Ableton Forum

I love beat oriented music. Stuff like Thom Yorkes solo stuff or Becks more rhythmic work, as well as stuff like this: http://projectmooncircle.bandcamp.com/track/shunkanido


I can sit down and write a melodic song on the guitar/piano, I can arrange a string section - but grooves and beats are so difficult for me! When a lot of the music I listen to and want to make revolves around grooves like this, it's very frustrating that I have such a hard time with it...

I'll sit down to try and work out a groove; punch out some basic beat on my lap or beatbox something, then put it into ableton's drum rack in midi... thats usually where it ends.
Simple beats sound too naked, boring. I'll usually just end up with the stock 808 or 909 sounds and just not know what to do with the beat from there. I feel stuck.

If I want to make a groove of some sort, I just can't figure out how to get sounds to mesh well together. I don't know how to move past the stock synths and drum sounds that all these VSTs and DAWs come with and make something interesting with it. It always just feels static and monotonous...

I don't know where to turn to get better at this... All I can find online is a bunch of tips on making house, dubstep, etc. Genres I'm not very interested in. I could use some help.

TL:DR: Having a real hard time writing/composing grooves and beats to make beat oriented music. Frustrated and could use some help

If you want to speak the language, you've got to learn the words & the grammar. So: theory

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/feb98/a ... rythm.html
http://www.alandmoore.com/blog/the-theo ... ogramming/
http://www.residentadvisor.net/feature.aspx?1748
http://www.musicradar.com/tuition/guita ... ts-613063/

Understand how this works in various styles:

http://www.attackmagazine.com/technique/beat-dissected/

Then take a piece of music that has the groove that you like. Listen to it carefully. What is going on there? See if you an emulate it.

I don't know Thom Yorke's or Beck's work but I do know that the solid foundation for modern music consists of bass and drums together. If you've got a good drum part, how could the bass fit in with that? Maybe a straight rhythm to the bass, or a cross-rhythm? How could that be made as interesting as possible?

Yeah,it's a cliche--but practice, practice, practice, listen, listen, listen. In my earlier days (pre-Ableton) my grooves were dry and generic. But then I really started to listen. If you ever play in a live band--really listen to the drummer. Listen to how he interacts with the music, what get's emphasized, where they lay out...it takes time, but as with writing fiction (my other thing)--you've got to consume mass quantities to improve your own craft.

Have you tried classic break loops?
In early Beck stuff it was combination of classic breaks and he's own playing sampled and chopped.

What you can try is when you have your "naked" loop going that have right beats but feel too weak. Browse some break loops that sound good with that and layer over. Then try to cut bd and snare away and just use the groove stuff in the middle.

Moldover have pre-warped 100 classic breaks to one Ableton set for you to use:
http://moldover.com

*bookmark*