Music, A Love Hate Relationship.

[Hades]

Hades why is your mixing process so painful for you ? Is it purely technical reasons? Id have thought that you could cut through a mix quite fast considering your many hours of critical listening

I guess it's a combination of many things.
It's most definitely "painful" because I take very little pleasure out of it,
and it's no fun at all. It's mostly moments of pure frustration.
It's nothing like the creative part which can take me only half an hour to maximum 10 to 15 hours per track.
(average would be like 2 to 10 hours)

Biggest reason would be my perfectionism.
I can re-listen to a mix for 20 hours easily,
and still hear little things I wanna change, some times just one single hit, or adjust the panning or...

For example my love for vocals.
I don't just put some vocals on top somewhere and EQ them a little.
(only time I did that was when I used vocals the 1st time, which was my "Despair" track, also the very first track where I had this massively painful detailed process,
but back then it was because I was constantly learning abut EQ and making a proper balanced mix, and comparing between monitors and headphones a lot)
I usually select one or two longer samples, and then when I'm pretty much certain that the arrangement is mostly done,
I'll carefully start slicing the parts all up. And I'll be moving those separate parts back and forth in the arrangement all the time,
many times the difference in timing is really tiny, and I'm just closing my eyes to prevent my visual feedback from kicking in,
just until I have the feeling "ok, this is it" (or rather "as good as it gets", it's always just "as good as it gets" for me)

Another reason would be my natural tendency to make things far too long, just like my posts on subsekt.
So I often go back and try and restructure stuff so that my tracks aren't 11 minutes long, but 8 to 9 minutes long.
I already make a more melodic type of techno, if it's even techno, not just some heavy rhythmical groove that's proper pumping Trésor material,
but I would still like it to have a certain minimum of power,
or I might as well be making ambient (which I'd better be doing more often tbh),
so I often go back and think how to make it less "stretched out", and just a little more ballsy,
even if it sounds stupid to say that for my kind of music.

Have a look at how detailed I try to give feedback on the "post a clip..." topic.
Can you imagine how much more detailed I automatically am for my own stuff, and keep on re-listening over and over.
Last track I consider 95% finished (see the "post a clip topic"), I literally ran out of the studio on 2 separate days after like 6 hours,
just cause I couldn't stand listening to my own track any more.
But I'm pretty happy with the result now, and it only took me about 30 hours, which is a really decent time for me.
And I'm hoping this will improve even more in the future.

I know working so many hours on the mix/arrangement of one single track is far too much overkill,
but I'm a perfectionist, and I need to be able to silence that voice at the back of my head that is saying
"ahhh, but I hear this tiny little detail, you knew you could have changed this, but you didn't, you lazy fuck !!"

To give you an example of my perfectionism in other things.
I live in a big old house.
I sanded off the old wooden floors on the ground floor, and oiled them afterwards,
but the result was far too dark. My mrs didn't want all the dust again, so I waited for 2 years, till the moment I knew she wouldn't say no.
I sanded them off again, oiled them again. Result ain't perfect, but it's really great, and most certainly "as good as it gets".

I paid a guy to paint the walls in my hallway (high ceilings, many hard to reach places, otherwise I would have done it myself).
He always laughs with me and says "that perfection of yours, it only exists in your head" (and he's totally right).
His work took about a week. I needed about a week to correct his lines after he was gone,
and the very few places where I wasn't able to try and correct his lines were the ones where I could be braking my neck if I tried.
95% of the people don't notice when they enter my house,
but when I do show them the 2 or 3 small parts that I couldn't correct, they always say the difference is extremely obvious.
To me, that difference is always extremely obvious.
Otherwise I simply wouldn't bother doing it.

Perfectionism is a real hard thing to live with.

[Hades]

mind you though, on the rare occasions that I make some no brainer type of track,
the arrangement/mix process goes really really easy.

I have made tracks from start to finish in just 4 hours.
But those are few and far between, and I usually look down at them like a father would look down at his adulterous/promiscuous daughters.

[Will Frances]

Great insight and reference to building work, its funny you say that, I worked as a Carpenter and general builder for years after school and still do stuff now for myself and family. On my first day of my apprenticeship back in like 2002 I remember the 40-year old chippie saying to me 'once you have learnt this trade you will forever look at things differently to most people, your eye will become trained to point out problems and imperfections constantly. For example - 'you'll walk into a room and look at the quality of the moldings and their mitres, you ll look at the angles of the walls for skirting, you'll look at the gap around the door, whether the hinges are the right way around etc etc.

This advice has alway stuck with in and translated into almost all things I do, it is often a hinderance to be honest as you know, and often it can seem to harbor a negative critical outlook, constantly picking holes and seeming to be difficult for the sake of it.

One other thing that I remember being taught also was 'understand what your time is worth' (not just financially) there were two experiences that I remember getting this lesson.

The first was when i was fitting a lock in a new build house on a big building site as an apprentice, all the chippies were on a price so they are given a job say a roof, first fix, second fix or finals to complete and a price is given to them regardless of the time they finsih it in, obviously this creates drive to finish as fast as possible to move on to the next job. Any how I was fitting this lock to a solid fire door, sitting down in a chair as I chipped away the timber with my chisel, when a guy approached me and said what do you think you are doing? I said I'm finishing this mortice lock, he said yeah why the fuck are you sitting down? You should have it drilled and fitted in 8-12 minutes, I felt weak and embarrassed. He then showed me him do one, he said you will never earn any money or learn to value time if you don't streamline your work flow and ethic. Granted he was young fit and heathly back then and maybe he has slowed down now but it was a valuable lesson.

The second was when I was relatively poor and thought id make some money buying bikes and selling them for a profit for a short while. I would buy a cheap banged up bike get it home get it working maybe spend like 6 hours getting it road worthy then post it up on Gumtree and maybe turn a profit of 40-60 pounds if I was lucky. The stress of learning how different bikes are build, what specialist tools are needed, how much time was spent looking for bikes, parts, waiting for people to meet to exchange or drop off etc. was a massive learning curve.

I t made me think about my attitude previous which was I won't pay someone to do something I can do myself, even if it takes me hours to work out how to do it and I have no experience whatsoever in doing it. Whilst part of this attitude remains and always will, time has become a precious commodity since having a kid I have learnt to utilize it as best as possible all the while becoming aware of its value.

[avmilli]

Jazz is a great idea for an organic break from the electronics.

After a few weeks with the Jazz - many, many variants - as a listener you can move on to perhaps experimenting with instruments, instruments can be hired of course. Don't forget to mute with a bar towel from your local to help add effect to your instruments, ( and not to offend your neighbours during the day.). I could go on and on but to finish I bought myself a mouth organ from ebay recently and, to admit, it is also a lot of fun! Fresh air and exercise might also aid your listening variables. Try just walking around your neighbouring streets!

[Hades]

Great insight and reference to building work, its funny you say that, I worked as a Carpenter and general builder for years after school and still do stuff now for myself and family.

good to know, then I can continue even further comparing both.

I t made me think about my attitude previous which was I won't pay someone to do something I can do myself, even if it takes me hours to work out how to do it and I have no experience whatsoever in doing it. Whilst part of this attitude remains and always will, time has become a precious commodity since having a kid I have learnt to utilize it as best as possible all the while becoming aware of its value.

I still agree on that attitude, but I started out really extreme. I had worked with my hands before, but just the occasional small job here or there,
and the 1st real big job I did was install a new roof because I wanted solar panels and my old roof was infected with woodworm.
Obviously, I didn't do this alone, and got the help of my best friend and another guy who had done this before.
Nonetheless, those were easily the 5 most stressful days of my life, and I wouldn't recommend it to anyone.
You can't fuck up much when you're making your own music, but you sure can by building your own roof !
We're 5 years later now, and things are still all ok (apart from having to have the gutter changed by a professional company),
and I'm still proud I did a job myself that would have normally costed me 2,5x more compared to what it costed me now,
and that is with having selected only the best (and so most pricey) materials possible.

But anyway, that story about the amount of time spent versus the end result.
I have 2 kids, oldest 9, youngest 5.
Apart from that I tried my best to give as much time as possible to the kids of my sister who died 5 years ago,
which isn't always easy when you live 200km further.
Time is precious (and some over here take it for granted when you see how they just keep on asking for our time and hardly give anything back),
and the more responsibilities we have, the less free time we have.
Such is life.

But to compare with some carpenter work :
I restored my old stairway.
There was a huge thick ugly vinyl glued on top, so of course I had to start with a "décapeur" to take off most of the glue.
(one of the cans actually even exploded upwards in my face when I opened it, it ate away parts of my glasses and gave me slight burnt marks here and there,
thank god only temporary, my glasses probably saved my eyes)
But then I still had to take off the paint (and as usual with all these old houses : thick layers of toxic paint).
Every normal person would have used a sandblast-gun.
But I was told that this leaves sand all over your house for years to come, and I had my studio to think of...

So I used 2 machines, and did it all by hand. Using tons of sanding paper...
Some times I came back from a series of nightshifts and immediately went to work on my stairs, working a whole day,
only to fall into a coma around 7PM to sleep a full 12 hours and have made the switch again to day-life.
Working a few days here and there, it took me 1,5 years in total to complete it.
(I'm guessing in normal working hours I would have worked 1,5 to 2 months, but this is for a stairway that goes from the ground floor up to 2 floors,
and with very detailed banisters)

Of course nobody would be able to pay me for that (though that is mostly because of the banisters),
but fuck it, every carpenter, plumber, electrician,... basically anyone who ever worked with his hands,
when they walk into my house, the usually stop and say "damn, those stairs are beautiful".
Not as in "wow, just like new !!", but as in "damn, really restored with respect to the old materials and atmosphere of the whole house"
And hey, it was only me being the fool, wanting to invest all these hours,
so it makes me grin every time that I see them and I think about all the work...

But yes, the handyman who some times works in my house,
he always told me that stairway project of mine was just totally nuts.
And he was right, but I proved him wrong.

Some times money ain't everything, and there have to be some labors of love once in a while.
I'm proud to say most of the work in my house was purely a labor of love,
and I hope I can keep up the same values with my music, whether or not 5 folks or 200 folks listen to it.
My sister was the only other artistic one in the family, and she died far too soon, never having enough time to properly finish 90% of her paintings.
I did a mostly ungrateful job for 15 years, but it gave me the time to learn my sound design,
build the studio, renovate my house, spend as much time with my children as possible, and do a bunch load of stuff on the side...
I'll always be thankful for that time.

But having said that, next week I'm entering a 2nd round of a job interview for a job that would mean a LOT of hours.
So maybe in a few weeks from now, I'll be scraping to find just a simple 10 to 15 hours a week for music making,
and my painful finishing projects thing will automatically get reduced to 10 hours max, because I simply don't have time for more any more.
Who knows, maybe it's time for a new phase in my life ?

[Barfunkel]

FWIW, Mr. Oizo's Flat Beat was written in 2 hours and it did pretty well.

OTOH, you have stuff like Bohemian Rhapsody which was a MASSIVE production job at the time. It also did pretty well.

You never know with these things. Defining perfection is not easy, it doesn't necessarily mean that you have to spend 2 months on mixing alone. If it sounds good after 10 minutes then it is good. Especially if it sounds good a year from now too.

[WOLF!]

If you ask me, maniac perfection sometimes is a pain in the ass.
Yes, that attidue it's very important in life (for some things) it also makes life harder.
I know guys who don't care shit about anything and they always look happy with their lives (on the outside).
Off course they're not always happy but I guess it's nice to sometimes just say 'Fuck It, tomorrow is another day'!
I guess that maniac attitude can give you that 'love, hate relationship'. It's just the nature of the beast!
Understand that this attitude is a gift but you need to use it wisely and don't overdo it (it's hard to draw the line).
Just try to do some other stuff to clear your mind (for me that is sport or do some work in my garden).

[Hades]

If you ask me, maniac perfection sometimes is a pain in the ass.
Yes, that attidue it's very important in life (for some things) it also makes life harder.
I know guys who don't care shit about anything and they always look happy with their lives (on the outside).
Off course they're not always happy but I guess it's nice to sometimes just say 'Fuck It, tomorrow is another day'!
I guess that maniac attitude can give you that 'love, hate relationship'. It's just the nature of the beast!
Understand that this attitude is a gift but you need to use it wisely and don't overdo it (it's hard to draw the line).
Just try to do some other stuff to clear your mind (for me that is sport or do some work in my garden).

I couldn't agree with you more.
People who don't give a shit about detail are FAR more happy than us über-obsessed detail freaks.
I keep repeating this : there is very very little to gain from perfectionism.
90% of the extra hours you put into any kind of job is usually only noticed by yourself or other pefectionists.

I had my IQ tested about a year ago (not even because I asked for it myself, mind you).
Serious test, not some online stupid shit.
I now know why depression is just around the corner a lot of times.

Perfectionism would be a lot more easy to bare if the whole world would be prepared to spend more time and love on whatever they were making,
because in the end the love for the final product makes you forget all the time you spent (wasted ??) making it.

Having said that, mr Wolf, you are still on for a proper MTB ride in some really beautiful scenery !
I was out there twice in the last month, and I'm pretty sure you would love it.

[SFBM]

If you ask me, maniac perfection sometimes is a pain in the ass.
Yes, that attidue it's very important in life (for some things) it also makes life harder.
I know guys who don't care shit about anything and they always look happy with their lives (on the outside).
Off course they're not always happy but I guess it's nice to sometimes just say 'Fuck It, tomorrow is another day'!
I guess that maniac attitude can give you that 'love, hate relationship'. It's just the nature of the beast!
Understand that this attitude is a gift but you need to use it wisely and don't overdo it (it's hard to draw the line).
Just try to do some other stuff to clear your mind (for me that is sport or do some work in my garden).

I couldn't agree with you more.
People who don't give a shit about detail are FAR more happy than us über-obsessed detail freaks.
I keep repeating this : there is very very little to gain from perfectionism.
90% of the extra hours you put into any kind of job is usually only noticed by yourself or other pefectionists.

I had my IQ tested about a year ago (not even because I asked for it myself, mind you).
Serious test, not some online stupid shit.
I now know why depression is just around the corner a lot of times.

Perfectionism would be a lot more easy to bare if the whole world would be prepared to spend more time and love on whatever they were making,
because in the end the love for the final product makes you forget all the time you spent (wasted ??) making it.

Having said that, mr Wolf, you are still on for a proper MTB ride in some really beautiful scenery !
I was out there twice in the last month, and I'm pretty sure you would love it.

I agree with parts of this more than others, I think it really depends what stage you're at with learning techno production (and music production generally) and also how far along you are as a producer in pumping out the tracks.

For a good while, whilst you're learning all the proper skills, how to make sound x or y ("how do I get reverb rumble bass grr!?!" etc), being a bit of perfectionist can be a good thing - as it forces you a bit to sit down and properly program in a melody, design a sound, craft a bit of percussion to exactly where you want it etc, even though doing this can cause many many headaches in the process. But, when you've pushed yourself through this stage, then you can completely unfocus on the concept of getting everything perfect, as you'll be able to make your ideal sound/sound in your head onto your DAW/whatever in 1/4 of the time it would take normally as all the skills are there. Then you can switch from "get everything perfect" to "get ideas out on paper, finish tracks" mode, imo.

At least, that is what I've found in my journey so far, anyway. I'm at the point where I know how to do a lot of my sound design, get the sound I want, program decently good melodies, get a good track structure together etc...but because most of my practical experience has been in perfectionism and sound design and "how do I make this sound that's in my head", I'm terrible at finishing tracks or projects. I just start 10-20 different concurrent "work in progresses" that I takes ages and ages to finish (if I even ever get to them). Definitely need to swap to that mindset of "finish tracks/just make some techno and finish another track" to get me over that big hump (I have only properly finished 4 or 5 tracks to date, I'm aiming to reach 10 in the next 6 months or at least year).

Then again, everyone is different!

[Hades]

I agree with parts of this more than others, I think it really depends what stage you're at with learning techno production (and music production generally) and also how far along you are as a producer in pumping out the tracks.

For a good while, whilst you're learning all the proper skills, how to make sound x or y ("how do I get reverb rumble bass grr!?!" etc), being a bit of perfectionist can be a good thing - as it forces you a bit to sit down and properly program in a melody, design a sound, craft a bit of percussion to exactly where you want it etc, even though doing this can cause many many headaches in the process. But, when you've pushed yourself through this stage, then you can completely unfocus on the concept of getting everything perfect, as you'll be able to make your ideal sound/sound in your head onto your DAW/whatever in 1/4 of the time it would take normally as all the skills are there. Then you can switch from "get everything perfect" to "get ideas out on paper, finish tracks" mode, imo.

At least, that is what I've found in my journey so far, anyway. I'm at the point where I know how to do a lot of my sound design, get the sound I want, program decently good melodies, get a good track structure together etc...but because most of my practical experience has been in perfectionism and sound design and "how do I make this sound that's in my head", I'm terrible at finishing tracks or projects. I just start 10-20 different concurrent "work in progresses" that I takes ages and ages to finish (if I even ever get to them). Definitely need to swap to that mindset of "finish tracks/just make some techno and finish another track" to get me over that big hump (I have only properly finished 4 or 5 tracks to date, I'm aiming to reach 10 in the next 6 months or at least year).

Then again, everyone is different!

Your current situation sounds like mine a year or two ago.

I never had a problem with my perfectionism when it came to making sounds.
Like I said before (but probably not here in this topic) :
when I restarted my whole synth love, I didn't buy a sound card for almost 3 years or something,
just to force myself to spend time learning my synths, instead of just banging out tracks immediately (which was what I did from my 16 to 19, and they were all total shit).
At some point, I even remember making like 500+ patches just with simpler and Analog, and using nothing but the onboard Live FX for them.
All sounds were made from scratch (well, at least the Analog ones were, Simpler obviously uses samples), and I even tried to design them to make them sound as good as possible all over my 88 keys (which is of course mostly impossible).
I always said I'll make a free sample/patches pack for subsekt when I reach a certain number of plays, and that happened a few days ago, so I should try and find some time asap and share a few of those patches, thrown together with some audio loops from my way too big clip library.
I've handed some of my Analog patches out before to people here on subsekt.

They're just sounds, you'll always make many more once you properly learned how.
But yeah, my perfectionism in this case meant that if I started a sound from scratch, I would need like 20 minutes for 90% of the sound,
(it would no doubt go way faster now, but this was many years ago)
and then I could still spend like 1 hour or more just tweaking that last 10% and building a decent rack out of the patch.
I didn't care though, I loved doing that shit (and still do), and it's my love for sound that eventually lead me to techno.
Most people learn sound design and learning how to work with different synths because they start making techno,
I just was a synth fanatic that eventually got into techno because I fell in love with all kinds of sound.

I do have a problem with my perfectionism when it comes to finishing tracks, which means making my arrangements and mixes.
Maybe tomorrow morning I'll be lucky enough to find 2 or 3 hours more to do a few final comparisons and little adjustments, and then I'll finally upload my last new track (the private link is already up here in the post a clip topic, please feel free to make any kind of comments).

[Hepta]

Great thread mate, I can relate to so many things here. I also think its great to do and try different things. Ive had a major break from Techno for over a year. I got two Ep request (shortly after my first release) and I screwed up because my expectations of myself versus reality clashed. Had no inspiration at the time and I got all stressed out and acomplished nothing. I got new gear that only gave the illusion of inspiration, when instead should have focused on working in other ways with the gear I already had so I sold everything and kept the rest to a minimum.

I accepted my failure and started making ambient instead, just turning off the grid and dont have that kick pattern looping constantly gave me a sense of freedom. Im learning new stuff in sound design for both field recordings and synthesis that dont have to constraint itself into any bpm. Im having fun again and I think when the time is right my production will naturally get back into more techno.

Photography is another thing I do as a "sidequest" when i field recording and dont produce. Visual inspirations is important for me so getting out there recording sounds, look at nature helps from getting the tunnel vision. Video games is great too haha!

Fuck I dont know what to type more but I dont think we can forget "how to" no matter how long the break is. Maybe we'll get rusty in the beginning but the flow will come back fast.

[Hades]

I accepted my failure and started making ambient instead, just turning off the grid and dont have that kick pattern looping constantly gave me a sense of freedom. Im learning new stuff in sound design for both field recordings and synthesis that dont have to constraint itself into any bpm.

I should really try and make more ambient stuff.
I mean, I probably have like 50 clips in my clip library that are already half of an ambient track,
I love pads and textures, and I can play keys. It would be almost a no brainer in a way.
I'm a total idiot for not doing it more,
but it's exactly that no bpm thing that always feels like a total block for me.

I recently rediscovered Mind Over MIDI's music, and the guy used to make techno as well as ambient,
but nowadays he only makes ambient,
and I had a chat with him, asking how he did it, the no bpm kind of thing,
and he couldn't really give an answer because he just records everything as a jam and then only changes 1 or 2 tiny things afterwards.

I can't really explain why, but that not having a bpm and kick. It totally blocks me.
I need that kind of minimum structure I guess...

[Barfunkel]

You could put a steady 4/4 kick in there, write a tune around it, then later remove the kick completely. Never tried it though, it's just an idea. Kinda like a techno metronome.

You can also make danceable techno without a kick, like this:

youtu.be/7-Mz6hRUfLE

[Hades]

yeah, but most ambient doesn't have a typical tune structure at all, so that wouldn't work for me.

[Hepta]

I accepted my failure and started making ambient instead, just turning off the grid and dont have that kick pattern looping constantly gave me a sense of freedom. Im learning new stuff in sound design for both field recordings and synthesis that dont have to constraint itself into any bpm.

I should really try and make more ambient stuff.
I mean, I probably have like 50 clips in my clip library that are already half of an ambient track,
I love pads and textures, and I can play keys. It would be almost a no brainer in a way.

Yeah man, you should give it a try again definitely. Maybe try get that minimum structure following some pads dynamics. Start with a swelling ambience of some sort, and as the sound naturallly fades you add another and just see where this will take you. After you get that basic long structure of evolving sound you can record some sweet harmonics on top of that etc. I tried slow tempos for ambient having the metronome on but it just fucks the flow for me. But I guess it will come in handy if i ever try more rhytmical ambient music hehe.

[rktic]

Alume,

I know this ebb and flow very well, too. Moreso being scared that something has gotten away, is broken or whatever.

From my experience this comes from a number of things:

Expectations

The longer I made music the further I felt like pushing the limits. To a point where I put my bar so high I wasn't able to satisfy myself any longer with my output. A lot of that has been said in the other thread about "making only safe and linear music". It helped me to rethink my process all over and go back to why I make music in first place.



Life is not only making music

When this kind of block hit me for the first time I was like "I need to fight it". Before I was able to make three tracks in one go at an evening. It vanished. Part of it was the thing above. Another one being: running out of creative juices. Ideas don't emerge in a vacuum.

While my focus was constantly shifting to other stuff I frustrated myself trying to get music done. Needless to say that didn't work. I eventually let things slide. And the energy came back.



You can probably add more things like self-doubt, imposter syndrome and whatnot to the list.

[Stace]

Arrrrgh, I am having exactly the same thing.

I have not made anything in ages. Like, AGES for me and ages in real life.
I have been giving thought as to why that is. The conclusion I have come to is, well, that I am not feeling any kind of negative emotion. Without getting too emo about it all, I used to use production as a hiding place from anxiety and feeling sad. For pretty much the first time in my life I don't feel either, which is LOVELY but I am missing making music and I don't want to me emotionally tied into only making music when I feel one of those things.

I can't make a track for the sake of it, I never think, "I am going to make a banger", it has to come from some kind of emotion and I don't know how to make something without feeling anything. I don't like the prospect of not making anything, I also don't like the prospect of feeling those things again.
On the plus side, I have been doing loads of reading

[Alume]

Jo Stace I had/have the same, I always made music as a "way out" and now that I can make sense of certain things that need to express fell of its horse.


I figured I dont need to be sad to make music, and I just need to learn how to express other emotions rather than only the negative emotions of the past.


That doesnt mean its easy though!

[Stace]

Maybe I could make a track about being sad that I am not sad enough to make a track

I think in the time I have been making music I made one track that didn't come from a negative emotion, I don't know how I feel about that.
You can spend so long feeling something it is sometimes easier to go back there as a default as it is what you know - even if it isn't a nice place you go back to, I guess humans are prone to seeking the familiar.

I kind of feel like I am ready to start trying to start something in the near future. I miss it, I really really miss going on Logic and not being on grid and the hours just flying.
Also, I think personally I look at things in a very black and white way, I either feel it all or feel nothing.

Worst case scenario, I am sure something bad will happen soon

[Lost to the Void]

Just go look at the news, you`ll soon feel the creeping nihilism.