tips:

try not to listen to your own music unless its within the sequencer until its done. this will give you more the initiative to change things that you dont like or dont work right away.

work on multiple projects and switch off between them when you become tired or creatively dry from one of them. this especially works if youre working with different genres.

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quote:

Originally posted by meriter Your primary focus should be making good music. That's all. No one gives a shit how you do it. And the people that do are fags.

quote:

take some time off be realistic, would anyone buy this ? I mean not your friends, would this be the track people would have to play or just filler. of course i think if you are starting , that will just depress you. Maybe take time, compare it to a track you really like, and write down what is different. GO thru each part. like bass and drums, the mix, the production .....

Will do.

quote:

Originally posted by Looney4Clooney i find i'm my own worst critic. Most good artists are that way. If you are convinced at any time you are awesome, you will stop growing. That isn't to say you should just trash what you do, it just comes instinctively because you know you can do better and you usually do. Honestly, i can't think of any really good artist that isn't this way. I look back at the few EDM tracks i did , i mean looking back, if I stuck with it , i would be touring living that lifestyle as I was rather good but at the time, i never felt like i was where I wanted to be. And with the stuff i'm doing now, i feel like i can do better. It takes some time before i can listen to anything of mine and not think it is meh. I find if anything , it is hard to be objective the other way. ie , stop trying to make it better and move on. If you like the smell of your own shit, as Richard so eloquently put it, odds are you don't have the ability to know when you suck and when you need to haul ass. Some of the biggest composers, when they are testing the locked picture, are sweating bullets. Because they are never completely satisfied or sure. It could of been this, or that. You have a serious issue if you are completely assured that you are awesome. And all it can take is one person in the group, who knows nothing about music to say, hmmm that was weird. For tips take some time off be realistic, would anyone buy this ? I mean not your friends, would this be the track people would have to play or just filler. of course i think if you are starting , that will just depress you. Maybe take time, compare it to a track you really like, and write down what is different. GO thru each part. like bass and drums, the mix, the production .....

Thankyou very much for this advice and also for all the other bits of advice you have given me in my other threads. It's been a great help to me.

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Thanks to everyone that has posted in this thread. There's been some great advice so far, keep it up.

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when I think im almost at the finish line with a song I leave it for at least a week or two, enough to kinda let me forget about certain aspects of the song and to try and detach myself from it.

Upon first listen after that break, I will open the sequencer, put headphones on, minimize the project so I cant see the arrange page and hit space bar (play). I'll only leave the page minimized for the first listen. i dont want to see the arrangment, tracks, etc.

I used to leave the arrange page open but I found i was pre-empting what was about to happen in the song because I was able to visually see it. In my head I was kinda saying "oh thats right" before the part even happened cause I was reading it on screen. Therefore I wasnt giving my mind a chance to hear it as a normal listener, which is hard enough to do when its your own stuff. Leave a song for a couple weeks then give it a try, it works wonders for me!

cheers,

quote:

Originally posted by Looney4Clooney i find i'm my own worst critic. Most good artists are that way. If you are convinced at any time you are awesome, you will stop growing. That isn't to say you should just trash what you do, it just comes instinctively because you know you can do better and you usually do. Honestly, i can't think of any really good artist that isn't this way.

Absolutely.

I find that a lot of my stuff never gets beyond the sketch stage, because once the initial enthusiasm stops and I start listening to it critically, I convince myself it's crap and not worth the bother to finish.

quote:

Originally posted by madmuso Upon first listen after that break, I will open the sequencer, put headphones on, minimize the project so I cant see the arrange page and hit space bar (play). I'll only leave the page minimized for the first listen. i dont want to see the arrangment, tracks, etc. I used to leave the arrange page open but I found i was pre-empting what was about to happen in the song because I was able to visually see it. In my head I was kinda saying "oh thats right" before the part even happened cause I was reading it on screen. Therefore I wasnt giving my mind a chance to hear it as a normal listener, which is hard enough to do when its your own stuff. Leave a song for a couple weeks then give it a try, it works wonders for me!

Yeah, that is a good exercise. Reminds of this bit from an Autechre interview:

quote:

"There's nothing better than turning the screen off and just going analogue," stresses Booth. "You're not looking at data representation and so you can drift off and just listen. We do this a lot. When we're putting things down and mixing things and are trying to make things sound right, the screen has to go off. It's an illusion that totally pollutes what you're thinking and what you're listening to. Yes, you can be in the zone when sitting with a laptop. You absolutely can. But you just want to listen and not interact with the device. The worst things are the timeline sequencers where you can see on the screen what's coming up. That really f**ks with your head when you're listening."

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/apr04/articles/autechre.htm

quote:

Originally posted by Nightshift tips: try not to listen to your own music unless its within the sequencer until its done. this will give you more the initiative to change things that you dont like or dont work right away. work on multiple projects and switch off between them when you become tired or creatively dry from one of them. this especially works if youre working with different genres.

I would not follow this advice...

quote:

Originally posted by BritishLizard I would not follow this advice...

good.for.you.bro.

these are things that work for me personally so i thought i'd share them.

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Garrido & Skehan ft. Erin - Waiting For You (Nightshift Remix)
Elvin Ong - Motion (Nightshift Remix)
Tidal Forces - Machine Blue (Nightshift Remix)

quote:

Originally posted by meriter Your primary focus should be making good music. That's all. No one gives a shit how you do it. And the people that do are fags.

You can only be so objective about your own tracks and your own style, so ultimately you can't separate yourself from your tracks, nor do you need to IMO. Do the best you can, let other people determine if they think it's good enough, and always strive to improve knowing that creating music is a journey, not a destination, pardon the cliche. First and foremost, make sure that YOU are satisfied with it by listening to it subjectively. All the other advice still applies here, e.g., take a break from it and revisit it later with fresh ears and perspective, compare it to reference tracks on both creative and technical fronts, etc. until YOU are satisfied with it. There's no need for you to try and determine how another person will perceive your music.

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haha he said separate yourself from your music, not separate yourself from the universe.