4 completely different approaches to developing a song

Over the years I’ve developed and learned several techniques and workflows to develop my tracks and to make sure I’m producing faster (to finish more tracks) and writing better ideas (to finish better tracks).

Therefore, here are 4 completely different approaches I’ve tried and can recommend to you since they all have their own unique value in them…

4 THOUGHTS FROM ME

1. Focus on finishing one hell of an 8-bar.

My preferred way of developing songs is to develop the last 8-bar of drop 2 (the fullest one) first and then build the song backward. This saves me time since if I don’t like the 8-bar after I build it or get stuck with it while I’m building it, it normally tells me I’m not feeling it, so I can just trash it instead of having to develop the whole song.

Therefore, for your next session:

1. Pick an idea you like and add as many elements as you can. Make it as full as possible adding as many elements as you can until you’re done with it;
2. If it’s not a ‘HELL YEAH’, switch. After you finish this 8 bar, if you’re not saying HELL YEAH to it, either you need to add more, change the main lead or the main chord progression, etc. Give yourself another hour or two, and if it’s still not a hell yeah, trash it and start over;
3. Build your song backward. You’ve done the fullest moment of the song, so now to finish this drop, it’s just a matter of taking elements from it. If you have 9 drum elements in this last 8-bar, you’ll likely need to start the drop with around 4-5 elements (ish) so your song can grow the drop to the fullest moment to keep it moving, and the same happens with the melodic elements.
   If by the time you reach the start of the drop you still can’t delete many elements because otherwise the song just loses too much energy, try to add more elements to your ending 8-bar loop to make it fuller and keep the drop growing;
4. Adapt your Drop 1 to make it interesting. Drop 1’s ending can’t be as exciting as Drop 2’s start, so you can copy the start of Drop 2 to the end of Drop 1, and unbuild that until the start of Drop 1. Sometimes, you will need to change the elements you used in drop 2 for drop 1 to make it ‘less intense’ than drop 2.

2. Arrange the whole song with just pianos.

Instead of thinking about elements, you’re going to build the whole arrangement of the song before you start thinking about sound designing anything. The idea here is to avoid overthinking sound design and to get the idea of your song on paper as fast as you can. So:

1. Be creative with the octaves you use. Since you’re only using the same piano sounds, you’ll need to use different octaves to fit all the elements you want without making them crowded. Therefore, leave one main element for each octave and play around with rhythmic and sustained elements to avoid letting your elements overlap and sound crowded;
2. Apply the same mentality to drums, and only use drums as placeholders. You can spend, at most, 1-2 min to find any drum sound. Just put in the song to get the arrangement on paper as fast as possible, and then, if you like the idea, you replace it later with a better sound;
3. Add all the core elements of your song into your arrangement view. To make sure the song makes sense, make sure you have all the main elements and sections of your song in there (Leads, basses, chord progressions, arps, etc).
   • Is the idea and the song flowing nicely?
   • Is it sounding repetitive?
     
     If you feel you’re not developing as much, or the song is getting repetitive, add more elements, but make sure to get a good arrangement before you start sound designing it to make sure you only sound design it if the song is good. Why? Because (a) a good song and a good idea don’t need fancy sound design to stand out, and (b) why would you waste time with an idea that is not good?

3. Copy the structure from a song you love.

Instead of thinking about your own structure, just copy the structure of a song you love into yours. This is especially helpful if you’re still not sure about how to arrange your song and points #1 and #2 are sounding a bit too daunting to you. You can do this in a few ways:

1. Define the start and finish of drops and breaks before you even start to produce the song. This is helpful because it gives you an overview of the song before you even produce it, which will develop your ability to have a vision for a track without even building it.
   In the end, this can make you more efficient in deciding which ideas are worth developing, and also help you develop tracks that will keep the listeners hooked from the beginning till the end;
2. Build the main blocks of the song with midi. One amazing arrangement exercise is to build a song you love with midi, but without adding the sounds. You’ll add a channel for each element you hear, and add an 8-bar loop midi block every time you hear it, and you’ll do that for every element you hear.
   By the end, you’ll have the arrangement of the sections and the elements of a song you love, which can later serve as a blueprint or template for your own songs (I recommend doing this for 3 to 5 of your favorite songs);
3. Reference the tracks you love when you get stuck. While building the song, we often get stuck without knowing what to add next, and that’s when you need to reference other tracks.
   • What did the reference add from one 8-bar to the other?;
   • Is there any element the reference has that you don’t?;
   • Is your song as energetic as the reference by the end of the drop?
     
     All these questions can help you get moving again if you run out of ideas, and if you do this for multiple references, and not just one, picking something from here, other things from there… then it’s not copying, right?

4. Use something external to develop an idea.

If you’re stuck finding your track idea and nothing you used to do is working, it’s important to try something different as, sometimes, using something other than your pure creativity can help you trigger your creative side. Here are a few options:

1. Use any acapella available online. Go to YouTube and try to find an acapella you like. Now, write a chord or bass (easier than chords) progression that fits that acapella. Try to write two other ideas for the same acapella and choose the one you love the most. Boom! Delete the acapella and now you have a starting point to work with;
2. Learn how to play the leads, chords, or basses from your favorite songs. Choose 5-10 tracks that shine in the element you’re trying to write or improve on (leads, chords, basses, arps, etc) and study them until you can play them on your keyboard. Then, try to play something similar, but put your own touch into it.
   If you don’t have a keyboard and programming the midi notes in a clip, instead of playing, recreate the element you’re focusing on in midi, and then rearrange it to make it your own. After doing this for a few songs, you can also merge ideas from one into the other, which can lead you to come up with something unique;
3. Ask AI to come up with a chord progression for you. If you’re still stuck, ask AI to come up with a chord progression in the mood that you want, which is something I’ve shown in this video;
4. Check your old ideas and if you can stitch anything into this new song. Sometimes, you’ve written a melody and the chord progression, but left it as an idea and forgot about it. But, that can be used for the song you’re working on right now. So, go into your past ideas and skim through them and if something sticks out, add it to your current song and see if it works.
   More often than not, something will spark you’ll end up having a magic song after that. By the way, if you’re not saving random ideas anywhere, start doing this now.

1 QUICK TIPS FOR YOU

What else can speed up your workflow when building songs and ideas?
1. Have a go-to sample pack, preset pack, piano, and synth.
When arranging and composing, the faster you can get an idea out, the easier it will be to check if that idea is worth it. To avoid wasting time, have go-to sounds, presets, and instruments to make you think less about sound design and more about the composition, which often prevents you from getting stuck because you didn’t find or you were overthinking which one is the perfect sound;

2. Send your 8 bars for feedback.
Have 2 or 3 people who can listen to your 8 bars and quickly tell if the idea is worth developing. If the idea is a ‘hell yeah’ not only to you but to others as well, it’s likely it could be a great song to develop. If the response is not so good, then good. At least you avoided wasting time on what’s not worth it.

3. Develop your ideal workflow.
Your ideal workflow might not be just one of the thoughts mentioned above, but several, and understanding which techniques make you produce faster is more important than the ideal workflow of any other producer. Therefore, try multiple techniques, mix and match them, but be aware and focus on the ones that give you the best tracks.
Lastly, remember that you can run out of these techniques eventually, so always keep on trying new workflows to never lead them to exhaustion, and to keep production fun by not always doing the same.