Titles

I always struggle to come up with decent titles for stuff. Seems like you're faced with the choice between something descriptive, something generic (which is more of a problem for classical music than other stuff) or something poetic/ downright inscrutable.

What do you guys do when you have to title things? Or perhaps you think of the title first... Should titles be linked to the music in a more substantial way than just naming something so it can be identified? For example, "Pete Standing Alone" is a pretty cool title but would you be bothered either way if it was just slapped on the track at the last minute without any real connection to the music?

Waldzenen: Titles

Tracklisting:

Side A: "What's Your Approach"

Side B: "Today, 12:58 P.M."

Honestly, it's a question that seems a lot more pertinent to electronic music. With pop music there are usually lyrics, and with other forms of "live instrument" music or bands and projects with multiple people or planned composition, there's a lot more time and effort to be had with thinking of a theme and likewise titles.

Personally I find albums listed with "untitled" tracks or very literal or non-descriptive track names appropriate when it's an improvised or experimental release. It shows that ultimately the producer is concerned with the music itself first and foremost. Otherwise I think you should see if you have a inspiration in mind. If you don't, name it only if it's something your music has in turn made you think of (I get the impression Flylo and a lot of beat scene guys do this, I think Madlib does too for his beats). I often find a lot of "gimmicky" or nonsensical track and album names very distracting and sometimes even misleading. As much as I like his work, Kid606 for example has put out some pun-heavy and cheeky album titles out, though he's also put out very literal track titles too.

I make a curious thing: I normally think first of cool/interesting titles, and then when I have most of the songs completed I assign one of those names to each track, depending on how they sound, how they fit to the theme.

  On 7/31/2013 at 8:42 PM, joshuatx said:

Personally I find albums listed with "untitled" tracks or very literal or non-descriptive track names appropriate when it's an improvised or experimental release. It shows that ultimately the producer is concerned with the music itself first and foremost.

 

I agree with you in principle but then you're running the risk of appearing self-indulgent with that kind of title.

Every few months or so I look up a bunch of cool sounding words/phrases and add them to a list. Then when I finish a music track I take a look at my list and picks a title that fits. It doesn't really make a whole lot of sense but it's really easy.

  On 7/31/2013 at 8:51 PM, waldszenen said:

 

  On 7/31/2013 at 8:42 PM, joshuatx said:

Personally I find albums listed with "untitled" tracks or very literal or non-descriptive track names appropriate when it's an improvised or experimental release. It shows that ultimately the producer is concerned with the music itself first and foremost.

 

 

I agree with you in principle but then you're running the risk of appearing self-indulgent with that kind of title.

 

Idiotek - "Listen 2 This Song Right Now"

  On 7/31/2013 at 8:51 PM, waldszenen said:

 

  On 7/31/2013 at 8:42 PM, joshuatx said:

Personally I find albums listed with "untitled" tracks or very literal or non-descriptive track names appropriate when it's an improvised or experimental release. It shows that ultimately the producer is concerned with the music itself first and foremost.

 

 

I agree with you in principle but then you're running the risk of appearing self-indulgent with that kind of title.

 

Oh I agree, I think it's a slippery slope of pretentiousness if it isn't a novel or appropriate title or something that's convenient for the release itself (i.e. a really long song, or an entire side of an unusual record). For instance, look how names were assigned to SAWII - it's just easier and more personable for fans. Naming a track is a better choice more often than not.

i just pluck random words i like out of my head and use them. i number my tracks as opus numbers as a throwback to my love for classical music, and it just sticks out slightly more 'ep1' . i mostly just dont care that much. my music is rarely descriptive, my process is just playing about with sound until i think it sounds good, so i title them mostly just to make it easier to distinguish them.

any title you choose is gonna seem dumb to some people and good to other people. you really can't win at song names so just name them whatever you want

something usually pops into my head quickly when it's time to name a track and it's very easy. i'm on the opposite spectrum of ae and other glitchy music that have numbers in their titles and such.. i guess it's like poetry...

As others have said usually something pops into my head and I'll write it down in a sketch pad. I can have things for years before I end using them. I quite enjoy cryptic/obtuse word play and will often make a note of something I've misheard or misread, or something taken out of context.

The other approach is to come up with something that fits with the track I've made but it's usually still quite cryptic/lateral.

Sometimes, perversely, I will make changes to a track in order to make it fit with a title better.

  On 8/1/2013 at 7:41 AM, yek said:

it's like poetry...

Yup.

Songs with vocals typically have a word or phrase that's part of the lyrics assigned as the title. But with something completely instrumental, the approach is less obvious.

Usually I either take the cryptic approach, or invent my own, arbitrary name for the track title. For example, one of the tracks from an album I finished five years ago, I assigned the title "Eugene Coen", which, in Japanese, can be interpreted as "友人公園", (literally "Friend Park"), which has almost the exact same pronunciation.

But, how can Sean and Rob think of "random" song titles and they end up with catalan/spanish words? (highlighted in bold and italics)

• Corc (a wood bug)
• os veix3 (os means something different in spanish and catalan) ("veix" isn't anything, but "veig" means "I see" in catalan -> see on see D: )
• Cep puiqMX (a kind of very appreciated mushroom)
• Lentic catachresis ("Lent" means "slow" in catalan)
• r ess ("res" is "nothing" in catalan)
• Pule (this is a spanish verb form, and means "he/she polishes"
• Cal - Bruc ("Cal" means "someone's house" in catalan) (Bruc is the name of a neighborhood in Barcelona)
• Rotar (in spanish, it's a verb form that means "to rotate")
• Nil (it's the river Nile in catalan, or a male name)

  On 8/1/2013 at 12:43 PM, Rulohead32 said:

 

• Nil (it's the river Nile in catalan, or a male name)

 

Also in french (and many other languages), and also my name. Sorry for the OT.

I used to give name to my tracks which some considers poetic/meaningful while cryptic at the same time. So that it was somehow possible to guess/understand what the music itself was about to me.

I also loved to use absurd play on words.

Years later / nowaday, I mostly go for one word titles that can mean anything and everything to you (but not to me, obviously). Funnily, I've noticed afterward that several of the tracks have geometry/mathematics related titles.

I'm struggling to find the LP title though. I first wanted to go for the eponumous title, but am reconsidering it more and more.

  On 8/4/2013 at 3:08 PM, lin said:

 

  On 8/1/2013 at 12:43 PM, Rulohead32 said:

 

• Nil (it's the river Nile in catalan, or a male name)

 

 

Also in french (and many other languages), and also my name. Sorry for the OT.

 

 

I used to give name to my tracks which some considers poetic/meaningful while cryptic at the same time. So that it was somehow possible to guess/understand what the music itself was about to me.

I also loved to use absurd play on words.

Years later / nowaday, I mostly go for one word titles that can mean anything and everything to you (but not to me, obviously). Funnily, I've noticed afterward that several of the tracks have geometry/mathematics related titles.

I'm struggling to find the LP title though. I first wanted to go for the eponumous title, but am reconsidering it more and more.

 

Oh, nice to know a not catalan Nil! Although it's not very usual here.

For me the most difficult thing is coming up with the LP title, therefore I'm never satisfied with it.

• The first album I made is titled Idiotek, as my project. Easy, huh?
• For my second album, I was in blank alll the time until I decided all the songs on the album would follow a theme (the Submachine games tribute). Then I just saw the best title had to be 32. A very significant number in the Submachine world.
• I Came Here For Nothing came (heh) suddenly, I thought it was a nice name for it, although I already was acknowleged that it could produce a contradictory effect for people who "came to my website to download the album" (like, I downloaded Idiotek's album and I got nothing). But then it turned out that the lonely-ish-like artwork for the album fitted so well with the lonely-ish-like emotion that evoqued the title, so I kept it. This was the first LP title I had thought before starting to record any song.

Nice, you're a submachine fan Rulohead? I seriously love those games (pretty seriously IDM, especially after "the edge").

Anyways, I can say that bad song titles can have serious repercussions- for instance, I still haven't listened to VSnare's album Filth

in an interview once, Ween said they liked to come up with the title of the song first, so they could keep the theme tight. i liked that idea.

  On 8/5/2013 at 12:25 AM, vletrmx said:

Nice, you're a submachine fan Rulohead? I seriously love those games (pretty seriously IDM, especially after "the edge").

 

Anyways, I can say that bad song titles can have serious repercussions- for instance, I still haven't listened to VSnare's album Filth

Fan? pls I'm a next lvl sub-fan. I even made theories on the official forum xd. Yes, it's very idm, and also the sound ambiances of every game, most of them are made by Thumpmonks. I specially like the one in "The Loop", the Lucky Room in sub 4 and 5, and there's the "The Core" one that really seems taken from SAW2.

And talking about SAW2, it was the last album I heard from Aphex because the titles didn't really attracted me compared with the others.

I'll usually listen to a track three or four times after it's finished and a title will present itself. It's almost always a one-word title (Concourse, Intentions, Mold), especially if it's more ambient but sometimes it's a nonsense phrase (Time Travel is Possible Because Your Eyes Are Blue), usually if it's more upbeat.

Luke Viia - You're Overthinking This