Tracks Sounding Amateur

SimplerCity

New member
Hi All!

I've been producing now for over 7yrs and working on a track today and listening back thinking, this sounds crap lol! I'm not just saying that either, it sounds amateur.

I don't really know what I'm doing wrong. Using decent plug-ins and the sounds on their own or in You Tube videos sound great but when I use them they sound ok-ish if that makes sense. The melody lines and things sound good, gelling well and all that but the track sounds limp and has no oomph. Maybe it's no processing as yet and I only have 20/20 headphones to listen through atm but when it comes to processing, even though I understand the principles of EQ, Compression, Reverb, Delay, Saturation, Panning and Levels, apart from the last 2 listed there and reverb and delay, I don't really know how to apply the other stuff for any great benefit. Like I don't listen to a bass sound and go, oh, that needs EQ'ing at a certain range or whatever.

Think mainly in todays track, it's the drums. Think if I could get more oomph with those, the rest would fall into place. The drums lack punch and oomph.

Thanks!
 
Maybe your songs are missing what I would call 'Story through Dynamics'...(not a technical music term of course).

As a listener, are you aware of when you are intently listening and then moments where you drift away? And when you drift away, is there something that brings you back in? Ask a friend as well.

Often times a song has a foundation of a strong but lacking in dynamic shifts that feel like a journey for the listener. At a basic level, it's part of having the verse 2-3db quieter than the chorus as the uplift to the chorus brings the user back in to pay attention. Groove is great but if it's static throughout then listeners get bored. Pulling instruments in and out works very well for dance tracks.

Do you feel like it's something like this missing? Or do you feel it's dated instrument choices or something else?
 
Are you choosing instruments that are all in a tight frequency range or are you at least using instruments across the frequency range? Maybe post a track or two and we can help narrow the issues down.
 
Have you tried referencing other tracks in your project and than A/B with yours. Also using some analysers like AB metric or ozone balance could help - sometimes they can point you in the right direction and you can see if you have any gaps in frequency spectrum, too much bass or to mach mids etc...
 
I'm a bit going through the same thing it is like after a bit the song is no more interesting or some like that.
 
Yeah working on a track this evening and the same thing is happening again. I started with a decent kick drum, 909, sounds good. I add a bass, tweaking and altering for like half an hour (synthesis using TAL Bassline 101) can't get it to sound good, it just sounds reasonable but not great. Got it sounding as best as I could then got fed up do left it as good as I could, then moved on. Now I tried adding strings, again, made a melody line and with the Korg M1, going though every string patch and they just sound, well amateur, nothing outstanding about the sounds then it makes me thing, it's 'cause the tracks I'm listening to on You Tube use analogue gear and such and it's all the different elements of the electronics that added to the sound back then. I watched a Point Blank video on it the other day and the guy said on there that analogue gave it something, all the different elements of the gear, adding drift, distortion and noise.

I also kind of get the feeling that back in the day (late 80's early 90's) there were techniques they were applying to make it sound good, not sure. Very frustrating.

EDIT - Got it sounding better. Changed the strings to chords instead of a single melody line, listened through a few more presets, got it sounding loads better. Think the range of 4 notes (a bass note too) has given the strings more depth but now the kick seems to have started sounded bad lol! I'm finding though, it's very subtle tweaks and changes (bass - ADSR and filter cutoff) and EQ on things that seems to make things sound better. Many different little things add up to one great big thing if that makes sense.
 
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I hope things are coming together for you. Sound design is tough, especially if you're making beats. If you listen to a lot of professional tracks, the difference isn't always the songwriting, it's normally the way the snare hits, or the tasteful reverb on the synth, etc. In some ways that's the most frustrating part of making beats but at the same time, it's also a good thing to know that you don't have to be a music theory savant, you just have to develop an ear for the sound design.
 
What Soundcloud? unless you have Reaper, the Reason Rack Plug-In etc and the same samples.

What would Soundcloud tell you without seeing what I've done in Reaper etc?
 
You’re saying your tracks sound amateurish, and you want our opinion on why, but we shouldn’t hear the tracks ourselves? We can only judge the sound if we *see* them?

You’re not making sense right now, bruh.

If you want opinions (unbiased) on what the tracks sound like, and some possible recommendations, we need to hear them.


GJ
 
Will post what I started today. Old skool house / rave. Started sounding average again. Part of me still thinks (as I said previously in this thread) VST's don't sound great. Think they sound great when you audition them and on You Tube videos but when you throw them together, not so good. These are good vst's too. Korg M1, UVI Emulation II, TAL UNO LX V2, TAL Bassline 101 and a pretty decent 909 Emulation I found online called Maxsynths DR-910. Sorry there's a bit of white noise coming from the TAL UNO LX V2 as I'm on demo and this track doesn't have the TAL Bassline 101 in it, a rave stab instead.

Ravey Piano Song by creativemind75 | Free Listening on SoundCloud
 
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Often times a song has a foundation of a strong but lacking in dynamic shifts that feel like a journey for the listener. At a basic level, it's part of having the verse 2-3db quieter than the chorus as the uplift to the chorus brings the user back in to pay attention. Groove is great but if it's static throughout then listeners get bored. Pulling instruments in and out works very well for dance tracks.

I get what you saying but listen to Frankie Knuckles - Whistle Song, starts off with the full drum beat and the drums never change throughout (which is very unusual) and sounds amazing.

YouTube

In this songs case I think with the 909's shuffle and just because it sounds so good, it just lays the foundation for a great track straight away. The drums in house are the thing that really drives the song along for me (crap sounding drums and it's flat) and can inspire you to create a whole track. The rest of that song are just the catchy hooks over the top of the flutey sound (and it sounding very spontaneous but isn't) and the catchy layered whistle. It's also very well mixed too.
 
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The sounds aren’t bad. I can hear some need for mixing and maybe EQ carving. Two things that standout right away though are the bass drum (not a good choice sonically, imho), and everything on the track sounds very dry. As in, no reverb or delay, or sense of space. Listen again to your Frankie Knuckles example and see if you can hear how the track has some spatial quality with the judicious use of reverb.

GJ
 
The sounds aren’t bad. I can hear some need for mixing and maybe EQ carving. Two things that standout right away though are the bass drum (not a good choice sonically, imho), and everything on the track sounds very dry. As in, no reverb or delay, or sense of space. Listen again to your Frankie Knuckles example and see if you can hear how the track has some spatial quality with the judicious use of reverb.

GJ

Thanks man. It's just something I threw together in 45 mins or so but after it beginning to feel lame I lost inspiration and so returned to this thread.

The drums are this Maxsynth 909 emulation.and that's how it sounds. Suppose there's no substitute for the real thing?

The strings are the TAL Uno LX V2 and couldn't locate my Reaktor Player Juno-60 one for some reason wasn't there (and it's as good as the TAL one really) but yeah, the strings are good but only 70% the way there, how do I get them to sound like this? -

YouTube
 
Well, comparing the two, yours are very “80s” sounding to my ear; synthy. But some of that could be in the performance and arrangement, not necessarily the sound itself.

They are very bright. But you could try an octave lower, or, use a different inversion of the chord to take some of the treble off of the patch (naturally, before EQing). You can also try layering different sounds and samples. Do you have an orchestral string sound? How about some Mellotron strings? Pipe organ mixed way back for some beef? Lots of tricks and options to try. The best, if it is available to you, is to get a real violinist or violist to overdub some live parts that you can mix in.

Again, experiment with reverb, delay, and panning to create a sense of space. If a string section played live on your track, would they be in your lap? Or would they sound better in a studio or concert hall with some ambience and reverberated quality? Maybe panned L to R but mixed back a bit? Oh, one more thing— on your ideal string example, I think I hear some slight flanging or phase-shifting; you could even try a Leslie emulator or some type of tremolo or doubling plug-in. Which brings up another point: being careful to avoid cancellation issues, you might copy that string track, mix one more to the left, the other more to the right, and delay/offset them a few clicks. This can thicken things up nicely, but don’t overdo it.


GJ
 
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Well, comparing the two, yours are very “80s” sounding to my ear; synthy. But some of that could be in the performance and arrangement, not necessarily the sound itself.

They are very bright. But you could try an octave lower, or, use a different inversion of the chord to take some of the treble off of the patch (naturally, before EQing). You can also try layering different sounds and samples. Do you have an orchestral string sound? How about some Mellotron strings? Pipe organ mixed way back for some beef? Lots of tricks and options to try. The best, if it is available to you, is to get a real violinist or violist to overdub some live parts that you can mix in.

Again, experiment with reverb, delay, and panning to create a sense of space. If a string section played live on your track, would they be in your lap? Or would they sound better in a studio or concert hall with some ambience and reverberated quality? Maybe panned L to R but mixed back a bit? Oh, one more thing— on your ideal string example, I think I hear some slight flanging or phase-shifting; you could even try a Leslie emulator or some type of tremolo or doubling plug-in. Which brings up another point: being careful to avoid cancellation issues, you might copy that string track, mix one more to the left, the other more to the right, and delay/offset them a few clicks. This can thicken things up nicely, but don’t overdo it.


GJ

Yeah got the strings sounding a lot nicer now, on a new track where I was tryna emulate the Science Lab track. Changed the patch to one I found on the Korg M1 and sounded nice being in a lower octave. The first 15 seconds is the original one then onto mine on the Korg M1.

Science Lab by creativemind75 | Free Listening on SoundCloud

I'm gonna hazard a guess here and just say it's the synth he was using on the track. I wouldn't be surprised if hardly any processing was applied. I've been listening to a lot of analogue synths lately on You Tube and they just sound bigger, warmer, smoother like the one in the track sounds, perhaps a little EQ before mastering perhaps but it would've been going through equipment adding to it, possibly a mixer too which may have added even more warmth or nice-ness. I don't think personally they were getting all that in depth with layering stuff on top of each other or that in depth with EQ if applied.

However, I listened to an SH-101 the other day and compared the raw sounds (square and saw) to the ones in TAL Bassline 101 and they were identical but after tweaking the parameters on the TAL they sounded good but not as good and thought, are they behaving as good as the real thing. If anyone has TAL Bassline 101 and can try and replicate was this guy does in the video, I'd be stoked.

YouTube
 
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There is processing there.


GJ

What, on Science Lab or the SH-101 clip? I know there's reverb and delay on the SH-101 clip. If you meant the Science Lab track, what d'you reckon, I think I can hear chorus and must be some EQ and possibly reverb, a gentle amount?

EDIT - What I meant though, yeah there would be processing but the patches were great to begin with.
 
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