Well you can do one of two things. About where your stopping point is, the time that you say okay, this is my track.. keep going.. You'll find that the more you work on a track the better it becomes (usually). The second thing you could do is quit. Now I don't think you're going to do that, so, keep going. I just started a track today. I did a rough edit, a simple song structure just so I could hear some of the elements as they would fall in the song. Then I tore it all apart again and restarted. I'm not near as far a long as I was when I did the simple song structure, but, its getting there.. I even uploaded it earlier so I knew what I was working with. Now before you tell me it sucks. I know. Its just a few ideas sketched out in a musical format. But I have faith in you.
Originally posted by DJRYAN™
Well you can do one of two things. About where your stopping point is, the time that you say okay, this is my track.. keep going.. You'll find that the more you work on a track the better it becomes (usually). The second thing you could do is quit. Now I don't think you're going to do that, so, keep going. I just started a track today. I did a rough edit, a simple song structure just so I could hear some of the elements as they would fall in the song. Then I tore it all apart again and restarted. I'm not near as far a long as I was when I did the simple song structure, but, its getting there.. I even uploaded it earlier so I knew what I was working with. Now before you tell me it sucks. I know. Its just a few ideas sketched out in a musical format. But I have faith in you.
Nice. The track is all right, really repetitive though. Maybe I should try this in the future. Lay out a really simple structure and build off of that. I generally just always edit and tweak as I go, which I've noticed really slows down my workflow. I need to get better on my workflow as well.
-FSP-
I know this isn't the answer you're looking for but sometimes it's just best for the song to be short. If you make it long, it just drags.+
OOPS!
quote:
Originally posted by -FSP-
I know this isn't the answer you're looking for but sometimes it's just best for the song to be short. If you make it long, it just drags.+
Well kind of actually. I was also wondering from the perspective of a listener, if a song is short does that make it any less enjoyable/favorable?
EddieZilker
Stop thinking about length as a goal. I don't ever set out to make a deliberately long song. I tend to get carried away exploring nuances and my tunes get longer, because of that. If you've ever listened to Bad Boy Bill, you can hear that a DJ set can be short times and rapid transitions. It doesn't have to be fully blown, epic songs.
mnw479
If you want to make a track around 6-8 min, you could loop a lot of parts to make it longer. It may sound really boring, but you'll achieve your goal and know how it feels to make a track of that length.
-FSP-
The thing is, just looping won't cut it imo. The song will tell you if it needs to be long or short. There's no shame in having 2 min songs, the average pop song is around 3:20. Sometimes looping it won't cut it imo it just doesn't sound natural for the song.
From the perspective of a listener, getting to the point is all that matters. I think there are very few people who will listen to a DJ Tool techno track for a full 10 min. Those type of songs do get loopy, but the transition from phrase to phrase is smooth even if it's repetitive: the structure of the song makes it okay to do so. Go loop if your song absolutely tells you to loop.
mnw479
I'm not saying that looping will create better tracks, but it will help learn how to structure tracks. We have to face that professional edm tracks (which is what type of music I'm assuming OP is trying to make) are usually 6 min long. Yes, the first track you force to make 6 min will be really bad, but more importantly you'll learn a lot from the experience.
Beatflux
It's usually a good idea to have some sort of idea of how long you want your track to be and the general arrangement of how it will go.
Sometimes "filling" up the arrangement can be the more difficult part.
DJRYAN™
I'm with Eddie (partially) some of my loops just rock. By my difficulty lies in extending those loops, not to mention, how each sound sounds when its played on its own. It might sound great with all the sounds playing together but as soon as I start building the track I'm like wtf? So, like I said, make the loops longer. Instead of just doing a 1 bar loop do a 4 bar loop and then when you have that down, go from an 4 to 8 and then 8 to 16 and then to 32. You'll notice that it'll get better.
Looney4Clooney
quote:
Originally posted by DJRYAN™
I'm with Eddie (partially) some of my loops just rock..
Let's not get carried away now.
To answer your question, listen to tracks that are the goal length, then listen to yours. Then scratch yo head and ask yourself what is different in terms of structure. Not a very impressive question. You can also just do the opposite of what djRyan inc. ltd. Does.
meriter
just make short tracks no one has an attention span anyway
