Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

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Lost to the Void
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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by Lost to the Void »

jordanneke wrote:Yeah, I agree on the taking a break.

I often wonder about my hobbies 'So much effort for such relative mediocrity', as I'm not actually naturally talented at much.

But time away from music (like a month), always has me ready to start again.
I think you are talented mate, I think you make very good music, you just suffer from self critique.
It`s a sign that you will never be happy and thus will keep improving.
It`s a good thing, you just have to manage it and don`t let it cripple you.
When artists get too happy or self satisfied with their own work, the work turns to shit IMO.
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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by Mono-xID »

Lost to the Void wrote:I think you are talented mate, I think you make very good music, you just suffer from self critique.
I can wholeheartly agree on this Jordan. I really really like your music. Don't be so hard on yourself mate.
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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by ashley BORG »

Aurongroove wrote:I found myself obsessing over unfinishable tracks, like "Fuck this, I deserve my music to be easier to finish-and-sound-good then they're proving to be".

I think one of the shames about online audio sharing, and what it has become is, I can often feel under pressure for everything I do to be good, and everything thing after that to be noticeably better. and it makes the whole affair stressful, disappointing, and sad.

But recently my philosophy has changed.

You gotta remember why you like creating.

You're not, I assume, in a position where you NEED to produce your music, and the music NEEDS to sell well or your family will starve?
if not, then bang. That's the pressure off, you CAN stop finishing music if you want, you can just go and play with sounds, with no pressure to even "make something exportable".


Second, if you aim is to "express yourself with your work" (this is one of the reasons I make techno) then it's not written anywhere that you ALSO need to IMPRESS people while expressing yourself. You can communicate with someone without impressing them, children do it all the time with their shit crayon paintings.
When people feel sad, sometimes what they need to express isn't impressive, or entertaining, or nice to hear, or "better quality" then the last thing they expressed.

Sometimes an expression is what it is, and all you have to do is let it be, and the right people will see/hear it and be glad you shared.

We give ourselves rules to work by, and we then strangle ourselves with those same rules. Sometimes it nice to just play and see, and discover something about yourself.
Alot of sense in this post.

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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by jordanneke »

Mono-xID wrote:
Lost to the Void wrote:I think you are talented mate, I think you make very good music, you just suffer from self critique.
I can wholeheartly agree on this Jordan. I really really like your music. Don't be so hard on yourself mate.
Cheers lads, although I wasn't really fishing for compliments.

I was listening to the berghain mix by function today and had a 'fuck me, how in fucks name did they make that track?'

I can only compare my tracks to the pro's and people better, and think 'Jesus, I've got a loooooong way to go'.

I think that provides both drive and frustration for a lot of people on here and in my position, and sometimes that leads to 'Why in fucks name am I bothering', which is how I read the OP's point.

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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by Kromasome »

jordanneke wrote:
Mono-xID wrote:
Lost to the Void wrote:I think you are talented mate, I think you make very good music, you just suffer from self critique.
I can wholeheartly agree on this Jordan. I really really like your music. Don't be so hard on yourself mate.
Cheers lads, although I wasn't really fishing for compliments.

I was listening to the berghain mix by function today and had a 'fuck me, how in fucks name did they make that track?'

I can only compare my tracks to the pro's and people better, and think 'Jesus, I've got a loooooong way to go'.

I think that provides both drive and frustration for a lot of people on here and in my position, and sometimes that leads to 'Why in fucks name am I bothering', which is how I read the OP's point.
Yep, pretty much got it right there Jordan!

This is also why I have a love/hate relationship with using reference tracks while writing my own tracks - they are quite clearly the only way to compare if your own track is anywhere near close to "pro", but it can also be debilitating if you are low on confidence and don't feel like you can ever achieve that level (similar to listening to a mix full of great tracks). I know there is extra processing done in pro tracks by talented engineers that can make a good track really shine, but it surely can't make that much difference if the track is not already good to begin with.

I also get down on myself because I feel like I should be creating better stuff by now (been trying for quite a few years - admittedly not full time, and having 3 kids in the last 5 years has made the process/journey a little more challenging)

Also a good point about never being 100% satisfied with your own work.

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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by intrusav »

I'd imagine we've all got this going on.

I find a lot of it is down to unrealistic concepts of what we consider "good enough"

When it hits me, I find that the best way to refresh things is to drop or bump the tempo by 20bpm or so, get's me out of that "gotta make a peak-time banger" mode and back into explorer mode. It also shows up what the essentials are to get some kinda flow going...

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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by Kromasome »

intrusav wrote:I'd imagine we've all got this going on.

I find a lot of it is down to unrealistic concepts of what we consider "good enough"
Yeah, definitely not saying I'm unique in any of these struggles, just find it helps me to nut out what's going on in my head if I get it down on paper (or onto a forum).

Was also thinking earlier about the advice to keep it fun - which is great advice, and I definitely still really enjoy making music. But my competitive nature always pushes me to want to improve faster than I feel like I am. And that's when I get frustrated and start doubting my ability and my tracks.

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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by intrusav »

Sounds to me that the thing that is tripping you up is "forcing" things.
Sometimes it's best to let the track/sounds nudge you in a certain direction and let it develop.
It doesn't always help to set out to make a track fit a predetermined mould.
You will just end up fighting it at some point.

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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by jordanneke »

Kromasome wrote:

....and having 3 kids in the last 5 years has made the process/journey a little more challenging)

WTF...

Only idiot, or a man who has no understanding of consequence would ever embark on such a foolhardy voyage.


;)

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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by Mono-xID »

3 KIDS IN 5 YEARS... :shock:

Dude, calm down....
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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by Kromasome »

Mono-xID wrote:3 KIDS IN 5 YEARS... :shock:

Dude, calm down....
Haha - ok, maybe my maths is a bit out, but we had the first in June 2011 and the youngest is still only 16 months now - so yeah, let's just say the doctor has made a couple of choice cuts recently!

And 2 of the 3 are girls, so I'm pretty much doomed...

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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by Mono-xID »

Fook me. My son is 7 now, starting school 'n shit. Missy is like " time is running out, we have to make a girl to complete the family".

I'm like :shock: .... :?
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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by jordanneke »

Mate.

I have 3 boys

6,4 and 2.

I did not understand consequences. I fucking do now!

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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by Mono-xID »

You dudes are machines. Nuff respect!!!
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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by mainst09 »

keep them cumming!!!
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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by Kromasome »

jordanneke wrote:Mate.

I have 3 boys

6,4 and 2.

I did not understand consequences. I fucking do now!
Ha ha - bet it's fun at your house when the fights start!!

Mine are just about the same as that, but my boy is wedged in the middle of the girls. I sometimes wish he had a brother to kick around with, but he does well to balance playing with the girls and doing the boy stuff that they just don't really understand.

I'm lucky the two older ones actually like listening to my music at the moment!! Doesn't mean they cut me a break to get anything done when they're awake - which is cool with me, didn't have them to just chuck them in a corner all day. But, yeah let's just say the tank is running on empty more often than not at the moment.

16 month old starting saying "oh shit" the other day at the shops - quite clearly that's her mum's fault - I would never speak like that.

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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by Lost to the Void »

Am I the only one here not plopping out walking bloodsacks in to the world?
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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by Hades »

winston wrote:i wouldn't delete your tracks and move on. I'd move on, but i like to every now and then, when they pop up, listen to old tracks or half-finished&bounced quick arrangements that i have made over the years and think back to that time when it was all new and enjoyable and i was just doing what sounded good instead of doing what i think is right or what should be done. getting wee flashbacks of being in my bedroom at my parents house, or having shit set up on my dining table and just playing tunes. compared to other tracks in my music folder, they don't stand up sonically, but they all have a little piece of me in them, a little bit of my soul when i had one, a little bit of a dream when i had them too. it is good to still have those ableton files that i can open up and have little play with, a little tweak here and there that tries to add an extra piece of the puzzle without it all toppling into a pile of shit. one day i'll finish a track that i think is good, one day i'll finish a track that sounds the way i imagine it sounding and i'll play it and then i'll play a dusty old mp3 of mine from 2004 and i'll think, "you're alright man".

i would say Kromasome that you are over thinking things. it is the modern curse. i do it too & i reckon everyone else here does as well. getting back to the fun is what you need. i don't know how you can do it, sorry mate. but don't delete your old shit, don't delete your so called failures, your so called disappointments. that is needed for the making of the man, or woman or however you define yourself. [it's all ok with me].

you almost sound like The Dude ! :D

I totally agree with not deleting all the old stuff.
However, I do believe in going through your older stuff from time to time and delete the stuff that's really worth nothing.
Last summer I went through like 2 years of making tracks, and I only kept a handful of them, but I was amazed by what I heard.
Not as in "wow, how great", but like you said : it was part of my life at some point.
Apparantely I was making happy sounding house tracks at some point. Really funky stuff.
Now pretty much everything I touch is infected with melancholy instantly.
But yeah, I guess it's just part of my life
a little bit of a dream when i had them too
Sounds so recognizable. Though I still have them, just far more modest ones, and I'm totally fine with that.
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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by Hades »

ashley BORG wrote:
Aurongroove wrote:I found myself obsessing over unfinishable tracks, like "Fuck this, I deserve my music to be easier to finish-and-sound-good then they're proving to be".

I think one of the shames about online audio sharing, and what it has become is, I can often feel under pressure for everything I do to be good, and everything thing after that to be noticeably better. and it makes the whole affair stressful, disappointing, and sad.

But recently my philosophy has changed.

You gotta remember why you like creating.

You're not, I assume, in a position where you NEED to produce your music, and the music NEEDS to sell well or your family will starve?
if not, then bang. That's the pressure off, you CAN stop finishing music if you want, you can just go and play with sounds, with no pressure to even "make something exportable".


Second, if you aim is to "express yourself with your work" (this is one of the reasons I make techno) then it's not written anywhere that you ALSO need to IMPRESS people while expressing yourself. You can communicate with someone without impressing them, children do it all the time with their shit crayon paintings.
When people feel sad, sometimes what they need to express isn't impressive, or entertaining, or nice to hear, or "better quality" then the last thing they expressed.

Sometimes an expression is what it is, and all you have to do is let it be, and the right people will see/hear it and be glad you shared.

We give ourselves rules to work by, and we then strangle ourselves with those same rules. Sometimes it nice to just play and see, and discover something about yourself.
Alot of sense in this post.
I'd like to 2nd that !
I had my first 3 years of making shitty music when I was 15 till when I was 18.
I made shitty music and thought it was great. But yeah, no internet, no proper gear, no fucking info anywhere.
Anyway, after univ, I restarted and said "first I'll learn how to work with these synths properly before I start recording",
and I was just happily fooling around for another few years. Literally like 2 to 3 years of not recording anything.
You can't imagine how many people were giving me shit because I wasn't recording any music.
They were literally saying stuff like "what, so many synths, and no music ?"
I started feeling bad because they wanted me to feel bad.
But as my mrs pointed out to me some day : so what if all I wanted to do was just fiddle away with these machines ?
What's fucking wrong with that ?
And she was totally right.

Of course it would have been a bit of a shame if I had never started to properly make tracks,
but yeah, now the kind of "stress" of "gotta finish a track" is there. Didn't have any of that crappy stress before ffs. :)
I hadn't finished a track in a few months, and it was at the back of my head all the time.
Now I'm dead happy I finally finished another track yesterday.
But really, it shouldn't be like that.
If you're not making a living from this, it should always remain fun.
Normally I would take a break now, but I just got a lovely plugin this morning,
and I can't fucking wait to get home and squeeze another 2 hours in HAVING FUN !!!!
:D 8-)


ow, and mr kromasome : your track was one of the very best in that mix !!
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Re: Boredom/Apathy when reviewing works in progress??

Post by Hades »

Lost to the Void wrote:Am I the only one here not plopping out walking bloodsacks in to the world?
the world would simply not be ready for your little bloodsacks Steve,
no way. :lol:
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