Do Something Challenge Discussion Thread

[DrewJD82]

I'm hoping that creativity and song writing is like a muscle...you get better the more you work at it. Hopefully.

I certainly believe that’s the case. After a while you become more sure of your choices the first time around and things start moving faster. With each song that goes by, there are things you’ll hear after you’d like to do differently and I take those things and put them into the next song in one way or another, so it’s a continuous refinement.

I think the biggest ‘trick’ to it is getting inspiration to start writing something and recording just enough of it that you can retain the inspiration via what you have recorded. The next day you might not be as keen to jump in the studio, but if you’ve tracked enough to catch the inspiration for what you did record, it usually floods right back pretty quick. Other times I’ll open a started session and think “Why in the f*ck did I even waste time recording this? This is f*cking stupid”

The other side to that is the more familiar you get with a DAW, the more time you end up saving by not having to look up “How to do a crossfade in ______” I’ve got templates in Logic that are already set up with all the tracks and plug-ins I’ll need, already have something on the master buss for compression, it makes things pretty smooth.

 

[Jarick]

One other thing I want to do is learn more about keys and pads and things. In my mind I can hear stuff like that. Will need to pick up a little usb keyboard.

 

[DrewJD82]

My hope is I don’t make 52 versions of the same song lol

It’s definitely easy to fall into that trap. When I first had a little studio rig put together I was busting out basic verse/chorus/verse/chorus/bridge/chorus songs left and right and while I was stoked with them, they weren’t a reflection of what I had in my head for what I wanted to do with my music. I was always thinking “I can’t let this part go on too long, people will get bored” or “If I don’t throw in a catchy chorus here, no one will keep listening” but eventually I stopped giving a sh*t about “people” because there’s no guarantee ANYONE will dig any of it, so I’m better off just writing how I felt the song should go from a feeling/creativity standpoint rather than my head defining it for me.

And even if ya DO make 52 versions of the same song, you’ll probably be REALLY good at it by the time ya hit 52!

 

[Jarick]

So right now my process is to listen to the drum track a few times and noodle over it until something starts to take shape. Then I’m recording me some of the riffs and chords and ideas and I’ll listen back and see what works and doesn’t. From there I’ll try and get enough pieces to get a basic track structure and then start tracking final parts and then some complementary pieces on top. Eventually I’d want to do some melody as I can’t sing but probably not these first challenges.

 

[DrewJD82]

So right now my process is to listen to the drum track a few times and noodle over it until something starts to take shape. Then I’m recording me some of the riffs and chords and ideas and I’ll listen back and see what works and doesn’t. From there I’ll try and get enough pieces to get a basic track structure and then start tracking final parts and then some complementary pieces on top. Eventually I’d want to do some melody as I can’t sing but probably not these first challenges.

That’s exactly how I go about it. Maybe I’ll post up my work-in-progress track tonight to see how it sounds like absolute dogshit at the start and gets shaped into something towards the end.

I end up with 3-4 tracks that run the length of the song and it’s just improvised guitars, eventually I start remembering the good riffs and where they go, so by the 3rd/4th time through it’s starting to take some kind of shape. Then it’s a lot of terrible editing with cut off notes and sh*t played terribly to make the final structure. Then I generally have to practice it all to play it cleanly enough to track.

 

[duzie]

I certainly believe that’s the case. After a while you become more sure of your choices the first time around and things start moving faster. With each song that goes by, there are things you’ll hear after you’d like to do differently and I take those things and put them into the next song in one way or another, so it’s a continuous refinement.

I think the biggest ‘trick’ to it is getting inspiration to start writing something and recording just enough of it that you can retain the inspiration via what you have recorded. The next day you might not be as keen to jump in the studio, but if you’ve tracked enough to catch the inspiration for what you did record, it usually floods right back pretty quick. Other times I’ll open a started session and think “Why in the f*ck did I even waste time recording this? This is f*cking stupid”

The other side to that is the more familiar you get with a DAW, the more time you end up saving by not having to look up “How to do a crossfade in ______” I’ve got templates in Logic that are already set up with all the tracks and plug-ins I’ll need, already have something on the master buss for compression, it makes things pretty smooth.

What’s a cross fade ?
I’m totally inexperienced with anything other than hitting the record button

 

[DrewJD82]

What’s a cross fade ?
I’m totally inexperienced with anything other than hitting the record button

A crossfade is what you do when you have a piece of audio you edited and stuck together.

So say you were playing great then f*cked up, you can punch in right at the spot you f*cked up at, but there’s now a break in the track from where the old file was cut off and where the new one was dropped in, a cross fade fades the old track out as the new one comes in. This is what they used to have to splice tape for and sh*t like that, it’s now done with a mouse swipe! It happens so fast you can’t hear there was an edit to begin with. Hahahha if it weren’t for crossfading, 99% of the albums we listen to would sound like chopped up pieces of sh*t.

 

[JiveTurkey]

I never punch anything in

 

[DrewJD82]

I never punch anything in

Just baby’s heads, eh?

 

[TSJMajesty]

What's a punch in?

 

[duzie]

A crossfade is what you do when you have a piece of audio you edited and stuck together.

So say you were playing great then f*cked up, you can punch in right at the spot you f*cked up at, but there’s now a break in the track from where the old file was cut off and where the new one was dropped in, a cross fade fades the old track out as the new one comes in. This is what they used to have to splice tape for and sh*t like that, it’s now done with a mouse swipe! It happens so fast you can’t hear there was an edit to begin with. Hahahha if it weren’t for crossfading, 99% of the albums we listen to would sound like chopped up pieces of sh*t.

Thanks Drew

 

[fretworn]

What's a punch in?

Goes back to tape days brother…

It’s where you waited until your part came up on the tape and then you “punched in” by hitting the record button for the section you want and then you punch out when you’re done; it’s a way to record an incremental part or overdub.

A lot of these terms come from working with linear tape, in a random access mode…

(Physical tape and analog gear has an high noise floor, which becomes problematic in multitracking… Lots of techniques were developed to try to overcome stacking noise floor)

 

[JiveTurkey]

Just baby’s heads, eh?

 

[TSJMajesty]

Man this shit is badass! I have no DAW recording experience. I'm watching the Reaper tutorial videos, and just imported one of the drum files, from only watching less than 10 minutes of the 1st video, and I'm already amazed that the track automatically sync'd to the measures.

This is so freaking cool!

 

[DrewJD82]

Man this s**t is badass! I have no DAW recording experience. I'm watching the Reaper tutorial videos, and just imported one of the drum files, from only watching less than 10 minutes of the 1st video, and I'm already amazed that the track automatically sync'd to the measures.

This is so freaking cool!

Technology is pretty damn slick and even better when it all works!!

There’s ZERO shortage of Reaper tutorials on YouTube, that’s for DAMN SURE! Can’t wait to hear what ya do with it, man!!

 

[TSJMajesty]

Can’t wait to hear what ya do with it, man!!

I appreciate that, and I owe you for prompting me to get started in this stuff. But my next step is simply recording myself playing, so I can better pinpoint the areas I want to improve on. I'm on a quest, that right now is primarily focused on my abilities as a guitarist. I'll gradually learn how to record, and go from there, but it will probably be a while before I post something. (Or not. )

 

[DrewJD82]

I appreciate that, and I owe you for prompting me to get started in this stuff. But my next step is simply recording myself playing, so I can better pinpoint the areas I want to improve on. I'm on a quest, that right now is primarily focused on my abilities as a guitarist. I'll gradually learn how to record, and go from there, but it will probably be a while before I post something. (Or not. )

We'll get somethin' outta ya at some point! I'm just stoked you're getting your feet wet. Try to keep in mind that what you're going to hear back is akin to modelers/IR's producing the sound of a close-mic'd speaker where you're hearing the tone in great detail; you're going to hear all the inconsistencies and slop more than you did before and it can be disheartening, but most people's tracks don't sound like Petrucci's Vai even says there's so much slop going on in his main tracks you can't hear because of a dense mix and I certainly know what I've gotten away with.

Sometimes that stuff is what turns into a happy accident that sounds intentional or just gets that "How TF did he do that?" thing going on, fingers sliding on the strings, a pick scraping the strings and letting out a chirp, harmonics when they weren't intended, etc.

 

[TSJMajesty]

We'll get somethin' outta ya at some point! I'm just stoked you're getting your feet wet. Try to keep in mind that what you're going to hear back is akin to modelers/IR's producing the sound of a close-mic'd speaker where you're hearing the tone in great detail; you're going to hear all the inconsistencies and slop more than you did before and it can be disheartening, but most people's tracks don't sound like Petrucci's Vai even says there's so much slop going on in his main tracks you can't hear because of a dense mix and I certainly know what I've gotten away with.

Sometimes that stuff is what turns into a happy accident that sounds intentional or just gets that "How TF did he do that?" thing going on, fingers sliding on the strings, a pick scraping the strings and letting out a chirp, harmonics when they weren't intended, etc.

Sure, I'm not shooting for perfection, but there is a certain bar I wanna be at, that isn't there yet. But the good thing about it is, the 2 things that I'm most focused on- evenness of playing, and clean string changes w/o overlap- are improving. I'm practicing a harmonic minor legato riff that works both, and it's coming along nicely.

 

[Jarick]

I'm curious, what software everyone is using?

Here's what I currently have:

DAW: Garageband
Drums: EZ Drummer 2
Guitar: Helix Native, Scuffham S-Gear, NDSP plugins (Plini, Tone King, Soldano, Petrucci, Fortin)

 

[DrewJD82]

I'm curious, what software everyone is using?

Here's what I currently have:

DAW: Garageband
Drums: EZ Drummer 2
Guitar: Helix Native, Scuffham S-Gear, NDSP plugins (Plini, Tone King, Soldano, Petrucci, Fortin)

DAW- Logic
Drums: SD3
Guitar- AxeFX Tree