Posts Tagged ‘Ableton tutorials’
10 newbie mistakes when writing in Ableton
10 Newbie mistakes in Ableton
Here are some common newbie mistakes people make when writing in Ableton. This isn’t all Ableton specific as some tips apply to music production in general. It also isn’t in any specific order and doesn’t necessarily assume to be the Top 10 of newbie mistakes. These are just some mistakes I’ve seen people make over the years and are certainly some mistakes I have made as well. If you are new to Ableton or cumputer music production, these should be of some assistance.
1. Assuming Ableton’s auto-warping will warp your songs perfectly :
This is a fairly common but huge mistake when working with Ableton. Although Ableton is excellent at warping loops without much trouble (as long as the loop is already seamless), a full song is a different animal altogether.
I suppose it can be pretty misleading to see an option called “Auto-warp” and wonder why your songs aren’t syncing up to tempo perfectly. While the auto-warp function does do a lot of the work for you, it’s your job to fine tune it so that every thing is 100% on. Learning this process is the single most important thing you need to master if you want to unleash 95% of Ableton’s true capabilities.
Here’s are a few videos to get you started.
For Ableton 8:
For previous versions of Ableton:
2. Recording parts on the same track in both arrange and session window:
A common mistake for people who are new to Ableton is assuming that the session window (the window with all the boxes for clips and scenes. Also home to the mixer) and the arrangement window (the window the most resembles other audio recording software) are separate entities.
For example you will have a clip on audio 1 in your session window but audio 1 in your arrange window is empty. If you are new to Ableton it is easy to assume that it’s fine to record on that track in the arrange window but that would be a big mistake. You will quickly find that one of your parts is no longer playing.This is simply because you have put 2 parts on the same track at the same time.
Once you understand how the session and arrange windows are intertwined, it will make complete sense what is happening. The simple rule to follow is:
1 instrument per track.
Think of each clip in a track (audio or midi) as representing what 1 instrument will be doing in different sections of your song. For example, one clip might be for the intro, the next for the verses, another for your bridge and another still for a chorus.
If you have ever programmed a drum machine, clips are similar to patterns on your drum machine. When you want to chain those patterns together to make your complete song, you would do that in the arrange window.
If you are recording something start to finish (like a full vocal take), you would also want to record in the arrange window. The important thing to remember is that at the end of the day, everything will need to go into the arrange window before you mixdown (render) your song. If you are arranging your instruments from loops or recording separate parts of your song to arrange later (like with drums) you would most benefit from starting in the session window and then chaining those parts together in the arrange window.
*As a sidenote, some would argue that you can do everything in the arrange window, and I wouldn’t disagree, but i’d suggest you learn the basics of both windows and then decide what works best for you.
Here is a video that might make the concept a little easier for you:
3. Too many loops or parts fighting for the same frequencies:
If you are building your songs with loops and samples, a common mistake is to think that the more loops you add, the more full and complex your song will sound. You are only half right though. It’s true that more layers can give your song more complexity and depth, but the downside is it can easily make your composition sound muddy, off pitch or just plain not right. Keep an eye on your fighting frequencies when choosing your loops. A good way to finding these conflicting frequencies is to use a spectrum analyser. Ableton 8 has one built right in, but if you are using an older version of Ableton, you can use one of this free plugin.
4. Not removing needless frequencies – Keeping on the subject of your EQ’s and frequencies, it’s really important to keep in mind what is the most important part of a an instrument and cut out the frequencies that aren’t needed. You won’t want 2 or 3 parts all playing a deep, heavy kick drum. You’ll need to choose which one has the best lows, and remove the low end from the other loops. Same with your hi frequencies. You’ll want to make sure your hihats are coming through clean by removing the highs from your othertracks. For snare and percussion in your mid frequencies, you may need to attenuate certain frequencies so that each part has it’s own space and doesn’t sound muddy. In most cases, you’ll find that popular music doesn’t have too much going on in any given frequency. Everything is balanced and that is what you want. The goal of this blog isn’t to tell you exactly how to dial in all of your EQ’s but rather to point you to where you should look if your songs aren’t sounding as good as you had hoped.
This video might give you the basic idea:
You can also read this Blog
5. Not arranging your songs in multiples of 4 :
Now I know that there are many other time signatures than 4/4 time but I just want to give some basic tips here for people struggling with producing songs. If you are struggling, it’s probably best that you learn to write in 4/4 timing before getting into complex time signatures.
That said, it’s very important in popular music and club music that you create your parts on multiple of 4 bars. For example, if you have a verse that goes 7 bars instead of 8 and then you jump into a chorus, it’s most likely going to sound all wrong. This multiple of 4 predictability in music seems very natural. Don’t try to get too tricky until you’ve successfully got this down. Once you know how things are “supposed” to sound, you can tweak the timing to create more tension successfully.
6. Doing your songwriting and sound design in the same session:
I’ve written a whole blog on this subject if you want to get deeper into this, but basically, you don’t want to be fumbling around trying to get THAT sound when you have a melody or bassline in your head. In the time it takes to create this amazing sound in your head, you will likely have lost the original idea that inspired you. It’s best to work fast with a template of sounds or presets that you have found to work for you and touch things up after the rough idea is saved.
7. Adding parts to compensate for bad sounding parts:
Each part in your song should be able to stand on it’s own. It shouldn’t sound crappy when you solo it. Of course I know that sometimes it takes a couple layers to get that certain Bass sound. It’s totally ok and even encouraged to layer your sounds but at the end of the day those sounds need to all stand together as 1 Bass or 1 Stab sound or whatever.
If you find yourself adding melody on top of melody in an attempt to make something sound “right”, you might be better off redoing your melody.
Make sure your drums, bass, pads, melodies and vocals all sound great on their own. You aren’t going to make good tracks by burying so-so parts deep in your mix. If you can break your song down to 6-8 elements, it will keep you focused on if you are adding too much stuff. You may end up with 40+ tracks in your song, but you definitely don’t want all those elements playing at the same time.
If you have 3 different melodies, you should only have one out front at any given time. Even complex songs should come across sounding fairly simple and there should be empty space between the parts. Put on a CD and listen to how many elements are going on at any given time. Notice how each sound has it’s space to come across clearly.
The less you have going on in your song, the bigger each sound is able to be. That’s why with a 3 piece band like Nirvana, each instrument can sound so big.
Regardless of the style of music, we are all limited to a certain frequency range. When you have parts fighting for the same frequency, both parts are bound to have to sacrifice something in order to fit into the mix.
Another way to look at building a song is to ask “What frequency am I going to fill in now?”, then you want to use a spectrum analyzer to find what works in that range. If you have 2 parts you like but they are taking up the same frequencies, perhaps you can take one up or down and octave so it has it’s own range. Once you have filled up your full spectrum you can see how strong each element is before adding any extra layers.
8. Too many options:
Having too many choices with instruments and plugin’s without having made yourself a “go to” collection can become a huge time and energy waster. It’s far better to have a few “go to” plugin’s and instruments that you know really well than it is to have 100′s that you aren’t familiar with. Using unfamiliar software can really slow you down and give you below par results.
Find 4 or 5 synths (or even less), 2 compressors, 2 or 3 reverbs, a couple delays etc.. Then take some time to find out what each one is really good at and build some “go to” presets. This will make things much easy and you’ll be getting the sound you are looking for much more quickly.
It’s fine to have lots of plugins in your arsenal but it’s best to find out what each one does before you start your songwriting process. Believe me when I say that I am writing this for myself as much as for you!
Before the days of free plugin’s and fast computers, we pretty much had to make due with whatever equipment we had. Given those limitations, it’s easiest to get to the process of making music instead of trying to fiddle with every toy in the toy store.
Another thing that you’ll find is that when you get comfortable using certain equipment, those limitations become your sound and gives you some consistency. Get your “go to” collection started asap.
9. Not making a template:
Templates are a saving grace when it comes to songwriting. When you have a setup that works with your favorite effects settings or your send/returns, drumkits, synths etc take the time to save it as a template songfile or to drag it to your presets for later use. This will save you loads of time trying to figure out how to get that certain sound you had before.
Fumbling through presets and setup takes time and can easily distract you from your goal: To get your ideas down while you are inspired.
Templates give you a basic setup with all your “go to” stuff included. You can even make different templates for different styles of music. Having several options will allow you to be ready to go regardless of what creative mood you are in.
10. Using low quality samples:
Using low quality samples with the intention to “fix it in the mix” is another big mistake. Now I’m all for lo-if and I’ve been known to use less than optimal quality sounds to great effect, but you need to make sure it works for your track and that you aren’t building your track off a bunch of lo quality sounds.
If you have to doctor it up with tons of effects and eq to make it sound decent, you should probably use a higher quality sound that has most of the tone you are looking for from the get go. For example, a kick drum that doesn’t have good low end from the start is never going to sound deep,punchy and professional.
Using a lower quality sound might not seem like it will make a noticeable difference, but just wait until you have a whole song full of these sounds and the overall quality will become pretty apparent to you.
Using mp3 quality is something I wouldn’t recommend. Generally speaking 16bit 44.1 should be the minimum you accept. If your computer can handle 24 bit recording at 96kbps you will likely hear a difference, just keep an eye on your hard drive usage. I personally stick to 16bit for most of my work and I get good results.
I hope this has been helpful for you. Feel free to email me your newbie mistakes and I’ll consider updating this Blog to perhaps 15 newbie mistakes.
Happy music making,
Jason
P.S. – Don’t forget to comment & tweet (down below) & “like” (up above).
All your feedback & support is appreciated!
Control Ableton with this cool Iphone ap!
*This post will likely only interest Ableton users who have an Iphone and work on a PC (or Bootcamp/Parallels).
Here is a custom controller I have made to control many of Ableton’s features with my Iphone. Although it isn’t an “end all” solution, it definitely makes things go faster and much more conveniently whether you are producing at home or DJ’ing. As long as you have a wi-fi signal to connect to, you’re golden.
Here is what you will want to do to get started.
1. Go to your Iphone AP store, purchase and install Snatch Remote (don’t worry, it’s only $4 and if you don’t like my custom controller, you cn pretty easily make your own).
2. Download and install snatchtrackpad & remote onto your computer at this link http://www.hoofien.com/Snatch/
3. Open up Snatch on your computer, and then your Iphone
4. enter the server/password info into the setting on Snatch inside your Iphone
5. Download and unrar my Snatch remote files at this link http://www.musicsoftwaretraining.com/share/snatch.rar
6. In Snatch on your Iphone, hit “Keys” tab, then “Edit” then “load screen”
7. a window will pop up on your computer, choose the first Snatch file, confirm on your Iphone and hit “done”
8. On your Iphone, swipe from right to left to get another blank screen and repeat steps 6 and 7.
9. Watch the video below and make sure to assign your 1,2,3,8,9 & 0 keys to the correct locations.
Enjoy!
I look forward to our community sharing further tweaks and custom controls.
Happy Music Making,
Jason
Follow me: http://twitter.com/AbletonVids
Website: http://www.musicsoftwaretraining.com
Is technical talent truly inspiring?
Is technical talent truly inspiring?
I watched a live performance of Shadowplay by Joy Division from 1978 on Youtube the other day. The performance was raw, the playing was amateur and the vocals were out of key and..
it was still amazing.
I proceeded to read the comments below and was pleasantly surprised that 90% of the comments were also praising the performance. Only one person mentioned the lack of technical skill and everybody jumped down his throat.
Then of course everyone was dogging the Cover version of this song by The Killers basically calling them a bunch of hacks. Now technically speaking, The Killers version could easily be considered better. It was sonically recorded and mixed better, the instruments were well played and the vocals were on key.. but nobody cared. Now I’m not here to say The Killers are shit, but rather I want to explore why bands like Joy Division, Bauhaus and The Cure are practically worshipped despite their lack of what some would call musicianship.
Why are bands like these so well respected despite(or perhaps even because of) a lack of technical talent? What is that magic formula? Why is it that we excuse their lack of technical talent and in fact rate them much higher than bands that clearly have better musicianship?
Some of you reading this will simply say these bands are completely over-rated or popular for being popular in the underground. I’m going to have to say that I believe there is more to it and I would like to explore this a bit deeper.
Being a proud non-musician myself, I enjoy the idea of mucking about on an instrument like a curious child. If I already felt I knew everything there was to know, I probably wouldn’t be very interested in making music. I suppose what I do mocks people that slave over their instrument of choice, but I don’t think that is the whole picture. I, in fact, have slaved over music, but the things I am interested in are how to convey a vibe.
Sometimes pure talent shows little humanity.
Often times talent is something you hide behind. Nakedness and vulnerability can evoke much more emotion. I personally think it takes bravery to stand up on a stage with little but a handful of chords and some ideas that you want to get across.
Don’t get me wrong, there are times when you need talent to convey a complex idea and those are amazing moments, but those moments are not driven by the desire to “show off” talent but rather to get across your message as accurately as possible.
There is also something to be said about having pent up emotion and being a bit frustrated that you can’t express it accurately. I think I can hear this in bands like Nirvana and Joy Division. Those bands were very vulnerable and spoke for so many who were afraid to speak for themselves. Those who were afraid of their own normality. We can see ourselves in those who show themselves, warts and all.
It might be safe to say that those who are true fans of music don’t base what is good on pure talent but rather on how the music hits them whether it be Mozart, The Who or Velvet Underground. I think it’s likely that “musicians” might get off on complexity for complexities sake because having the skill to learn it can be an ego boost in the same way as mastering a difficult video game. However, music is in a completely different field altogether. Some of the best music defies logic. Sometimes the words are nonsense and the simple parts that construct the song is laughable yet we still find something intriguing about it.
I like to think that there is more that goes into music than just the instruments and vocals. I think there is something that gets recorded between the notes that weaves through the empty gaps. A sort of “ghost in the machine”. I believe emotion and intention comes through the music and those subtleties are picked up by those who really “listen” and “feel” the music.
Although all of my examples in this blog are talking about live bands, I think the same “ghosts” can come through in electronic music as well. All instruments whether played by hand or programmed are soul-less until the soul is injected into it.
I am beginning to get into another tangent, so I will simply leave you with this Joy Division video. I hope it intrigues you to reconfirm or re-evaluate your attitude towards music and the shallow definitions of talent.
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Happy Music Making
Jason
P.S. – Don’t forget to comment & tweet (down below) & “like” (up above).
All your feedback & support is appreciated!
Best of Twitter Video Posts
Best of Ableton Twitter Video Posts
Over the last couple of months I have found Twitter to be a really great tool for sharing ideas with likeminded people. I’ve learned a few great tricks and I wanted to pass this on to all of you.
If you would like to follow my “Tweets”
follow me here: http://twitter.com/AbletonVids
These are some of my favorite Video posts over the last couple weeks regarding Ableton
Hope you enjoy these!
Jason
P.S. – Don’t forget to comment & tweet (down below) & “like” (up above).
All your feedback & support is appreciated!
Dennis DeSantis makes a song in Ableton:
Misuse of Ableton’s Frequency filter:
http://www.channels.com/episodes/6710914
Follow Dennis: http://twitter.com/dennisdesantis
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WinkSound.com has a wide variety of video tutorials (Including some of mine) on their site. I’m not sure if they have any content that they make themselves, but it’s a great portal if you are looking for a specific tutorial.
These are a few that caught my attention:
Turn samples and ambient recordings into instruments using Ableton
Live: http://tinyurl.com/dc2wle
A video tip to help with your Ableton Live workflow.
One of the “Whoda Funk” guys (Shiny Disco Balls) give you some tips:
http://winksound.com/video/House-Music-Production-Tutorial
Creating a basic sound with filter enveloping & stereo spread in Ableton
Remove feedback from sound system -
http://winksound.com/video/Ringing-Out-Feedback-from-a-PA
NFX explains the importance of understanding Scales.
Follow WinkSound: http://twitter.com/WinkSound
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Here are a couple from my favorite tutorial making Sound Designer Nick Maxwell. I suggest you go to his website and look at his free videos. Really great for Drum Racks and Sampler users.
Follow Nick: http://twitter.com/NicksTutorials
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This is another Ableton 8 Misuse video from Dennis Desantis regarding Groove extraction. This was posted on the CDM site (Look 4 videos down)
Follow CDMblogs: http://twitter.com/cdmblogs
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Lastly these are some of my favorite videos at the moment. Gustavo Bravetti is really a “next generation” DJ who is using Ableton and a bunch of other technology to take his DJ set to another level. He also takes the time to make tutorial videos that drastically simplifies the process of making electronic music. I will likely be making a more detailed set of videos diving deeper into his techniques.
http://www.dancetracksdigital.com/wp/?p=553
http://createdigitalmusic.com/tag/gustavo-bravetti/
Follow Gustavo: http://twitter.com/gustavobravetti
Happy Music Making,
Jason
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