As a music producer and game music composer, it’s still pretty crazy to me how many people around the world have heard my stuff, even by accident. Sometimes I get emails or messages about how to make music, or how to get a job making music. Luckily for you there’s a magic pill you can swallow that makes you good and successful at everything, so I’m about to write you a prescription in the form of this article… The only downside is it may take years to metabolize.
Actually, you must first understand that I can only speak from my own personal experience, and everyone's path is uniquely their own... So what works for some may not work for others, but there are some “best practices” so here’s basically all the stuff I was left wondering about when I was first starting out.
The absolute most important thing of all time is, if you want to make music, literally just be making the f*ck out of some music. Every day. For years and years. Congratulations, you made music!
It will suck for a long time, you will hate it some of the time, and you will be discouraged and impatient much of the time. But not forever. That's all completely normal and is part of the journey. The most important habit you can build is finishing... believe me when I say producers of all skill levels struggle with this one, myself included.
If you get into the habit of calling something done and moving on to the next thing, even if it sucks (which it will and that's totally fine), you will make extraordinary progress.
Don't get yourself trapped in 16-bar purgatory, and don't get "demo-itis" from over-listening to your unfinished work, becoming used to how it sounds and not knowing where to take it next. Try making incremental progress before listening all the way through again.
When you finish the first couple tunes, try keeping 2-3 projects going at once so you can keep the juices flowing and bounce between them, but don’t let it get out of control and fill your hard drive with unfinished, undeveloped ideas. This is actually inevitable anyway, but you want to be actively working against that and finishing your ideas to keep them in check.
It does take a lot of time to develop the skill of finishing, as it does with any other skill... but you need to take breaks, take care of yourself, remember to unplug every now and again, don't be afraid to walk away and come back later, or the next day. All of these things will help you to make better music.
The software I use is not important, there's so much of it out there, we can get into that in more detail later on but let’s go over it quickly here since it comes up so often.
For making chiptune, I personally insist on using Trackers (LSDJ on GameBoy, Famitracker for NES music on a PC, Deflemask for a desktop or mobile device) since these programs are designed to work with the original console hardware, and that makes it special to me. Plus there’s the added satisfaction of hearing your music playing back on original hardware, there’s no feeling like it in the world and I just wouldn’t have it any other way. When the intention is to create chiptune that sounds like a specific console or time period, there's just no better method than actually using the thing itself. I use Logic Pro for everything else, as well as recording and mastering the chiptune, if only because it's the program I started with back in 2006 or so, I stuck to it and I'm better for it.
Find a DAW (or skip the computer and find a different sequencer altogether) that suits your specific needs for the kind of music you want to make, stick with it and develop an efficient workflow by learning it inside and out. Key commands are your best friend, learn them, memorize them. Print out a cheat sheet if you have to (I've done this) but searching the help file directly on your computer is just as useful. When I was learning famitracker I would keep the help file open in one window while I was tracking in the other window, and reference it constantly.
Remember that all this software crap are just tools that exist to enable your own creativity, so don't let your lack of knowledge in any area hold you back from creating, your only obstacle is yourself and your level of persistence to learn and grow. You don’t "need" anything apart from the basics to make great music, you will find you will have much better results learning the tools you already have to the extent of their abilities before you invest tons of money in stuff you don't really need or know how to use. Plugins for the most part all do the same things just in different ways, so learning how stock plugins affect your sound will help you to understand if you actually need something different or more advanced. There are some pretty unique plugin choices out there that are highly specialized, so weigh the features of those against the options you currently have to make an informed decision if it feels necessary to invest the money.
To help you learn music, first of all I'd recommend spending some time actively listening to music you like. Active listening is when listening is the activity, maybe you're taking notes about what you're hearing but you're not doing anything else like videogames or homework where your brain is occupied with other tasks.
Set aside time to make covers or remixes of songs you like, so you can get a feel for how song structures work and you’ll be learning a sequencer in the process. It’s a great life hack that takes the guesswork out of writing a great song… just copy one that’s already been written. You shouldn’t at any point in this process worry about how to monetize it or what people will think of it, because you’re just learning, you can worry about that later, if at all.
Game music tends to be structured differently from other music since its generally going to be a loop, but even with game music you should be able to discern multiple sections of a track before it loops again. Not to over-complicate things too soon, but if you’re in 4/4 or “common” time, you’ll almost always be working with multiples of 4, so think about that if it helps.
We are fortunate now to have YouTube as a learning resource (I did not have this when I was starting out) so if you’re focused and dedicated you can really fast-track your progress compared to the previous generations, but don't get sucked into watching tutorials for hours at a time. The journey never ends, so you will never feel like you have all you need to get started. Just get started… right now. You will make much better progress by diving in and making a song, stopping to watch a tutorial only to remove a specific roadblock you encounter along the way to learn how to do a specific thing, then immediately go back to your song to apply it so you retain what you just learned. Again... memorizing key commands goes a long way in enabling a fast and efficient workflow.
In Logic, you can press option-K to pull up the key commands window, and search for the action you are trying to perform. You can memorize the key command, or remap it to something more intuitive for you. I think all DAWs have this feature. Keep a notes file of your favorites.
It's never a bad thing in the game world to be proficient in making several different genres, but your own golden ticket is going to be figuring out the thing you most want to make, that you're the best at, and becoming really really good at that thing. People will seek you out for what you do best, eventually. I had no aspirations to make game music myself, it just sort of happened because I was making what I wanted to make, putting it online, and going on tour for over 10 years. Sabotage discovered me before they were Sabotage, it was 2-3 guys fiddling around with a prototype of a then-untitled ninja game that needed a chiptune soundtrack. The rest is history or something.
If you really want to make game music, it's not always a job you have to apply for, and you probably shouldn't anyway without having a massive catalog of music under your belt. So building a portfolio of your own stuff and your body of work is going to be your resume and calling card to land a job. With the amount of composers out there, a developer is far less likely to give a composer a chance if they can’t even hear what their music sounds like.
Creative jobs are unique in that you have to front-load all the hard work honing your craft for a long time, often years, before you ever see a return. Don’t let that discourage you - let it excite you about how much you’re going to learn and where you’ll be 6 months or a year from today.
If you aren’t enjoying it and having fun while you’re doing it casually, you’re going to truly, deeply loathe it when it’s your job.
It helps to keep in mind that indie game studios are just one person or a group of people making something they want to make, in the hopes that people will play it one day. If you dig around all the websites and social media you can find a project to connect with, there’s thousands at any given time. Networking can wait as long as you’re honing your craft, it's fine to do but don't confuse networking with self-promotion, and there is actually no need to put forward a 100% professional face 100% of the time. Just be yourself (as long as yourself is kind, and self-aware, otherwise reevaluate your self). If people are looking for help, figure out how you can help them without expecting anything in return. Build a reputation doing that, but don’t let it take time away from making music.
I'm not saying sell yourself short or give your product away for free (editor's note: non-exclusive licenses do exist) but overall the best thing you can do for yourself as a music producer is to keep pumping out music with no expectations whatsoever, and eventually you'll end up where you want to be or, even better, in a completely different place you never could have dreamed about. It sounds corny but it's true, the only true path to failure is giving up too soon.
Apart from your music, you can make a name for yourself as a pleasant person that someone would want to work with. The goal posts will keep changing for you as time goes on, that's just how it goes, if you ain't growin’ you're dyin’. But if you keep at it for way longer than you think makes sense, or is fair, you will absolutely succeed. I was exactly where you are once except I didn't know theory and was often too shy to reach out to people. Now I'm older and I still don’t know a lot of music theory but I have loads of experience under my belt, a body of work dating back almost 2 decades, and I dare say a decent ear for what sounds good to me.
So in summary, the secret formula is that it's not actually a secret, its just lots of time, persistence and dedication above all. Getting started is easy, sticking with it can be a challenge. Just keep at it and enjoy the ride.
Hope this helps. Now go make some friggin music!
- Eric