is production too easy?

[bassmusic]

any old joe can load up a professional sounding synth in logic, grab a load of samples off a good quality sample pack, throw them together and come out with a clean, crisp, clear mixdown that 10 years ago a pro engineer woulda spent all day trying to achieve. i've seen some big names do exactly that, in fact

feels like we beseiged by well-produced, characterless blandness these days

[wub]

If it was THAT easy, everyone would be doing it.

[Dystinkt]

I disagree, its taken me the best part of a year to get anywhere near half decent sounding, and I can safely say Iv downloaded pretty much every sample pack/ synth software going.It takes a lot of effort to master what you download.

[bassmusic]

If it was THAT easy, everyone would be doing it.

i'm guessing that was a joke, but they are! i probably get sent 500 tracks a week these days, and growing all the time (that's not including soundcloud, can't keep up with it any more)...

[polygonfiction]

Breaking in to production has never been easier, good, original production will never be easy.

[wub]

If it was THAT easy, everyone would be doing it.

i'm guessing that was a joke, but they are! i probably get sent 500 tracks a week these days, and growing all the time (that's not including soundcloud, can't keep up with it any more)...

Yeah, it was


It's because people want InstaTalent™ - download this sample pack, load this template, copy & paste this MIDI file into this preset and VOILA! You are a producer! Now, register a MySpace/Soundcloud page and VOILA! You are a record label. Repeat ad infinitum...

[alphacat]

It's still as hard as it ever was to write a good song though.

[wub]

It's still as hard as it ever was to write a good song though.

The issue is not enough producers taking time to actually learn to produce before they start throwing tunes out into the great online abyss.

[alphacat]

It's still as hard as it ever was to write a good song though.

The issue is not enough producers taking time to actually learn to produce before they start throwing tunes out into the great online abyss.

"If you throw enough at the wall, some will stick..."

[Kochari]

a clean, crisp, clear mixdown that 10 years ago a pro engineer woulda spent all day trying to achieve.

This is my main weakness
And you're saying its easy??
God damn I feel inferior.

[wolf89]

Breaking in to production has never been easier, good, original production will never be easy.

This

[therapist]

It's a good point. There have never been so many well produced bits of music out there that are utterly, utterly shite.

I think this kind of electronic music particularly suffers because there's no real line between producer/composer, so it's easy to think that a good mix down = a good track, even if all the elements are hacky, cliched bits of crap. Cue "haterz guna h8" or some other blindingly original e-quip.

[decklyn]

hahahaha!!!!

YOU WIN THE MOTHERFUCKING ALPACA AWARD! HOWS THAT FOR EASY!

[bassmusic]

I disagree, its taken me the best part of a year to get anywhere near half decent sounding, and I can safely say Iv downloaded pretty much every sample pack/ synth software going.It takes a lot of effort to master what you download.

ah but this is kind of what i mean.

well, the subject line is a bit over-egged - obviously anything that makes it possible for the seriously talented to make their voices heard is always a good thing.

but on the other hand, look back ten years or so, and take someone like Zed Bias. Who, we can probably all agree, is seriously talented. It took him about seven years to get from starting to produce to becoming known and signing a publishing deal, and even then, he was getting help from the likes of Steve Gurley and some of the best producers in the scene.

And that was pretty much typical - all the good producers I know who came up around that time either took 5 - 10 years to get to that level, or they worked their way up from tape-op in a pro studio and did it in 3 - 5 years.

So although it might seem like a long time, learning half decent production in less than a year was literally impossible until pretty recently....

[bassmusic]

hahahaha!!!!

YOU WIN THE MOTHERFUCKING ALPACA AWARD! HOWS THAT FOR EASY!

hey can i have a bite?

[krispy]

If learning about production was any more difficult than it already is i'm pretty sure I would be doing something else with my time

[gravity]

well compared to actually playing proper music, yeah 'production' is pretty easy.

but the more ive been doing it the more ive realized that compared to doing proper music, its really fucking dull. certainly trying to make dance music anyway.

i mean theres still that satisfaction towards the end of a tune when everything is starting to come together really nicely, or that excitement when you get into a groove, but the actual process of making music on a computer is really uninspiring compared to fucking about with some instruments. even if your not very good at them.

[paravrais]

Do you people really think that Skrillex, Datsik ,Excision and the like all just bought some presets one day and started throwing tunes out there? No. All the big poppy names have put some serious time and effort into learning how to produce. Maybe they aren't the best musicians in the world but it certainly wasn't easy for them to become such good producers and anyone who has just cracked massive and thinks their tunes sound just as good. Your wrong.

In my opinion I'm waaaaay behind after two years of producing compared to the stage I was at after two years of playing guitar.

Production aint easy, there are only less than a handful of truly decent producers on this forum and I think that in itself should prove the point. If it was so easy then surely all the cats on the production forum would have mixdowns as crisp as Eskmo

[joeroxor]

as crisp as Eskmo

punny

[Trebek]

I don't find production to be very easy. Granted I have only been doing it for a few months but not every day...I seem to just get bored or even frustrated sometimes. There is a wealth of information everywhere that can be read to help you become a producer, anyone can throw some crap together but putting it together into a complete song that sounds good takes time and talent.