I keep coming up with melodies and stuff, but when I try to put them into the piano roll, I can never get the proper note lengths and stay on-beat. Even trying to copy other producers just for learning purposes, like the relatively simple-sounding rhythm to Deadmau5's Professional Griefers (the part after everything fades in, the dun-dun-dundunnnnn, dun-dun-dun-dundunnnnn, that's later copied by the higher-pitched synth), or the more complicated bass riff repeated throughout Tame Impala's "The Less I Know the Better" (figure it's better to focus on the simpler one though). For whatever reason, I just can't figure out quick note changes or even really chops. Any time I try to chop my notes it ends up sounding like garbage, and same for quick note changes. I know the synth hits that go with the kicks are 1 beat long, and it sounds to me like the 3(?)-note extra-long one is also one beat long. I don't quite get how, though. It definitely sounds longer.
I'm not really sure how to better describe the issue I'm having other than that. I can play stuff like that just fine on my guitar, but put me in FL with a keyboard and my notes are just totally fucked. My knowledge of guitar and sheet music tells me you've got 8th notes, quarter notes, 1/2 notes, full notes, and so on. 8th being 1/2 a beat, quarter being 1 beat, 1/2 being 2 beats, and full being 4 beats and so on, with 4 beats in a bar and 4 bars in a stanza(?) (in 4:4 time), as I'm sure you all know. I can pull it all of on guitar if I'm following sheet music. But for whatever reason that concept just gets completely lost to me on a piano roll, I try to get the melody in my head into FL, and after like 30 minutes to an hour of failing horribly I get frustrated and go do something else.
I think part of the problem is the length of beats. Whether I write in 75BPM or 128BPM, the length of a beat just seems far too short to actually hold any notes like in Deadmau5's intro.
Are there any particularly good videos I should watch, or any methods I should try? If I didn't already have the technical knowledge about notes/beats I'd know to start with something basic, but I do know that stuff and can apply the knowledge in some places, just not in FL.
What should I be looking to work on?
Edit: Got beat and bar mixed up in the first paragraph.
Submitted April 28, 2018 at 04:02PM by RewindRepeatIt https://www.reddit.com/r/edmproduction/comments/8flyuv/note_length_is_killing_me_and_i_just_cant_figure/?utm_source=ifttt