Where do pro producers (and you) get their sounds?

Discuss music production with Ableton Live.
Panax
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Joined: Wed Dec 30, 2020 12:23 pm

Where do pro producers (and you) get their sounds?

Post by Panax » Wed Apr 07, 2021 3:53 am

Hi!

Yes! I've only been doing this for less than a year and I ask some weird questions.

I would have asked this question on Reddit but I'm sure the regulars would have told me to read the manual and learn how to make your own sounds.

Thank you for any light you can shed on this topic.

[jur]
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Re: Where do pro producers (and you) get their sounds?

Post by [jur] » Wed Apr 07, 2021 8:39 am

If you're not interested into making your own sounds, then the dozens of Live Packs that come freely with your license is the most straight way to go.
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josefreak
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Re: Where do pro producers (and you) get their sounds?

Post by josefreak » Wed Apr 07, 2021 6:05 pm

Panax wrote:
Wed Apr 07, 2021 3:53 am
Hi!

Yes! I've only been doing this for less than a year and I ask some weird questions.

I would have asked this question on Reddit but I'm sure the regulars would have told me to read the manual and learn how to make your own sounds.

Thank you for any light you can shed on this topic.
I used to struggle with this stuff as well, and then realized that most producers just use basic sounds that you can easily create yourself from within your daw. They also might record someone actually playing an instrument and then turn it into a sample themselves. The only sounds that you might not want to attempt are drums. While you can definitely design kick drums, toms, snares, symbols, etc., yourself, to get some real drum sounds, it's best to download samples and/or use a vst. What I have for drums is Addictive Drums 2 by XLN Audio (which is more than enough for realistic drums sounds), and some free sample I've downloaded, as well as the packs that come with Live (for edm, trap, pop, wave, etc).

What you probably don't understand when you're fiddling around with the sounds in Live is that most pro producers "layer" their sounds. For example, when I'm creating my drum track, I'll use 2 or 3 types of kicks, 2 or 3 types of snares (and claps, sometimes more), layer looped sample of a drum pattern, different types of cymbals (reversed and altered in different ways), wood blocks, rimshots, and the list goes on. And that for just one song! But don't get overwhelmed; this will get easier with time. But I can attest that this is what most pro producers do. So searching for that killer kick drum sample will just send you down a rat hole only to be disappointed every time. You can take a basic kick sample in Live and turn it into something amazing by just tweaking and layering.

Also, don't fall into the "I need every synth plugin to make music" bottomless pit. This is totally not true. For the majority of edm, pop, and many other genres, you can simply use the basic synths that come with your daw (I use Wavetable for almost everything). Most people will typically buy a vst synth for its easier workflow (Serum comes to mind) and not so much for the sound it can generate because most synths basically do the same thing (unless you're composing orchestral stuff, but that's another topic). But honestly, Live's Wavetable vst should do just fine for 99% of the things you want to do. I used to think that the plugin defined the music creation process, but that's absolutely not true! You can make a lot of great sounding music with basic stock plugins and packs that come with Live. Just about everything you hear on pop radio (and other electronic genres) can be done in Live with the defaults. So don't get sucked into plugin hell!

Panax
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Re: Where do pro producers (and you) get their sounds?

Post by Panax » Thu Apr 08, 2021 3:11 am

Thank you for your insight! I see where you are coming from. It would be a mistake to think you can buy yourself out of learning how to do the things you say. I'm sure with time things start to clear up a bit.

Do you have a song of a part of a song you can share and point out one of two things you did to achieve the sound? Even if you point out two kicks layered with an audio effect on it? You must have a really good ear to hear a drum sound you like on a popular song and have a strategy to choose which drums to combine to get the sound.

I can see what your saying, it makes sense. A lot of the drum sounds I liked on Ableton were just a tiny bit too thin. Yet I didn't want thick booming and thumping. I wanted more of a dance kick not in the frequency of the bass. But the drum sounds I like were lacking something.

Thanks for saving me needless frustratiion!

properLofi
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Re: Where do pro producers (and you) get their sounds?

Post by properLofi » Thu Apr 08, 2021 12:12 pm

The key thing I’ve learned over the years is that what you do with a sound can make or break it. A pretty standard kick drum processed through effective eq, compression and drum bus can become a dance floor monster. While it’s important to start with good sounds, good composition and arrangement is far more important. Just adding layers and layers of kicks won’t get you where you need to be if you don’t understand the complimentary processing needed to utilise the parts of each kick drum you are interested in. When I layer I’m looking for attack, sub, body and noise. If I can’t find all of it in one sample I’ll look for elements in others but once I’ve got sub I need to know how to get rid of it on other samples. Hence knowing what your processing is doing. If you can eq and compress well you can alter the nature of a kick drum significantly to achieve different results.

Curating your own samples packs, presets is also vital. Delete samples you’re not going to use and create folders of sound types you want to keep. As you get a new snare sample you want to keep review what’s in your Snare folder and delete to make space. You realistically don’t need more than 128 snare samples to cover pretty much every eventuality.

There’s loads of tutorials about processing and sound design. Pick a plugin and study it. If you want to know how to process kicks, learn lots of different processes across different genres. Don’t shortcut by just relying on the right sample as when you can’t find the right sample for a track down the road you won’t know how to get around it.

slow.robot
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Re: Where do pro producers (and you) get their sounds?

Post by slow.robot » Thu Apr 08, 2021 2:32 pm

honestly, I think the most important thing is to not overthink things. if you’ve got a good song and arrangement, the actual sounds will become less important. not unimportant—just not as crucial. a great sounding synth or pristine sounding, carefully tailored drums won’t save a shaky song. on the other hand, a great song will make great sounding instruments shine. the song is the true foundation, not the sound design. but of course, if there’s a particular sound that’s inspiring to use, slap that bad boy on a track and record it—just don’t spend too much time hemming and hawing over details at this point.

that said, you should still strive for the best sounds you can, once the song is there. to put it differently, save the heavy tweaking until after you’ve crafted a good piece of music, then let the music guide you toward what it needs. it may call for that layered kit, or some really weird resonant filtered delay, but it may not. there are more great sounding (and successful) songs out there that don’t have those things than those that do, so there aren’t any hard and fast rules, other than one...

follow your ears.

if it sounds perfect with a stock preset, a pro knows it doesn’t need to be messed with any further. they also know if it’s missing something, that’s when they reach for the knobs or other sounds to augment it. before you make any change, you should be able to answer the question “why am I about to make this change?” if the answer is something like “because I haven’t added any compression yet”, or “because it isn’t layered”, you probably don’t need to make the change. the answer should always be something more like “because the tail of the tom sound is being lost, and I want to compress to bring that out more”, or “because the snap of the kick is where I want it, but it could use more beef in the low end, and adding this sub kick sample to what I have will help”.

Panax
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Re: Where do pro producers (and you) get their sounds?

Post by Panax » Thu Apr 08, 2021 7:19 pm

properLofi wrote:
Thu Apr 08, 2021 12:12 pm
While it’s important to start with good sounds, good composition and arrangement is far more important.
This seems like an agreed upon principle by most everyone who answered my post and I can see why you guys are telling me this.

If I don't learn this I probably wont finish a single sound, searching endlessly through libraries of sounds and never being satisfied.

This is my first year of production and it is overwhelming. There are so many little things that trip me up. There is really basic stuff that throws me off, little annoying questions circulating in my head.

The advice I received here is very helpful and I am very grateful.

Thank you!

Shift Gorden
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Re: Where do pro producers (and you) get their sounds?

Post by Shift Gorden » Thu Apr 08, 2021 7:57 pm

Not to add to your long laundry list of things to learn...but I'm gonna add to your long laundry list of things to learn...

One thing that can really make sounds stand out is the mix - it's really a major key to a great-sounding track. EQ is your buddy here.

Panax
Posts: 18
Joined: Wed Dec 30, 2020 12:23 pm

Re: Where do pro producers (and you) get their sounds?

Post by Panax » Thu Apr 08, 2021 8:15 pm

Shift Gorden wrote:
Thu Apr 08, 2021 7:57 pm
Not to add to your long laundry list of things to learn...but I'm gonna add to your long laundry list of things to learn...

One thing that can really make sounds stand out is the mix - it's really a major key to a great-sounding track. EQ is your buddy here.
Yes! Thank you! I'm starting to grasp the concept of competing frequencies and a muddy, cluttered mix. I don't know what to do about it but I do know it's important. And from what I understand EQ is the key.

I'll jot it down on the laundry list which reminds me I have laundry to do, also. These are crazy times for me. Every day hundreds of emails and messages to learn something new and I'm not talking about music but that to0. "Can we send you notifications?" "Enter your email and we'll tell you how to solve your problem." "The ten most vital apps every person needs to have."

Modern times and I'm living in 1985. Thanks!

[jur]
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Re: Where do pro producers (and you) get their sounds?

Post by [jur] » Fri Apr 09, 2021 4:51 pm

Oh, you can also have fun while learning the basics of synthesis right from your web browser thanks to Ableton.
And its "learning music" companion.
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properLofi
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Re: Where do pro producers (and you) get their sounds?

Post by properLofi » Fri Apr 09, 2021 7:11 pm

A really useful tip I was given to help manage the potentially overwhelming nature of production is to divide your time.

If you have less than two hours to use, spend that time on tutorials, experimentation and sound design. Don’t get trapped in writing but just play with no real end goal. Anything interesting, save it for later.

If you have a substantial chunk of time use that for writing, arrangement and mixing. Allow yourself to submerge in a track and don’t get distracted learning a new plugin, process or creating new sounds. Avoid breaking the creative flow even if it means that some sound choices aren’t ideal.

Panax
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Re: Where do pro producers (and you) get their sounds?

Post by Panax » Fri Apr 09, 2021 11:51 pm

That is helpful advice as I have already falling in the procrastination from perfection trap. I recorded a complete song, bridge and all, lol. Then I got stuck for a month trying to mix it and EQ it and add audio effects.

You would have told me to stop and move on before any of that.

Right now I am going through Komplete, specifically auditioning bass sounds in Massive. With all the expansions I could be stuck here for days.

I am going spend another couple of hours and if I have 20 bass sounds I love it probably will be all I need for a long time.

Yes! I wanted sounds and I have two million.

This is ridiculous!

Thanks for the reality check

josefreak
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Re: Where do pro producers (and you) get their sounds?

Post by josefreak » Sat Apr 10, 2021 11:56 pm

Panax wrote:
Thu Apr 08, 2021 3:11 am

Do you have a song of a part of a song you can share and point out one of two things you did to achieve the sound? Even if you point out two kicks layered with an audio effect on it? You must have a really good ear to hear a drum sound you like on a popular song and have a strategy to choose which drums to combine to get the sound.
Rather than me posting an unknown song, to really demonstrate how a producer uses basic synthesis knowledge and layered sounds to produce songs, I think ill Factor has a great youtube channel for that, because he uses songs that most people know and recreates the main beat using Live and basic synthesis and layered samples.

His videos are inspiring because he does a lot in just 30 minutes or so with basic concepts that you'll learn over time.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCbG720 ... aM2cfrBpaQ

Panax
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Joined: Wed Dec 30, 2020 12:23 pm

Re: Where do pro producers (and you) get their sounds?

Post by Panax » Tue Apr 27, 2021 2:34 am

Hi! Josefreak!

Thanks for the tip. I just saw this. I will check out that channel. It's absolutely crazy how many people out there are selling courses and education. I know the guy you referenced is a reliable source.

Thanks again!

josefreak
Posts: 66
Joined: Fri Jun 07, 2019 8:16 pm

Re: Where do pro producers (and you) get their sounds?

Post by josefreak » Mon Jun 07, 2021 9:52 pm

Panax wrote:
Tue Apr 27, 2021 2:34 am
Hi! Josefreak!

Thanks for the tip. I just saw this. I will check out that channel. It's absolutely crazy how many people out there are selling courses and education. I know the guy you referenced is a reliable source.

Thanks again!
Well he also offers music production services, but at least he post videos that give real examples of the stuff you'll be able to do if you take his courses. I've learned a lot just by watching his free vids.

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