Out of inspiration

I'm currently very out of inspiration to make music.

I try to sit down in front of my computer and make something, I make a loop and play around with it a little, and then i can't be bothered anymore.

Yeah i know, I'm probably just lazy, but i want YOU to help me overcome my lazyness, see i got this little idea.

If you use ableton, and you are able to (no pun intended) upload some of your projects, so I/everyone else who's interested can see, and get inspired of your workflow/ideas/chains etc.

I promise I won't steal your music or anything like that, I'm just purely interested in seeing someone else's ableton projects that aren't just some lame generic EDM/Dubstep projects that you can find on google and shit.

I do understand that you might not be willing to, and I respect that, I just thought it was a fun idea ! :)

I used to feel this way, but then I realized that my brain is capable of just about anything and therefor I no longer feel like I'm out of ideas, I just tell myself I'll try again later. No point in forcing it if there's nothing good coming out. I mean, unless it's your job to write jingles, soundtracks and other shit, just let your brain rest. Experience some things in life, contemplate on childhood memories, relationships and let the music build up in you.

About uploading my Ableton projects: What do you hope to get out of it? What I do is probably completely different in mood and textures to what you would want to do and it would just be a crutch for you to never force yourself to learn to come up with new ideas out of thin air. Also, I only use FL Studio these days for everything.

You can do it, man. Your mind is capable of anything.

Taking a break works every time.

Yes, I know the inspiration will strike once again in a near future, but i still think it would be interesting to see other peoples ideas, not from a musical/melodic viewpoint, more like fx, eq's, compressors, arrangement, and stuff like that.

I think we could learn many cool techniques, and develop them into our own from looking at eachothers projects, if anyone would be willing to !

Oh, sorry, should've made myself more clear. I was responding to the "I try to sit down in front of my computer and make something..." part of your post.

Yea, playing around with other people's project for a bit sounds like a good idea.

Yeah, don't apologize, my mind jumps all over the place when i write stuff !

No inspiration >>> do something else. Spend time in nature.

there can be a lot more to music production than just building loops and songs in ableton. there is a really vast landscape of software and workflows. there's really no excuse to give up so easy after just playing with a loop in ableton when there are so many awesome things you can try

Try making tracks out of very limited sample libraries, like Matmos do; it can be a great spur for creativity and you'll get ideas for more complex tracks in the process. An example could include making an entire track using sounds collected from a stainless steel water bottle.

im most inspired when i'm working within some kind of loose conceptual framework. I usually feel the least inspiring way to work is to open up a DAW program with no previous ideas and expect to make something cool.

good ways to get out of a creative rut:

- field recording, or crate digging, grab about 20-100 samples load them into a sampler/beatslicer/mulitracker and see what comes out of it

-come up with some kind of limitation or 'rule' for a concept and see how it effects your workflow and approach

- grab a deck of Oblique Strategies, it's actually pretty useful

bad ways to get out of a creative rut:

- download hundreds of VST plugins and check out their capabilities

- buy some new gear to hope it will inspire you to make music

- trying to imitate a popular style in a serious fashion

i pass things in and out of logic, between logic and ableton, into a tapedeck,. mangle things. i find that it helps to destroy and reuse what has already been made instead of always trying to make something new.

anyway, i had some really bad down periods after my initial spurt of creativity in like 2009. i thought everyone would instantly worship me for what i made but it sort of petered off and i couldn't be arsed to try to send stuff out to label who are too busy with their shitty gimmicks. it turned out to be a godsend as i guess it made me work a lot harder.

but i was completely dry for a few months. it was weird. i mean, i kept working. i never stopped making new stuff. but i felt uninspired and depressed sort of, disconnected. i think those phases happen and they add up to something greater later on, you just have to pass through them and do something else, work on other parts of your life. and you may find yourself back at the creative land again later, and the cycle repeates.

if you're like me, however, you won't be willing to just "take a break" and you'll keep making stuff out of compulsion. somehow it just happens. even if its not pure creative inspiration, you're still making things and thus learning and perfecting the process of doing music, using synths, workflow. kind of like pitching or something.

  On 5/20/2013 at 1:28 AM, Goiter Sanchez said:

Try making tracks out of very limited sample libraries, like Matmos do; it can be a great spur for creativity and you'll get ideas for more complex tracks in the process. An example could include making an entire track using sounds collected from a stainless steel water bottle.

this pretty much always works for me. Once you do the leg work, which could sometimes take an entire day just collecting samples the actual composition part is very pleasurable.

some wise words I heard from an accomplished musician were if your lacking inspiration/motivation go back to the music you first got into

  On 5/20/2013 at 1:34 AM, John Ehrlichman said:

im most inspired when i'm working within some kind of loose conceptual framework. I usually feel the least inspiring way to work is to open up a DAW program with no previous ideas and expect to make something cool.

 

good ways to get out of a creative rut:

- field recording, or crate digging, grab about 20-100 samples load them into a sampler/beatslicer/mulitracker and see what comes out of it

-come up with some kind of limitation or 'rule' for a concept and see how it effects your workflow and approach

- grab a deck of Oblique Strategies, it's actually pretty useful

 

bad ways to get out of a creative rut:

 

- download hundreds of VST plugins and check out their capabilities

- buy some new gear to hope it will inspire you to make music

- trying to imitate a popular style in a serious fashion

Agreed 100%.

Recently I've been changing up my workflow to be more like my earlier days of writing: cutting up and arranging audio. I still use 100% synths, but instead of using lots of MIDI sequencing and automation, like I have been doing for a long time now, I am recording jams straight to audio, cutting it up and arranging it that way. Also throwing pieces into samplers and just focusing more on audio manipulation.

The reasons this is helping me is that it is preventing myself from going back and making endless tweaks, which I have a terrible habit of doing.

Try setting up a midi controller and focusing on playing and record it all to audio... Skip MIDI and then go from there.

write a song called "the pirate's hook" and give it a really catchy hook. use that idea, i'm giving it away for free.

  On 5/19/2013 at 9:32 PM, Friendly Foil said:

Taking a break works every time.

Indeed, I took a break one and a half year ago and it still works. I mean, I'm still on a break.

  On 5/20/2013 at 7:22 AM, yek said:

write a song called "the pirate's hook" and give it a really catchy hook. use that idea, i'm giving it away for free.

lol

Ridiculously inspired since I have better insight in my creativity, making a distinction between a planning & play stage (rational vs intuitive). If the sound doesn't inspire you to take the next step, play around with it. A tweak might take you in another direction. What I like doing after a while of tracking is listen back to the w.i.p song a few times and ask myself 'what does the music need here?'. Based on what I feel in the moment and what I'm going for as an ideal I than continue adding or cutting away. Trying to find out what works musically, finding a good balance between repetition and variation is subjective, mainly based on your own taste and is song/sound dependent. I don't think anyone can give a guaranteed success formula to finish a track. Best train your ears through listening and find a better understanding of what you feel based on what you hear.

Besides asking for peoples project files, which could be incompatible because of missing vst(i)'s, you could also go on a youtube listening spree and listen for other peoples signatures, structure in music. Next to the unconscious, intuitive approach to music, you can take on a rational approach and learn through analyzing. Apply what you heard in sketches, etudes and eventually work out an own style. I could say many things on the subject, but you might just want a double drop .

Buy some new gear! Works every time.

Here is an exercise that is very useful for not only getting your creativity flowing but for learning your plugins and daw.

Take just one sample, anything really. I like to use a vocal phrase and then use that sample and that sample only for every single track in your mix. Drum hits, pads, fx, the lot. You'll end up with an unusual song to say the least but you throw all your plugins at it and chop here and there and timestretch and stutter and blah blah, you get the idea. You will learn from your own creativity and perhaps stumble upon some magic. Either that or just press the random button on absynth until it throws something at you that is irresistible to all human ears.

Whenever I'm out of inspiration I just go on a learning spree.

That's the best advice I can think of.

It might sound trivial but try firing up some documentaries about artists who inspire you. I was totally disillusioned with playing guitar recently and ended up idly watching a documentary about '60s music, Hendrix, etc, and while my initial response was to get even more disillusioned- 'fuck that, I'll never be that good'- in the end it served as a wake-up call and got me back into playing, and in a far more focused manner than before. It's always important to remind yourself why you got into making music in the first place.

I can second Leon... I'll youtube: <artist name> in the studio

I'll also youtube tutorials for say ableton, learn something new which then sparks some inspiration.

Crate digging seems to help me a lot too... find some obscure record then just poke the needle around until i spot something that strikes me.

  On 5/22/2013 at 2:23 PM, Leon Sumbitches said:

It might sound trivial but try firing up some documentaries about artists who inspire you. I was totally disillusioned with playing guitar recently and ended up idly watching a documentary about '60s music, Hendrix, etc, and while my initial response was to get even more disillusioned- 'fuck that, I'll never be that good'- in the end it served as a wake-up call and got me back into playing, and in a far more focused manner than before. It's always important to remind yourself why you got into making music in the first place.

that's a good idea, and it's going to sound somewhat 'faggy' to others but I get really inspired musically almost moreso when i watch documentaries about artists or filmmakers explaining their craft . Like for example i watched all of the featurettes on the Extended edition Lord of the Rings dvds and Peter Jackson's ridiculous hands on approach and determination is just inspiring to watch on display. Even though i don't love Cameron as a filmmaker watching the making of the Abyss or Aliens is also similarly inspiring. To see these dudes arguably in their prime against most reasonable odds bringing their vision to the screen gives me a nice lift. Making of Raiders of the Lost Ark was also pretty cool, watching Spielberg wrangle and get frustrated with working with hundreds of extras.

An artist falling on his own sword documentary can also be quite inspiring. Lost in La Mancha, the movie about Terry Gilliam failing to complete his film is a great, same with the making of the Phantom Menace. Both are good lessons on how to learn to temper one's ego and have realistic expectations and visions. The Phantom Menace one is more of an enigma, because it's not overtly presented as a failure in the making, but the way it's edited it's pretty clear to me whoever made it knew the movie was shit and the subtext is pretty clear when you watch it. Just watching the guy in the jar jar binks suit in the sweltering hot sun (who ended up being digitally removed from the film) is excruciating, as is watching the whole crew panic and get super withdrawn when they watch the first edited rough cut of the film.