Hip-hop producing and what to learn first.

J

Jokke90

New member
Hi!
Let me first tell something about my self. I'm 23 years old guy from Finland. I've been making music on and off for a while already. I started when I were 13 or so with fruity loops. I used to do it just for fun and never finalized any beats. Recently I have started to make rap lyrics and started to make beats again and this time I decided to do it more seriously. Now I'm using ableton live 9. I've watched many tutorials on youtube of using live and started to read live's manual too. I'm pretty good at programming drums since I used to play drums back in school and I think that I have pretty good sense of rythm.

But now I don't know where to go next. I've been reading and watching tutorials about music theory, using live, mixing, making melodies etc. but all the data coming to my head is overwhelming. I don't seem to catch almost any of it, propably couse I'm trying to learn everything the same time.

So now comes the question. What do you think I should learn first? What did you learn first and how did it work for you? What are the best rescourses to use?(books,webpages etc.) Any other tips you have for me?

Thank you very much in advance!
Jokke
 
I find that having a sense of music theory is always best.
But at the end of the day If it sounds good JUST RECORD IT

Structure your Beats like writer would structure a song (Basic would be INTRO, HOOK, VERSE, HOOK, VERSE, HOOK, OUTRO.)

What I suggest is to create your own drum kit. Find drum sounds that you'd like to work with and drop them all in a folder (I go even further by creating my own sounds and renaming them). Also do the same for synths that you want to work with. Its gonna take a LONG time to do if you have boatloads of samples like I do, but it will be worth it because your work will be consistent and recognizable.
Then simply do what a producer is supposed to do, GET CREATIVE! There's no right or wrong way to make melodies. It's all learning right now. Just make it a goal to finish as many beats as possible.

Now, here's a pitfall.... that TONS OF PEOPLE FALL INTO:
Its alright to listen to music thats popular right now and see whats hitting BUT what producers should know is "WHAT'S CURRENTLY HOT, WON'T BE HOT LATER, SO DON'T WASTE TIME WITH TRYING TO SOUND LIKE SOMEONE ELSE AND CREATE YOUR OWN SOUND/STYLE."

Good Luck!

Rique // Cortez Syndicate
Hip-Hop & Moombahton
Cortez1's sounds on SoundCloud - Hear the world
 
I have almost the same question as jokke90 . But what I wwant to learn is a genre like neo soul for example . I want to be very good at hip hop beats . what should I do should I always learn by listening to a lot of hip hop and try to learn from every track I listen or just enjoy and let it all come naturally and only learn when its necessary ?
 
Hey freezy

Thats a very tough question to answer because people learn in so many different ways.

Unfortunately production is filled with options so although there will be opportunities where you could utilize a new technique, if you are not confident or dont know about a particular technique this could hinder you from potentially using it.

Listening to songs over and over again, focusing your ears on different elements - essentially picking the song apart with your brain, is how I listen and learn from music. I actually enjoy this, - I find it more difficult to try and just enjoy the song for what it is, essentially I have to explicitly stop my mind from analyzing the song if I want to try to get a normal listeners perspective.
 
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