NewSc2

I wish somebody told these to me 4 years ago. Everybody bashes these rules in music forums, but fuck it, the reason they talk down on it are because they’re easy and they work.

1. Use only 3 or 4 notes. For example, in C minor, use C, Eb, F, G, and maybe B. That’s it. You could easily build a track off just C and G, with another note thrown in somewhere. Fuck the 6th and 7th notes.
2. Rule #1 does not apply to chords. Program a MIDI note generator to play 9th, 11th, or 13th chords, so you can press 1 note to hear a full chord.
3. Intervals are your friend.
4. Compress everything (at least slightly). Compressed sounds sound good. Do your sounds bleed all over the place? Compress! Compression gives you easy control over your sounds.
5. I would say something about a transient designer, but I don’t have access to one.
6. Sidechain everything to your bass drum. It makes a track punchier.
7. EQ everything. Don’t be afraid to boost.
8. Low-cut everything that isn’t a kick or bass.
9. Arpeggiators, reverbs, and delays are your friend. Almost every hot track out there utilizes these tools for movement.
10. Perfecting arrangements is difficult and probably the most important skill and discipline to have. My ratio of unfinished:finished tracks is something like 20:1.
11. Transitions within songs are key to perfecting arrangements. Automation is the key to transitions.
12. Rolling beats. Grooving bass. Sexy leads. Focus on these adjectives.
13. Polished, well-rounded tracks have these elements: Lead, Pad, Percussion, Beats, and Rhythm. Lead = voice, lead sound. Pad = strings, pads to fill out space. Percussion = polyrhythms, everything besides mm-tz-ka-tz. Beats = mm-tz-ka-tz. Rhythm = Arpeggios, rhythm guitar, delays, tonal percussion.
13. Rules are meant to be broken.
14. When I say “everything” I really mean “almost everything.”
15. DJ. You’ll be surprised how fast you’ll end up training your mind to figure out what songs are good and what aren’t with a 10 second listen.
16. Presets are your friend. Tweak them.

I would say more about layering sounds and sampling, but to be honest I don’t know much about that, yet. And I’m not a good producer, so take the rules with a grain of salt.

I’ve seen Radiohead, Kraftwerk, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Richie Hawtin, Sasha & Digweed, Chemical Brothers, Tool, Beastie Boys, The Pixies, Common, MIA, Weezer, Iggy Pop, Flogging Molly, Blue Man Group, The Cure, Prince, Carl Cox, Air, Sigur Ros, The Crystal Method, Infusion, Rabbit in the Moon, Jeff Mills, Deadmau5, The White Stripes, and Prodigy live.

Nothing ever came close to Daft Punk (Chemical Brothers, Pixies, and Kraftwerk tried to).

It’s kinda funny how personal these blog posts can become. I’m not really sure how an outsider would gloss over these words, but reading back… my intonations, my sentence structures… they feel like they reveal too much. Maybe I’m looking too deep into things.

I haven’t posted on here in a while; I guess I’ve been retreating into a sort of anti-social shell these days.

It wasn’t that I didn’t have enough time to write a post (even though these blog entries can sometimes take upwards of an hour). It’s not even that I haven’t had enough to say, because my Gmail’s littered with saved daily diary entries.

And it’s not even me not being comfortable with letting others into my deeper thoughts — if you know me well, you’re probably sick of hearing me blab on about myself when we hang out.

Back in high school, I used to be a pretty social guy. Every weekend would see me out, and even most weekdays would find me in a group chatting at Starbucks or over at someone’s house.

One day somebody asked me why I felt the need to be in the company of others — why couldn’t I be satisfied by myself.

I spent most of my childhood moving around from town to town (my family moved 6 times before I turned 13), so I guess I always had to rely on myself for company.

But that comment rekindled some of that independent spirit, and it’s echoed through myself ever since. From time to time, I like to take a couple weeks off, relax, and have pleasant discussions with my inner voice.

No need for company.

Anyway…

As long as I’m here I might as well update this blog with some history. I finished my 4-week techno course; you can hear my final exam track here:

(will upload mp3 later, it’s freakin’ 4am)

I know it isn’t very good, but it’s something to build off of. The course was very demanding and jam-packed with information, so I’ve taken a couple weeks off of music since it finished. I was putting in about 20-30 hours a week for studies, and I needed some R&R.

And, well… other than that… I guess there isn’t much else to say.