Well produced but uncreative (sound design?)

Dusk · Post by **Dusk** » Wed Apr 23, 2008 1:10 pm

Hi all,

Im a relatively experienced producer (10 years, 3 serious) who's been making everything from breaks to downtempo to various forms of house.

Ive built up a modest but decent setup, plenty of software, a Nord Lead and some nice Adam monitors. Thanks to a normal musical background Im pretty good at programming, writing melodies and (sorry to sound immodest) my overall production standard is fairly high. I tend to construct pretty dense melodic tracks with plenty of layers. My engineering is also getting there thanks to some new monitors.

However, I started listening to Trentemoller about 18 months ago which led me onto other deep and minimal artists (Loco Dice, Villalobos etc) and I soon realised that my ability to create interesting, distinctive, "simple yet full" grooves is very, very poor. Big electro or breaks tracks - no problem, because you can just add some more detuned synths and a swoosh sound!

I can program interesting minimal percussion, but as soon as I try to create any melodic interest with bass and synths, it ends up sounding like another sub standard progressive/electro track.

How do YOU create synth sounds that DONT sound inherently electro/synthy? Minimal producers seem to find ways of including melody that doesnt sound, well, too melodic. Tuned percussion? Dissonant or atonal chords? Dissonant arpeggios?

At the moment Im chopping samples up, using granulisers and the resampling with different FX. Good for unmusical weirdness but somehow, I need to get melodic/harmonic content in there. 5 or 6 engaging elements that sound and develop organically, with enough melodic content to be interesting, is really tough. The more minimal I listen to blows me away in subtle intricacy.

steevio · Post by **steevio** » Wed Apr 23, 2008 1:33 pm

if you dont want those synthy sounds, but you still want to use synths, keep your filters closed down and be subtle with them.
the big difference i see between electro / synthy type music and deeper music is that theres more emphasis on allowing brash cheesey sounds through with open filtering. also get away from obvious sounds like pulse width modulation, and synched oscillators, and over use of FM, be more adventureous, complex and percussive with your filter modulation.
get into velocity morphing on your Nord, or move on to an analogue synth.
i've got a nord lead and a nord 3, and they are great for percussion, but not the best for warm deep sounds, get yourself a moog voyager !
this is just from my perspective as a synth guy, sample guys will be better at helping you from that angle,
good luck mate

Dusk · Post by **Dusk** » Wed Apr 23, 2008 2:06 pm

Thanks for the advice. I see youre one of the most helpful guys around here and you clearly talk from experience.

puReDLX · Post by **puReDLX** » Wed Apr 23, 2008 2:54 pm

Albino3 and Predator (and maybe other vsti's) have a "randomize" button which is quite helpful. It (slightly) changes the parameters of the synth, so you get new sounds and combinations one would not try usually.
Try to pitch your percussion samples some octaves up or down and use percussion sounds or other samples as your melody. In general, try to do things that you normally would not do. Just abuse your software/hardware/samples.
Oh, and you can always go into field recording

Torque · Post by **Torque** » Wed Apr 23, 2008 3:25 pm

I think the tip about keeping your filters closed up is a good one, however it may end up leaving a frequency gap in your track that you're not used to and lead you back in the direction of big fat synths like you did in the past. It's tricky....
What i would do is close down the filters like he said, do your drum thing like you were and then fill in the empty frequency gap in your mix with a reverb effect. It will end up sounding a bit more dubby but you'll have a big sound without it sounding like your electro tracks.

Honestly though i really just a big fan of people doing what they do naturally. Minimal in the form it's been lately is becoming kind of played out and in my opinion it could use some producers coming and bringing in some elements that might seem out of place to most of the minimal purists out there. I personally don't make minimal and never really have in the pure sense of what you hear now. I come from a Detroit Techno background and tend to lean towards that style (if there is a such thing). I used to think that i could sit there and make minimal like these guys if i wanted but every time i try it ends up sounding nothing like what these guys do. It seems like somewhere in the process my sensibilities take over and i can't leave the track alone to sound like the rest of these guys because the track ends up sounding boring to me. This is probably the same problem you're running into being from a background with a different style. I say fck what you hear from everybody else there are enough records like them. Create your own monster.....

royen · Post by **royen** » Wed Apr 23, 2008 3:52 pm

+1 to whats already been said.

Also, make a conscious effort not to go in the same direction as you're used to soundwise. Start exploring stuff you haven't touched that often before -- it's amazing what you can do with a notch filter, for example.

Same goes for chords and melodies. Stay away from common intervals and chord structures and see what comes out.

Dusk · Post by **Dusk** » Wed Apr 23, 2008 3:59 pm

Torque wrote:I think the tip about keeping your filters closed up is a good one, however it may end up leaving a frequency gap in your track that you're not used to and lead you back in the direction of big fat synths like you did in the past. It's tricky....
What i would do is close down the filters like he said, do your drum thing like you were and then fill in the empty frequency gap in your mix with a reverb effect. It will end up sounding a bit more dubby but you'll have a big sound without it sounding like your electro tracks.

Top advice and makes a lot of sense to me. That frequency gap is exactly the problem Ive run into. Ive been using spot hits of reverb and delay for a while - turns bleeps and percs into notes, now that I think more about it. White noise and other atmospherics, sometimes sidechained to kick or other elements and with HP filter movement, also seems to fill that gap with "deep air", as does bit reduction.

On closer analysis (villalobos set) it seems like alot of melodic/harmonic stuff is percussive and vocal snippets at different pitches, with spot verb and glitch effects for variation.

Your final point about originality is of course very true, but Id just like to know how to constuct full sounding tracks without big sounds, that's all.[/i]

oblioblioblio · Post by **oblioblioblio** » Wed Apr 23, 2008 4:49 pm

Dusk wrote: How do YOU create synth sounds that DONT sound inherently electro/synthy? Minimal producers seem to find ways of including melody that doesnt sound, well, too melodic. Tuned percussion? Dissonant or atonal chords? Dissonant arpeggios?
.

Sometimes I like trying to recreate the sound of humans playing acoustic instruments with synths and other electronic devices, for example a certain style of acoustic guitar playing. Especially sounds from tracks that are relevant to me on a personal level, as I can relate to what the musician is trying to express, and to try and recreate that electronically is good way to keep me focussed as quite often if I'm just playing with a synth looking for new potentials I get bored quickly and having and end goal is quite helpful.

Also, it's probably not the best suggestion on a forum for a popular style, but just picking apart sounds and approaches from electronic tracks that you like can be helpful. In many ways it can be very dangerous as you can just lift someone else approach and get stuck in that as you've never had to properly question it yourself, but if used carefully think there is definitely potential for self improvement.