>ATTENTION! DON'T post Soundcloud, YouTube, or any other links where you are not anonymous (unless somebody asks you for it). That's considered self promotion and will result in bad feedback.
RESOURCES:
Sound Design:
>SeamlessR (in-depth music production and sound design tutorials, based on FL Studio) youtube.com/user/SeamlessR
>Syntorial (widely considered the best place to go to learn synthesis) syntorial.com/
>Mr. Bill (Ableton based, some of the best sound design tutorials on the planet. Aimed more towards IDM-type stuff. He also posts his music here) youtube.com/user/MrBillsTunes
Gonna repost this here since I wanted a couple more opinions.
Trying to buy my kid some music equipment for Christmas. He wants to start making "electronic" music (he likes Avicii, Martin Garrix etc.)
Should I get him a synthesiser to start with, this will be his first instrument and he can learn the basics of music and synth theory or... should I just buy him a midi keyboard so he can plug it into his laptop and tell him to download FL Studio? The latter seems to have longer shelf life but it might be better to focus on one thing especially at a young age.
That was my first thinking but because music theory is so important I actually considered just getting him a piano or guitar. This seems more sensible that just diving deep into DAWs without knowing the basics and having a good ear for what sounds good and what doesn't.
John Richardson
Well, if it helps, I learned music theory through a DAW, and I actually much prefer it that way. I have a much better understanding of what's going on when I'm looking at notes versus fucking around or even reciting things on an instrument
Brody Gutierrez
>synth theory
this is not even a thing
Cooper James
not sure but here's how I see it music theory = chords, rhythm, melody, octaves, notes etc. synth theory = modulation, oscillators, filters, LFOs etc.
Asher Rodriguez
Going to repost too since thread was dying whenI posted
>I posted a wip of this like 2 days ago, sat down to finish it today, I think I ruined it andmy ears are dead. also my best idea for mastering seems to be gain turned up on the fruity limiter
my main concern is the bass. I have just a hard 808 in the chorus and using Wobble for the bassline in the verse to mellow it out a bit, although i'm thinking of scrapping it and just making a few patterns to sprinkle in and replace it, y/n?
and how the fuck do i make my hats sound like not complete shit. Right now i have a flange on the rolls to "wet" them a bit (so they aren't as aggressive), but even without mixing they still sound super muddy and warbly.
I haven't started mixing yet, so it's going to sound like absolute dogshit, plus i know the kick and snares are super repetivie right now, but it's mainly just placeholder until i get the overall "sound" in a good spot, then i plan on going back and adding some variety in the patterns. I'm mainly just looking for some feedback about the bassline and the hats
Jordan Rivera
should i start putting the eq/compression/console vsts right on the channel input to be more like an actual studio with rack effects going to the board going to the daw
Nathaniel Gray
4 people replied to you in the last thread too. You didn’t bother replying to any of them you ungrateful cunt.
>is this thing good? i want it Tricky to say with Akai stuff nowadays as they seem to make quite a lot of low quality gear. I’d look into the build quality before buying. I’m not sure about the software side of it either as I stopped keeping track a few years back when I bought a Maschine, But back then the maschine software seemed way ahead of the MPC stuff, but I’m sure it’s probably on point by now. I’d probably look into the maschine Mkii or the 3 as it comes with some really good software bundled with it and the controllers are rock solid. They were in the sales last month too
>this is the general quality of music that /prod/ produces
Damn dude work on your theory this sounds like garbage
Evan Cook
do yourself a favor and learn harmony
Jose White
The Juno DS61 is a solid keyboard that has over a thousand sounds such as pianos, organs, guitar, brass, drums, synth etc. and you can modify sounds with attack, delay, release, reverb, chorus, resonance.
You can't make your own sounds from scratch like with a synthesiser, but the sounds it comes with are all very good. And you can get thousands of more sounds from free expansions from the axial roland website.
If not the DS61, then I'd recommend the Gaia SH-01 synthesiser.
Samuel Nguyen
Also if any other company’s are giving away free (but usually paid for) plugins over the holidays post them here.
Isaac Rogers
>clyp.it/rtwrbn2c everything about this is just not right and i don't think mixing will help it at all
Brandon Cooper
fuck the haters, i like it man
Michael Perry
>tone deaf
Landon Taylor
>that feelin when you first heard FL Studio's DL Breaker loop
Parker Campbell
My name is Pilchard And I am funky Women love me Cause I am spunky
Hudson King
Just found a cool feature in FL that can help with pitch bending non-native plugins.
Use the Fruity Keyboard Controller, load up the To Pitch (Transposing) preset, open the synth you want to pitch bend, set the pitch bend range under channel settings in FL to 12, link the pitch knob to the keyboard controller notes, turn up the smoothing in Fruity Keyboard Controller to taste.
C5 is unchanged, D5 is 2 notes up, etc. It's as you'd expect.
Still don't have a way of converting slide notes to pitch bend data though.
Jayden Jones
>trying to make a bass sound >carefully only employ notes that occur within 60-250 frequencies >make sure i have the most basic sine wave in history with no extra nothings >still get frequencies way over 250hz
going to commit a fucking murder
even if i limit it to shit i will still hear the frequencies
Aiden Jones
Also you can bind the smoothing knob to keyboard controller's own velocity output, but to use it you have to add a note at the velocity level / smoothing level you want before the note you bend with, like C5 at max velocity for max smoothing and no pitch bend, and then you use A5 to bend down slower, or C5 at min velocity, and then use A6 to bend down instantly.
Is it little clicks and pops at the start / end of the notes? Post a spectrogram and a screenshot of your settings side by side.
Blake Green
Get him a DAW
Logan Gomez
FL Studio got synthesizers what come with it and you can get a bunch more for free, not even pirating, off the net. He'll learn about synth theory (sound design) on a laptop just fine.
Nothing stopping him from learning about music theory, there's videos of what amounts to music theory classes online that are free and easy to watch since they're entertaining and have personality, there's free ebooks like Music Theory: The TL;DR Version, all sorts of materials.
At least with a DAW it'll support larger projects than just having a piano or guitar because you can orchestrate a larger supply of sounds and make full songs.
Jaxson Lewis
when i download vst's where to do i save them so my daw recognizes them as a plugin
Grayson Brown
wait nvm just got it lol
Sebastian Jenkins
Fun trick I used to do a lot with breakbeats in Slicex:
On the snares, and maybe kicks sometimes too, tune a highpass filter to the fundamental of the snare and turn up the resonance like 45% so it boosts the tone instead of making a new one from too high of a resonance on noise and then use an envelope on the resonance to make it start ~50% and then cut down to about negative 10% so the tone boosting is quick and goes away fast. Don't set the end of the envelope too low though or it'll make a swishing sound when the resonance drops too lower and the highpass becomes very smooth and cuts higher frequencies a bit as well. Makes it POP, and doesn't always sound good but sometimes it's nice.
Ayden Stewart
Best of both worlds get him Maschine mk3. He’ll fucking love you for it. See my post here . It comes with komplete select which includes a bunch of really high quality synths, samples and effects.
It is marketed as a groove box so it’s not quite as fully featured as a full on DAW so it’s nice and newb friendly. The controller works seamlessly with the software so you get away from the mouse and keyboard of the computer and it actually feels like using hardware. I have actually stopped using my DAW and have been working entirely inside Maschine now as I really like the workflow with the controller and it’s certainly capable of making complete tracks. Keep away from the micro though as it is a bit button shy and apparently this makes it feel a bit less intergrated than the others as you might have to use button combos to get to the same features that are 1 button press on the mk2, studio, or mk3 if this is a problem.
Angel Fisher
buy him fl studio producer edition and a midi keyboard
fl studio gets free updates for life
Jacob Gutierrez
what hardwear can i buy to increase the quality of my audio output? i don't want any bottlenecks
Gavin Young
I've been following the guide and getting familiar with Ableton and making basic melodies and learning synthesis but I've never played the piano so I'm looking into getting a MIDI keyboard and this one looks amazing.
Does anyone recommend it? I think it covers everything I want and some more but i just wanna make sure that model is reliable
I've worked been working on this track for quite some time and I feel like it's almost where I want it in terms of Equalization but I'd like to get your thoughts on it.
trying to learn piano has been the hardest thing I've ever had to do desu
Trying to get your hands to play two different things while trying not to hit the wrong key is a real chore. I hope I can do it
Caleb Jones
not to mention i have small hands so it's even harder
Nathan Hughes
I know exactly how you feel, I even bought a Piano for dummies book, but I feel like it might be that I have high tables that come up to my chest and have to raise my arms up to play the piano. I feel like it'd be easier for both of us if we could just get the pianos down to our waist area instead of middle chest area then we'd be perfectly fine playing the piano.
Unless your hands are super fucking tiny.
Jackson Moore
sending 2 mics hardpanned onto the interface input (then splitting them) so it works like two channels
???????
Gavin James
I started on guitar and switched to keys and it was a major pain in the ass getting used to it
Liam Collins
I liked where you were going with the first synth patch, but completely goes downhill from there once the first kick is introduced. The main problem with this track is the complete lack of momentum it has. The synths sound like they were from preset loops that were in different keys. The easiest way to fix the harmony of this track would be to just pick the bass notes from the first synth chords that come in. The bass movement is not in the right key and any mixing you do with it won't help. This goes for the other synth lines as well, pick diatonic chord tones from the first synth lines as a start and make your melody from there instead of trying to reinvent the wheel. You can break the rules of harmony only when you know the basic rules of harmony first, otherwise it's going to sound "like dog shit".
As far as mixing goes, I'd stack more percussion sounds on top of each other to give it more punch. If you eq out any conflicting frequencies out in the individual percussion samples stacked together then pool them into an aux bus it will start to give it a more full sound. Is there reverb on that bass too? It sounds fucked up to me imo. Smart synth automation with midi CC to add tension and release throughout the different energy levels in your track is your friend too. Keep at it, dude.
Parker Hernandez
I posted a beat in the last thread and some guy replied to it asking for the snares I used
“There's nothing remarkable about it. All one has to do is hit the right keys at the right time and the instrument plays itself.” ― Johann Sebastian Bach
Ethan Diaz
that's easy to say when you're a musical savant
Jack Cooper
there's nothing remarkable about getting rich. all you have to do is buy at the right time and the money makes itself.
Juan Perry
yass I hear that nexus preset in there baby
Joshua Foster
Well I wasn't trying to be Aphex Twin as I don't really listen to the guy that much lmao. The track I made was something new for me, and going forwards I wouldn't want to be just another aphex wannabe desu
Matthew Adams
Hey guys.
Would anyone be interested in testing out some Max4Live patches that I made?
Hudson Powell
>OP Was too lazy to scour the thread for pastebin link
it's called ctrl/command+f then search "pastebin" holy shit
My goal is to make dark ambient and some idm like BoC but ive never had a midi, would you recomend 25 or 49 keys? Im on a budget but im willing to try any option
Ryder Clark
Yes you can do that
Nathaniel Ortiz
Just get one with 49 if you think you might need it, they're not that much more expensive
Matthew Jenkins
Thanks for the advice man, any good models? I'm between this , M-audio oxygen 49, or Nektar LX49
Landon Gonzalez
As someone with 0 experience in production and little to no knowledge in music theory where should I start with FL Studio 12? I've been working on the Syntorial demo for now.
Logan Wright
i'm a beginner too, i made some progress by watching youtube videos and just repeating every step that they do literally. i'm more familiar with the program and the hotkeys now
look for busy work beats on youtube
Connor Thomas
No fuck off and take your trip and name fagging with you
I need someone to tell me if the mixing on this is good or not. I've listened to the loop for so damn long i can't even tell. Are there any aspects you dislike about the song? Also part of me feels the song is too derivative from the sample i took youtube.com/watch?v=apkrZIAXDRc
Cameron Rivera
did you mean for it to loop forever
Dominic Roberts
shit track l2theory
Brody Smith
>clyp.it/bmc2su0n Are you joking? I don't hear any harmonic/melodic issues with it.
Christopher Cooper
I want an Octatrack.
Cooper King
you're tone deaf
Daniel Robinson
It's not even my track. Tell me what's wrong with it with your advanced theory knowledge, please.
Bentley Wright
I'm guessing he's just some dumbass posting the same reply to every track
Chase Jackson
it sounds bad.
Owen Rodriguez
This is how you choose to spend your life. Think about that for a minute user.
David Lopez
Anyone have a link/torrent/cracked copy of Image Line's Groove Machine?? Can only find windows
PLEASE/THANKSS
Benjamin Sanchez
sooooo synthesis
Caleb Robinson
What's the most expensive VST out there and where is the torrent link for it? I'm ready to set my foot in the door of the music industry now.
Nathaniel Anderson
Idk why but I just can't translate my emotions to music and make something sad. anyone got tips to make euh sad shit?
William Campbell
Learn all the tools of your DAW. Literally think of a sound, and mess around until you know how to make it instantly. Then get high and produce at the speed of sound because you know all the tools
Jaxson Thompson
look at this shit
Jordan Miller
if i get that i will finally break through in the industry
Zachary Martinez
thoughts on that? I'm a newbie with production but I know already a bit about music and composition. in the end it should sound militaristic and eerie and I'm not sure if I can get to that by instrumentation. whats the best way to emulate heavy guitar riffs?
contact jagex, this will fit perfectly in runescapes track list
Kevin Powell
no amount of mixing will make this good. shit track l2theory
Cooper Howard
who's jagex? right now it sounds like garbage imo, although there are some nice harmonic ideas in it
Julian Parker
I'm just saying by him whatever, but I'd get him a synth, because, if it's midi people usually just type that in like, it's a process, and then you put the live synth over it for that raw feel. like, you don't even need fl, but I suppose you do if you wanna do if the easy way. but I'm just sayin a live set with a good synth or two is wayyy funner then daw music.
Michael Ortiz
composition wise I don't like it, but if you erase everything besides the drum beat in the beginning it could build up to something nice
>feel inspired >open up DAW >immediately lose inspiration >get sad
wtf is wrong with me it didn't use to be like this
Caleb Campbell
not bad, although I wouldn't listen again. that b9 at 0:35 was nice. add some velocity
Hudson Garcia
looks like u need to look for a different hobby
Brandon Ortiz
thanks
Lucas Gonzalez
you have some things to handle, go handle them, and get back to it. amen.
Zachary Robinson
>whats the best way to emulate heavy guitar riffs? anyone can help with that?
Aiden Hill
my advice: make the stereo/left-right combo a little closer together and not so one sided, also it needs longer, and more instruments, add a midi instrument and some vocals or chopped vocals or something, do all that and I think your golden.
Robert Richardson
wtf is that advice supposed to do good? if anything he should lighten everything up and take instruments away.
Adrian Flores
Yeah I've been trying to come up with lyrics but I'm stuck
thanks for the advice guys it's probably the most emotional thing I've ever done other than trap beats and stuff so I wanted to share
Jose Hall
>probably the most emotional thing I've ever done I'm sorry to hear that
Benjamin Brooks
yeah I broke myself with drugs and alcohol you know the good meme
Benjamin Wright
an acoustic guitar and a whole lotta filters. mainly a compressor, a harmonic generator, and some sort of distortion vst: usually an overdrive, which is basically a limiter, a distortion pedal which usually is an eq of some sort and could be a noise track autoducked under the sound, or you could just use a light rectifier and overdub that onto the original already compressed track, or if you want you could use a decimator... there's a few ways to go about this. it's all just making everything loud, adding harmonics, and distorting it to add more harmonics. when you're all done I recommend a 20hz high pass at 36 db and a 20,000 hz low pass at 24 db to get rid of aliasing and bass pops. instead of compression you could also use a limiter or leveler which also adds distortion. but it needs to have a pretty even sound first.
Robert Green
wow thank you. I look forward to try all this
Julian Watson
i want an octo-rack (that is to say, 8 pairs of boobies) in my face
Daniel Brooks
no, I've seen this ten thousand million times before: it's too basic. people hate minimalism. even singer song writers use lots of chords and complex lyrics. it's all about keeping things interesting.
Carson Jones
sure, minimalism shouldn't be the goal. but for a beginner it's especially important not to solve a problem by adding more layers on top of your track
