How to not get bored of your own bars/patterns?

[Uija]

Hey!

I would like to hear, how you approach the following issue:

I really love long evolving progressive music. I don’t need breakdowns every 16 bars and I can totally dive into a Simple 2 notes acid pattern over a full song.... When I hear it from others.

If I listen to my own stuff while arranging it, I tend to get bored of my own loops so fast, that I always change stuff to often. No chance of having the same loop play for 32 bars with only changing small stuff (envelopes, filters etc). I totally measure my own stuff different then other peoples tracks. The funny thing is, that I hear myself telling my wife: ‚That’s so awesome, but I would never allow me the same‘ when we listen to music in the car or so....

I am able to force myself to stay on the same patterns for longer, and people I play it to, are totally happy with it, but I for myself am not. The thing is: as soon as I do it my way, I tend to find it as too hecktic when I listen to it after a break.

I think, that’s a bigger reason, why I get so less done, then sound/gear/loop2arrangement issues....

Any options? Hints?

Thanks, jens

[subvers^v]

Very subtle modulation is usually the key.
Also, if you have a loop built out of say three elements playing off each other, keep a clear view of what is dominating at any one time and rotate which one gets the focus and is carrying the track along, again subtle variations with levels, filters, stereo width, amount of distortion, etc.

Examples might help.

Or just do what the Stone Roses did and listen to your stuff backwards! ..

[Críoch]

Apart from velocity.. & odd length patterns / repeating over odd amount of bars, 5, 6,:7, 10, 12,14 etc..

Stuff like that, few elements.. it can help to 'play' the arrangement. You're definitely probably doing this already ...but having some faders mapped to the volume of each drum part, rather than muting / unmuting , can give something a real injection of oomph. Live is great the way you can set max / min levels on the midi map. Nice for reverb swells / Dub FX etc.. too.

Some subtle (or not too subtle) LFO tool , regular LFO modulation can be cool. I could listen to s+h on the filter / Res all day long. Same for gentle flangers, phasers & chorus.

Pick an element.. I'll sometimes record a pass of fucking with a delay on ms setting / pitch mode.. and have it through a reverb.. with a few auto planners in series, 50% wet to begin with, firing off at different rates.. one slow with no l+r panning. The other one, slower with some % panning. With the volume down low, it can be an extra bit of randomness coming in& out.

[Alume]

If you are a midi note kind of guy and you’re swapping notes, patches, fx, clips, triggers and all that good stuff around constantly and never really settle for a vibe.

Try committing to audio.

So take your pattern, record a passage while you wiggle some knobs and work from there. This limits you in going back to the initial pattern and changing everything up.

[henry1]

If I understand your post correctly, its about how a long track progressively develops without falling into the perils of tecnho repetition.
There are a lot of good examples of this in techno - that is creating an engaging track throughout a duration.
Largely I believe it refers to Crioch's input where modulations go through different phases over time.

One thing that can't be escaped though, is that in techno all elements need to stand in their own right in the first place.
This is so that despite the repetition, the output is already pleasing to begin with - added into composition to elevate the whole thing.
Use reference tracks - this will make things much easier because honestly a lot of it is technique and practice.
Also consider that a techno track is more widely intended to be mixed within a set than other genres.
This means that toleration for simplicity is higher than the norm - although many here may argue otherwise.
One last thing is that ad-hoc elements of isolated frequencies might help bring attention in a continuous phase.

I don't wanna share a techno track here because I am certain that you have your particular techno direction as others here do.
What I am sharing here below is a modern progressive track true to the very nature of the genre's namesake.
It is an illustration of how a variety of techniques has been used to maintain engagement in a long track.

youtu.be/7B9wVdwmOiE

[Uija]

Hey!

Thanks for all the responses.

I did metal music for a really long time in my life, and I felt the same there. While there are songs, that have really easy riffs repeated over and over again, and I have no problem listening to it, I had the problem, that (if I were to decide) would have changed parts on our own songs, after the second repetition.

Let’s take some minimal songs. If they have melody, its very repetive. Sure it has a lots of movement (in the sound, in decays, envelopes, filters etc) and all the tracks in the background have all the minor changes too, but sometimes the same melody played for 4 minutes straight.
Maybe I am just bad in doing those minor changes to everything, but I get bored of my own melodies after 2-4 repetitions. Maybe I need to focus more on the background stuff, adding interesting bits and pieces there, so my mind gets distracted by them, but that’s quite hard, because stuff that is unpredictable to others and fetches others interest is something I placed and with that, know about it already.

I tried random (elektron way and ableton way) but am not sure, if I really like that ,) if there comes up something really cool, I mostly Programm it after that, to have it like I liked it.


And because it came up:

I am doing a lot of stuff with hardware synthesizers, so I build most of the parts in midi but sample it to have the synth for other stuff free. Sampling is mostly done in long runs, having me play around with the knobs and then either chopping it up on the Mpc or in ableton. So most of the Filter and Sound movement is done by hand. The rest is done with automation in ableton.

Thanks, jens

Edit: To the music I do: I love percussion stuff and I love progressive stuff more then breaks-every-16 bars-stuff. I love progressive psytrance and old school Goa stuff, but have a really hard time creating it myself. I really love some minimal stuff, as long it is more then a kick and 2 beeps over 2 hours, and, as much as people might hate me for it, I really like stuff like the „selected“ ep from de witte.

[Careland]

It might also be a workflow issue? I work pretty slowly so I really need to force myself to not over listen to my loops. Try to work on elements more in solo and not have the entire loop running while tinkering, only occasionally listening in context to hear what needs to be done to get the elements to where you want.

[dubdub]

It might sound circular and trivial; but I've found that more often than not, the real solution to getting bored of your loops is not to endlessly fiddle around with automation but to just write better loops and patterns.

[Alume]

It might sound circular and trivial; but I've found that more often than not, the real solution to getting bored of your loops is not to endlessly fiddle around with automation but to just write better loops and patterns.

Yeah, agreed. I’d like to add, maybe it might be worth it to just go with it and finish the tracks that aren’t great in your opinion.

You’d at least be able to judge them fairly and pinpoint more clearly why they don’t work. You’ll complete the learning cycle instead of staying stuck in it and make better tracks as you move along in time.

[Uija]

Thanks a ton for all the input!

[mindstuff]

By the way, great question and I struggle with the same issue. If I can't make it change a lot I want to keep changing it myself but that helps you identify what you want to be changing all the time anyway.

Number 1:
Polyrhythm/Polymeter. Simple way to get a sequence to vary with time. Test out with a 3 note bass sequence in a 4/4 track. Or create a lead with 7 repeating notes...they'll keep hitting different on every kick and it'll keep your mind going for a long time. In practice its hard to get it just right.

Number 2:
Here is something I don't often seen mentioned and I first discovered it using a tb303 so I'll stick with that as the explanation. The tb303 has an accent which if I remember correctly opens the filter quickly for that one note. When you then lower the filter envelope say on an 8 note sequence you'll hear just the few notes with the accent applied, then as you raise the filter envelope you'll start to get all 8 notes audible...if you mess with the filter envelope (raising and lowering) you can start to hear sequences within sequences.

Here is an example track I did something similar with an Elektron Digitone (arp on top of the bass). 2 notes have parameter locked with high amounts of filter envelope...when the filter envelope is set to low you'll hear those few notes in the lead, then as the filter envelope is raised you start to hear more of those notes coming in.

[Ostbahnhof]

pretty good thread. in my opinion this seems a bit more psychological related than tecnical

[over9000]

pretty good thread. in my opinion this seems a bit more psychological related than tecnical

what do you mean exactly?
i think this is the essence of techno right here, tricking the mind into a state of bliss by repetition that is technically no repetition

[timc3]

I like to inject some randomness. Whether that is elements in a sequencer hitting randomly, or random notes/pitch. Also differing amounts of random/S&H playing with envelopes/filter/tuning and other parameters in a subtle way.

[Ostbahnhof]

pretty good thread. in my opinion this seems a bit more psychological related than tecnical

what do you mean exactly?
i think this is the essence of techno right here, tricking the mind into a state of bliss by repetition that is technically no repetition

Definitely, it's the trance state created by repetitio that is present in multiple musical cultures

What I mean is about OPs perception about his own work. It's obviously just a personal hint of mine, mostly based on personal experience.

[tsaro]

Most obvious (and some not so obvious) methods seem to have been covered here, to somewhat echo a few of the earlier posts, work faster.

I tend to usually blow through without much care for any subtleties when the main idea becomes obvious, and try to get in the main elements, sound wise and arrangement wise (for better or worse). Most times when I don't manage this, the next time I'll try and add something, or change some things around it often feels derivative and/or forced. So at that time it's a case of cutting out some bullshit (in my case almost always tbh), maybe add a fill here and there and touching up the mix a bit.

[subvers^v]

Another approach I've taken is where I have a loop or melody that I like and I get it to a point where I think it's engaging by adding velocity changes and some automation but then I get bored with it, I tone it down in level, close down filters, etc. until it's in the background and barely audible.

I use this as a start point and build a new loop or melody on top of it.

The new loop becomes a build up of tones that has very subtle things going on in different ways on different levels.

I find that the "not so obvious" stuff is more interesting. I think it might be because it's harder to read it and pinpoint what is going on ..

[Stace]

Move it on, honestly.

Sure get a loop going but move it on as soon as you have. Slam it in arrange mode. Make an intro, get the track going, switch some shit up, have a breakdown if you want one, change shit again and then wind it down.

Bish, bash, bosh.

[quest]

yeah Stace is right, I think the trick for me is to pry myself away from using a DAW for the wrong things. having hands-on control either via really really good controller mapping or hardware helps compared to mouse+keyboard editing, DAWs like Ableton make it too easy to make the "captain obvious" sequence structures where new elements keep coming in after 8 bars until you obviously had enough then there's the obvious breakdown, etc.

the hands-on control with lots of jamming, esp if you can record and recall all the triggers is good to bypass this. eventually the two approaches can work really great together, with the DAW bringing the final track together in the end, but too many people are just sitting there making cookie cutter tracks all in the DAW with poor controller setups these days, too much separation from the music leads to obviousness, bad-kinda repetition and similarity imho