Everybody these days seems to be a bedroom producer. Some have even moved out of the bedroom and have bought a mega computer with all the latest software and equipment. While being important, there are several other things that you will need. More often than not, these things are a secret amongst producers.

Why?

Because they are so simple and they don’t want you to know!

Here are 11 things that are essential in your quest for releasing music online.

1. Base your song on something you heard that you like.

Don’t copy it, but try to think about the emotion it gives. Think about the chord structure and the beat. Pay homage, not copyright infringement costs.

Remember that song by Justin Timberlake? Yeah that one, ‘Rock your body’. Pharell wrote it. How did he start it? By trying to ape ‘Le freak’ by chic. then he went to step 2

2. Change, change change. Try new stuff. Use your DAW like a sketch pad.

When you have your song in its rawest form, dont just sit back and show your mum and dad. Make it your own. Try different instruments. Change the sound of the synth. Add a guitar, use some modulation, pitch bend. Remember, subtracting something can give the whole song a new lease of life. If you end up with 5 different song parts, then you are on the right track. you just have to decide which ones to use.

3. SAMPLE!

I don’t mean just sample the lyrics off another track. If you use logic like us, then bounce a section of your track (without drums) into audio. Put the audio on a channel and cut it up into different parts. This is usually done by cutting it at natural sounding changes. Then load it up as a sampler instrument in your EXS24 sampler.

Now go and play with it on your keyboard. Remember, bouncing a section without bass gives you more control. Bouncing with bass gives you more of a glitch hop feel.

4. Use the right VSTs!

There are gazillions of VSTs out therem but make sure you choose the right one. If you want a perfect sounding bass, then choose Trilian. Trilian sounds just like a real bass and can fool people into believing that you have the fingers of Jaco Pistorius. We play our own bass a lot of the time, but sometimes, a VST can give you a different feel . It can save you a few thousand dollars on buying a bass with the sound you want. The same with your guitars. Find the VST that is right for you. If you want to make the guitar sound like a real guitar, then get a VST that sounds like a real guitar. When you think it sounds perfect in the mix, mash it up. Cut it up. Make it sounds different. Remember, variation goes a long way.

5. Don’t overload your song

Some of the best songs in history are so simple it hurts.

Look at daft punk’s ‘Get lucky’. They have drums, bass, guitar and vocals. Then a nice harmony of talkboxes come in and there is a little synth solo at the end.

The skeleton of the song is pure simplicity. You may be unwilling to cut one of the instruments from your track, but trust me, it will be worth it in the end. Your track will have more vibrance and clarity. Remember, record companies expect your songs to be played loudly on a dancefloor. Don’t confuse those poor disco-goers.

6. Dont just follow the main hook. Duck and dive!

You have a banging riff, a pumping bass line and heart-stopping beat. There is a tendency to just layer more and more sounds on top. Instead, find where things can fit INBETWEEN your riff. These can make good segways into other parts or can really make a song take off. Look at our song ‘Rock the flock’ At the point where Andy starts the chorus ‘You suddenly appeared….’ there is a lovely little singy bit there, a sort of ‘doo doo doo do doooo’ . Tim added that and that’s my favourite part of the whole song. It adds something extra. Something magical. I remember listening to Jeff Buckley a few years ago and there is a small mistake he makes when he plays “Hallelujah”. That’s the best part for me. Something which makes the music sounds more ‘organic’

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MRkUw3uc324

7. Listen to what artists on the record label are doing.

What common thread runs through the other songs on the roster? We were lucky, in that we were the first real Nu-Disco artists on the label and monstercat chose us for a release. Not everything we make goes on the monstercat label. Somethings just don’t fit. Monstercat have an expectation from their fans. They can fire up youtube and listen to a monstercat genre. That’s a really clever way of doing it, finding a niche in the market and giving people what they want. We all know about the 2nd album syndrome. An artist decides “Ok we did the first album, now we want to explore ourselves and sing about our time in Marrakesh’. Cue a massive bomb in sales. So, when you want to release on a certain label, aim for the sound that they release.

8. If you are going to use autotune, don’t hide it. Celebrate it.

And for that matter, if what you make doesn’t sound authentic, then make sure that it is obvious that you are not trying to make it authentic. We use autotune quite alot on our songs. It’s a mix of not having a great vocal range ourselves (then we make it very subtle) or it’s because we want that autotune sound. Autotune fits our genre very nicely. And before you say it, Daft punk were not the first to use autotune and talkboxes. Have a listen to Stevie wonder and Earth, Wind and Fire. They were doing it well before Daft punk even had their helmets moulded.

9. DON’T USE A GOOD DAW. USE TWO!

DAW = Digital Audio Workstation. There are tonnes of them. We prefer Macs with Logic pro. Madeon prefers fruity loops apparently. Some people even use ableton. Whatever floats your boat. We use two. The second is Reason. Why? Well, reason has an amazing sound library and each different DAW has its own way of influencing you when you start a song. Cubase, Logic and Pro-tools are for setting down what you have in your mind. Logic is becoming more and more of a composers tool, in that it has amazing synths and arpeggiators. Reason has hundreds of thousands of sounds which can set you off on a musical journey. Even when you have musicians block. There is always something there to get you going. If you can’t find anything, then its straight back to logic and spending 5 hours on the right kick drum sound.

10. Work on 2 songs at the same time!

Tim and myself do this quite often. It keeps you fresh and stops you getting bored with either of the songs. When you are working on just one song, its easy to become bored and to lose sight of how good it actually is. The amount of times we have left a song because we were bored with it. A few of our tracks have been ones that we rediscovered and realised ‘WOW! This is ACE!’.

You will own your song and if you are not careful, it will own you.

11. If you do get release and you grow a fanbase then release free music online, just for them. It will keep your fans happy and will let them know you care. If you don’t have any material to release for free, make sure you keep them involved next time, by using conversation and content management. But thats for the next post!

If you have any questions, then you can follow us at facebook.com/televisormusic or tweet us at twitter.com/televisormusic.

Remember that the first thing you should do when making music, is to have fun. If you are just in it so you can get gold teeth and an orange private jet, then you are at the wrong starting point. If you make a song and it makes your feet tap without you even realising it, then you are on the road to something special.

Oh yeah, number 12

12. Mix and master your track well.