New song: Aflecht - RoboPimp

The song and the lessons I learned

I wrote a new song. It's kind of electro-pop. Check the below youtube video to hear the song.

During the production I was surprised at how bad a singer I am. As you can hear, I don't seem to stay in tune even with heavy autotune processing :-( There are some nasty pitch glitches in the vocals. I would have used a proper singer but they are really hard to come by. I've tried hunting for singers for the past 4 years or so without notable results.

I also learned something useful during the production of this song:

If you arrange the lead melody/vocals with bass so that the bass gets the front stage once in awhile, it brings lots of personality into the song. Listen to the chorus part at 0:46 to hear this idea in action. The lead synth+vocals play through most of the chorus and immediately when they stop playing, the bass gets more aggressive, eating up more of the higher frequencies which were previously occupied by the synth+vocals playing the lead melody. Some people call this technique "play and respond" or "call and respond" like the instruments are having a conversation, taking turns. I have to experiment with this technique some more.

Gear Used

Eurorack modular

Moog Voyager RME

Sylenth1

Battery 3

Logic Pro 9

Glue

Elephant

EchoBoy

Distressor EL8-X

Shure SM7B

Millennia HV-3C

Lyrics

this ain't your day
fix up your face

fix up lips shoes
pushups hips boobs
handbag earrings
dried up nose bleed

makeup bruises
change your clothes and
get back there you
need to suck

don't you worry babe
they asked you by name hey
bring their money in yeah
flow their juices in ya

and smile when you meet them
they'll want you much more then
white stuff helps you get there
this will ease your pain yeah

bruised eyes and lips
didn't want you this
this ain't your day
fix up your face

My approach to writing music

I've come to realise that over time I've created strict rules and philosophy which I follow when working on a new song. I consider these rules to be mandatory for my work and decided to share them with other people. Maybe some readers get some nuggets of information which they can integrate into their own working methods.

So here we go...

COMPOSING & ARRANGEMENT

• A bad song with great production is still a bad song.
• The song is good when only the melody and bass are needed to extract an emotion from the listener.
• Every song needs a hook. It doesn't matter if the music is techno or rock.
• Start with the hook and expand from there since it's the hardest thing to get right.
• Song has to have more than one part in it and they have to have dynamics/contrast between them.
• A good song structure usually makes mediocre song parts sound great together.
• Keep it minimal: use as few instruments, sounds, song parts and notes as possible.
• Every instrument and sound effect has to have a clear purpose in your arrangement.
• Finish your song before you start the next one. Otherwise you'll run out of time and creativity and get nothing done.
• When you bring in another instrument in the song, always bring in or drop out at least a second one also: otherwise the overall change is too small and boring.

MIXING & MASTERING

• The most important part of mixing is the arrangement. If the mix sounds overcrowded: adjust the arrangement.
• To fill a space in the frequency spectrum, first see if you can tweak an existing instrument to do the job instead of adding a new one.
• Shit in, shit out. There is no "fixing it in the mix". Get it right at the source.
• Keep it minimal: the less processing your sounds have, the better they usually sound.
• Use as little reverb as possible: substitute it with delay to keep the mix clean.
• If every sound is in the background, nothing is in the background.
• To create the feeling of space, keep most of the instruments dry and add delay/reverb on only one or two instruments.
• Produce and mix your song on different days.

Blog audio links are now party up and running

Most links are now up and running, thanks to Reaktio.net who kindly offered me a new place to host my data.

Some audio examples are still down, but I intend to recreate them at some point.

Music links are down for awhile due to file hosting server crash

Filehosting server blew up, so all the music links are down for awhile. Hopefully this will be fixed soon.

New song: Aflecht - Again

A new song is ready once again. The melodies should be a female vocalist, but none were available for this song. If you know a good one which might fit this song, point her to my direction.

Alternative content

Download original MP3.

New song: Aflecht - Junkies

Alternative content

Download the MP3 version.

New song: Aflecht - Drive

This month's track is ready.

Alternative content

MP3 download.