Is this forum only for skilled/experienced producers?

T

Trip Lykely

New member
I ask because despite giving feedback on a few dozen tracks and posting a couple of mine I haven't gotten a single comment. My experience isn't great, although I've casually messed around for a while. My equipment also isn't great. Is that why nobody will comment lol?

PS I've had people tell me they like it but I know them, and they don't produce. It would invaluable to get feedback from people I don't know who do know what they're doing. But if this site is only for those with real strong skill I might as well move on because that's not me haha



 
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Damn people trying to learn new things, right? So aside from doing everything the stickied post says to get feedback what should I actually do?
 
I usually find threads through the "what's new" tab, so I don't search the forums really that often.

but I'm listening to the song you posted. It good melodically, and rhythmically, ...but it seems to missing a lot of frequency range. The lows need to be lower. The kick drum sounds like the frequency of a snare. Look into your EQ and make sure the Kick is hitting somewhere around 70 - 100 hertz.
I think it has a lot of potential because the melodies are tight, but the mixing needs a lot of work.

and no, it's good to have producers from all levels, so no it's only for professionals..
 
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I've been using this forum very sparingly for years myself.
I still looky looky every now and then, but as far as info I've stopped using this area for that.
 
Epsilon-144 said:
I usually find threads through the "what's new" tab, so I don't search the forums really that often.

but I'm listening to the song you posted. It good melodically, and rhythmically, ...but it seems to missing a lot of frequency range. The lows need to be lower. The kick drum sounds like the frequency of a snare. Look into your EQ and make sure the Kick is hitting somewhere around 70 - 100 hertz.
I think it has a lot of potential because the melodies are tight, but the mixing needs a lot of work.

and no, it's good to have producers from all levels, so no it's only for professionals..
Click to expand...

I really appreciate the feedback. My setup isn't great and mixing is one of my current focuses as it clearly isn't as clean as it should be. Any recommendations on visual ways I can mix to help compensate for low quality gear?

It's nice to hear you hear potential. Its been enjoyable going from zero musical background to making halfway decent stuff.

Edit: Been listening to some of your stuff and I dig it. Obviously you can always further perfect your craft but how long did it take you to say, "I make some awesome shit" and know it?
 
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ha, thanks dude! idk it varies on person but I posted my first tune on Soundcloud about what, 4 years ago? Ya, 4-5 years producing. Ya can't let that intimidate ya tho, you just have to put in quality work/research everyday. 6 months to a year down the road you'll see improvements. Keep going, fam.

An what are you using? Get some kind of monitoring system (speakers or headphones) that can reach reasonably well in the 60 hertz range.
 
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Thats what I've been doing lately. Every day I read or check a tutorial and try to create something; drum pattern, bassline, melody, whole track, etc. The time doesn't intimidate me, anything worth pursuing takes serious devotion. Still good to hear 6 months to a year for real improvement. Definitely no intention of stopping.

I've got lower end Senheiser cans and plan to upgrade once I reach a point where I feel I'm doing the best possible with what I've got. One issue I think I have is that I get into this zone sometimes, like I did with this track, and tire out my ears and they deceive me. I listen the next day in my car on the way to work and am like, wait, thats not what I heard yesterday..
 
haha ya that happens. Just like sports, ya gotta train yourself for 2-3 hours and then rest.

but ya, that sounds good!
 
I don't give a lot of feedback on individual, it's just not my thing because it's often down to personal tastes... and mine are kinda peculiar, hah.
You have to be critical on your own work, most of the stuff I'd point out you probably already know ;)

Ask a question in the more technical forums and I try to be all over it. No such thing as stupid questions in that regard. So definitely not a forum for experienced producers only.
I've been doing it a long time, but I still learn new things everyday. I found that explaining them to others helps make it clearer for me too.
 
localspace said:
I don't give a lot of feedback on individual, it's just not my thing because it's often down to personal tastes... and mine are kinda peculiar, hah.
You have to be critical on your own work, most of the stuff I'd point out you probably already know ;)

Ask a question in the more technical forums and I try to be all over it. No such thing as stupid questions in that regard. So definitely not a forum for experienced producers only.
I've been doing it a long time, but I still learn new things everyday. I found that explaining them to others helps make it clearer for me too.
Click to expand...

Good point. I think it helps to get generalized/broad feedback and from there I can refine it with more technical questions. Its difficult to explain my recent obsession with getting good at this but its incredibly rewarding making better and better music with zero background. Some things are starting to click for me which will only help in the infinite pursuit of perfection.



*just some quick tweaks
 
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Lol, I started off much like that too. I had a bit of background playing in bands but never really learned to read notes or any kind of theory. I simply don't have the brain for it.

They can be general questions too. I just don't like commenting on individual tracks. I don't think you learn that much by going back to one track until it's perfect. It's better to focus on getting good at putting your ideas down. Worry about perfecting later. Especially when you're still on shabby kit, you won't get the super shiny fat commercial sound no matter how hard you try.. trust me, I've been there ;) You can do a whole lot of other cool shit with it though. A lot of styles of music don't even have to be mixed perfectly. Raw is always better!

Mixing for too long definitely isn't good... especially with headphones you tire much more easily and your ears will deceive you. They'll act like a compressor. But the big difference between systems is probably mostly down to poor gear.

Don't wait too long with upgrading to better headphones and then monitors and a good audio interface. That should be priority number one because only then you'll have a clear picture of what's going on in your mix. That's really essential. The headphones you use now probably warp the sound a lot.. and mixing on headphones only also brings a lot of issues. Whenever I tried doing it I came out with really weirdly balanced tracks.

Before I had monitors I used two sets of hi-fi speakers, one was set was old and used... really dull sounding but they were pretty decent for judging the dynamics. The other set was more precise and natural sounding. I switched back and forth between those, and use a good pair of headphones to do the detailed mixing. I could make that sound pretty good! But getting monitors still made world of difference. They're not even good by any stretch of the imagination. I blew out the tweeter on the left one which now sounds completely fucked...but I'm used to them like a pair of old shoes and that seems to trump actual sound quality for now.

You should also look into some of the basics like using asio drivers, 32 bit audio, etc.. if you haven't already. I don't know if that's still the case now, but for instance FLstudio always used to default to really crappy settings for the audio quality. Asio is much better than directsound. It works with any audio card, even onboard ones.
 
It makes sense about monitors, if you're not hearing things correctly during creation and mixing you'll compound your imbalance. I just don't want to shell out the bucks until I really like where my skill is at. Getting better every day but obviously its a never ending learning experience.

And I get what you're saying a bit more. Just saying, "listen to this and tell me what you think" isn't as good of a question as "I want the guitar to be the focal point with the drums and bass complimenting it, did I pull that off?"

Also I don't spend too much time on each track. My goal isn't to make the best song of all time every go, I just try to apply what I've recently learned and make something I think is better than the last. I don't always succeed but I do get incrementally better.
 
Took lots of breaks over the years to learn the following:
Sheet music's language
Basic music theory
Advanced sound design
All scales since you can find any chord based on scales.
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This probably wouldn't interest you, but that's the first thing I'd suggest.
 
KonKossKang said:
Took lots of breaks over the years to learn the following:
Sheet music's language
Basic music theory
Advanced sound design
All scales since you can find any chord based on scales.
--------------------------------------------------------------
This probably wouldn't interest you, but that's the first thing I'd suggest.
Click to expand...

With zero musical background I've definitely spent some time on all of that aside from sheet music's language, which I am interested in learning as well.
 
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