The importance of...
Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2010 6:50 am
Today's thought is "The importance of Space and Pace".
Dubstep, as a sound has become what it is today due to a little motto I call "space, pace and bass". Every dubstep tune what has had an impact into the scene and has gone down as a classic sits within these 3 fundamental aspects! I will cover space and pace, bass isn't an issue here.
Space
(no, we're not talking about the milky way)
One of the biggest mistakes made by people who come from genres such as Drum And Bass, Metal and House is that they try and fill up the track with as much as possible to keep the track interesting while dubstep doesn't need twenty different bass sounds and 4 different melodies all playing at the same time.
What I mean by space is that there is room for the tune to breathe, room so you can hear the release of the pad and hear the delay trickle out of the track, this brings absolutely insane amounts of tension, atmosphere and most of all room for you to be creative! While you don't 100% need space, as a producer you should keep it in your mind when you're making a track.
Some "classic" dubstep tracks with space.
Skream - Midnight Request Line
Pinch - Qawwali
Loefah - Rufage
I invite you to analyse these tracks for not the sounds or for your opinion on them but how they make use of little > no sounds playing at times and still make the track feel exciting and how you can clearly hear every element in the track. The way this is done is by having great core sounds in the track, if you have great drum sounds, a great bassline and full atmosphere, throw in some one-off sounds in there or little percs and you've got yourself a great dubstep track..
Pace
What is pace? Its simple to explain, hard to actually accomplish.
Pace: A track that goes somewhere, doesn't ever fell like its in a "sore" spot, where every second of the tune makes sense it moves along without anything not feeling right.
I'm sure people will disagree but the relationship between percussion and bassline in dubstep drives the track! Percussion can be melodic itself there are plenty of great dubstep tracks what are heavily percussion orientated and everything else in the track is very repetitive and simple but because of the complexity of the percussion(and I don't really busy/acute programming, I just mean how it all fits together), it creates such amazing pace it doesn't need very deep progression or an odd structure.
The same goes for a great bass line, artists such as Cyrus, Loefah, Caspa(early stuff), J@akes and i'm sure there are LOADS of others make tunes where the bass line carries the tune, be it sub or midrange you can still have great pace if you build your bass-lines properly.
Things to take into consideration:
1) Sample choice is THE key element in any Dance music don't settle for less than perfect drum sounds
2) Its easier to find a better sample instead of fix a okay-ish one.
3) A drums groove can make or break a track. Kick on 1, hat on 2&4 and snare on 3 isn't the only thing you can do in dubstep experiment with percussion don't be afraid to add 8 different pieces of it!
4) Is your bassline making your head bop up and down? if so, good! If not, try again! This is supposed to be dance music to be in awe of sound design.... Having 8 different bass lines play for 1 second each isn't cool, whoever thinks it is, put your bpm up to 175 and make drum and bass.
5) Does the bass line , drums and percussion work together? Good!
//will add more when I can be arsed//
Tracks what have great pace.
Pangaea - Router
Benga - Flame
Kromestar - Take Time
Cyrus & Tunnidge - Ding Ding
Dubstep, as a sound has become what it is today due to a little motto I call "space, pace and bass". Every dubstep tune what has had an impact into the scene and has gone down as a classic sits within these 3 fundamental aspects! I will cover space and pace, bass isn't an issue here.
Space
(no, we're not talking about the milky way)
One of the biggest mistakes made by people who come from genres such as Drum And Bass, Metal and House is that they try and fill up the track with as much as possible to keep the track interesting while dubstep doesn't need twenty different bass sounds and 4 different melodies all playing at the same time.
What I mean by space is that there is room for the tune to breathe, room so you can hear the release of the pad and hear the delay trickle out of the track, this brings absolutely insane amounts of tension, atmosphere and most of all room for you to be creative! While you don't 100% need space, as a producer you should keep it in your mind when you're making a track.
Some "classic" dubstep tracks with space.
Skream - Midnight Request Line
Pinch - Qawwali
Loefah - Rufage
I invite you to analyse these tracks for not the sounds or for your opinion on them but how they make use of little > no sounds playing at times and still make the track feel exciting and how you can clearly hear every element in the track. The way this is done is by having great core sounds in the track, if you have great drum sounds, a great bassline and full atmosphere, throw in some one-off sounds in there or little percs and you've got yourself a great dubstep track..
Pace
What is pace? Its simple to explain, hard to actually accomplish.
Pace: A track that goes somewhere, doesn't ever fell like its in a "sore" spot, where every second of the tune makes sense it moves along without anything not feeling right.
I'm sure people will disagree but the relationship between percussion and bassline in dubstep drives the track! Percussion can be melodic itself there are plenty of great dubstep tracks what are heavily percussion orientated and everything else in the track is very repetitive and simple but because of the complexity of the percussion(and I don't really busy/acute programming, I just mean how it all fits together), it creates such amazing pace it doesn't need very deep progression or an odd structure.
The same goes for a great bass line, artists such as Cyrus, Loefah, Caspa(early stuff), J@akes and i'm sure there are LOADS of others make tunes where the bass line carries the tune, be it sub or midrange you can still have great pace if you build your bass-lines properly.
Things to take into consideration:
1) Sample choice is THE key element in any Dance music don't settle for less than perfect drum sounds
2) Its easier to find a better sample instead of fix a okay-ish one.
3) A drums groove can make or break a track. Kick on 1, hat on 2&4 and snare on 3 isn't the only thing you can do in dubstep experiment with percussion don't be afraid to add 8 different pieces of it!
4) Is your bassline making your head bop up and down? if so, good! If not, try again! This is supposed to be dance music to be in awe of sound design.... Having 8 different bass lines play for 1 second each isn't cool, whoever thinks it is, put your bpm up to 175 and make drum and bass.
5) Does the bass line , drums and percussion work together? Good!
//will add more when I can be arsed//
Tracks what have great pace.
Pangaea - Router
Benga - Flame
Kromestar - Take Time
Cyrus & Tunnidge - Ding Ding
