Another track where I did not have much time. I kinda like that seed and may want to come back to it to make something out of it.
Another track that features Koto, the Japanese traditional instrument. I feel I have started being a bit formulaic with my approach to creating tracks in the past weeks - find a couple of chord progressions and milk them as much as possible with simple variations of instruments. I have hit a local optimum and will have to kick myself into the wilderness to be a bit more experimental in the following weeks! Until then, here's a synthwave symphonic koto based track!
To be perfectly frank, this tracks bears some resemblance to some tracks I recorded in the past. The chord progression at least is the same. I had probably that in the back of my mind when I was running the other day. I love thinking about music when running, the mind is doing its own thing of taking a track, finding counterpoints, new ideas, playing with a riff and morphing it in all kinds of directions. So i had the main bass stuck in my head and built from that.
I spent more time on this track than I usually do, which allowed me to go pretty proggy there. There are A LOT of layers in this track, which may not necessarily be a good thing in itself. The mix is a bit full. Also the mid part is a bit strange, it does not flow perfectly but that's ok.
I spent some time on the intro, trying to work on this part that I usually oversee or do very simply. It's not a perfect but there is an idea there to work on again in the future.
Anyway, here's a sci fi track, with some synthwave vibe!
This is yet another uninspired track.
It started with a simple bass line (which I suspect I probably have used in tens of other tracks in the past) that I was playing around the other day. I was not very inspired so went for simple and efficient, if a bit sad - arps and rubber leads. This always kinda works, like doing pasta in water and instant tomato sauce.
Most of the synths and bass come from FLEX in FL Studio. I had fun with one aspect, which was syncing the bass with the drum kick and leaving pauses. That was inspired by watching a Nik West video where she was explaining her approach to bass. The drums are mostly drum samples from Splice.
Overall I am pretty unhappy with the track. It does not sound bad in itself but it's easy, unoriginal, not trying out something new - it's a bit of a cop out. I feel like a sell out, though I have never really sold anything. I'll need to get more inspiration for something more adventurous. A friend of mine said that weekly beats is like "a celebration of the act of creation". This is what I really want to do every time, hence my disappointment at doing something uninspired. But a lame track is better than no track, so here we go.
Ok here is a track I believe in more than what I have done in a few weeks. I did struggle quite a bit to get it started but after putting a lot of polishing touches, piano melodies and experimenting with structures, I feel I made a track I feel good about.
This is inspired by synthwave and a cyberpunk vibe, something between blade runner and akira, cowbow bebop and gunnm.
This week has been very stressful and I could not focus properly. Here is a synthwave like track, with some Japanese percussions on top. Not my favorite track but at least I got to experiment with different sounds and textures. If I spent more time on it, there are a few lines I would modify as there is some dissonance in this track but this is as far as I'll go this week on this one. Time to focus on next one.
This track is more the seed of what might become an interesting track. I lacked the time or to be honest the motivation to work properly on the track this week but I kinda like the main melody. There is this on-the-edge-of-cheesy synthwave melody that could be reused in something epic - this will be kept in the fridge until a better idea comes! Until that time, this is a speedtrash but a track is a track!
I used FLEX and Sytrus on this one, along with quite a few different Splice samples for the flute and the drums.
What does a jazz club sound like in the 24th century? A double bass and synthwave?
This track is a bit more inspired than the tracks from the previous couple of weeks but we are not there yet. It's one of these tracks that started very differently, with a main melody that generated a few other lines. In the end I binned the main melody and ended up with that. It still kinda feels like it's two different tracks, which is not totally bad in itself but some polishing could help. Also the synthwave version would benefit from some lead on top. I was experimenting with saxophone solos but my libraries just sound too bad. I'll need to invest!
