I must deal with this as much as everyone else on here maybe even more. I say more because I never "write down ideas in my phone" or anything like that, because I am absolutely incapable of putting ideas that are in my head onto a software. I can only deal with tangible things like going through sounds in my daw and then knowing what I want to do with that sound, sample, fx.
I can honestly say, in 10 years of producing, that I've never sat down with a pre-established idea of what I wanted to do.
I should also add that sometimes I haven't produced anything in months just because I had no inspiration at all but after realizing that all my finished projects had something in common I've decided to write this.
I'll try to make this as short as possible because I don't want to bore you and I want to get straight to the point so I'll list everything in bullet form.
1- Play the keys, just play, you'll come up with something that you'll want to put into your daw. This has saved me countless times.
2- ACAPELLAS, Vocals HELP SO MUCH with music, are you stuck? No ideas? Download some fucking vocals, there are tons of resources out there for vocals. PM me if you want more details, I must have 500 gigs of vocals on my harddrive. To add to this, laying chords on vocals will greatly help you with music theory.
3- Scott Storch once answered the question "how do you come up with your tracks" with this answer: "I throw shit against the wall".
This is probably the best answer to writers block there is. Can't come up with chords? Work on a kick. Not happy with the kick, try making a bassline. The key here is to work on these things without having an end goal, just DO IT FOR FUN, and more often than not, you'll be surprised at where it leads you.
4- Tempo, genre and sounds: Experiment, I've always been doing 120 bpm dance tracks and lately I've just said fuck it, trying some new stuff at 80bpm. You'll see how your brain goes off the "auto" mode of always doing the same thing and you are now tempted to try new things: High hat rolls, new fills, different chord patterns, etc. Trust me on this one, it also works like a charm.
5- The most common denominator of the tracks I've actually finished and released are adding vocals. As soon as I'm in a rut, you know that rut, where you have a 4 or 8 bar loop and don't know where to go? Yes you know it very well actually. Try throwing an acapella on there and you'll see it will open a WORLD of possibilities. You are now going to be
- Excited for your track. I swear the feeling you get from finding a compatible (sometimes with pitch and tempo adjustments) vocal for an existing loop is almost like a drug.
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You'll be motivated to finish it because you won't stand to see 80 empty bars with just vocals. A good trick is to copy paste you original loop throughout the track then make notes of what should go where, ex: Drop here, transition there, break here, pre chorus there, etc.
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You'll now have a guideline (the vocals) for your structure and the vocals themselves give you a big hand to know where to transition, where to put a drop and most importantly you will really start experimenting with your software once you get into vocal chops and effects, you will translate those new found skills and ideas to your track now and before long, you'll be able to get a nicely polished, exciting song.
I really hope this helped someone.
Ps: English is my second language so sorry for any mistakes.
Submitted November 23, 2016 at 01:39PM by willdill https://www.reddit.com/r/edmproduction/comments/5ei87a/a_personal_tip_that_has_always_worked_for_me/?utm_source=ifttt