Jeff Tolbert: Nobody writes their best work sitting in front of a DAW loaded with samples and plugins. O RLY. But, reading on: [W]ith the plethora of excellent sample libraries, effects and soft synths out there today, it’s easy to make anything sound amazing, even if it’s musically bland. When you write on piano, you [...]
It doesn’t have to be good, but it does have to be something
by Kim Lajoie on November 20, 2012
Why aren’t you making more music? Actually, why aren’t you making any music? Don’t get bogged down in the technical stuff. Sure it’s fun to explore synth settings or audition presets or jam on your guitar. It’s actually important to do that stuff. It’s called practice. But you’re in trouble if you’re spending all your [...]
Bare Toes Into Soil – Sarah [video]
by Kim Lajoie on October 29, 2012
I didn’t write this song. (if you like it, download the song here) This is a cover of a great song by local (Melbourne) electro-folkers Brightly. Creatively, this was an interesting project. Even though the song is a cover, we approached it as if it were one of our own. Obviously, the instrumentation and creative [...]
Masculine and Feminine sounds
by Kim Lajoie on July 19, 2012
In my ‘Emotion in Music’ guide, I explore eight different types of emotions that you can use to organise the sections in a song or the different kinds of sounds in a track. While that’s rather involved (and beyond the scope of a single blog post), there’s a also simpler way to approach it. Rather [...]
What if I want to make a song longer?
by Kim Lajoie on July 17, 2012
Erik Magrini: I think in general, if you’re going to go for a longer song, the the biggest thing to keep in mind is that you need enough material in the song to keep it interested to the average listener for that amount time. A lot of times as producers we like to think that [...]
Rap it in a Grid
by Kim Lajoie on June 2, 2012
Nishant Kothary: Users want a predictable experience. When something is a link, users want to know it without having to think about it. A link should behave like other links. But users demand that these expected experiences simultaneously be delightful. For most people, this idea is somewhere on a tangent, living on the opposite end [...]
Fragile chord progressions
by Kim Lajoie on March 16, 2012
Gary Ewer: Some would argue that fragile progressions have the greater potential for creating interesting musical moments, as they are a little less predictable. But how exactly do you create a fragile progression? Read the whole post. I love fragile chord progressions. As a composer, they give me opportunities to create unexpected harmonies, sudden turns [...]
Does your arrangement suit your singer?
by Kim Lajoie on March 13, 2012
Sometimes I work with low-pitched singers. Low-pitched singers can have lovely voices. They can be deep, rich and expressive. They often have a very ‘personal’ sound – one that makes the listener feel as if they’re the only person in the room and the singer is performing directly for her/him. For a producer or engineer, [...]
5 Reasons Your Song Might Use a Pre-Chorus
by Kim Lajoie on January 17, 2012
Gary Ewer: But if you find yourself looking at your song and wondering what to do to enhance the build between verse and chorus, consider the power that can come from a pre-chorus. Some great thinking here on how a pre-chorus fits into a mainstream song structure and how it can make an important contribution [...]
A sense of movement
by Kim Lajoie on January 13, 2012
Mark Strauss: One of the most valuable production techniques an electronic musician can learn is the sense of movement or subtle variation applied to individual sounds of a given track. Subtle variation is what brings sounds to life. It’s why live performance is so interesting. It’s why complex ‘flawed’ compressors have vibe and mojo. It’s [...]