow from one to the other, but it's a lot of work. When I write songs I'll usually jam around on a riff or rhythm idea until I have it solidified (or bring one back from jamming in my band), and then for lyrics I generally lock myself in my vocal booth (yeah I built a vocal booth what up) for a couple of hours and improvise until I have either the whole song or most of it, and then do touch ups later after the initial production. Writing lyrics on their own to fit music later on has yet to yield successful results (in my eyes), so I usually need large brackets of time to focus on making a song. Well I guess that David Firth quote comes in handy there... "it doesn't matter how slow you go, as long as you don't stop". I know the feel of getting into it late; I started playing my instruments over 10 years ago but only really started giving it the proper dedication and serious attention it requires to actually be worthwhile maybe 3 - 5 years ago, so I have a lot of catching up to do to get myself where I want to be, in terms of skillset. Writing lyrics on their own is something I also almost never do, but I think it might be worth giving it some attention; especially with the issue i described before of struggling to find a place to "progress" a riff into; the phrasing and structure of pre-written lyrics might help drive that on. RandomCheese posted:Either a feeling of increased energy or getting goosebumps. A song has to connect with me on a physical level for me to really consider it good, and if it makes me want to stand up and jump around/get poo poo done/destroy the world (like punk stuff) or makes my hair stand on end at certain points of the song then I consider it to be a great song, this applies to both my own and all external music. A lot of songs I still like if they don't have that connection with me, I listen to the radio (Triple J) at work everyday and always enjoy what I am hearing, but unless it strikes me in a particular way then I am unlikely to acquire that music for later consumption at home and am happy to leave it as pleasant ear-filling throughout the course of my day. Okay so you kind of see particular genres of pieces as having a given purpose almost. I Can relate to that; i had a small electronic project i did for a while where the purpose of each piece had a very, very specific emotions set that I wanted to conjor for the listener in a kind of synesthesia, so each piece very much had a particular intended purpose. And I agree about acquiring it later for consumption; one of my evaluative criteria for music is the same as I use for films; simple and obvious really - "would I eagerly choose to listen to it again y/n?".
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Jul 28, 2014 14:46
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BrendianaJones posted:Most of the time when I start work on a song I start with an interesting musical or lyrical idea. I've been at work many times and had thoughts connect themselves, found the image interesting, so I'll grab a piece of paper and write it down to see if anything takes shape. Sometimes it flows out effortlessly, sometimes I have to tweak and think about it a lot. I've learned over the years to trust my instincts. If I think an idea is solid, there's probably something there. Once I've gotten the song put together to where it forms a cohesive whole I let it sit for a few days to a week without working on it. Then when I come back to it I see if I still think it's a good idea. I've thrown out a lot of songs because I come back to them and I don't find the idea nearly as strong on a second look as I did when I was working on it. Yeah I think most of us probably have the big garbage heap of abandoned ideas that on a second runthrough sucked major swinedick. How do you make sure you're not throwing the baby out with the bathwater on stuff, though? And the same question I asked to random i'll ask to you (i'll put it as a main question in the OP in a sec): how do you overcome the issue of "okay so I have this cool 'bit' that i like (riff, lyric, lick, phrase, whatever) but where do i go from here with it without it being derivative or powerchords for the sake of powerchords?" BrendianaJones posted:Lack of focus, self-doubt, laziness. I can get distracted with other things that cause me to lose focus on writing or getting ready for a show, which is something I'm working on since I live closer to musically inclined friends who are helping to keep me motivated and focused. I also have a lot of anxiety about playing my songs for people. It's odd because most people who I play for really enjoy my music. It's never stopped me from seeking out shows and playing though, but it makes it hard to write a song if I have an idea that I find interesting but my self-doubt tells me nobody else is going to like this/it's not good/you don't have the skill to pull this off. Well lack of focus, self-doubt and laziness i believe are all relatively easy to correct problems. The hardest is probably self-doubt, though. The other two issues are just a matter of the realization that "drat i REALLY REALLY want this, and i am GOING to have it" and not taking your own passion for granted. As for the self-doubt yeah, that's a big one for all of us to some extent, myself very much included. So lately my kind-of workaround is to say to myself "okay, I'm just going to work totally within my abilities and not overreach. If i can make an honest and complete piece of music to the best of my ability, whilst maintaining its integrity and still do something even a little different and interesting with it, I will consider that progress." BrendianaJones posted:When I'm writing I think of a song as good if it has interesting lyrics, memorable music, basically if it makes me want to hear it again as soon as it is done. It doesn't have to be weird or experimental, most of my music is pretty simple after all. Just an unexpected turn of phrase, an unusual chord, switching up the phrasing, anything to make it sound unique to the songwriter. I also tend to focus on a solid hook for my own music, since I tend to write on the poppier end of singer/songwriter music. I have friends who don't focus on hooks as much, but their songs are memorable for the incredible lyrics and gorgeous music. Yeah again the "makes me want to hear it again" factor, it seems obvious but I think it's easily overlooked. There's countless ridiculously woowoo prog bands and such I've listened to and been like "holy hell and god drat wow" and then realized later that i didn't listen to it again and it didn't strike me in the way i originally thought it was doing. I agree that trusting your instincts about its quality is good, but for me an issue there is finding peers who have a sufficiently similar music taste to my own to get feedback that I can really use. If someone just doesn't like the related genres to what I'm writing, I can't expect their feedback to be particularly useful, unless I am really pushing to make something more universal, which at the minute I happen to be doing i guess...
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Jul 28, 2014 14:57
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jryan42988 posted:Composition - "The secret to creativity is hiding your sources" - Einstein. I take a song I like, and alter it slightly by incorporating something I like from another song. That is an interesting Einstein quote and since I read your post yesterday it's been playing on my mind a bit. A personal error of mine is perhaps striving for a level of originality which is essentially impossible. "what is this chord pattern similar to... [insert answer here]...okay so where does that progress to and can i use a modified version of that progression to make this work better?" is the thought that's grown out of that, which is useful for me so thankyou. jryan42988 posted:Passionately spilling my heart on to paper and then immediately thinking it's the shittiest thing anyone has ever written. Lol and also that implies your own perfectionism which I think is probably a good thing to an extent. Self-doubt again; there definitely seem to be a common thread of stumbling blocks for us here, perhaps there's room for us each to help each other out a bit on this somehow. jryan42988 posted:I think a piece is good if I interpret the creator's intentions as good.
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Jul 28, 2014 15:02
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quote:You find it easy to move on from a "bit"? I really don't, it's probably my second biggest roadblock - progressing from whatever riff or "bit" i've figured out and like, in a way that's consistent with what i like about that "bit" and doesn't feel like a cop-out. How do you manage that? That's the kinda insight I might be after with this thread, not sure yet. Also two-pieces are interesting - Lightning Bolt inspired? and lol it would be interesting to know which kinds of things your drummer likes and you hate, and vice versa. Don't get me wrong, it's not a foolproof method, for each near-completed track I have there are a dozen snippets and ideas that ran very quickly into a wall and never went further. But all the stuff I consider to be my best work has stemmed from a single point and then a couple of hours later I have the skeleton of a track, and then I flesh it out over the coming nights. Sometimes I will ruin a piece by adding something so I usually save multiple versions, if I don't feel that it works the next time I revisit it I will go to a previous revision and try moving forwards again. The majority of my electronic songs are written by pure chance, I'll stumble upon some cool sounding preset and make a melody or progression and then just throw poo poo at the wall and see what sticks. Some riffs I come up with just sit on their own for months until I bring them out at just the right time during a jam session and it flows on from there. Sometimes I like to write songs in the same vein as that einstein quote, I'll find a track I like and dissect it right down to the granular level, like 8 bars intro, drums come in midway through bar 3, short terse vocals, 5 note melody, any detail I can extract from the track and then use that recipe to build up my own songs. I don't consider it to be stealing, music is impossible to create in a vacuum and everything new is influenced by everything old. I'm not taking things like lyrical content or exact melodies or anything, just using the basic blueprint and using my own materials to construct similar architecture. Haven't heard of Lightning Bolt sorry, we are a two piece more out of convenience than anything else, ideally I'd like another guitarist to bounce ideas off as all the chord progressions and ideas I come up with sound samey to me after a while, especially as there's only so much you can do with one guitar. I have my instruments rigged up with an offset bass pickup that sends the low two strings through an octave pedal to another amp (ala Local H) so we get the power trio sound with two guys and I can do a bit creatively by switching off either the guitar or bass part but it's still somewhat restricting, especially as every rhythm, melody or lyric has to stem from me. I guess the easiest way to differentiate my drummer and myself would be mainstream vs alternative, he likes metallica, disturbed, korn, anything "heavy" that got commercial airplay in the late 90's really, whereas I got into the whole punk persona in my mid teens and kept away from anything that I (probably incorrectly) defined as mainstream. Bad Religion, Pennywise, NOFX, Propagandhi, anything on the Fat Wreck or Epitaph samplers from that era really defined my musical tastes. I want lyrics that mean something and interesting riffwork while he is happy with chugga-chugga breakdowns and meaningless shouted slogans (Down with the Sickness is a favourite of his). He won't really scratch the surface of a lot of lyrics, says he doesn't want to listen to songs about the government and social awareness but lists Rise Against as a band he really likes so I'm not sure if he's actually listening too closely. I hate to rag on him because he's an awesome dude and we are great mates but I can't be as superficial with the songs I write, especially if we remain a two piece, I can't get up on stage and be the sole expresser of melody and lyrical content while playing songs that I'd never listen to and don't really consider to be worthwhile even if he is in love with them. This is probably because of the punk mindset I grew up with, if I am up on my soapbox on stage I really want to say something worth listening to, not just write gruff mean songs that exist just for the sake of being loud and agressive. I had a pretty turbulent upbringing so I have no desire to be unnecessarily angry whereas he's closer to the stereotypical middle class suburbs boy, hasn't really had any solid reasons to be angry during his lifetime so that sort of music might be an outlet for him in that way. With a third bandmate I'd be fine with it because then it'd be a couple of dudes up on stage sharing dumb riffs, singing about dumb stuff and making dumb faces, but I feel as a two piece I feel isolated on stage, it's basically a solo project with supporting drummer and I'm not the type of dude to get up there and make an idiot of myself alone. quote:Well I guess that David Firth quote comes in handy there... "it doesn't matter how slow you go, as long as you don't stop". I know the feel of getting into it late; I started playing my instruments over 10 years ago but only really started giving it the proper dedication and serious attention it requires to actually be worthwhile maybe 3 - 5 years ago, so I have a lot of catching up to do to get myself where I want to be, in terms of skillset. Writing lyrics on their own is something I also almost never do, but I think it might be worth giving it some attention; especially with the issue i described before of struggling to find a place to "progress" a riff into; the phrasing and structure of pre-written lyrics might help drive that on. Without tooting my own horn too much I am really good at improvising lyrics and sometimes the songs just start writing themselves in my head so I'll come up with a couple of verses and chorus straight away and be able to flesh the rest out using the cadences and rhyming schemes that came to me in the spur of the moment, but when I try to replicate the musical backing that appeared behind it in my imagination I haven't succeeded in making anything but bare bones progressions that then taint the original memory of the imagined song. I can freestyle rap for hours providing I keep getting fed new seeds to launch verses off (almost like stage improv, someone yells out a scene and place or whatever and off I go), but if left to my own without external stimulus I can run an idea dry reasonably quick. I have started writing all my lyrics down in a notebook so there will come a time when I can marry some riff ideas with some preconceived lyrics. Even if I don't use the lyrics that I write down, just the practice of writing another song is always beneficial and can lead to some really cool jamming sessions where we basically end up with 5 songs that just need some polish to complete. quote:Okay so you kind of see particular genres of pieces as having a given purpose almost. I Can relate to that; i had a small electronic project i did for a while where the purpose of each piece had a very, very specific emotions set that I wanted to conjor for the listener in a kind of synesthesia, so each piece very much had a particular intended purpose. And I agree about acquiring it later for consumption; one of my evaluative criteria for music is the same as I use for films; simple and obvious really - "would I eagerly choose to listen to it again y/n?". I guess punk is my default "get poo poo done" music, as soon as I hear a d-beat blistering along at 180bpm my heart starts racing and I start bopping along, punk itself feels so productive to me because a lot of the time there's a strong message involved and they can really shape your political and world views, and the songs are sometimes a great way of articulating thoughts and opinions that you hadn't quite pieced fully together but knew you wanted to say. Anytime I am building something or cleaning I will have my thousands-thick punk playlist accompanying me. Electronic/hip-hop is my settle down and chill style of music, like winding down for the day or sitting back with a bit of green and having a good solid pulse that I can nod or rock in my chair to. I like this thread, and yeah self doubt is a huge stumbling point for me showing my music to anyone, it's only recently gotten to the point where I can show my work to my partner of 15 years without leaving the room in embarrassment while she listens, and even still I try not to look at her while she listens because what if there's disgust or rolled eyes OH GOD, but it never happens, she always likes it and gives words of encouragement, but still it's the same next time I hit play on a new track. Singing is my personal bugbear at the moment, it's my most recent musical addition and I have made tons of progress in the last few years but still I am terrified of people hearing words I wrote sung in a voice that is inherently me. A lot of my songs are about how much of a low confidence, depressed idiot I am but hey, write what you know.
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Jul 28, 2014 16:36
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Quickscope420dad posted:1. How do you approach composition? Inspiration? Motivation? Inspiration is almost always emotive. Motifs are almost always born of some feeling at a given point in time. Perhaps it's some form of synesthesia, but I constantly hear things in my head. Some are foreign, like my waking up every morning with a different song playing in my head (Saturday was Vaughn Williams "Variations on the Theme by Thomas Tallis", yesterday was Three Dog Night "Joy to the World", this morning was "Little Sister" by Queens of the Stone age), but a lot of them are literally new motifs triggered by a sentence someone says at work, someone cutting me off in traffic, a really good sandwich at lunch, whatever. Small emotive reactions to large, most of them come with a sound. My head is a noisy place. Back when composing was part of what I did, I wrote these things down. I have numerous staff books with all kinds of crap in them. Quickscope420dad posted:2. What are your biggest roadblocks to writing original music? The biggest roadblock to writing anything for me is time to do so. My composing days are almost another life ago. That may be changing as my focus on actually learning how to play guitar is kicking my old formal writing neurons back in action. My biggest roadblock to writing GOOD original music? Efficiency of means. I'll use 3. to flesh that out... Quickscope420dad posted:3. What do you think makes a piece of music "good"? Good is totally subjective. Let's just get that out of the way. Ear of the beholder. That being said though, in my youth as a composer I put too much material in my pieces. All that stuff I heard in my head I tried to slam as much of it into any piece I wrote. I can't tell you how many times I got evals back in my composition classes where profs would have torn what I wrote to bits, big red vertical lines slicing through what were phrases to my eyes, with notions saying "separate motif... another motif... another motif... another motif...". I had to work my rear end off to calm that down and take 1-3 ideas and build off of them, not add to them. There's a difference. This is where the other theory tools in the box come in handy. Mode, sequence, modulation, theme, variation, dodecaphony strategies of inversion, retrograde, whatever. Take the idea and go somewhere with it. Stretch it, bend it, break it, fix it. There's an academia to music that says whatever you put down as a work... is a work. It's a thing. It's an entity. At that face value you're absolutely right. But... you can compose so far past the perceptions of your audience that you cannot communicate that which you were trying to. You lose them. Now, you can be a hardass and declare "artistic integrity" or "they just don't get me, man" or whatever the phrase du jour is, and nobody can tell you that you're empirically wrong (and there are folks that had careers of just hacking at the "boundries" nonstop), but... Good music is that which can be performed and by either the nature of the actual source material or the nature of the interpretive performance can communicate a close proximity of the idea intended by the composer. I don't care what the genre is, if you can do that... you're in a good place. Quickscope420dad posted:4. Once you have written a "bit" that you like (a riff, lick, phrase, whatever), how do you grow that into a full piece? By taking what I know of formal theory-based framing as well as folk tradition framing to mold the motif into whatever I want it to be.
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Jul 28, 2014 18:14
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Quickscope420dad posted:You say " a good piece is rather universal and timeless" - does that mean that, for example, jazz metal (which is totally inaccessible to the vast majority of listeners) is necessarily NOT good? I don't think that would be fair, but i'm also not sure that's what you're saying so..
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Jul 28, 2014 21:28
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Quickscope420dad posted:Do you find that when you use that method of thinking of a song that you want, that you struggle to stop your work from sounding derivative? And if so, how do you overcome this without reducing the sense of integrity you feel about your work by just slapping on some wacky distortion/ using a gimmick to overcome the issue? quote:Sounds like the whole integrity thing is a big deal to you too. So i guess i put the question to you again; aside from knowing you've worked your rear end off on a piece, how do you ensure your own sense of .."sonic integrity"(??) regarding the sound itself? beatlegs fucked around with this message at 22:16 on Jul 28, 2014 |
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Jul 28, 2014 22:14
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RandomCheese posted:
I think when they do tracks with vocals the drummer sings through an old analog phone's receiver attached to the inside of a gasmask lol. RandomCheese posted:I like this thread, and yeah self doubt is a huge stumbling point for me showing my music to anyone, it's only recently gotten to the point where I can show my work to my partner of 15 years without leaving the room in embarrassment while she listens, and even still I try not to look at her while she listens because what if there's disgust or rolled eyes OH GOD, but it never happens, she always likes it and gives words of encouragement, but still it's the same next time I hit play on a new track. Singing is my personal bugbear at the moment, it's my most recent musical addition and I have made tons of progress in the last few years but still I am terrified of people hearing words I wrote sung in a voice that is inherently me. A lot of my songs are about how much of a low confidence, depressed idiot I am but hey, write what you know. I can relate to most of that though I try and avoid the low confidence depressed idiot aspect of things. As for singing, check out speech level singing. It's a great way to buff your singing ability / quality, but be careful cause there are a lotta people teaching a really dumb version of it. So maybe even forget I said this. Just bear this in mind: sing in the same way you speak. So rather than "hi how are you "hiiii howwww areeee youuuuu" - just extending the same notes and timbre that you use to speak, rather than switching into some "singing voice" (this is why a lotta singers end up sounding like they're singing in a different accent). Don't rely on it, just give it a try. It'll really boost your singing confidence. you posted way more than I have replied to here but I don't want this to turn into a "OP replies to everything" thread... Same goes for those of you who have replied above that I'm not directly responding to. All awesome stuff which I relate to, I'm just trying to get folk to post these kinda ideas for each of us to read, and trying to think up other questions which I personally find important in the writing process. Feel free to add your own questions. les fleurs du mall fucked around with this message at 03:55 on Jul 30, 2014 |
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Jul 30, 2014 03:52
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I just wanted to add that this thread is great, and very thought provoking. I have literally had half a dozen "me too!" moments while reading, thank you for the insight.
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Aug 28, 2014 09:21
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This is a cool thread! To (barely) contribute: For lyric writing, I recommend checking out a songwriting book by Pat Pattison - "Writing Better Lyrics." It's got some approaches/exercises for songwriting that I had never even considered, and I've found them really useful for expanding ideas into songs and generally cleaning up lyrics. He's a professor at Berkley, and I took one of his online courses for free through Coursera, which I'd also recommend. He's pretty kooky, but he really seems to know his poo poo.
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Sep 14, 2014 05:18
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Writing music for me is incredibly cyclical. I'll go through a phase where all I want to do is play my guitar or write in my notebook, or sit at my computer banging out drum tracks. Then I'll go months where the thought of sitting down with an instrument is just the most boring thing in the world. I feel like if I forced myself to sit down and play, stuff would come out, but at the same time I don't want to write anything without emotion behind it. Eh, who knows.
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Sep 23, 2014 20:14
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Quickscope420dad posted:I want to get some goon insight into the creative process for musicians. I'm not entirely sure what my question ought to be, so I'll give you a few to play with and we'll see what Sometimes I will have a quite definite idea in mind; other times it will be a mood or a feel that I somehow want to express in music. Sometimes I just plug myself into Logic and see what comes out. Sometimes it is the result of absent-mindedly playing a beat-up old acoustic on the couch. No matter the motivation or inspiration, whatever I come up with usually ends up being rather different from what I had initially conceived of (if I'd conceived of anything at all). Sometimes just playing around with different settings on my amp or pedals will inspire me to something. edit: sometimes I like to impose arbitrary rules on myself, and work within the boundaries of those rules, i.e., only use two chords for an entire song, or only one chord for the verse, etc. Quickscope420dad posted:2. What are your biggest roadblocks to writing original music? Habits. I think Tom Waits put it exceedingly well when explaining the shift in his approach in the early 80's: "Your hands are like dogs, going to the same places they've been. You have to be careful when playing is no longer in the mind but in the fingers, going to happy places. You have to break them of their habits or you don't explore; you only play what is confident and pleasing." It's easy to let yourself get stuck into a rut like that. Now, since I'm not a professional musician and don't have access to all of the varied instruments that Tom does, I try to write in different ways - on different guitars (what I write on an electric will be different than what I write on an acoustic; what I write on my Jaguar tends to be different from what I write on my Gretsch), in different tunings, in/through MIDI, etc. One thing I do is try to listen to a wide variety of music, take it apart and put it back together in different ways. But maybe the most important thing is that I write and demo a lot, and my songwriting partner and I try to exercise a pretty strict program of quality control (I'd say we demo'd somewhere around 40 tracks, maybe more, for Myth That Kills). I also hoard my demo sessions rather than deleting the ones that seem to go nowhere - because sometimes I will get an idea months or even years later that will end up completing the song. Almost nothing is a dead end. Quickscope420dad posted:3. What do you think makes a piece of music "good"? Quickscope420dad posted:4. Once you have written a "bit" that you like (a riff, lick, phrase, whatever), how do you grow that into a full piece? This is a real sticking point for me; I have a huge stockpile of what i consider great "bits" which I don't seem to be able to progress from, and patching them together makes a real ugly quilt instead of a finely woven tapestry. For me, I try not to think about it - things will come of their own accord. Nietzsche points this out in Beyond Good and Evil: a thought comes when it wants to, not when I will it. Music is the same way. Instead of trying to fit things together, pick a part you like and keep playing with it: don't try to stick it to something else, just let it sort of take you where it wants to go. Of course, I am also very content - arguably too content - to run the same riff into the ground for 10 minutes (I am listening to one of my own tracks doing that right now). I have a weakness for long, repetitive, noisy, groovy guitar-sounds-like-an-icepick-stabbing-my-brain stuff. Luckily, I have a songwriting partner who knows better than to let me indulge that weakness too often. But seriously, I try not to overthink it. Years ago, when I first started playing, I wanted things to be much more complicated than they needed to be. I learned later that even subtle variations on a theme can make for a good (or at least, interesting) song, and that not playing is often much more important than playing. But the other thing I learned is that as a musician I benefit from playing with other people - enormously. Even if it's just playing around on an acoustic guitar while drinking with friends. Playing with other people forces you to grow as a musician, but it also gets your creative juices flowing. El Miguel fucked around with this message at 03:04 on Oct 20, 2014 |
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Oct 20, 2014 02:32
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Alleric posted:Good is totally subjective. Let's just get that out of the way. Ear of the beholder. This might be  but good is not totally subjective. I'd say it is ultimately subjective but in order to get to that point you have to pass through a field of objectivity. While you might find the sound of someone rolling their face up and down a keyboard to be the epitome of musical expression, most people will just hear noise. There is a reason why music is something that can be studied and it is because there is some intrinsic basis as to what kind of sounds are pleasant to human listeners and what kind aren't. It's analogous to visual art in this way. Sure, you might think brown and black look good together, but the vast majority of us won't, and that's why colour theory exists. There are definitely people who have better ears than others.
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Oct 21, 2014 03:02
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1. How do you approach composition? Inspiration? Motivation? Motivation comes from feeling creative, and that's something that I really have no control over. I find it depends on my energy and stress level. When I'm relaxed, I can let stuff flow. This is also how I approach composition. (for the record, I write/play metal) I'll take a guitar and plop down somewhere outside on a nice day, by the river, at a park, against a building, and sit there for hours just doodling and letting ideas flow. Riffs I like I'll write down into a notebook, because I will NOT remember them later. Once I get home I'll try to record them or at least get them into midi for timing so I don't forget them. Later on, if I like them, I'll make songs. This is a long process for me, with lots of corrections. I need to let compositions sit in my head for a while before I know if I like them. Inspiration? Everything around me, and all kinda of music. 2. What are your biggest roadblocks to writing original music? I'm very slow at it. Sometimes it's a lack of coming up with anything I like, others it's deciding that something just doesn't work, or that I can't figure out how to solve a musical problem. Sometimes I'm just not in the mood. 3. What do you think makes a piece of music "good"? This is a different answer for anyone you ask. I used to ponder this question a lot, mainly because I got sick of being asked "why do you like that aggressive/angry music so much?" and I realized that most people use music to wind down, while I like to use it to wind up. Some factors that will vary from person to person: Freshness/Familiarity: I like stuff that dares to be new, stuff I haven't heard before. Other people like familiarity, like Blues, which is why I don't care for it. I want new sounds, new structures, new compositions. Passive/Aggressive: Most people seem to like music to calm them, to be used to background noise. I do not, I want it to hit me in the face with attack. I like complex music and timing, figuring out how it's put together. Although this sometimes clashes with... Catchiness: I appreciate a good catchy tune. Much more than I used to. This becomes apparent to me when listening to a lot of tech death: it's crazy and wonderful, but it doesn't really stick with you when you're done listening to it. The good bands are the ones who try to have it both ways, catchy AND interesting to dissect. There's no one answer. It depends who you ask, and they're all correct. Me, I want new things that catch me off guard, stick in my head, and make me want to study them. 4. Once you have written a "bit" that you like (a riff, lick, phrase, whatever), how do you grow that into a full piece? This is a real sticking point for me; I have a huge stockpile of what i consider great "bits" which I don't seem to be able to progress from, and patching them together makes a real ugly quilt instead of a finely woven tapestry. I believe I'm pretty good at this. Once I have a riff, I'll almost always be able to think of one or two more riffs that fit together well with it. Once I have that segment, I play it over and over, and eventually my mind will add a new segment before or after it, with a good tie-in. I try to listen to what my creativity says will work. If that works, if I can get a section together that's maybe a minute, I'll then decide what to do: repeat it? Add a chorus? Would it sound better as a way to end a tune? At that point I start thinking about structure and what it needs. Sometimes things work out they way they are intended, sometimes they don't. I am guilty of putting too much into a song, and then later having to go back and trim out some fat. I think I'm ok with that.
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Oct 21, 2014 03:16
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Quickscope420dad posted:I want to get some goon insight into the creative process for musicians. Quickscope420dad posted:1. How do you approach composition? Inspiration? Motivation? Typically, first thing I'd do is scroll through my collection of movies and tv shows, try to find something that suits the mood, throw it on and mindlessly noodle along on a guitar while watching. If that doesn't work (and I usually give it 30-60 minutes or so) or I'm not feeling it, I'll shut electronic media down, go into the library and prowl through my books until something, for whatever random reason catches my eye and I'll pull it down and start flipping through, trying to find a phrase that jumps out at me. Sometimes this can vary, I'll browse Twitter and Reddit quite a bit and (rarely) FaceBook. Once I find 'the phrase' I start envisioning the scene around it in my head. 'What's the soundtrack to this moment like? What's the mood for the viewer/participant? What should someone FEEL when these characters hit their eyeballs?' which helps me figure out key, mode, beat and so on. As an example, while watching the livestreams and following the Twitter streams during the early Ferguson, MO protests, I came across this picture:  Which, after some noodling around, jotting some lyrics (based again on the Tweets I was reading and the streams I was watching) ended up as a weird, jazzy, lighthearted tune for the verses (the 'daytime' mood) dropping into an angry RaTM/Amon Amarth-ish chorus (the 'nighttime' mood) but, I was utterly stuck on how to end it properly. All of a sudden a few days later I was listening to the 'F#A#∞' album and 'Dead Flag Blues' came on and I sat, listening to the lyrics (I bolded the most relevant lines) and realized how it all ended. GY!BE: Dead Flag Blues posted:The car is on fire, and there's no driver at the wheel Jumped up, ran and grabbed a guitar, fired up my rig and proceeded to throw the most rambunctious, reverb, delay and whatever odd effect I could shoehorn in on top of the receding lines from the final chorus until everything washed out in a cacophony of feedback, noises folding in on themselves and just, well, just a bunch of loving noise. Other times it may be other things, admittedly, that particular piece I felt lucky for, because everything just fell properly into place and was just right. I generally ALWAYS have my trusty Tascam DR-40 field recorder in my bag and I'll pull it out constantly whenever I'm out and about. If ANYTHING has the slightest hint of melody, rhythm or structure, I'll snatch up a quick sample of it, throw it on my comp and let it loop until I figure out what's melodic about it. There's no real set method I guess, sometimes a client will have a poem, or lyrics or (usually when scoring a short film or something) they'll say 'ok, right here this guy/girl is at the end of their rope, blahblah uplifting grand piece' so I'll go from there, ultimately if I had to nail any one criteria down, it's looking for the 'mood'. Quickscope420dad posted:2. What are your biggest roadblocks to writing original music? Quickscope420dad posted:3. What do you think makes a piece of music "good"? The more cynical, pessimistic side of me says 'the check clearing is a good indicator' but that's just being pissy. Quickscope420dad posted:4. Once you have written a "bit" that you like (a riff, lick, phrase, whatever), how do you grow that into a full piece? Sometimes, (actually pretty regularly), I'll start playing around with effects, chaining things together in weird ways, different amps, different cabs, experimenting with something way WAY out of my comfort zone and seeing if the sound itself can sort of guide things into the right direction. And sometimes, rarely, every now and again, there's no real thought to it. On those days I just happen to be the scribe for whatever generous muse decided to visit that day. THOSE are the best days.
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Oct 29, 2014 00:17
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One thing I do regularly is sit down w/guitar and play whatever comes to mind, and if I stumble on an idea, even if it's a fragment of a melody or whatever, I'll record it on my little digital voice recorder. Usually it's just a piece of melody I hum & play along to. I keep all these sketches in a folder on the computer and when I need song ideas I just play through all the sketches until I hit one that inspires me, then I go forward with it. I find it's way easier to utilize the stockpile of sketches this way rather than approaching writing with a completely blank slate.
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Oct 29, 2014 01:34
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Subyng posted:This might be It really is subjective and entirely is based off your environment (what you are used to). Listen to some Balinese gamelan music and you will notice how dissonant and uneasy 0it sounds to you where as not so to those who grew up with it.
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Oct 31, 2014 03:42
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Quickscope420dad posted:1. How do you approach composition? Inspiration? Motivation? Quickscope420dad posted:2. What are your biggest roadblocks to writing original music? Quickscope420dad posted:3. What do you think makes a piece of music "good"? Quickscope420dad posted:4. Once you have written a "bit" that you like (a riff, lick, phrase, whatever), how do you grow that into a full piece? This is a real sticking point for me; I have a huge stockpile of what i consider great "bits" which I don't seem to be able to progress from, and patching them together makes a real ugly quilt instead of a finely woven tapestry. I have to get the piece together in few sessions so it maintains it's "identity". It can be turd polished later but it's really hard to get into the original vibe later. If I work on older material it usually turns out like a remix.
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Jan 27, 2015 11:19
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Stravinsky posted:It really is subjective and entirely is based off your environment (what you are used to). Listen to some Balinese gamelan music and you will notice how dissonant and uneasy 0it sounds to you where as not so to those who grew up with it. The counterpoint to that though is that among the Balinese I expect you'd still see a broad concesus as to which pieces were better than others though. Good is culturally relative and ultimately subjective but if your goal is, say, to make people dance there is a visible success and failure state there.
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Jan 27, 2015 12:01
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Quickscope420dad posted:1. How do you approach composition? Inspiration? Motivation? These days I generally start with a set of limits. I will start with the idea of an album and the themes that will be present, a rough idea of a "color palette" that the music will bring to mind in my head, the kinds of feelings and concepts that I want the album to represent. Then I get more specific - the album will be dominated by X instruments, the sonic "timeline" of the album will go in Y direction, under the influence artists Z, etc. I think a lot about the sort of mentality that I need to be in for this particular music. I don't write any of these things down, I just develop the ideas in my head and concentrate on them. Then with those limits in mind I start improvising within them, usually starting with a rudimentary beat and playing some sort of keyboard instrument on top and just playing freely for a long time. Then after I'm done I listen through what I recorded and generally focus on a phrase or two that will become the seed of a song. That's when I am just writing for myself, but I have a similar approach when I am composing for other people - it is more collaborative and I try to be more influenced by their words of course. quote:2. What are your biggest roadblocks to writing original music? Fear of writing unoriginal music. I am trying to write simpler music and these days to get closer to traditional verse/chorus/bridge structures. However the more I do so and the more I try to write music with "hooks" the more often I find myself wondering "did I really compose that or did I just hear it somewhere and now it's lodged in my brain". Sometimes I'll write a phrase or section and then Shazam it to make sure I'm not unintentionally ripping someone off. quote:3. What do you think makes a piece of music "good"? Motion. Either it takes me mentally to another place, or it makes me move my body. Or both. Obviously, thats subjective. In terms of deciding when my own music is "good", I rely to a large extent on trusted ears of my friends. I don't think it's a good idea to make that decision oneself, especially as you get into the final stages of working on a piece and making tiny little tweaks and listening to it all the time, it's very easy to lose perspective on what the music sounds like as you are automatically focused on details no normal listener will hear, so IMO it's important to get feedback from others at that point. Just make sure you know who's ears to trust. (and it's going to be different people for different things - you might trust one person with "does this composition work" and another with "does this mix work") quote:4. Once you have written a "bit" that you like (a riff, lick, phrase, whatever), how do you grow that into a full piece? Sorry if this is too simplistic an answer, but usually I just think "ok so what comes next?" and start playing around with different ideas for another phrase that can nicely come from the one I just wrote. Of course you have to think of the role your "bit" is going to play. What part of the song is it? If you think it's got potential for a chorus start thinking of what kind of verse could go with it. If you think it's a good bassline think of a melody that could go on top of it, or vice versa. How does it hold up if you repeat it 4 times? How would it sound if you made X Y or Z variations of the bit and then made an alternating pattern of those variations, what can that turn into? etc. It helps to always be recording, every little bit of minor loving around you do - just have that be second nature. That way you will build up an archive of ideas and when you are really truly blocked you can go back and find something you might have forgotten about that could fit with what you are currently working on. Earwicker fucked around with this message at 17:55 on Feb 13, 2015 |
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Feb 13, 2015 17:49
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Quickscope420dad posted:1. How do you approach composition? Inspiration? Motivation? Motivation can be hard to come by between competing interests. I basically took most of the past year off because I took an interest in other, time-consuming stuff (I realize that sounds like it was drugs, but I swear it wasn't  ). I love making music for its own sake, I love the process, I love listening to the results; but it can also occasionally be a frustrating endeavour, one that's easy to gently caress up and waste, and there's a certain amount of self-esteem necessary to face that possibility. Sometimes it feels like it ain't worth it that day.Which nicely leads into: Quickscope420dad posted:2. What are your biggest roadblocks to writing original music? Quickscope420dad posted:3. What do you think makes a piece of music "good"? Quickscope420dad posted:4. Once you have written a "bit" that you like (a riff, lick, phrase, whatever), how do you grow that into a full piece? wayfinder fucked around with this message at 15:32 on Feb 14, 2015 |
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Feb 14, 2015 15:23
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slow meme posted:1. How do you approach composition? Inspiration? Motivation? Same as everyone else. An idea comes from somewhere. I'm fooling around on guitar or piano and a riff or chord progression pops out. If it's strong enough, I'll play it again next time, and again, and slowly it makes more and more sense. Very occasionally ideas come from intellectual concepts rather than scraps of music. For example, I wanted to experiment with polyrhythm, so I wrote a simple riff that sounds like it's in 6/8, then put a 4/4 beat over it, revealing that the riff was in triplet time all along, or something. That turned out as one of my best songs. Motivation comes and goes. I can edit and loop and tinker in Ableton forever - I'm hooked on that part of it. But getting up and setting up equipment to record stuff is harder. I have to set aside time on weekends to make myself do it, or else it doesn't get done. quote:2. What are your biggest roadblocks to writing original music? I find writing music easy. It's recording that loving kills me, because I don't have the skillz, even after years of trying. I can barely capture my guitar playing well enough to finish songs. I also find lyrics tough. Which is weird because I'm a writer by trade, and I have notepads filled with scraps of lyrics and ideas... it's just I find stitching them into lyrics to fit a song - the melody, the rhythm, the rhyme, etc - a monumentally frustrating task. Lyrics always come last for me, usually after I've recorded everything else. Like other people, I also struggle with originality. I have at least one song I think is loving awesome, but I stop myself from working on it because I think it sounds too much like a particular band I love, and everyone will listen to it and go "well, this is obvious". I still haven't figured out how much of a problem that is - some of my favourite songs wear their influences on their sleeves. quote:3. What do you think makes a piece of music "good"? There's an idea in it that's clear and strong, and everything in the song supports that idea. This is the same whether you're writing a 60-second punk song or a 22-minute rock symphony. I used to work with a singersongwriter I consider immensely talented, but she used to drive me nuts because she'd bury all her ideas under mountains of nonsense. She'd have an amazing chord progression, a beautiful melody - then segue into some nonsensical, twee bridge or something that had nothing to do with anything... it drove me nuts. We had an argument all the time about "nice sounds". She used to cover all her songs with string arrangements, because she knew some fantastic string players. And the thing is, if you get some good string players in a room and record them, that sounds really good. There's no arguing with it, it's just one of those amazing sounds. But she'd use them even when it didn't support her song, when the sounds were burying rather than revealing the song. We had huge arguments about that, and I stand by it: just because it's a good sound doesn't mean it helps the song. quote:Once you have written a "bit" that you like (a riff, lick, phrase, whatever), how do you grow that into a full piece? This is a real sticking point for me; I have a huge stockpile of what i consider great "bits" which I don't seem to be able to progress from, and patching them together makes a real ugly quilt instead of a finely woven tapestry. I try to find some sensible extension of that idea. I might come up with an arpeggio pattern or something, then play around with moving it into different chords while preserving the pattern, so there's a consistency of concept but a change in sound and mood. I'm a big fan of the old "outro" trick. If I have a progression that makes up the bulk of a song, then I find some twist on that same pattern that makes my ears perk up, it becomes the outro. I'm sure I used to be better at this when I was younger - entire finished songs used to fall out of me in single afternoons. Now I come up with riffs I love but I can't find a home for.
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Feb 18, 2015 02:31
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I also have issues with perfectionism, if I try to be objective about it though I think perfectionism is ultimately an ego problem. Its essentially saying "well the reason I can't finish stuff is because my standards are just so drat high that I wont settle for less than perfect". Which is great, because it means your tracks can carry on being genius forever, safely in your head. quote:3. What do you think makes a piece of music "good"? When it surprises me. I can knock out dumb guitar store riffs for ages, but If I listen back to something and think "how did I write that? it doesen't sound like something I'd normally do?" that means its probably decent. Usually that happens by accident, after hours of churning out the same old stuff, but thats ok. On the topic of songwriting, I heard this the other day, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=stPkdwm-KBg Its a song recorded by Dave Grohl, Trent Reznor and Josh Holme. And its not very good. Its listenable sure, but its even as good as probably the weakest track on With Teeth. 3 guys who collectively have sold millions of albums can get together, jam out a track and theres no garuntee it will be great. And thats ok, its just any given day in the studio, I doubt any of them are losing any sleep over it. Actual good stuff comes after you've gone through the motions again and again and then carefully edited out all the chaff. Its the result of time and dedication rather waiting for genius to happen. massive spider fucked around with this message at 15:57 on Feb 18, 2015 |
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Feb 18, 2015 15:27
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Subyng posted:This might be Pretty sure you just supported my point. Everyone's got their kink. The majority (or minority) only really rules when you're selling something. Do not misunderstand my pragmatic belief for my personal practice. However, there's a key thing you may want to think about : explanation is not the same as definition. Music Theory (and Color Theory) explain relationships in a quantitative way, but their descriptions of what was done do not dictate how everything has to be done from here on out by every person that will ever exist. There are definitely people who have other ears than others. Passing through a field of objectivity is an extravagance only afforded by the intelligent in a field of knowledge. The vast majority of music consumers do not, and will not do this. They like something or they don't. It's visceral. And that is all that matters. Believe me, it is hard for me to keep this thought from getting murdered constantly by the objective understanding I personally have about how a lot of music is composed and performed. If anything, that's the ultimate downside of the "field of objectivity". Once you look behind the curtain, and see that the wizard is just a busted old man with some levers, it's harder to love him. But for those that don't recognize that there's a curtain, will never look behind it and see how things are really working, they will always be shocked and awed.
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Feb 18, 2015 18:00
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I think there is a different and more useful way of reading that question. Instead of thinking about music in general and what makes you like a particular song you hear or think of it as "good", maybe the question is better approached in the context purely of your own music and goals as a composer. I mean pretty much anyone who writes music will turn out some pieces they think are good (one would hope) and others that they think do not work - obviously that's a very individual and subjective decision but what is interesting is the different places where people draw those lines and why. Even if you aren't trying to sell your music, even if you never release it publicly, you still have your own standards as an audience to contend with.
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Feb 18, 2015 18:12
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My gut feeling is that it's very much impossible to reliably qualify music for anyone except yourself.
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Feb 18, 2015 21:15
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GiTCMdoVnGk
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Feb 24, 2015 00:15
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Generally I feel truly original music requires some kind of technological innovation to drive it (piano, electric instrument, synthesizer, long player, etc), or a willingness to boldly abandon convention. Original music is typically rough and underdeveloped, but serves as the seed that contemporaries and subsequents refine, incorporate and polish. We have, in the course of the 20th and 21st century, constructed everything from pure noise to total silence, with more conventional sounds resting somewhere in between. It's very hard these days to make music that is doing 'firsts'; rather we exist in a period of reflection and recombination where musicians are refining or modifying the state of the existing art. Dudes 'do' techno. Dudettes 'do' noise. They are acutely aware of their position in the spectrum. At the conception of these genres, there was no hindsight, no vault of tropes from which to develop the sound. Innovators take influence from disparate musical sources of their time and use it to inform a new sound, often completely unaware they're about to define a genre. In the online era, it is no longer possible to not be aware of the metagame, and you see artists immediately trying to stake out new territory with microgenres that by virtue of their speciality, exhaust their options rather quickly. As for general composition tips, my favorite lesson is demonstrated by this Eluvium jam https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fNrpZGl7du4 I'm willing to put money on the fact that he was originally playing a more conventional and harmonious guitar phrase and he played the 'off-sounding' note you hear by mistake. But there was something compelling about it, about its 'wrongness' that meant that he kept trying it out, and eventually kept it. By pushing that comfort zone and daring to, tastefully, eschew convention, he has created an ambiguous, haunting tune that honors its nomeclature's visual metaphor. Do stuff that makes you uncomfortable, like playing the 'wrong notes', or actually working out how to use that weird area of the synthesizer that doesn't actually do anything when you try to use it (ladies we've all been there can i get an amen?). Pushing mini-boundaries like this is great. You listen to things enough, and they start to develop their own inner logic - like how an individual sample may not be particularly compelling, but the moment you loop it repeatedly it generates a dynamism or melodic quality that was impercetible alone.
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Feb 28, 2015 00:21
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1. How do you approach composition? Inspiration? Motivation? Inspiration mainly. I usually write songs after thinking myself into a deep black hole, and have some difficulty writing positive ones, as the inspiration mainly seems to come when im feeling depressed. I find some chords i like, and sing the words that come to mind - usually they come out with a good melody, if not, i try to change it or give up then and there. I tend to try to stay in the black hole until im done writing the song, or i lose interest and ask myself why the hell i am writing such depressing stuff. dysfunctional maybe, but its the only way i know 2. What are your biggest roadblocks to writing original music? lack of variety in my emotional life - probably due to the medication im on, leaving the world pretty gray - when i do try to write a happy song they usually come out over the top happy because im not really feeling happy. 3. What do you think makes a piece of music "good"? I have a pretty boring answer for this - it must have inspire some emotion in me and have a good melody I dont believe any music is objectively good - except maybe Black Sabbath. 4. Once you have written a "bit" that you like (a riff, lick, phrase, whatever), how do you grow that into a full piece? I try random chords until i find something that sounds good - i dont know much about music theory and chord progressions and all that, so its more or less trial and error for me. Sometimes this works, other times i just give up. i have many unfinished pieces that i think im never gonna use - once the mood is gone, so is my will to complete it
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Mar 24, 2015 18:36
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Answering is tricky just because everyone has their own particular process that suits them best. I personally feel like a big roadblock for songwriters starting out is feeling like they have to write the whole piece themselves. The tendency of fame to highlight the frontmen of bands and make them seem like they are the ones with all the ideas is partially to blame for this in my opinion. Personally I tend to start with guitar, sometimes I'll pick through my writing for imagery that strikes me and try to come up with riffs that fit the tone, and sometimes I just gently caress around until I stumble on something I like. Once I have a riff, I meet up with the other guys and experiment. For me collaboration and communicating musical ideas well are what really allow me to visualize the next step to take to flesh out a song. Once we get the basic components for a song down, then I work on etching out the vocal melody and bridges, and once that's done just frequent practice to smooth it all out. For me songwriting is fully a collaborative effort. I do most of the conceptual and imagery stuff, but playing as a group you may find that one of the guys comes up with something that fits the idea in your head way better than what you'd come up with alone. Biggest roadblocks for me tend to be when I have periods of low drive, or when I am too self-critical and perfectionist. That can lead to writing off entire recordings that may contain bits with potential just because they are mixed with mistakes or rambling bits, and lack of drive does it because I draw heavily from forming mental pictures to get work done writing music, and when I lose that creative drive my ability to visualize goes away. One last thing that helps me. Record EVERYTHING you play/sing/write. Even if you hate it. And review them frequently. I may love or hate a riff or poem initially, but when I listen again I might get new ideas or something I thought was useless may strike me. Plus you don't risk forgetting something that could sound really cool due to having never recorded it.
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Apr 8, 2015 02:12
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