I've been making an album for 5 years now and I feel I'm done arranging the first side. The gist of it is there's gonna be one suite on each side. The problem is I'm spastically ocd about releasing anything and I'm not sure if it's any good. It's pretty poppy but I get trapped in 4 chord intervals and I'm too dumb to know how to play with time signatures. I tried looking up music theory but I'm lazy and I kinda like these progressions. There's a nice mix of instruments though so I think it has good production. I originally wanted something sorta classical/professional that I could be proud of but I'm not so sure about it. Maybe I've just heard it way too many times. Also there aren't any consistencies to the melodies and verses so it's sorta like 7 choruses stitched together with vague lyrics that barely fit in different orders. Should I just give up or try to actually finish it before 2020?
>inb4 let us hear it
I'm too ocd famalam. Just give me random suggestions I guess. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Idk what to say from that. As someone who never released music up until this year ( been making it for 5 years), finally putting together an album was satisfying even if the final product wasn't what I wanted. It's a good experience that is formative in the way you see your new projects. Release your shitty album and make another and another and another. Good luck user
well, good luck user, I would realy like to see the whole thing instead of a short audio, the audio at least is not bad.
Christian Sanchez
yeah, your music fucking sucks. any music I can't listen to sucks. you better prove me wrong faggot or I'm gonna post it again. your music sucks
Adam Peterson
why does the opinion of this board matter so much? like who really gives a shit jesus christ
Jason Scott
Well I don't care THAT much what this board thinks, I just don't want the full thing going out to anyone before it's finished (if I finish it). I want a good, timed release with album art and everything done.
Thanks
Matthew Sullivan
you're literally an attention seeker. i dont care if your music is good or bad anymore. you're just a faggot
Kevin Baker
if you aren’t willing to let your music be critiqued you will never finish this album (although I really hope you do), and even if you do finish it then what? You just gonna not release it because somebody might say mean things to you? You can not create art in a vacuum, you need criticism in order to develop and evolve as an artist, there is no way anyone in this thread can help you unless you are willing to accept the fact that we might tell you your music isn’t good and show us
Brandon Lopez
well that's great have a good album launch I'm glad you're enjoying people giving you pats on the back for 10 seconds of audio
Grayson Gonzalez
Dude you have to let go of that shit. Just do what you need to finish it. 5 years is a while so why not wrap it up and start your next project?
Don’t worry about what people say or think.. honestly they are probably only going to think about it for about 2 minutes anyway.
Nathaniel Evans
Alright alright I'll post it. It's 15 minutes long so vocaroo is slow, hang on.
Drums aren't in yet, some of it is out of time and I think I'll redo the vocals because I had to whisper them.
Elijah Russell
I'm supposed to be working with two other people but they never respond to my mix updates.
Christopher Nguyen
So, any opinions/suggestions?
Levi Gonzalez
its pretty good, first off i really like your voice, i think if you did redo the vocals to make them sound cleaner and once you have the drums in it would make all the difference but i dig the sound a lot and i like what you're doing, unfortunately i cant really give any advise production wise as i don't know much about it but keep it up man you got potential
Michael Rivera
I don't like it sorry. Out of time and mixed badly and the strings are very offputting. Are you playing all the instruments or what?
Alexander Barnes
this sage
Samuel Smith
How about drum suggestions? Any rhythms I should go for?
Yes I'm playing them and yeah it's a crappy mix. Should I just do away with all the strings for now? My friend who's better was supposed to be recording them but she's busy in college. Also how's the composition? That's what I'm most worried about.
Cameron Lewis
I don't want to say too much because I have no experience producing music only listening to it, but the composition is uninteresting in my opinion. Your voice isn't awful but the lyrics are and you clearly aren't skilled enough at the instruments to make an engaging composition for the length of the song, I found it arduous to listen to. I really don't know if a 15 minute suite is the best idea for you but you have come this far and shouldn't give up. As a visual artist I know it can be against your best interests to work on a single thing for so long and you should probably do your best and move on instead of dragging it out for another 2 years
Cooper Davis
I like it. I kind of like the strings being crazy. But yeah you want to be able to hear your vocals and that is something to look out for. Don’t mix them so far back. Overall, pretty good job, reminds me of my own music a bit
Bentley Butler
As a side note it's commendable that you set your sights high as that too is a very effective way to learn and improve, although there is a point where it becomes counter-intuitive
Leo Gray
>Should I just do away with all the strings for now? not that user but for me its that i like the idea of the strings and they could sound really good on the track if they where to be played proficiency, so my suggestion would be to try and get that recording from your friend or do away with them, i feel in their current state it drags the track down
Liam Gonzalez
did you play the stringed instruments yourself? where did you learn to harmonize your voice like that? that was good. I would listen to this. Maybe fix the parts where you go a little off time, I only noticed two notes that came in a little late though. Maybe play the strings with a little more, uh, authority? Something about the beginning is a little off. But it didn't affect my overall enjoyment. good job.
i got a little bored around the 10 minute mark though. but i listen to a lot of pop-oriented music, so take that as you will. either way, there's no reason not to put this out. might as well at this point.
Grayson Russell
>I found it arduous to listen to Yeah I kinda agree. This was originally 6 or 7 separate songs but I'm under a certain philosophy that if they can't make a single coherent piece then they are just filler. I'll keep working on it though and try to finish quick enough.
Nice quads. If I'm gonna bring them out more I'll need to make the melodies stronger then.
Yeah ok. I'll probably have to wait until summer for that.
Landon Thompson
>5 years This better be one really fucking good album.
Zachary Bell
>did you play the stringed instruments yourself? Yeah, I borrowed my cousins violin a couple months ago and tried it out.
>where did you learn to harmonize your voice like that? Idk, self taught I guess. I used to be in chorus but it didn't train me much. I guess a lot of Beach Boys and classical music.
>Maybe play the strings with a little more, uh, authority? I think you mean practice lol.
>Something about the beginning is a little off. Should I shorten it? It's 3/4 compared to 4/4 so that might also be why.
>i got a little bored around the 10 minute mark though
I think that's because of the chorus bit I used 3 or 4 times in a row. I'll work on that.
Aaron Robinson
the sound design is pretty underwhelming
Lucas Turner
Like needs effects or volume dynamics or panning or?
Jace Watson
Responding as quads guy. Honestly man you do have an ear you’ve just got to look at this as an exercise.
Your situation doesn’t sound like it’s affording you the proper support you would like for your work so you’ll need to get more creative in how you approach your music from now on.
If you’re gonna do it solo then figure out how to use beats or drum machines or set something up that you can have a drummer easily come in and fill the gaps later. You can even hire people via internet. But you need to focus on making your mistakes and moving on instead of wallowing in them. You can always write better material. If you want to use strings I would go with midi from now on, you can get good sound and not turn off people who are less experimental
Remember mistakes are not bad. They are good, learn from them and just keep moving. I think a good practice for you would be to sit down and write songs with 2 verses 2 choruses and maybe a bridge and outro. Narrow it down and just focus on getting something straightforward and sounding good. And don’t give yourself legroom, start writing it and finish it within 24 hours.
Logan Wood
I have a lot of friends into music so i could always ask them. I was using midi strings for a couple years but they turned me off more than the messy real ones. I might ask prod about drum machines.
Yeah I wrote normal 3-minute songs but it was too formulaic and I got bored so I found it more interesting stringing what I had together. I haven't gotten back into churning out songs in 3 years. There are a few more I'm saving for side 2.
Kevin Moore
compositionally, i honestly dig this a lot. i'm no theory nerd, but i find the progressions and melodies to be really enjoyable, if a bit disjointed. i listened to the whole thing, and it kinda started to dip a bit in quality around 8 and a half minutes, but when the drums started to kick back in it picked back up and finished quite strong. this is definitely your strongest suit imo.
however, as others have said, the production needs some work. the vocaroo sound quality definitely isn't helping which prevents me from making a more detailed judgement of it. i'd suggest using clyp.it.
i think you'd also seriously benefit from finding some other musicians to help record tighter, more competent instrumentation as well
anyway i think you've got potential, keep it up
Brayden Russell
>it kinda started to dip a bit in quality around 8 and a half minutes I recorded the core bit for this separately without the same bpm and stuck it in as a demo. Have to remember to redo it.
>drums started to kick back in it picked back up and finished quite strong. this is definitely your strongest suit
Yeah i'll get them in. As long as the composition is alright i can layer it.
Clyp.it doesn't accept files larger than 5 mb and an mp3 of this is 36.
>seriously benefit from finding some other musicians to help record
I'll ask some people I know.
Joshua Sanchez
Hey, this is pretty cool I really think all you need is some better mixing and instrument playing, and I could see myself actually listening to something like this. But you do have a nice voice, and unlike some people in this thread, I don't mind the lyrics. I also think the harmonies and melodies are nice enough to carry the song throughout the long run time, so good job.
Wyatt Kelly
Thanks. I wish the lyrics made more sense, they don't match up yet. I'm not a bad writer, I just don't know how to blend words with music.
