Totally relate to all of this. I've recently swapped from a desktop PC to using a Macbook and it's been a revelation for me. Gone from being locked in a specific place, to being free to make music anywhere - and not necessarily far away, but now I can be more involved in family life, so music making feels more inclusive and less selfish. Also gone from having lots of external synth hardware to a setup where I'm trying to do as much on the laptop as possible and the external gear is mostly midi controllers, so I can still work on tracks anywhere with just the laptop or bolt on the controller upgrades for the full studio experience. I've also found that for short sessions or ones where you're tired or whatever, just doing some housekeeping - organising samples, updating plugins, sorting out backups etc is all valid and a worthy use of time if it helps you achieve the goal in the longer term.
Thanks for the really positive and relevant comment Jimantronic! I was the same for a long time. My set up has always been a laptop at the core, but like you I had a lot of external bits and bobs that were part of the set up and really just complicated matters when it came to getting ideas down. Now, I love recording and messing around with hardware when I get the chance, but I nearly always try and make some useful preset racks in Ableton out of anything I sample so it's quick to pull into projects, and actually useful, when I'm out and about, or away from my main desk space. There's another thing having a simple set up affords and that's being able to make music in unusual spaces, like coffee shops, on holiday or wherever you are. Just changing your situation can be really inspiring! Glad this resonated with you and thanks again.
@humansynthetics these are great tips! I’m in a similar situation and have found myself doing most of these myself, just to be able to continue with production somehow. I set myself a sequence of goals achievable in short sessions, such as 1) chop an amen to get the basic vibe for a tune 2) choose / discover vocal samples for the tune 3) set the basic percussion structure for the tune, etc etc I’ve also discovered that I’m tired most of the time- and because most of my available short sessions for production are last thing at night, I’m not as productive as I could be. Recently I had a couple of appts in central London, and there wasn’t quite enough time to get home in between to help with the kids, so I sat in the British Library and was amazed at how much i got done in two hours
So glad it resonated. And these all sound incredibly familiar to me. I've been there too! That's a great approach with the micro goals. I think there's an element of accepting that hey, for now it's gonna be less than I'd like and 5 minutes is gonna have to do. But even that can add up, and time making music is never wasted, even if it feels like you're getting nowhere. I read a great book about the creative habits of some of histories greatest artists. A lot of them had very similar things to contend with. Families, jobs, no time to do their work - and they still managed to carve out slivers of time to write, create, whatever. I love the sound of the British library. I guess it's about engineering these moments more if you can. Keeping an eye out for when a spare hour might present itself in between family and work commitments, or trying to make it so that these moments are part of the ebb and flow of... a hectic life haha. Don't give up. Slow is not stopped!
Cheers Broken Semitone. Wouldn't be doing it without the support of you, and the community. Thanks for helping me along the way. Doing it for all of us man!!
very nice list of tips for organized music production! i went farther with "being mobile" and got an anbernic win600 handheld umpc for ableton purposes. waiting for it to be delivered. also i love working in clean organized projects, and creating a framework to sort of fill in the blanks when i want to produce music. keep up the videos!!! 🎉❤
Nur that is an excellent idea! Love it! Had to look up that, but it's essentially a handheld PC right? Totally admire the dedication, these little bits here and there really ad up over the time. Thanks for the kinds words, I might do something on creative block next, although I do have more ideas for this type of format. And open to suggestions for things people are struggling with. Cheers
Great video Alex. Can definitely relate! Would be really interested to see how you set up the Zapier/Trello /folder structure you mention in the Organization section
Thank you so much :) great suggestion - I had in mind something around an easy folder structure for staying organised with WIPs, and Zapier/Trello would be great to mention in tandem with that. Thanks again.
I've actually found the same thing myself recently. I thought I had it all figured out a couple of years ago, but things change in ways you don't expect, for better or worse. When my daughter was born, I shelved everything, I didn't do any music for a couple of years. I couldn't even listen to the things I'd created before. But then, things gradually changed and I started to find a bit of time here and there. I also found that the things I'd created before actually had some potential. I hope the same thing happens for you soon. And it sounds like you're working towards good things anyway :)
Have you ever found yourself in this position? How do you deal with not having enough time to make music?
“Save as default preset” is a huge time saver also.
Totally relate to all of this. I've recently swapped from a desktop PC to using a Macbook and it's been a revelation for me. Gone from being locked in a specific place, to being free to make music anywhere - and not necessarily far away, but now I can be more involved in family life, so music making feels more inclusive and less selfish. Also gone from having lots of external synth hardware to a setup where I'm trying to do as much on the laptop as possible and the external gear is mostly midi controllers, so I can still work on tracks anywhere with just the laptop or bolt on the controller upgrades for the full studio experience. I've also found that for short sessions or ones where you're tired or whatever, just doing some housekeeping - organising samples, updating plugins, sorting out backups etc is all valid and a worthy use of time if it helps you achieve the goal in the longer term.
Thanks for the really positive and relevant comment Jimantronic! I was the same for a long time. My set up has always been a laptop at the core, but like you I had a lot of external bits and bobs that were part of the set up and really just complicated matters when it came to getting ideas down. Now, I love recording and messing around with hardware when I get the chance, but I nearly always try and make some useful preset racks in Ableton out of anything I sample so it's quick to pull into projects, and actually useful, when I'm out and about, or away from my main desk space. There's another thing having a simple set up affords and that's being able to make music in unusual spaces, like coffee shops, on holiday or wherever you are. Just changing your situation can be really inspiring! Glad this resonated with you and thanks again.
@humansynthetics these are great tips! I’m in a similar situation and have found myself doing most of these myself, just to be able to continue with production somehow. I set myself a sequence of goals achievable in short sessions, such as 1) chop an amen to get the basic vibe for a tune 2) choose / discover vocal samples for the tune 3) set the basic percussion structure for the tune, etc etc
I’ve also discovered that I’m tired most of the time- and because most of my available short sessions for production are last thing at night, I’m not as productive as I could be. Recently I had a couple of appts in central London, and there wasn’t quite enough time to get home in between to help with the kids, so I sat in the British Library and was amazed at how much i got done in two hours
So glad it resonated. And these all sound incredibly familiar to me. I've been there too! That's a great approach with the micro goals. I think there's an element of accepting that hey, for now it's gonna be less than I'd like and 5 minutes is gonna have to do. But even that can add up, and time making music is never wasted, even if it feels like you're getting nowhere. I read a great book about the creative habits of some of histories greatest artists. A lot of them had very similar things to contend with. Families, jobs, no time to do their work - and they still managed to carve out slivers of time to write, create, whatever.
I love the sound of the British library. I guess it's about engineering these moments more if you can. Keeping an eye out for when a spare hour might present itself in between family and work commitments, or trying to make it so that these moments are part of the ebb and flow of... a hectic life haha. Don't give up. Slow is not stopped!
This is awesome advice Alex! So glad your channel is starting to take off.
Cheers Broken Semitone. Wouldn't be doing it without the support of you, and the community. Thanks for helping me along the way. Doing it for all of us man!!
very nice list of tips for organized music production! i went farther with "being mobile" and got an anbernic win600 handheld umpc for ableton purposes. waiting for it to be delivered. also i love working in clean organized projects, and creating a framework to sort of fill in the blanks when i want to produce music. keep up the videos!!! 🎉❤
Nur that is an excellent idea! Love it! Had to look up that, but it's essentially a handheld PC right? Totally admire the dedication, these little bits here and there really ad up over the time. Thanks for the kinds words, I might do something on creative block next, although I do have more ideas for this type of format. And open to suggestions for things people are struggling with. Cheers
Great video Alex. Can definitely relate! Would be really interested to see how you set up the Zapier/Trello /folder structure you mention in the Organization section
Thank you so much :) great suggestion - I had in mind something around an easy folder structure for staying organised with WIPs, and Zapier/Trello would be great to mention in tandem with that. Thanks again.
50 hour work weeks while taking 4 college classes I never get too make music
I've actually found the same thing myself recently. I thought I had it all figured out a couple of years ago, but things change in ways you don't expect, for better or worse. When my daughter was born, I shelved everything, I didn't do any music for a couple of years. I couldn't even listen to the things I'd created before. But then, things gradually changed and I started to find a bit of time here and there. I also found that the things I'd created before actually had some potential. I hope the same thing happens for you soon. And it sounds like you're working towards good things anyway :)