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JizzMan wrote:you heard this Prodigy beat wub?

nowaysj wrote:Hey wub, where is your music career at? What is going on? With production, with dj'ing?

You're one scarily methodical person, what is the master plan?

Mainly stolen from computer music see issue numbers after titles in block capitals






TOTAL DRUMS 110

Build good collection of sounds
Tune up drums
Pitch up for dance
Pit5ch down for urban
For electronic styles make sure sample stops when key released
For real drums play whole sample
Play drums on pads don’t program them (take best bars)
Lay down basic beat and then play other patterns over the top
Use quantisation to add little skip use 3/16 and set it to 35%
Can quantise bass to fit or just quantise some drum sounds
Move drum hits slightly before or after their original position
Use humanise function
Check out beats you like by slowing them down and analysing them
Save good drum parts you program as a midi file
Panning is good way to get exciting stereo drums
EQ off parts of sounds you don’t need
In hip hop make patterns simple don’t clutter loop
Layer real kicks with synthetic kick on separate channels for processing
Some tracks don’t have kicks just toms
Experiment with different drum sample lengths
Dance drums tend to be tight
Use reversed sounds
Use amplitude envelopes to make a tack pump
In real bands everyone plays slightly behind the drummer, so put drums slightly forward and other sounds slightly back
Real drums use lots of grace notes and fills
Use reverb on some parts, use it sparingly
Layer, layer, layer good drums are often layered
Compress kicks and snares set attack to 3-6 ms then raising the ratio and lower the threshold will accentuate the kick
EQ drums, but cut first before you boost
Boosting at high frequency or use exciter can help sounds cut through

MAKE DRUMS SOUND REAL 108

Crash usually accompanied by kick
Only play 4 sounds at once
Kits usually 4-5 drums, 3 cymbals and one hi hat
Drums should not detract from song
Fills are usually before chorus kicks in
Start with simple beat with crash at start of every 4 bars
Put in rolls, use flam's and shuffle
Try not to put to many fx on drums keep it simple
Use groove quantise
Use relevant kits for the genre you are in

MAKING BREAKS 89

Use original breaks as a template for placing new drum samples to make new breaks
Use EQ to match frequency spectrum of old breaks to make them sound similar through EQing (Voxengo Curve EQ can do this)

LATIN PERCUSSION 83&84

Uses metal bells, wooden blocks, shakers and gourds as underlying rhythm and then you have solo drum played by master drummer.
Congas are used mainly with there being open tones and slap notes and subtle hits in between notes.
Congas consist of tumba (low), Conga (mid) and quinto (high) with quinto being the lead drum.
Rhythmic pulse is usually the clave playing 2 beats in first bar and then three in second or vice versa. The clave sets the rhythmic pattern everyone follows.
Beyond these two parts you could have a cowbell pattern, a straight bongo pattern and a timbale part.
The timbales mostly play a cascara pattern which is played by hitting the sides of the metal shells with sticks and sometimes moving to cowbell in the centre and a few hits on the drumheads and the odd cymbal crash.
The bongos, timbales and congas then solo on turn over the top.
Basic concept behind Latin percussion:
Drummers playing together and wanting some freedom to improvise without it turning into a mess.
In practice this can mean that in the first bar the first 3 beats are straight and beat 4 is where improvisation happens. Beats 1-3 are muted tones and beat 4is open tones. In a phrase of say 4 bars beat 4 will always be the improvised bit albeit slightly changed. Sometimes the variation section can be at a different section of the bar i.e. beat 2.
When layering drum patterns ensure that each pattern has a different point where it has prominent notes. So although mainly in 16th note patterns regularly have differing prominent notes i.e. high congas on beat 3 of the bar, bongos on beat 4 etc.
Clave patterns are usually on 3:2 or 2:3 patterns.
3:2 pattern is on 1st beat 2.5 and 4 and then 2 and 3 in second bar.
Cowbell patterns are relatively simple.
Maracas patterns are also quite simple.
Bongos also use finger strokes and touches as well as accents to make parts sound effective.
Congas use heel tip, and slap and open tones on patterns to make them sound real.
Timbales are hard to program better to use sampled phrases.

Often percussion grooves have a distinct feel to them which can be hard to master.
Overcome this by taking groove templates from original loop and applying them to your programmed parts.

PROCESSING LOOPS 76

Reverse reverb a part add 100% wet signal and export reverb calling it forward reverb.
Reverse the sample and record reverb from that then calling it backward reverb.
Then import the loops and arrange them so that backward reverb moves into original sample and forward reverb moves out of sample.

Use squareomatic to add distortion to loops or scream 4.

Make own phasing affects by displacing a sample in the sample editor and adding its copy to the sample.

Encode loops to mp3 low bit rate 16kbps and then convert back to normal sample rate you use.

Snaking breakbeats: add flanger not synced to tempo export as a wav and then cut up and rearrange into new loops. Reversed sections sound good to.

Rhythmic pads: stick them through a vocoder and make sure that none of the original beat comes through, set bandwidth settings as high as possible to let beat cut the sound as much as possible. Stick a delay on at the end to get sound world effects.

Add sensual vibe: route through low pass filter, low resonance level, cut-off should cut through loop but not too much. Route sound through reasonably quick delay i.e.3/16 and add bit of reverb. Then automate the filters lfo speed sticking between 0 and 4 Hz. Add to guitar and electric pianos.

100% wetness: set reverb up on percussion part and set to 100% wet and then adjust so not to muddy then export add distortion and compression and then play along with original loop but only using parts of it slightly.

Percussion torture: Send loop through gate turn gates attack, hold and release settings right down so beat starts to creak and strain. Put through compressor with attack and release right down then experiment with threshold setting to hear range of sounds available. Now slap on reverb with nice big sound.

Dub FX: Need feedback delay plug in such as echomania, stick loop through it then reverb and automate between dry and wet.

Ping Pong beats: Send through reverb small room, run through delay synced to tempo 1/32,then route through compressor attack and release as low as possible and then adjust threshold to level when beats cuts through again. Alternate between this and original beat and fiddle with delay times to get different fills.

PROGRAMMING BASS AND DRUMS:

Drums:
Sometimes you can leave them out or have very simple phrases happening in different parts of the song.
A percussion arrangement that slowly builds in intensity and instrumentation can add drama to a song.
Bass:
Less is often more, needs to fit the song sometimes just one note is all that is needed.
Where a bass note is placed is as important as what note it is.
Bass players play slightly into the beat and slightly behind it depending on style, but not to far as can make to slow or fast. You need to get the feel right.
Basic roles for bass are to identify the chord being played, play something which grooves with the drummer and doesn’t get in the way of the vocal.

HOUSE

Drums are built on 4/4 structure.
Drums bought in every 4 bar in 4 bar sections.

Bass decided by chord sequence but rhythm must fit in with the drum parts.
Popular approach to bassline writing is the off beat bassline where bass and drums alternate. These works well musically and when mixing as bass drum and bass occupy same frequency. Can be boring if used throughout track need to vary a bit at points in track

House drums in reason:

Set shuffle to 26 this delays every other 16th step in pattern.
Kick on every beat.
Layered snare and clap on beats 2 and 4 at medium velocity
Tom on 1 and 7 medium 4 and 15 soft
Shaker soft hits on1, 5,9,13
Hi hat medium hits on 2,8,16
Open hi hat medium hits on 3,7,11,15 and soft on 16
Run through scream compression P1 = 104 P2 = 76 damage 26
Run toms and bass through separate channels.

Bass:
Add subtractor and select lately bass, route through matrix and draw in pattern on 2 – 3 – 5 – 8 – 11 – 15
Put through delay and set feedback to 0 and dry/wet balance to 12
Then copy to tracks for 32 bars.

POP & RNB

POP:

Pop drums are usually non assuming drums set to basic patterns.
Kicks vary in positions.
Snares stay on 2 and 4
Simple eight note hi hat patterns.
Use simple kick and snare fills.

Bass uses ascending and descending notes within an octave.
Then uses sections where plays the same pattern on one note and then is transposed up on each bar.
Heavily compress the bass and drums.

RNB:

RnB drums are usually huge booming kick, tight snare, and a bass which sits well low in the mix. In RnB it’s the kick which gets busy, leaving the snare to do regular stuff. This leaves the kick and bass to do some funky syncopated patterns.

Start with tight groove.
Let second half of each bar lag so kick lands on off beats.
Kick on 1 – 3 – 11 – 13 – 12 Snare on 5 – 13
Kick on 1- 3 – 11- 14 Snare on just 5
Add simple eighth note pattern with emphasis on all four beats.

Bassline mirrors snare and kick pattern with different pitches for snare position.
Leave every other bar clear makes room for vocals and other instruments to come in intro.
When bassline fully comes in fill empty bars with more sustained notes to give overall rhythm a sense of space.
At end of sections have a combined fill whereby bass follows drums.

ROCK:

Usually around 96 bpm.
Need real drum samples.
Kicks have long deep tail and clicky front to them, but finding one that hits hard at the chest works better.
Snares are high pitched, often a piccolo snare.
Hats are varied and stop abruptly when played together.
Ride cymbals are used to carry chorus.
Crash cymbals to signify changes.

Classic one kick snare two kick snare pattern with some extra snares and some off beat kicks.
Hats are monophonic, would not hear an open hat over a closed hat.
Usually eighth notes used with slashy sounding closed hats that open more and more as you get to the chorus.
Open hats are often placed every ¼ notes.
Ride cymbals (usually used for choruses) eighth note placed with first one of bar loud and next a lot lower to emphasise start.
Crash usually introduces chorus.
Crashes can get more frequent in later choruses.
Fills are used to lead into sections, usually this involves snares and tom and a few extra kicks.

Bass is usually pumping 8th notes playing as much of the same note as possible, interspersed with the odd fill.
Good real bass sound is needed and then put through amp distortion plug in.
Use velocity layering to get mute sounds full sounds, this gives accents and dynamics.
Program basses by playing live usually just playing 8th notes and use fills.
Chorus needs to up the ante so have some 16th fills at the start leading in and ending with some off beat eighths and some pitch bend.

HIP HOP

The main thing to remember about programming hip hop is to no quantise everything and keep to a minimal bassline. If it feels good then leave it.

Drums:

Rock sold fairly minimal groove often with big fat hi hat on the eights.
Kick and open hat on every beat and clap on beats 2 and 4, hats made a little late to give a slack feel.
Effect sounds with distortion, EQ and compression.
Place tambourine on beat 4 of every bar and crash placed at start of every 5th bar.

Use a loop and layer drum sound over the top. Keep hits dead on beat and let loop give the groove.

Bass:

Play simple basslines and record them in by hand, do not quantise.
Put limiters on it to get loudest possible sound and layer up sounds.

MAKING BREAKS PART 1: 72

When taking hits from breaks try to avoid kick drums with hats and rides over the top, try to get all parts clean.

Need to use compression and distortion on breaks to make them sound beefy.
Subtlety plays an important part with Ghost notes being the key to adding complexity.
If track is good and bass heavy then may not need ghost notes. Ghost snares nearly always needed for realistic rhythms.
The interplay between ghost snares and hi hats gives you that chicka chicka shuffle.
Try this technique of over sounds and grooves and in different places.


To keep parts from going stale make small change like delaying certain hits by a beat and bringing in and chopping out extra hi hat and ride parts can work a treat.

Turn off quantisation and move hits backwards or forwards a bit.
Extract grooves from breaks and use them on your own loops, don't make it too sloppy as it won't be able to be mixed.

To make breaks fat:
Compress breaks using fast compression i.e. short attack and release times.
Adjust threshold to -21db and whack up gain to 9db.
Add overdrive plug in before dynamics (scream 4) and increase bass, mid and high by 0db, 2.5db and 1 db respectively.
Place reverb as a send effect and effect separate drums accordingly.
Can add a limiter to make it grittier.
EQ each drum channel separately to get sound you want

Tricks:
For tough drum fills map a snare sound across a few semitones and use it like you would a regular pitched instrument.
Play break an octave down for huge slow motion fill this will invigorate your break when it returns with extra energy.
Render your break then pitch shift it an octave while retaining its tempo then pitch shift to different keys to use as percussion fills and cal and response sections.
Use velocity to get delay style effects on repeated notes.
Reverse beats take break add reverse reverb/echo and then render it and reverse it. This will give you sucking effects when played back and can be added to the original break to create variations on the beat.
Use a big reverb and turn it on when you a particularly devastating fill that disorientate the listener. Same can be done with feedback delay in a dub style, make sure its tempo synced though.

5 top breaks Bob James – Take me to the Mardi Gras, Commodores – Assembly Line, Led Zeppelin – When the Levee Breaks, Kool and the Gang – NT, Bobby Byrd – Hot Pants.

Website http://www.the-breaks.com

AND THE BEAT GOES ON 35

Need good drum track programmed initially.
Important to add plenty of changes so as not to bore listener.
Easiest is to remove fist kick drum, so loop starts on different sound, when done between two loops this can give a new edge to loop giving it a more subtle feel.
Reverse a hit in loop, though not to often.
Add a reverse reverb to one hit of the break, usually the snare (try 6ms pre delay)
Apply extreme amounts of compression around 10:1 this will make loop sound more powerful than it is.
Use an EQ and record yourself fiddling with it live.
Gentle EQ movements can produce interesting variations on a rhythm.
Take into account the frequencies that need to be left for rest of the instruments.
Try applying changes to 100Hz, 250Hz, 800Hz and 12 KHz areas.
Steinberg magneto is great for adding warmth to a loop.
Delays and noise gates can add more movement.
Try delay of 3ms with a gate to cut delay tails to thicken up loop.
Reverse loop add delay and then play the right away around and gate it again, can make loops sound more complex.
Use Northpole free from Prosoniq.com close filter to 50% and push up resonance and delay controls.
Using a chorus sparingly with a noise gate can help widen drum tracks image and give it more life. Any chorus applied should be subtle try a low frequency around 200 Hz with a 4ms delay as a starting point.
Use reverb on sounds, try large amount of reverb with a very short pre delay.
This adds the impression of a loud and powerful drum loop with a surreal sense of space.
Vocoders can be good, but bit clichéd now, try settings of 50/50 mix but go higher if you want, be careful not to lose dynamic edge of loop though.
Distortion and overdrive can add interest if added just to kick, snare or hi hats. Try to avoid whole loops as they can add extra harmonics to the sound which occupy the 300 Hz to 800 Hz region which are known as irrational frequencies, try cutting these areas with EQ if it’s a problem.
Use automation to open filters, resonance etc over the loop or to affect single hits like having a filter go on and off on the kick or snare, be careful to only have slight movement on filter as you don’t want to cut sound out completely.
Modulate the pitch of a snare throughout a track to create complex sounding rhythms, pitch only needs slight modulation and should be used infrequently throughout the loop, sounds like you are using lots of different snares.
On single hits try using filters to boost resonance on hi hats to make them brighter and use cut-off to reduce harmonics in the kick drum.
Try changing the amp envelope of every drum particularly the attack and release settings. Using a long attack on snare sounds can give rise to a strange sweeping effect which if used sparingly can be very effective.
Adjusting release settings can create strange loops, don’t do it on the kick as it will ruin its impact. Aim to adjust release of snares, hi hats and percussion.
Automate filter to sweep the entire drum track so that it slowly sweeps in the drums.

Reason:

Connect matrix sequencer note to the drum channel with the snare on then you can draw in snares of different pitch, this gives a different pitch for each snare hit and can be useful for doing drum rolls. By slightly pitching each snare up the roll become more complex and results in a more exciting build up to next part of track.
For hi hats connect the matrix curve to the hi hat pattern and draw in a curve to give sweeping pitch movement throughout hi hat part.
Reasons effects can be used to excite beats. Reverb can be added to create space in the rhythm. Use the CV out from the matrix to automate the frequency of a phaser by inserting it into the frequency input. If you then send the hi hats to the phaser via the mixing desk you can create sub rhythms that phase in and out of the main rhythm.
Try having a number of drum machines going each holding different pitched sounds, you can then create complex rhythms which can be EQ’d live to produce interesting combinations or be controlled with matrix sequencers.
A cool trick is to open two instances of redrum and load same samples into both then change the level, pan and velocity of the hi hat section and alternate between the two while feeding into a matrix controlled phaser. This spreads the hi hats across a stereo field in a strange and absorbing way.

Sample distortion: Try resampling at a lower resolution such as 8bit. Or feed the loop out of the computer into an old tape player and record it again and then send it out again, keep doing this until it's degraded to the level you want. Do the same but record the loop directly from the speakers using a cheap mic.

Mixing effected sounds:
Best to mangle loops while they are playing along with the rest of the track so you can make it fit. Ears can grow used to an effect quickly, meaning you can go overboard quickly and apply to much. If you find an effect you like save it immediately and move one and try a different one. Keep muting the effect to see what it is doing to the loop. If applying heavy or experimental effects better to cut up loops into hits, so you can effect each sound separately. Often its kicks that set the rhythm so sometimes best to effect the other parts. The most immediate part of the rhythm is the snare and effecting just this can produce exciting variations on a theme, especially when using a variety of effects and reversing. Don’t whack 100% effect on to all sounds experiment with different settings. When applying an effect to a loop if it is taken away its immediately noticeable but when its there it's difficult to tell the effect is there.

Mixing down effected loops:
Need to compress and EQ loops. Start by setting up the compressor threshold on the effected sound, by turning it up or down until the signal begins to register, and then compress the sound as you see fit. No fixed settings. For the kick can try a ratio of 6-7.1 with zero attack and release. For snare around 4.1 with zero attack and release. For percussion should not need heavy compression just enough to limit signal and prevent it going into the red, unless you want it distorted try starting at 3.1.

To EQ, apply cuts to low, mid and high to it fits. EQ settings will depend on the effect you have applied. You should work to remove most of the frequencies around 300-800 Hz area. Too much level here will distort the signal and result in a muddy mix. Distortion will need a more severe cut as it adds a high number of harmonics, especially around the 2Khz, 6Khz and 8Khz ranges and even 12Khz range if applied to hi hats. When using effects with a tail it is essential that you use a gate to shorten them as they will muddy the mix.

BEAT THIS 11:

Drum programming basics:

Listen to loops you like and notice where the kicks and snare are.
Kick should be following bassline to a degree.
Hi hats can be accented on the beat or off it or at irregular intervals. Try breaking up the pattern into something more syncopated or skipping the beat using groove quantise.
Hi hats are often replaced by rides for the chorus or anywhere where the part needs shifting without altering the pattern of the track.
Crash cymbals are for accenting, usually on a downbeat or a fill, although interesting patterns can be had by reversing crash cymbals or sequencing fast 16th note patterns.
Toms are most applicable to fills and be used as an offbeat accompaniment to the snare.
Get drum tracks simple unless you want them complicated.
Play same patterns using different kits to get variation.

Tips:

Decide whether to produce realistic patterns or synthetic.
To get snares and toms to sound natural vary dynamics of beat, particularly the opening beats.
Often certain patterns are instrument specific, but can be good to vary.
Break up patterns with fills; classically they contain toms and link verses and choruses.
Create different endings of drum sequences by letting loop play first beat of bar then stopping.
Accent hi hat patterns.
Use different samples for hi hat patterns such as sticks, shakers etc.
Some accented beats have greater impact if programmed as flams, particularly the snare.
If programming accented beats on the cymbals use the bell sample as it cuts through.
Move bass and snare slightly ahead or behind the beat to get more urgent/relaxed feel, don’t overdo it though.
Use different kits for different parts of the song.
Add delays to drums using tempo sync, best tempos are triplet delays, using instruments such as marimbas and other dry percussion sounds can build up complex multi layered patterns.
Use distortion to dirty up individual sound or loops.
Sample drum sounds at lower resolution to get grainy sound.
If you like reverb on the kit but it is swamping the sound use a gated reverb programme.
Use different reverbs for different drum sounds.
Use different snares in pattern, ones with long and short (for fills) decay.
Go easy on crash cymbals and toms; try using china or splash cymbal instead of crash.
If you want patterns to sound like everyone else use 808 and 909 kits if not then don’t.
Don’t over quantise, only quantise enough to get rid of glaring mistakes.
Try extracting grooves from different parts to quantise drum loops.
Use recycles to cut up breaks.
If writing jazz parts use jazz drums such as ride cymbals instead of hi hats, brush snares etc.
Transpose midi notes to get patterns playing different sounds.
Drums and bass lock in together in most tracks, use loose bass over tight drums or vice versa.
Learn importance of tempo many patterns are the same just played at different tempos.
Take into account drum lengths and tempo as long drum sounds will clutter high tempo music.
Change the levels of the drum sounds throughout track to get different feels.
Play drum sounds backwards.
To make a roll program 16th or 32nd notes in and draw a velocity slope upwards, since this sounds synthetic use a synthetic snare sound.
To make a pattern more interesting take occasional snare and change to a different sound, like rim shot or side stick, anything really.
Try layering drum tracks.
Successful rhythm programming is as much about what you leave out as a busy drum track leaves little space for other sounds.
Use non percussive sounds in your drum tracks such as vocal hits, found sound,
anything.
Try adding extra deep sub bass booms to your patterns especially for drum n bass and trip hop. Generally the purer the waveforms the better, sine waves are usually best.
Compress drum loops.
If writing drum n bass out go the toms, all the percussion instruments, claps, cowbells and the like and in comes the short duration kicks and snares, hi hats, side sticks and cymbals. Get the tightest sounds you can.
Don’t neglect panning your kit should be evenly spread from left to right with kick in the middle.
Also see midi patterns in this section there are Latin, jazz, ambient, dramatic effects and ethnic.

PROGRAMMING OLD SKOOL DRUM N BASS GROOVES 79

Set tempo to 174bpm.
Snare needs to tight and snappy.
Pitch up sounds 3 semitones as this simulates unavoidable pitch speeding up of old samplers.

Basic pattern 1:
Kick 1 – 3 – 11 – 12
Snare 5 – 7 – 8 – 10 – 13
Ride every 8th

Basic pattern 2:
Kick 1 – 3 – 11
Snare 5 – 7 – 8 – 14
Ride every 8th

Basic pattern 3:
Kick 10
Snare 1 – 3 – 4 – 5 – 6 – 9 – 13
Ride every 8th

To make this into a 4 bar loop copy pattern 1twice then add pattern 2 & 3.
Set tempo to 140 and this is a basic amen pattern with none of the feel.

In bar 1 lower the velocity of the second snare and play about with other snare velocities to get some feel. Lower the pitch of the second snare hit to mimic a drum being hit less hard. Repeat in bar 2 and lower the velocity of the third kick drum hit and play around with the other kicks velocities. Apply groove quantise or move hits around slightly to add feel. Increase tempo to 174bpm.

Draw in snare fills which raises in pitch at 13 – 14 – 15 – 16 of bar 1 do same in bar 2 but go down in pitch.

Add some grunge using cubase grungliser or distortion unit.

USE GOOD SAMPLES

Reverse reverb a part add 100% wet signal and export reverb calling it forward reverb.
Reverse the sample and record reverb from that then calling it backward reverb.
Then import the loops and arrange them so that backward reverb moves into original sample and forward reverb moves out of sample.

nowaysj wrote:Wub, what is your religeous background, or the religious background of your family? C of E, Catholic?

nowaysj wrote:Parents were 100% not religious?

fragments wrote:Stoked for the Ed Rush & Optical one though.

I have owned (and still do mostly) as best as I can remember:

Mackie 32/8 32 channel - (I have had 3 altogether), 3 x Emu E6400 Ultra (also E6400 orig), Akai S750, S900, S1100, S3000 samplers, Alesis Quadraverb, Focusrite Green Eq x2, Focusrite Green Compressor, Focusrite ISA430 Producer Pack, Lexicon Alex, Lexicon MPX1, Alesis MidiVerb4, TC Electronics Fireworx, TC Electronics Finalizer, Joe Meek VC1, Drawmer MX40, Sherman Filterbank, CryBaby Wah Pedal Boss Pedals - Too many, Novation Basstation, OSCar, Sequential Circuits Pro1, Prophet 5, Wurlitzer, PPG Wave 2.1, Neumann TLM 105, Fender Strat 1972, Oberheim/Viscount GM1000, Korg Z1, Kawai K1r, Otari Status 16R Mixing Console with Eagle Automation. BSS DPR-402 Compressor.

I have not managed to completely re-create a 100% comparable result using the same samples from and old track in a DAW, but of course I have found ways to get something that has at least as much power and tone, I just have to think in a different space from before...a Daw has way more response to very low frequencies below 40HZ, most analogue would roll off at this range and so bass was much more focussed in the 40-200Hz range for power and the 900-5k range for growl, this is expanded hugely in DAW so most of what I do now is to try to get bass sound to not eat up the whole mix, still the same principles of how to treat a bass sound remain very similar, ...Distort, Saturate, Filter, FX etc...I think Camel Phat is the closest thing I have to an analogue distortion effect.

When I build a song I usually have a very rough idea of source of samples to raid, then I go and pick a few tonal samples, a loop from a song, or a clip of a string, or a techno loop, or whatever, I might not keep it, its just to get working...I get it in the song in time and now I have a starting point. Now I get a hat loop or simple kik and snare to hear the timing. Now I have a simple framework to start trying out ideas over...now I get as many new sounds and beat hits and loops as I can find for the day and start literally chucking them over the basic loop I have. They will clash and be all wrong, but but working each sound and beat hit around my workspace I can start to hear what might work. From there is all refining and layering. But by experimenting early on you can have something unique before you start to layer VSTi's for example...which can be quite generic.

To mangle I like Glitch, WOW2.0, Stutter Edit, Camel Phat, Trash 2.0, FilterFreak...to be honest hand mangling gives you something that will fit more than just a random effect....I have gone into many sound and vocal samples and reversed small bits inside the sample of maybe a syllable and that gives you something really unreal sounding. I make my own delays by using cut up audio, I have resampled a lot of drum hits through 100% wet reverbs or mics in a corner of a room, then you can have a really controllable reverb effect that exactly stops and starts where u want, no overlap which sounds muddy on drum hits and you can pan and space them way better. Anything you can think of is worth a try...I have an audio input on my Pro One and OSCar which acts as a 4th oscillator and goes through the same chain as the other oscillators, adding something truly unique to ordinary analogue waveforms.

I am trying to master ITB audio and try to get to a point that compares with the height of the analogue production era, there is a lot of reasons for optimism these days as VST designers seem to have moved past just getting something to work to moving it on to what actually sounds good in a music production...analogue took nearly 50 years of innovation to get it to its peak, we are getting back to those values it seems now which is good.

I always work on a melody and rhythm first that really fits in the track...then I go into shaping each note and getting modulation and fx, I think starting relatively simple at first and the building on the strong points of what you have is key to getting a good final result.

I am always looking for new things but all of this boils down to exploring new things everyday, perhaps layer a bassline with a vocal...or patching up a bunch of gear in a certain way, or exploring all the filter possibilities...it could be anything...you are looking for something new each time.

I think that filters work much like the voice does in terms of expressing a generated wave which is restricted over time to make it change tone....this is how a filtered sound can seem to talk to us, and that is exactly what we are looking for when we make a bass in DNB as it has to be such a main part of the song, it needs to be properly expressive to work well. Most things are happy accidents when you are exploring what the possibilities are from your gear of software.

Breaks are always a case of finding a loop you like, then cutting it up VERY carefully and putting into your DAW in time, the I would chuck out any weak hits and replace them with stronger ones, move around the hits to get a groove I like, perhaps use a volume envelope to shape them to fit my track properly, the when I have something that works well I ask myself...is the snare or kik powerful enough? Are the hats noisy or crackly? are there any weak parts, any hits that sound too loud or quiet? I now try to work out all these issues and finally I would layer up the kik and snare with something generic I know will have good power underneath to pad out my break, finally I would layer hats carefully over the break to enhance in its rhythm and improve clarity in the top.

It just occurred to me, you can make your very own 24db LP pass filters without any electronics...this might seem stupid but actually very useful to think about....put your hands just behind your ears facing at 90 degrees from your head...then rotate them until they totally cover your ears...then open them again....this is filtering...high frequencies are very low power and so they get blocked easiest...bass frequencies are so powerful they penetrate objects and get to your ears even if the are blocked...this is how a LP filter works....

Pure sinewave bass in boring.

It has no character, it eats up level in your song badly...it only plays back well on big soundsystems and it doesnt have any harmonics to play with. Yes you are big and clever when u get a clear sinewave in a track (actually hard to do well) but for most people it will not be played back well enough to get that floorshaking bass you want. Equally, if you remove the fundamental bass wave from a bass sound...it might sound good on the radio...or on a home hi-fi...but in a club its like drum &?

So...what do we need? Well we need a combination of a powerful overall fundamental bass wave with good complementary harmonics that give it enough frequencies to be heard in all situations but also ensure in a club it reaches the correct power to really shake the system. The most simple bass wave that is just above a pure sinewave is a Sawtooth wave with a LP filter removing the harmonics down to say 200-300hz...now you have a sinewave shape with some more character....still boring tho.

So we want more...and we can have it by adding more OSC's, distorting, filtering, fx...but the key thing is the bassier hits in your bassline should have less high/mid information and the accents and higher notes should have a lot more high/mid information, you have really serious power from the low notes and no interference with their fundamental shape, then much more detailed mid/tops in the accent notes/higher notes. Using a filter that is set to 'Keyboard' does this automatically...higher on high notes/lower on low notes. Using an LP filter with ADSR envelope will help with this too. Bass where you want bass, mid and tops where you want it to speak to you. Contrast is the key to space in a mix

I am always looking for good plugs for distortion, I like Trash, Decapitator, Camel Phat, Ohmicide. They all have different sounding aspects...distortion is a search for the balance between sheer noise and something musical...almost every sound will need a different treatment so having a variety is good. In the analogue world I tried every bit of gear I could lay my hands on and tried to push the input or output to see what it did, I used eq's to distort, desk channels, my tape deck, guitar pedals, pretty much anything with a gain. I settled on using my Focusrite Green eq's and the Mackie desk gain as my staples for saturating drums and bass. I have a rack here still that has my analogue chain...I will post a pic at some point. I really like Guitar Rig for modern distortion and aslo Wow2.0(I know its a filter but try it).

I try as hard as possible not to split them as if you can get one whole channel to work it is just that bit clearer overall, If you really don't get a good result (mostly in a computer mix) then splitting is probably the way to go for a good clarity in the mix but be careful on where they split and the overlap of the 2 bands, it can make it hollow if its set wrong.

We just don't have a specific role, we both program audio and know what we are doing but I guess we both have things we are good at too...the key is that we know how to describe what we want to each other and also we can both spot where something is working or not working when the other is programming. It helps to focus in on ideas and how to capture them.

There are hundreds of amazingly talented new producers in music right now, too many to mention but for me in DNB, I love Audio, Optiv & BTK, Neonlight, Mefjus, Smooth, Metrik and loads more...

I have 3 E6400 Ultras in my room here, yes they need a dusting but they are still working and although they don't have the control of a VST, they still have a unique filter. They are very temperamental though, they have a will of their own ;o]

In the analogue days I used what ever I could to modulate a bass sound...so you have distortion, filtering, eq etc to get it moving but then I always found an extra layer of modulation and thickening from the EMU chorus effect...set to 7-9% it will sweep over the sample in a way that moves well for 175 bpm. To replicate this in a DAW....it was simply one Mono Bass channel, then 2 Mono copies that are detuned - one up 7 cents (7%), one down 7 cents (or 8 or 9 for faster movement in sweep)...its a simple chorus or phaser but is great for getting distorted top in a bass sound to move around a bit. Chorus is the best effect for bass sounds IMO, a Flange is more obvious and can get a bit tiring, a phaser can thin out certain notes in your bassline.

I am 100% vibe and everything else gets sacrificed to not ruin what might be something that is only half a feeling, getting caught up in the moment...the 'is my kik the best kik in the world'? game is just going to ruin a good day, an initial vibe or feeling is hard to pin down, you need to move fast to capture the moment, then take time to refine it into something perfect. I will spend a few hours on a 8/16 bar loop with all the 'sounds' in the track making sure even if they don't happen together, they work together, so the track has good fundamental melody. The parts can't be non-related to each other...it doesn't make a song using random sections with no relationship to each other...it must be music at the end of the day...however distorted or far out there...

The most important piece of gear in the late 90's by far was the E6400 Ultra, it was the ability to turn any sound into a synth, the sky was the limit, it just opened up a huge world of possibilities at the time. The Mackie 32/8 desk was also part of the sound for us, I have owned many desks, some very high-end but something about that desk just really worked with the samplers. Also very crucial to 'Wormhole' was the Focusrite Green EQ, it had a way of saturating without crunching hardly at all, it was like turning a sampled drum into a solid nugget of audio, and preserved the dynamic punch completely...some higher end gear just wouldnt respond like that, it was the mid-priced gear that had the best options for distortion back then IMO

You can make a sound (waveform) with an oscillator or audio sample. We can affect its volume, pitch, frequency spectrum(filters/eq's) We can layer it with more OSC's/Samps. We can duplicate it and detune it to make Chorus/Flanger/Phasing We can distort it.

Each one of these things can be made to create the bass sound and then by changing the settings, modulate it. So when we hit on bassline we like, then we can go and look at modulating any of these properties using an Envelope, LFO, Mod Wheel, Pitch Wheel and every other knob available...that is thousands of combinations already...now its down to you what to do with them...experimenting is always the key....

My Monitors are Dynaudio BM15's, I have owned many types of monitors and it is really down to preference, I settled on the BM15's because they are loud, they go down to 20hz, they are very open sounding, they have a front port for the bass driver (I like to feel the air coming out of the port to add an extra layer of understanding of the low bass). I use my Sennheiser HD25 MkII headphones and Audeze LCD-2 headphones for monitoring, I have a MOTU HD192 Audio interface.

A lot of Wormhole drums were built from very clear breakbeat samples, some recorded by us, some by friends, some sampled from records. We had a Studer 1/2" 24 track tape machine which we used to record the drum tracks in about 1/3 of the tracks to get them glued together, it was synched with a very basic version of Logic on a Mac LCII classic. Many drum samples were created in pre-production sessions where we worked on just making a certain kik or snare sound unique, a lot of the sampled loops were worked on to enhance each hit, by enveloping and shaping, distorting/saturation and mostly by sampling the outputs of the fx units and using them to pad the drum hits, mostly in a subtle way, just to thicken them or perhaps fill in missing freqeuncies. I think keeping in mind what you are actually trying to fix is very important, no need to add more reverb if it already got too much, sometimes you are trying to remove the room effects from the sample and so making it mono and enveloping it tightly so it ends quicker is actually what you are looking for, not masses of effects and eq.

sound engineers spent a life-time studying drum recording or vocal recording....it will be hard to beat them on a specific thing, but you need to build on what they have to make a beat...I really avoid using compressors on drum hits if I can, its much better to try and balance each hit to the right level using volume controls or envelopes than rely on a compressor to do the job..a compressor will AlWAYS REMOVE dynamics (to be clear, it might enhance the dynamic effect of a beat when used EXACTLY right, but only if that beat has hits EXACTLY the same distance apart...unlikely in a complex rhythmic beat in dnb...so it might make some hits right, others will pump or squash, best used for a very small amount of 'glue' if needed....like 1-3db reduction at most, just enough), thats what it does...it removes the difference between quiet and loud parts of your audio...it was invented to stop recordings from being too quiet when a note was played softly or a vocal hit was too low or far away from the mic because the vocalist moved or did something soft. I kept everything from a vocal or instrument recording at a certain level....a compressor is good for making a drum track a bit louder, perhaps glueing it a bit...but the individual hits want to be the correct shape every time they hit...a compressor reacts to every hit at once in a group...individual hits should be the best shape volume wise that fits the track...a volume envelope and correct cutting of sample should work in most situations, not tons of compressors..All my best beats have NO compressors, just getting levels right.

Step 1. I used a Novation Basstation, its a very simple synth but good for making solid 'reece' type bass...not the noisy filtered modern type but the very bassy house type...its a nice warm bass when filtered low and has some fairly quiet mid 'wobble' that you expect from an old reece bass sound. Its 2 sawtooth OSC's one detuned until it makes the wobble at the desired speed....have to use your ears on this one. I put a DAT onto record and I played groups of hits and notes live with some live modwheel on the filt cutoff.

Step 2. I went through the DAT recording and picked out single notes or maybe 2 that blended...ones that moved in the right timing for the track speed...or perhaps had something unusual or unique about it. I then put those samples up into 1 preset in the EMU.

Step 3. I fitted the bass hits into the track in a way that worked. Added filter movement and modwheel control to cutoff.

Step 4. Now its time to get some balls...so it gain on the Mackie(a lot!) then buss to Green EQ and even more gain and EQ boost...then back to the desk with more boost and more eq, layers and layers of pushing, eq'ing, filtering, pushing, crushing etc.

It seems daunting when you load up modern DAW, one thing I think might help is there is a lot or repetition in the layout of a desk/DAW so learning it is not as hard as it seems, a channel strip might have 10-20 buttons or knobs but then they are the same on every channel. Starting with something that gives you the chance to finish a real song in a good quality, such as Ableton, Reason etc will be better than a toy like Garage Band or the like. I personally think if I was me at 18 years old today, I would get the most complicated pro DAW I could and struggle through tutorials and random button pressing until I had got the hang of it rather than waste time on lesser software.

In production the truly great mixes were from the pop and rock of the 70's/80's, the bass influence came from reggae/ska/hip-hop, the rhythm from funk and soul from the 60's-70's. I have 20,000 records to dip into.

I did not go to college so I can't say whether it would help, I taught myself over many years by trial and error...there was no internet to look up tutorials or any source of help, but that made me find an understanding of audio that is very rich in experimenting and so I think that helps me to think outside of the general rules of audio engineering. I did spend many years watching other talented engineers and producers in my early career to help me gain some idea of a professional work attitude and the standard methods but real creativity is about pushing the rules and boundaries.

Sound design is like a bucket of sand....? Why? Well the empty bucket is all of space you have to make the song, bass is going to fill up like 70-80% of the bucket, the drums will make small sand castles on top which fill up the bucket to the top in some places.....now all you have left is the space around what you have built...so I am looking for things to fill up the remaining gaps in the sand with sounds to make my song. So I dont want lots of bass in my sounds...there is no room left, I don't want loads of top end in my sounds or the little peaks on my sandcastle will be lost...stabs or short bits of audio can be bigger in the places where my drum sandcastle is not hitting the top of the bucket but have to be restricted where I want clear drums or it will be a mess....I am trying to find space in the bucket...in frequency and volume to fit everything in....I'm not going to pick 10 sounds that go on top of each other, I want one low down, one high up, one far back, one in your face and mono, one off to the left and reverby....im looking for contrast in everything. To fill the bucket with clearly defined layers.

Have you ever heard a piece of music and it has made you feel a certain way? Like happy or sad?, or uplifted or melancholy? or angry? or like hugging a hippy? Whatever...when you feel that way...try to work out how that music did that to you...it might be the melody, it might be the sounds getting louder or quieter, more intense or more distant, maybe rising in pitch? Who knows? But when you think about it...sounds all have a basic meaning like an apple is green...we just build a feeling using the sounds that will be right for that moment...we might want to suggest something is going to happen...or that we are out of control, or we have taken a moment to reflect...a good song goes through lots of these moments to create a series of emotions that feel like real life...or more...a heightening of senses to really encapsulate a feeling that we all might relate to. Expressing a pure idea is one of music's great benefits...it has no limits in language or education....it speaks to everyone.

Real motivation comes from real life...when you make something that resonates with other human beings, it's because you are telling them a story they understand...portraying a feeling they and you both recognise...the obvious is a love song...the staple of pop and rock music....or a hard time song...the blues for instance. What I am trying to do is tap my experiences in life and try and draw them as sketch in sounds...everyone has a story to tell as they say. When I feel uninspired to make music I go and have break and try and live life, experience what I am missing in my work, get some new inspirations from life. Then I find I am ready to work without worrying about what to do when I get there...I just go with what I have stored up over the last few days/weeks.

I have 500 gigs of random samples, I look for new sounds every day. You never know what will work until you try is the way I think. When I am starting a song I fish through my collection...looking for lots of contrast and variety, short, long, loud quiet, perhaps I like just one bit of the sample, whatever catches my eye that day. I get a folder of samples, drum hits, strings, stabs, basses, whatever I find. The I start dropping each sample bit by bit and trying to get it to work with whatever I have started with. Slowly moving through the list and making something out of each bit if I can or perhaps chucking it out because it doesn't work. 'Layering' is about filling in the holes in your intitial sample to enhance it in some way..too much layering leads to a weak fundamental melody, and in drums, blurring and less defined dynamics...there should be a dominant channel in a set of layers and the rest of the layers compliment that fundamental part...to work well.

I group the main drum parts into a buss, you want a beat to be all in the same space in the mix and to glue it together so it doesn't sound like a bunch of unrelated samples. In the analogue world I used to send the buss to my Focusrite Green EQ's and do both saturation - by pushing the input gain or maybe output gain into clipping slightly...red lights bouncing on and off...then used a Low cut filter cutting off any rumble (30-40hz 24db Highpass Filter), I gave the beat a bit of shaping with eq section, all eq's were on widest q that they could be...this is smooth eq'ing not anything drastic...just to fit the track and make it 'pop'. In a DAW I buss the drums then saturate with say Camel Phat or sometimes Sonnox Limiter set to 0db and a bit of Enhance (25%). I would avoid anything else too much...maybe a small amount of a solid sounding compressor to just glue it but try not to let it 'pump' or that will make mixing down really hard. I may use an eq on the buss just to pick out some bite and perhaps cut the sub freqs with a highpass but I would EQ individual drum channels before doing the buss channel as it affects everything. I might leave rides and crashes out of the drum buss to make them and clean as possible and perhaps wider and more out there than the main drum loop.

If I want to try out a lot of different notes and filter positions the I would put it into a sampler as this is the quickest way to get a groove, but, if know I am using a long stretch of resampled bass then I would put it straight into an audio track in my DAW and add a vst filter to the channel to get going.

As for using multiple samples to make a coherent melody...I start very simple...one bass stab put somewhere in the part that sounds good...then I add the next sound somewhere else in the part, when I am happy with where it hits...i try and tune it to my 1st note or perhaps to a musical part in my song, the add another and do the same until you have built up enough for a good groove and a good melody.

I almost always resample bass sounds simply because anything other than a sine wave will have to have phase changes, as you overlay OSCillators and detune them to make the sound interesting, they phase either slightly or a lot but either way this phasing causes the notes to change in power over time..this will lead to some notes being too loud and others too quiet. To avoid this is just a matter of bouncing out say 8-16 bars of synth part...then bringing the audio back into a new channel and then carefully picking out your 2 bar original riff from the pieces of the bounce that have the right amount of bass. So rebuilding from a longer resample to make sure your bass does not phase out in places.

I use a combination of envelopes and lfo's to shape the main riff of the bass then add hand edits with the modwheel and also if more changes are needed I route the pitchwheel to the filter cutoff as well...so I can add overall changes at arrangement time.

I find that being in the same room with someone is the ultimate way to get something good going, you can feed off each others ideas and also act as editors when not physically programming...being able to step back and take a wider view or going and doing something specific while the other person works on the wider track. Having said that...once myself and Ed get a vibe and all the parts work...we might go away and work separately on different parts and then share our ideas over the net. I have had vocals done over a track i'm working on that get recorded somewhere nearer the vocalist and then sent to me to put it the track. Whatever works basically I guess.

I still use my Pro One and OSCar, I use my vocal rack for recording a lot (Focusrite ISA430 Producer Pack, Neumann TLM105 Mic), I use my guitars quite a bit. To make an EMU setup that works really well...you need to have PERFECT gold wiring with very short connections, a really excellent noiseless power supply, every cable perfectly layed out, no dust, recently serviced gear and ideal monitoring conditions plus tons of space. My studio in 1997 took 6 months to fully build and was the most carefully wired studio I have ever had...that was the key to a very high SNR...thus very clear and clean audio signals. There was shielding for the whole room from any electric currents in the building, it had 3 phase power with earthing noise reduction. This is the problem with just getting out the EMU for me...having said that I love playing on the filters...they are actually very weak compared to todays vst versions but I guess thats what made them nice to distort as they were so smooth.

Its tempting to turn every sound into a monster eating up all the space you have when you solo it. You want to pick out just a few candidates in a mix for making wide space and keep everything else fairly mono IMO. Like perhaps widen a top snare to trick us into thinking the beat is wide...or maybe a chorus on a stab to pick it out as the main element. I try not to rely on effects to do too much...a bit of space on a string or vocal is cool...a delay on the end of cut...mostly I think ht really unusual stuff comes from filtering and audio editing. A very (9ms?)short ping-pong delay was mostly what I used to give a bit of width to the mono stuff in my mixes...you can't hear it as such, it just spreads the sound of what you feed it. With a mainly mono mix...you can really make the stereo parts sing as they sound like they are around and inside the track...if everything is stereo...you can't hear the definition of individual parts anymore...you go space blind ;o]

I am ITB for new LP we are doing, I explained below the reasons in another answer, bu tI have my EMU's here in my studio and I can certainly talk over some aspects...

As for filters...boring as it may seem...99% of everything was the 24db LP filter...this is the one that gives you most useful control on most sounds. I always had it routed to an ENVelope and also ALWAYS to the mod wheel on my controller keyboard. I tried to throw around the LP filter by hand over most samples to see what it would do using the modwheel, then when i got something I like I would make an envelope that matched what I like or just record my hand modwheel in to midi/daw track data on the channel of the sound in question.

We sampled either CD's or vinyl and 80% of the samples were mono to save on space in the sampler ram...I would audition the left and right channels of the CD/Vinyl to decide which channel had the most clear result.

I usually kept samples at current volume (making sure I sampled them as loud as possible without clipping them). I quite a few time took a bass sample that was just very bassy like an 808 or old house bass and then used the emu gain to ram it in digital by gaining like 12-24db which makes some very offensive but it great for LP filtering as all harmonics are very loud now.

• The chances are slim that your audience will notice that small things you’d notice in your own work: they simply don’t observe/enjoy it the same way and their taste probably isn’t 100 % similar to yours. So take it easy. It’s not like anyone’s going to come and say “Hey, one of those layered snares sounds really odd to me”, so it may not be worth working on it for hours. Ask yourself when you find yourself working hard on something in your work: does this have any real impact on my work?
• So, all the time spent on minor details is time off working on the major body of your work. It’s like fixing punctuation when you still have 10 pages to write; not worth it at all. Work on making a song that’s catchy/interesting/original and rich in ideas, because that is what people pay attention to and not how strong your snare is. It’s been in drum and bass especially in the past few years that there’s a major focus on the production, and you can really tell, as the actual musical ideas and content are often weak and there’s not a whole lot on the menu for those who don’t stroke their beards listening to the snap of the snare (your mum won’t). I’ve heard too many “fat tunes” which I won’t remember after hearing them. Sorry to say it but that is true. Again, put the work on what matters.
• I recently read a nice D-Bridge interview on Resident Advisor where he points it out that the songs that the fans end up liking the most are always the ones where you’ve spent the least amount of time on.
  “Cus there was a point where I started to sit down and look at some of the tunes, the tunes that people liked of mine, and invariably it was always the ones that took me the least amount of time to do”.
  So there you have it, from a long-time veteran. This doesn’t mean you’re not allowed to work on something for ages, but the focus here is productivity (= getting things done), so let’s think of this in a context.
• One thing that used to be a major, major troubling factor for me when I spent way more time per song is that I developed very strong (emotional) ties with those songs. “I’ve spent three months on this song…it must be perfect before I can let it out.” It’s like we became buddies. That’s extremely stressful if you end up in that zone. So, for your productivity’s sake, keep on moving – do NOT spend ages on a song because it’ll be your “baby” sooner than you know it, and you know how mommas and daddies wouldn’t like to see their babies go.
• Go for the 80/20 rule. I read about this on Lifehack.org, for example (point # 6). Basically, it states that 80 % of your work can be done using 20 % of the total time it requires and the remaining 20 % would take a 80 % effort. For example, if you know that you’d create the absolute best piece of work you can do by using 100 hours on it, giving it 20 hours (20 %), you’ll come up with 80 % of the whole body of work, and to get the last bits done (“running the extra mile”, doing a lot of honing) and all that, it’d take you 80 hours. Not viable for most of us! So, as I kind of pointed out in my last blog post, focused sessions are important as it’s there that you’ll do the major part of your work. Especially in music, and coming up with songs, it’s hardly ever worth it spending hours and hours EQing that snare etc…you know how it goes. Don’t put your work where it’s going straight in the garbage bin – put it where it matters.
• If you have to, set a time limit for yourself. You probably have a lot going on, just like the rest of us. If you’re a perfectionist and you give yourself an unlimited amount of time per song, you WILL end up spending an unlimited amount on a song. Don’t. If need be, set a goal: “I will finish this song by the end of this/next week”. That way, you’ll put the focus where it matters and get the song done. You give yourself three days and you’ll start working on the arrangement, of course, and not the snare (unless everything but the snare is a wrap). You won’t be tweaking minor details three days; you’ll work on what matters, and then, it’ll be smooth sailing into the next one. Boom.
• The most important point I told myself to get rid of the perfectionistic way of thinking: mistakes don’t matter. We will never be “perfect”. See, we will always hear/see/perceive what’s not so great about our work. So, accept it. Yes, it’s likely that you hear a song of yours and spot something that doesn’t sound so good to you (this still happens to me, and always will). So what? It won’t kill you. Maybe you can learn something from it, and maybe you already have. Besides, as you learn from them and understand it, mistakes won’t be mistakes anymore. It simply is way better for you to create four songs in one month than spend four months on a song, right?
• Last but not least, let’s go with the idea for a minute that we’d come up with a “perfect” piece of work. How crazy and scary would that be? It’d probably make all our future work even harder, and we don’t want that. We’d always compare our future work to that one “perfect” piece, which’d make it really difficult for us. And, we don’t want to make things more difficult: we want to make it easier.