New with producing

Hey guys! I'm new with producing; and from my experience with hip hop, I know a lot people aren't very welcoming with revealing their tips and tricks. I know i'm going to get laughed at but I'm willing to put my foot on the door because I want to keep on doing this.

I've been working with reason 5 and recycle off my computer and mpd16. I'm sampling with vinyl and I've been making loops off a couple of bars of which I thought would sound cool. Lately I've been at a slump because all my stuff has been sounding repetitive. Mostly because I've just been repeating the same 4 or 8 bars and just use that same basic structure in all of my beats.

I was wondering if anyone can link me a video or explain to me any other methods of sampling off recycle. It seems like all I can do is sample the downbeat. Its getting realllllly boring in a way.. please help meee

heres a video of the style of producing that I want to start doing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8FeA5u3 ... zJ8Tvif5eg
I like how he's taking different parts of the sample and combing them together. Is there any way I can do that in recycle?

PLEASE HELP ME

So you like the Smurfs?

Thats good that you're getting sick of doing the same things. Thats how signature styles are born. From what I read, you know how to construct and compose a beat, so now begin to learn the art of chopping. Start with sampling a 4 or 8 bar melody and chop it up by 1 bar each to each pad. So pad 1 will contain the 1st bar, pad 2 will contain the 2nd bar etc. After that, its pretty much rearranging the melody by hitting pads and listening to what sticks. There's no limit in chopping samples, you can even chop by each measure of a bar, so its not really just chopping bars. A bar is four measures so that can be assigned on four pads. Just have fun with it and be creative.

so not to start a flame war or troll but a measure and a bar are the same thing.

both are one unit of 4 beats (if in 4/4 time)

a beat is the quarter notes

just dont want the new guy to learn the wrong thing and have it stick with him, its amaziing how many djs i deal with on a daily basis who dont know the simple terms in music

again i wasnt trying to flame or troll just enlighten!

drewphishes wrote:so not to start a flame war or troll but a measure and a bar are the same thing.

both are one unit of 4 beats (if in 4/4 time)

a beat is the quarter notes

just dont want the new guy to learn the wrong thing and have it stick with him, its amaziing how many djs i deal with on a daily basis who dont know the simple terms in music

again i wasnt trying to flame or troll just enlighten!

You may be right. Truthfully, I learned music by ear by sitting next to a radio and I would write down how many counts of 4 I've counted from my favorite songs. Someone once told me that those counts of 4 are called bars. So to me, 1-2-3-4 was a whole bar and the numbers themselves were measures. Being a carpenter, I look at music like pieces of wood and rulers, like a foot equals twelve inches, a bar equals a 4 count. But hey, its all good. I'll look into that even though my mind is already set

the individual numbers, say in a dance song where each measure or bar is 4 beats would have the kick on the beats 1 2 3 4, those are the notes or beats

also then theres bars, like when you hear a rapper say i am going to spit some bars

8 bars is usually it which is

8 measures/bars of 4 beats which is 32 beats in total

theres also phrases which are multiple bars, you can label these like

intro verse 1 hook verse 2 hook bridge hook 3 end

etc in a million ways, hopes this helps a bit

Yo Melvinsilgas - what illgreen and drewphishes is all true to the bone, they both mean the same thing. 1-2-3-4 beats make a bar as long as the signature is 4/4

On Illgreens first response - sick technique! try cutting the bars into beats as well, map them across the pads and rejig the bars, this can add interest. Try then putting your new sequence every other group or 4, 8 or even 16. Subtle, few but often changes can work best, as it creates movement in the pieces. These are techniques i have begun using to help mine. All i make are 8/16 bar loops for samples - so MCs can get a feel but they can drag after 40 secs so these help. also dropping beats on the drums can sound fresh.

hope this helps

great advice!

subtle drum ariations and changing loops are key to phat beats

thanks drewphishes

you guys are all dope. thank you so much for the tips guys! I took what you guys said in consideration and applied that in the beats I made.

Is anyone interested in listening to a couple of my beats?

May I just add, if you're just starting out try not to become overly dependent on sampling. Learn to program your melodies and basslines using a keyboard and some (soft) synths, that way you can include original parts in your music and have much more control over those parts than you would using a sample.

Clint wrote:May I just add, if you're just starting out try not to become overly dependent on sampling. Learn to program your melodies and basslines using a keyboard and some (soft) synths, that way you can include original parts in your music and have much more control over those parts than you would using a sample.

With even adding a simple string riff over the sampled loop you can make a simple chorus/ variation.

You can also sample multiple parts of a song, make two (verse and chorus) different loops and string them together as one piece.

Or you can also sample another record and add portions of that to the beat.