11 Essential Music Production Tips For Advanced Beginner Producers Who Want To Crush It in the Home Studio & Beyond
The music production tips you'll discover below contain a mix of practical and psychological suggestions to help you advance your music production.
So, let's just electric slide right into it:
The 11 Music Production Tips:
1. The Producer, Not The Gear, Makes The Music
A producer who doesn't know what he's doing cannot produce
golden sound, even with the best gear on the planet. Give a great
producer even just decent gear and he'll still manage to produce quality
results.
The point? New gear won't make you better. Work on your
super-ninja production skills first! Learn how to use the gear you
have, learn and use different mic techniques, study the basics of
acoustics, computer recording and mixing. Apply this knowledge and
refine it as you go along.
2. Garbage In, Garbage Out
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You've probably heard of the fix-it-in-the-mix mentality by now and you also know you should avoid that line from ever entering your mind. Heaping on the effects or compressing the living life out of a track during the mixing stage won't give you the fat sound you lust after. Focus on always getting down what you need when you track. Add a bit of compression, yes, but leave room for more later on in the mix. Cut out some rumble if you think it's needed but don't remove the entire body of the sound. |
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3. Monkey See, Monkey Do
You learn the most valuable things by watching and talking to other producers.
Advancement through osmosis!
Manuals and text-books are good maps, though they don't always show you the actual territory of the production process. This is where seeing producers at work can pay huge dividends for your own music production progress.
Luckily, you can now also watch other producers, even some of the pros, provide music production tips on YouTube and other video sites.
Music production forums also give you the opportunity to connect with other producers.
The point?
Connect with other producers and talk shop where you can. This is always where you'll
get the best music production tips. Watch and learn how others do it and you'll learn music production
faster.
4. S.O.S (Save Obsessively Silly!)
OK, so this one's a bit producer nerdy and maybe obvious too. Pure admin.
Fact: Computer music production is great, no doubt. Computers and software however like to sometimes crash.
It
plain sucks to get a mix just right, crash and then realize the last
half-hour of your work has vanished into the abyss, never to be heard again. Nice synth patch, bro. Too bad it's gone like, forever!
So, hit save like a hyperactive maniac with O.C.D. drip-fed on steroids. Learn the shortcut. Use the shortcut. Use it often! ;-)
The point? Develop the
save often habit into a compulsion. You may even find yourself hitting the
save shortcut (ctrl+S or cmd+S) while browsing the web. All good. At
least your work will be captured. This is one of those music production
tips you don't want to learn from experience!
5. Close Your Eyes To Open Your Ears
The visual sense takes priority with most of us which means that while your eyes are open the ears are pushed to second place.
The
visual aspect of computer-based DAWs makes music production much more
of a visual activity, often at the expense of good sound.
The
point? Close your eyes to make your ears into the top
priority sense. Trust your ears when hunting for a good sound. If it
sounds good to you, it probably is good.
6. Record Dry, Add Effects Later
This one's of the more simple music production tips: You can add all the effects you want in post-production. Removing effects is much harder. Track your effects on a separate channel if you must get them down.
The
point? Keep your recordings clean on the way in and the
mixing stage will offer many more possibilities for creative work.
7. Order is Freedom
As an artist you may draw inspiration from chaotic environments. This changes the moment you put on your producer cap.
Tidiness, whether it be in your studio, your computer file-system or your DAW session, will allow you to be creative.
The
point? Keep things tidy so you won't get overwhelmed or
bogged-down with technical issues or searching for files when you want
to be creative or productive.
8. Inspiration Comes When You Work
Pros
sit their behinds down every day and work. This is what makes them
pro. They don't sit around waiting for inspiration to strike.
What
you focus on grows. So, when you focus on music production the
inspiration will arise in that area. Ideas will flow and things will
happen.
The point? Work your craft
daily and the Muse will visit you often. Waiting for inspiration is a
fool's game.
My Studio Flow music production workflow course is designed to help you get into a state of flow more often and produce music on a consistent basis. Check it out if you want to learn the mindset, habits and techniques you can apply to produce more tracks, faster and on a reliable basis.
9. Gimme a Break!
Your
ears and brain need a little R&R or they cross over a threshold
where they start to shut out incoming signals. No, I've not
scientifically verified this. I'm sure the papers must be out there in
some academic journal. ;-)
The
point? Take regular breaks every 15 to 20 minutes to
avoid brain-fry and cloth-ears, especially when mixing. This will save
your ears, give you more perspective and boost your output.
10. Many Paths To The Grail
A
great final mix is all that matters to a good music producer. It's
what you work towards at every step of the music production process. How
you get to the holy grail is up to you.
The
point? Rules are for robots. You'll develop your own
techniques and work-flow. Use what you have to produce an excellent
track and it won't matter how you did it. What matters is only what it
sounds like when you press play.
11. The Hump Turns Into A Snowball
You'll
reach stages where you'll feel stuck and like you're making no
progress. You'll see other producers make it look easy and doubt your
own ability to ever do it well.
This is natural. Most producers
go through this process. The ones who make it are the ones who ignore
their doubts and fears and push on.
The
point? Persist. You will reach a point where you can
produce like a pro. The hump you're pushing up against will reach a
peak and start to go down, causing a snowball of good results. Keep
growing, pay your dues and soon you'll be the one who makes it look
easy.
I hope these music production tips help you along your way.
Be sure to sign up for the Renegade Report to know when I add new music production
tips to RenegadeProducer.com.
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