The most powerful learning tool all producers should use (and not all of them do): Feedback

Recently, I was working on a few songs and the feedback I got from the A&Rs literally shed some light on where I had to go with my music. At the same time, I had one of my students say to me that he didn’t want to ask for feedback anymore because feedback is not something you see PRO producers doing, which I disagree with.

Here are the reasons why I think feedback is so important for any level of producers, pro included:

4 THOUGHTS FROM ME

1. Learn how to develop yourself with the feedback you get.

When you ask for feedback from someone, you get a list of things that you need to fix in your songs, something that you wouldn’t otherwise if you didn’t share this song for feedback. But, what to do with all that info?

1. Identify blind spots in your skills by receiving feedback. One of the most useful aspects of feedback is how much it can help you discover things you need to fix in your music that you didn’t know before. So, look at each piece of feedback as an opportunity to discover something you didn’t know about yourself;
2. Test your song with a crowd. One of the best things about feedback is that you can test your song with a crowd and see their reaction. During our feedback live streams for example, you can get not only feedback from the crowd, but also from a label A&R, which could be a way to ‘soft-send’ your song to a label and get their comments on it, or sometimes even get a song signed;
3. Knock out any points that are bugging you about your song. Sometimes you’ll start doubting your song is not that great, or even obsess about little details that nobody cares about, and asking for feedback is a way to kill these doubts.
   For example, let’s say that you’re obsessing about the loudness of some melodic elements and the loudness of the kick and bass in your song… Send your song to someone you trust and if they don’t mention any of the points you’re obsessing about, that is a sign for you to let it go.
   Afterward, you can even directly ask about what’s bothering you, and if the person says it’s fine, then again you can ease your mind and move on;
4. Test your ideas with your friends. I share a lot of my 8-bar loops with some friends to get their initial impression of the idea, and when they love it, it normally means that the track has potential. Do the same with your producer friends, and focus on making the most loved ones into tracks, which will help you avoid wasting time with ideas that might not latch with others.

2. Improve your career opportunities and your music by giving feedback.

While getting feedback is so useful to you, giving feedback can be extremely helpful to you as well. For example:

1. Building a relationship with other producers. A great way to meet new producers is by giving feedback to them as this is something all producers look for. You can go to our Discord’s feedback section, and just start giving feedback to whoever needs it, and I’m sure you’ll end up making some friends;
2. Find collab partners with feedback. When someone asks for feedback, in addition to giving feedback, ask if they want to collab on the song. That’s how I started my newest collab that will be out this March 7th on Sekora, for example;
3. Learn from other producer’s mistakes and successes. When you give feedback to multiple songs, you’ll start to see a pattern of common things that bother you in songs, and common things that you like as well. Now, for your songs, apply all that you like and avoid all that you don’t like;
4. Create a folder with demos that inspire you. When someone asks you for feedback and you love the song or something about the song, ask if you can download it. Make a folder with all the demos that you like and use them as triggers for when you’re lacking inspiration.

3. Find the right people and the most effective way to ask for feedback.

Getting feedback is helpful, as long as you know who to ask for feedback from, and identify what good feedback is, to make sure you’re not doing something that might harm your track instead of helping it. Here are a few things you should look for:

1. Look for someone with more experience than you. Ideally, you’d ask for feedback from someone with more experience than you as they can give hints on issues you probably don’t know and also how they normally fix them. If you can’t find a more experienced producer, you can still ask a producer friend who is at a similar level to you, as they can still identify issues you may not notice, just understand they may not know the best way to correct the issue;
2. Look for constructive feedback more than a bigger producer. Make sure the feedback you get is actionable, and worth doing the work on it. A PRO who says only a few words about your song could be less useful than an aspiring producer who gives you lots of hints on how you can improve your song.
   All that matters is that the person who gives feedback to you can give you actionable points that you work on later;
3. Look for communities that have a feedback forum. Finding a community that offers a feedback section can be extremely helpful to you because it’s a way to connect with other producers and get quick feedback on your songs, but it’s important that this community has guidelines for feedback to be helpful and constructive. Otherwise, you’re just sharing your track rather than asking for feedback;
4. Develop a go-to group for feedback. I have found that even big producers have a group of people who give them feedback, and you should too. Not necessarily they are all producers, but they are all honest with you and cover an aspect of feedback that you want to satisfy.
   I, for example, have three/four friends that I ask for feedback because I know they are not afraid to say my song sucks, and normally when they like it, it means the song has potential, so do the same with your music and develop a group of people to send your songs to.

4. Learn how to make the most out of your feedback.

Now that you’ve received all this feedback, how can you make the most out of it? Not only this, but how do you deal with conflicting information? Here’s what I recommend:

1. Write everything down and tackle issues one by one. For every feedback you get, write down everything and run through each of them, questioning if it makes sense and if you agree with it;
2. If you don’t agree with something, ask other producers about it. If someone says ‘Your song has too much bass’, and you don’t feel you agree, ask one or two other people if they feel the song has too much bassf. If they agree with you, move on, but if they agree with the other producer, then question them why…
   • Their reasoning might convince you why you need that for the song, and;
   • if two people are seeing something you’re not, it could be a sign that you at least need to look into it;
3. Don’t deflect any bad comments about your music. When asking for feedback, don’t deflect comments if you don’t agree with what’s being said. Try what you don’t agree with to get a different perspective, and if you still like your vision best, keep it. At least, now you’ve tried both approaches and made a conscious decision about it. At the same time, never get defensive with someone who gave you feedback, or you could end up burning a bridge for the future.
4. Don’t take it personally. If you receive bad or even crushing feedback, don’t take it personally.
   • Ask someone else who might help you understand if the person is being destructive, or if it’s really the song.
   • Go to sleep and come back to the song tomorrow. Especially when you’re heartbroken you haven’t gotten the feedback you wished, it’s better to stop and come back tomorrow with a clearer mind;
   • Dissect the learning lessons and work on them, as this is what will make you move forward;
   • This is a hard one. Make it your goal to prove them wrong, and use this as fuel to work even more to get what you want

3 THINGS YOU SHOULD NOT DO

What common misbeliefs prevent people from getting feedback, and what should you do about it?

1. “I’m afraid someone will copy my tracks if I share them online”.
Yes, some people have had their songs stolen online, but the percentage of songs stolen, is microscopic vs the amount of good feedback people have received and not had their song stolen. And if they do, just knock them down or make a better song. Don’t be precious about an idea as your mind is what’s most valuable, not the idea;

2. “You don’t see PRO producers getting feedback, so doing so will make me look bad”.
I have found this to be false, as many big producers have a team of producers actively giving feedback to them privately, so you don’t see it. Sometimes the big producers even produce with more producers around, so they have real-time feedback.
And lastly, there are lots of big producers who share their ‘work in progress’ in their discord servers or even on social media, so I don’t buy this;

3. “I don’t have any aspirations to release with labels… I just make music for fun”.
Yes, but don’t you want to improve at what you do? Even if you don’t have a goal of releasing something commercially, developing your skills as a producer, is what keeps you having fun in the future. If you stop moving forward, that fun you have making music, will dry up quickly, and you’ll be more likely to stop doing it.
So keep having fun, by making yourself better by getting feedback.