Transition from intro to Verse

[Mycosis]

I'm new at producing trance, and feel I've run into a sort of brick wall in progressing my tracks.

 

I can create a pretty good intro, but am having a very hard time transitioning into the main part of the song. It seems like my tracks are just not flowing together. All the sounds are sort of meshing together and cancel each other out. Also, there seems to be way too big of a gap in the bass and melody and it sounds startling if this makes any sense.

 

What are the main components of any trance track? Also, is there a basic outline I could follow for my first track, such as 1-16 bars intro, 16-24 verse 1, etc?

 

Please help, I've been reading a LOT but I still can't practicalise the tutorials and such into actual making of a track.

 

Thank you.

[Veracohr]

My advice would be to not try to follow an outline. In fact, I beg you not to follow an outline. You'll just make songs that sound like everyone else's if you do.

 

You have an intro, and a main part, but can't figure out how to put them together? Perhaps they shouldn't go together. An intro should relate to the song, that's why it's an 'introduction'. But if you really want to put them together, and they just don't seem to play nicely with each other, try putting something random and sort of unrelated to either between the two parts as a bridge.

 

Or perhaps you can just leave out the intro? Not every song has to have an intro.

 

When you're new at it, you're going to produce some crap to begin with. Hell, I've been doing it for 6 years now and I'm still making more crap than anything else. Just write a whole lot of songs, do it as much as you can, and you'll get to the point where you're making good music. Essentially, "practice makes perfect". It may not be as much of an answer as you're looking for, but that's just how it is. Making music is an art and a craft, not just a skill.

[Otto Matta]

Yeah, good advice from Veracohr.

 

I recommend listening very closely to your favorite tracks and see how they're constructed. I find there's a very big difference between listening to music for enjoyment and listening for technique. I find I often listen to technical stuff when I hear music, but never nearly as much as when I concentrate fully on the technical details.

 

With skill and practice you can make pretty much any two segments of music fit with one another. But it's not easy! Remember that. It can be very time consuming and very frustrating, and you'll know you're a songwriter when you do what you have to do to work through a tough problem. That's what writing music comes down to: Problem Solving.

 

So practice, practice, practice. Every time you sit down to write you'll teach yourself another new trick or two (if you're doing it right), and then over months and years you'll have accumulated an enormous arsenal of tricks - while still learning new ones, of course.

 

Reading about songwriting is a very good idea, especially about the engineering/production aspects of writing because they can make or break the best or worst songs. Meanwhile, continue to write with your brain and your hands. You'll get there.

 

Oh, and posting your work - even if it's not finished - at music forums like this is a pretty good way to get feedback from people who know what they're doing, and from general listeners, too.

[Mycosis]

Thank you for the advice.

 

I have been listening to a lot of hallucinogen and astral projection to try and deconstruct them in my mind. Definitly not easy with trance with all the delay effects and filter sweeps going on, its hard to tell where the sound starts from without effects. I think I am being impatient. Learning is half the fun and 99% of the battle in any skill. I suppose I'm on the right track, reading all I can and practicing when I'm not reading.

 

I just want to put out some killer tracks heh.

 

I'm also having trouble settling on a sequencer. I own FL studio, Ableton Live and Cubase, and have tried Reason in the past. They are all very different and all have pros and cons. What do you all use?

[Mycosis]

For the most part I'm using Ableton Live, I think I'm going to stick with it. I only wish it had peak controllers like FL studio, and the Gate control I have no idea how to control. Also, I wish there was a way to draw in patterns in the arrangement mode.

[Reznik]

well, i found getting from intro to mainparts always very easy

 

some examples:

whatever fading in

pads kick/fade in

beat kicks/fades in

bassline kicks/fades in

tempo changes

cutoff modulation

filter modulation

harmonic thingies

reverse drumsample.... ---> something of the above

 

dunno, no sleep yet for me, thats all i can think of so far..

[Veracohr]

For the most part I'm using Ableton Live, I think I'm going to stick with it. I only wish it had peak controllers like FL studio, and the Gate control I have no idea how to control. Also, I wish there was a way to draw in patterns in the arrangement mode.

While I haven't used either, I have the uninformed opinion that Live is better, at least in the audio arena. So I guess it depends on what you want. FL Studio is designed to be a sequencer, Live is designed for audio, both live looping and recording/mixing.