cliched minimal sound

[AK]

A cliche for me, is when everybody does the same thing. So this sound appears on everybody's music and all of a sudden, questions on furms appear about, " How do I do this sound?".

Musical cliches, though ( a slight difference from regular cliches ) are I-IV-V. Even though you could probably use those chords over 90% of commercial music, when I hear it, I'm like Nooooo! Contrary to that, for beginners, it's an absolute must grab & understand thing.

I'm a hater of off-beat bass. I do understand being a hater doesn't qualify it as being a cliche but hey?

Pop music's semitone transposition outro, gotta be a cliche?

I dunno! Youtube videos of some old Prog Rock guy buying a Voyager or some other quality synth and doing silly portamento solos as his feature demo for the synth. My pet hate.

[AK]

the world cliche isn't really appropriate because it's subjective in it's own nature

I agree with that statement entirely, but as a musician, you want to strive to create new and exciting things I would have thought? I'm quite capable of doing what I think is really cheezy stuff because I'm a big fan of 80's funk. Moog style leads and Funk bass, not necessarily cliched but, to me it sounds like that because it's too scale orientainted and predictable.

I recently wrote some 80's inspired music as an introductory for a friends work related upcoming website, but I was never into it at all. That was just work , and yeah, cliched to the max ( but that was the intention )

Where's the middle ground though? To anyone/audience who knows nothing about music, they might be wanting only solid beats in 4/4 and repetition of elements to dance to and couldn't care less if the whole music was built around a simple minor triad or something?

I reckon that there's a lot of people here who could make money by making music for the masses. Fortunately, people aren't in it for the money, that's not the driving force ( sure if money comes, fair play ) but it's about the reason you started making music, keep true to that and try to be yourself. I see no reason then how the music could ever be cliched.

[Barfunkel]

Do you guys think it's even possible to make any new minimal techno that isn't a cliche? Or have all the possible variations of stripped down sounds, chords and melodies been used already? If it has to be techno and if it has to be minimal, there's only a limited amount of combinations available I think.

Of course you can always use some weirdo non-standard sounds, weird time signatures, non-western tunings or scales and so on, but when you go down that road the music quickly turns into something that would be hard to classify as minimal techno.

[mehta]

barfunkel, there is lots of good stuff getting produced. techno is gaining momentum and more people are noticing that it works well in a club setting to use stripped down and open tracks

music's nature is basically repetitive, we shouldn't be afraid of that

I don't think it's necessary to always try to make something new and different - if you are actually composing & playing music, newness is automatic

AK's point about harmony and melody is a tough one. I had a composition professor at university who refused to even comment on my purely diatonic/modal pieces because they didn't include enough complex harmony. I like lots of serial/atonal music and can work that way but it's nice to use simple harmony sometimes - in the context of subtle microtonality it can work well

[deccard]

in the end of the day what sounds good is good.
to many people try and focus on being truly original and there tracks just sound like a mish mash of other genres pieced together.
They will spend more time on a notion of this sound they think they need in a track but instead without it the track works better.
Trying to be orignal is a cliche. Just write music and what comes out comes out. Let your mind be free. Dont force something for the propuse of forcing it

sorry but sounds good to who? the people who only know the typical beatport chart crap with the standard cliche sample cd sounds? with all those producers who want to be in those charts and copy and paste the same sh!t cause if they are in these charts they get gigs and sh!t?
that´s like those kids who grow up with mcdonalds and other fast food and cant name the vegetables right neither know how they taste (a young teller in the supermarket asked me for the name of the veg in her hand. was a cauliflower!).
people who put effort in developing a musical identity which takes time and work and doesnt come from using shitty sample cds with the flavour of the month and you call them a cliche? ah right you are selling sample cds i read somewhere...

[deccard]

in the end of the day what sounds good is good.
to many people try and focus on being truly original and there tracks just sound like a mish mash of other genres pieced together.
They will spend more time on a notion of this sound they think they need in a track but instead without it the track works better.
Trying to be orignal is a cliche. Just write music and what comes out comes out. Let your mind be free. Dont force something for the propuse of forcing it

sorry but sounds good to who? the people who only know the typical beatport chart crap with the standard cliche sample cd sounds? with all those producers who want to be in those charts and copy and paste the same sh!t cause if they are in these charts they get gigs and sh!t?
that´s like those kids who grow up with mcdonalds and other fast food and cant name the vegetables right neither know how they taste (a young teller in the supermarket asked me for the name of the veg in her hand. was a cauliflower!).
people who put effort in developing a musical identity which takes time and work and doesnt come from using shitty sample cds with the flavour of the month and you call them a cliche? ah right you are selling sample cds i read somewhere...

LOL
well yeah i am, I have spent years developing sounds and methods for various other producers and now im giving away those methods and sounds.
And people from the big artist to the small ones seem to like them.
Theres no problem using sample packs. Use them as a idea starter. Or chopped up. To say you havent used a sample before would be a lie. Sampling and samples are a huge part of music.

but i have my own sound. You have missed my point completely. What im saying is people focus to much on a sound rather than letting the music flow naturally. Music should not be forced.

both come together. just dabbling without a clue is one thing and should be done too but also making your thought and trying to achieve something more. and in electronic music sounddesign is a big part. some tracks just work cause of their symbosis of sounddesign and your mentioned creative flow. take the sound away from guys like autechre and what is left? room for other guys who would take the place of this duo in electronic history

[mehta]

sorry but sounds good to who? the people who only know the typical beatport chart crap with the standard cliche sample cd sounds? with all those producers who want to be in those charts and copy and paste the same sh!t cause if they are in these charts they get gigs and sh!t?

just had a quick listen to the current beatport top 10

sure it's mainstream and accessible stuff but hardly derived from sample packs. there are a few different genres represented from nu-disco/deep house stuff to the big bass monster anthems that are still prevalent in lots of clubs

for example there is a fedde le grand tune in there, the way he makes music isn't too much different than lots of house artists, but compared to folks like lemos or vakula his stuff is totally surface

it's not really a matter of technique, more of taste

also I think it's possible for someone to have very boring taste and want to make big room tech house or whatever but still create interesting stuff just because the process alters whatever they are trying to do and also their musical idiosyncracies shine through

not to say that there isn't loads of bland club fodder being released all the time, but there is a difference between amateurs who think that can make a charting track out of pirated samplebanks and producers like prydz or laidback luke who can actually churn out legitimate (although boring) club anthems on a regular basis

[deccard]

dont get me started on fedde...that´s not a matter of taste.