Premeditation

I find myself keeping notes at work of ideas I'd like to flesh out try next time I'm in front of my gear. I rarely actually carry them out but it's a fun exercise while I'm at work. Sometimes I think it just makes me feel like I've created something when I haven't, though, and that I would be better off just not writing any of this stuff down and saving my creative energy for when I'm in the lab.

How about you? Do you have a perpetually growing list of ideas that you take cues from? Do you like to keep your mind as clear and open as possible when you jam? Somewhere in-between?

i get my best ideas when i'm at work, beatboxing away in the forklift. unfortunately they rarely make it to the studio, not sure why. i use my phone to record ideas as little voice memos.

I've been doing that too, but later I can never figure out wtf I was really trying to express. It always sounds ridiculous and the notes/beats don't seem to cohere into anything remotely cool. Lately when I do this I'm aware that I'm not going to figure it out later so I usually start cracking up as I'm doing it. Oh well, I guess you can't get too attached to those ideas or you just get frustrated.

just got Caustic on my Galaxy and need to sneak a headphone on when the boss's finally fuck off home

  On 1/19/2012 at 8:20 PM, soundwave said:

just got Caustic on my Galaxy and need to sneak a headphone on when the boss's finally fuck off home

Nice, hadn't heard of this before. I just put J4T on mine so I can multitrack my shitty beatboxing/noisemaking. Kind of sneaky that the paid version is in-app and not in the market - how much does it run?

  On 1/19/2012 at 8:23 PM, sweepstakes said:

  On 1/19/2012 at 8:20 PM, soundwave said:

just got Caustic on my Galaxy and need to sneak a headphone on when the boss's finally fuck off home

 

Nice, hadn't heard of this before. I just put J4T on mine so I can multitrack my shitty beatboxing/noisemaking. Kind of sneaky that the paid version is in-app and not in the market - how much does it run?

Caustic £2.49 - kinda like a mini reason with very nice touch note entry and there's also Budgerigar that is more a GM style composer where you can export songs as MIDI files

  On 1/19/2012 at 8:20 PM, soundwave said:

just got Caustic on my Galaxy and need to sneak a headphone on when the boss's finally fuck off home

fuckin' a, just got a galaxy as well, first android so i am not familiar with the music apps. any other recommendations?

  On 1/19/2012 at 9:17 PM, ryanmcallister said:

  On 1/19/2012 at 8:20 PM, soundwave said:

just got Caustic on my Galaxy and need to sneak a headphone on when the boss's finally fuck off home

 

fuckin' a, just got a galaxy as well, first android so i am not familiar with the music apps. any other recommendations?

Nanoloop is kinda fun. http://forum.watmm.com/topic/68960-nanoloop-for-androidiphone-post-your-creations/page__hl__nanoloop__fromsearch__1

I write down melody and beat structures on grid paper sometimes. Usually it's just mathematical arpeggio patterns (e.g. a melody repeating every 4 notes, inside a rhythm that repeats every 5 notes but takes up 7 16th notes, therefore making a strange mathematical cascade at 4/4) with no clear ideas on what the notes should be.

I also write lyric ideas into my phone, in fragments, so far I can't combine anything to make any sense just yet though.

As for music apps and recording, I record my guitar into my phone when I can't be bothered loading any music software. I also compose in nanoloop or similar every now and then.

About 5% of these ideas actually get used in songs though. And most of the time, I'll start to put something down and then come up with a better idea based on the original idea. So it's kinda indirectly useful, I guess. It's still good to have a lot of incomplete ideas sitting around though, in case I get a massive creative block or something..

Sometimes I hear music in dreams & write it after I wake up. Though weirdly it's usually poppier songs with hooks & choruses & shit. The weird noise tracks are all ones I come up with when I'm wide awake.

  On 1/19/2012 at 9:17 PM, ryanmcallister said:

  On 1/19/2012 at 8:20 PM, soundwave said:

just got Caustic on my Galaxy and need to sneak a headphone on when the boss's finally fuck off home

 

fuckin' a, just got a galaxy as well, first android so i am not familiar with the music apps. any other recommendations?

reactable is nice although you tend to mess around more than make anything constructive and nodebeat is similar in c ncept but not as tweakable but more fun to jam like electro plankton

SPS (like an MPC) and RD3 (Rebirth like) are also worth checking out

  On 1/20/2012 at 12:45 AM, modey said:

I write down melody and beat structures on grid paper sometimes. Usually it's just mathematical arpeggio patterns (e.g. a melody repeating every 4 notes, inside a rhythm that repeats every 5 notes but takes up 7 16th notes, therefore making a strange mathematical cascade at 4/4) with no clear ideas on what the notes should be.

This is a cool idea. I get these kinds of ideas although I have a lot of difficulty writing them down because I can't read/write music. I have better luck doing this kind of thing with rhythms because at least I can count.

  On 1/20/2012 at 12:45 AM, modey said:

About 5% of these ideas actually get used in songs though. And most of the time, I'll start to put something down and then come up with a better idea based on the original idea. So it's kinda indirectly useful, I guess. It's still good to have a lot of incomplete ideas sitting around though, in case I get a massive creative block or something..

Totally, that's the best use I've seen for this stuff when I actually try to integrate it. Seems like a lot of the stuff the mind (at least mine) latches onto is like this: it sort of works alongside something similar and good, but in and of itself it's just not so strong and maybe doesn't play so well with other things. It's useful as a kind of "clue" even if it's not really direct "evidence."

There was a Youtube video a few years back of a guy getting smacked in the face by his friend and saying "aw, fuck. I can't believe you've done this." I sampled it and brought it into Renoise, made a very short loop of it, and ended up making one of my favorite things I've ever done. Kind of derailing my own thread here, lol, but that the seed of an idea can be in something seemingly unrelated and maybe even incompatible or contradictory is a very useful consideration.

Unless I was composing for a film or something I wouldn't really consider jotting any idea's down or anything, that sort of thing sounds a bit constipated to me for some reason. Sometimes a gripping sort of imaginary sound will pop into my head (stoned) and shuffle my insides around until it shrinks away and leaves me feeling quite sure that If I could have somehow captured that as an idea it would translate into the coolest song ever.

Music making usually starts out uninspired or a technical exercise (like doing homework) and then on occasion it fades into a creative smear and the minutes magically turn into hours.

  On 1/20/2012 at 12:49 AM, Cryptowen said:

Sometimes I hear music in dreams & write it after I wake up.

I wish I did that! Lately I've been dreaming about an album that doesn't exist, but I keep spending too long looking at the cover art instead of actually listening to the music...

I get ideas all the time both musical and otherwise and then I forget them. My main aim is to start to sell some music this year and make a bit of extra bob on the side you know.

I don't compose on paper or something, if I get ideas I try to remember them.

Often I get those ideas on how to develop an existing song.

Sometimes I dream some kind of melodies (not every often).

I am not able to remember them in the morning. But one time I remembered the pad.

and the melody and the mood was still in my guts.

Somethimes when I'm pissed, I quit music for a few days, the ideas start to bother me again, which is nice, I can feel the itch and have to sit down

asap.