Difficulty Finishing Music

[3osc]

For me, the hardest part about finishing music is starting it. I get so lost just improving something that I fail to apply it to a song-like, coherent structure.

[Machinesworking]

I have no problem finishing songs, it's finishing my taxes, or organizing my files on my computer, or pretty much any task I don't like doing. One common method I seem to use is avoiding chores for writing. End up with dirty dishes, but a complete song.

My real advice? write a song with major limitations, just verse chorus, verse, break, chorus verse chorus chorus. Limit yourself to simple, then add to it when you feel it. I wrote a bunch of patches and a song for Filterscape when it came out, and it was odd to me how quickly I could write something if forced into some limitation like only using one plug in.
The key of course is a great plug in like Filterscape. Honestly Live itself is a great plug in.

Here's the track if you're interested, though it was done in Logic.
http://www.u-he.com/filterscape/songs/D ... ar_her.mp3

Another thing, I think anybody who likes their released songs 100% is usually a mediocre artist IMO. It's my experience and my observation that good artists tend to think they are always getting better, whatever that means.

[heavensdaw]

I think that one of the things that happens is that it's so easy to start a new project..

When I think of the days when all I would use to write a song was a guitar.. the amount of ideas that I would have to try out before I got something going could be a hell of a lot.. Now, often we put down the first thing we come up with, record it and then start adding to it... In my experience not all these ideas are worth spending so much time on...

I think that to finish a song you must have..

1 a good musical/tonal/rhythmic inspiring idea from the start...
2 a conceptual vision of what the idea is about
3 skills in bringing to manifestation the energy/concept of the track
4 discipline/love to actually do the work
5 Time and space to produce

What I'm trying to say here is.. Put more effort into the initial idea... If it is really good you'll want and know how to finish it up..
The collaboration aspect in my view is also very valuable.. When you're lucky enough to find the right people to to share with..

Best
Hd

[meio]

I think that one of the things that happens is that it's so easy to start a new project..

When I think of the days when all I would use to write a song was a guitar.. the amount of ideas that I would have to try out before I got something going could be a hell of a lot.. Now, often we put down the first thing we come up with, record it and then start adding to it... In my experience not all these ideas are worth spending so much time on...

I think that to finish a song you must have..

1 a good musical/tonal/rhythmic inspiring idea from the start...
2 a conceptual vision of what the idea is about
3 skills in bringing to manifestation the energy/concept of the track
4 discipline/love to actually do the work
5 Time and space to produce

What I'm trying to say here is.. Put more effort into the initial idea... If it is really good you'll want and know how to finish it up..
The collaboration aspect in my view is also very valuable.. When you're lucky enough to find the right people to to share with..

Best
Hd

I agree totally on the first point in particular. It's so easy to sit down with a synth and find a preset patch i like the sound of and blindly make a cliche track. I'm finding however that steering myself and focusing on what sounds really inspire me to be much more exciting and personal. I've spent a bit of time looking back over my catalog of sketches and close-to-finished pieces and noticed certain patterns which characterize my own sound.
I usually sit down and play and once i hear/find something which inspires me seek to create that. Other times just blindly experiment. I have noticed that if i start with something which sounds OK but doesn't really move me it seems to set the tone for the whole piece. I make something just OK but not really emotionally moving/inspiring for me.
Yes,yes yes and yes for all the other points too

[alex.the.forge]

I like what michaelangelo said about "the angel is already in the stone, I just have to free it"

to me the process is kind of a little like that - I start off by throwing in a bunch of sounds that I think might work or be a bit close, then gradually start picking it apart and chipping away at it, EQ out certain frequencies, cut samples into smaller pieces

I've also found recently since getting the VCM600 and building a template to go with it that it really helps to have a good template set with a lot of building blocks there ready to go - I can just hit the individual play buttons and start twisting the sounds about with the knobs right away

That's why I think I used to come up with a lot of ideas in Reason a few years ago - because I'd load it up and start tweaking the bits in the demo song

of course, I have found over time that I've got better at going for the sounds that I'm after from the start, but sometimes I need to have a starting point to work from

personally I like using presets as well for this reason - it's heaps quicker to load up something that's close and change it than it is to start completely from scratch

[UKRuss]

I tend to find inspiration in my everyday existence and then consciously note to write a song about it.

Aliens at Penge West, Graffiti, Fried Chicken, Riding Home Again, The Least Moveable Feast.

All recent tracks for me album, all came from things I saw or something someone said. Then I visualize the song in my mind, what instruments it'll use, tempo, what rhythm etc. and they usually come together pretty quickly from there.

This is harder for non vocal music and it always took me longer to do that than with vocal tracks where you can jot down some lyrics and a basic arrangement becomes obvious from that.

[SubFunk]

I think one of the arts of writing music, is learnign to step back, and look at that bigger picture. It's soooo easy to get stuck all day/week/month on an idea, and ultimately realize it's just not worth the time or brain power. It comes with practice and experience, just keep plugging away at things and you'll evnetually learn to realize when the ends are not worth the means.

+1

it's way simpler and easier then you think, just do and don't think to much, biggest problem i see is people can't make decisions and stick with them.
a song can forever be 'unfinished' who cares?
to me it's all about making decisions, absolute nothing else.

[ChiDJ]

What I'm trying to say here is.. Put more effort into the initial idea... If it is really good you'll want and know how to finish it up..

Best
Hd

This really is a great point! In addition, I would remind all of us that we are the master of our music and our tools and not the other way around. If you just sit down and start playing, "letting LIVE take you wherever it wants to go", of course you're never going to finish.

The song has to be created and completed in your head first. Then finish it.

Tod

[SubFunk]

What I'm trying to say here is.. Put more effort into the initial idea... If it is really good you'll want and know how to finish it up..

Best
Hd

This really is a great point! In addition, I would remind all of us that we are the master of our music and our tools and not the other way around. If you just sit down and start playing, "letting LIVE take you wherever it wants to go", of course you're never going to finish.

The song has to be created and completed in your head first. Then finish it.

Tod

nicely put.

[UKRuss]

I hear Sifu shout:


'FINISH HIM!'