13 Things That Makes Your Tracks Sound Amateur

[@Alice-Efe]

And here is my KZbin video on the most influential bass ever created 👽 kzbin.info/www/bejne/bJPHipyVj8d0gM0

[@Zayphix]

you have some of the best music production content I've ever seen

[@Alice-Efe]

Thank you Zayphix! Trying my best

[@logoleonachhilfe7701]

Geniusshit for sure, appreciate a lot!

[@lokealexander]

​@@Alice-Efe Succeeding!

[@edenseeker]

Agreed, simple to understand and concise

[@cw752]

agreed!

[@positif4047]

I study a master degree in music and your videos are always much appreciated. They're always very informative and clear, especially the visual explanations that are so intuitive and easy to understand ! You're very pedagogic, and I wish I had teachers like you in my uni. Keep up the good work :)

[@KORDHELL]

unexpected kordhell appearance

[@Alice-Efe]

Awww ❤

[@dragonfruitreal]

mfw unexpected kordhell appearance

[@Isakube]

mfw unexpected kordhell appearance

[@IvanDropA0]

Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat

[@zenxiee]

mfw unexpected kordhell appearance

[@winterburnwinterburn]

I love how much effort you put into the details of these videos! And the amazing visual explanations :)

[@Alice-Efe]

Thank you so much! 😊

[@maaaaase.]

This came at the absolute perfect time for me... I was JUST beginning to dissect my own tracks to figure all this out myself. Thanks Alice

[@Alice-Efe]

Good luck with your track! 😊

[@JoelAguero]

I really appreciate how you include little plugs but they’re so short and sweet, so they don’t detract from the video’s topic at all.

[@Quiet_Forge]

I produce old school 90s jungle so I avoid all the modern icky sample collections and stick to what was around in 1994. To me, genre drift is one of the hidden big mistakes. One thing I would love you to cover is, specifically, multiband compression treatments for ultra subs. It's really hard to stop a pure sine wave at 44kHz from either being inaudible or overly dominant... and then you listen to it in your car and it's completely changed. Thing is, nobody was putting comedy distortion on the subs back then so they have to stay clean to be authentic.

[@elianmusic7452]

Hi Alice! 2:08 isn't true -- in fact, overly hi passing your reverbs and delays to avoid "muddiness " is a massively easy way to cut a lot of body from your mix and relatively add a lot of "tinniness" and perhaps even harshness -- Spatial elements are elements. Theyre not just "effects", but they are an element of your mix. When an element of your mix is conistently highpassed so it has no body and only 800hz and up, then you are effectively increasing 800hz and up in all your mixes, which relatively speaking is ducking 800hz and down. On mix with the masters, ive seen almost NO pros hi pass their reverbs. Michael brauer has made fun of this practice (coldplay mix engineer) -- Jacquire King hi passes at around 150hz and explicitly says do not go further than that. This seemed counter intuitive to me because i was like "but reverb! its muddy in the low mids!" -- this is not true at all. Its an element that needs to be mixed in like everything else, using eq, compression perhaps (rare but can happen) --- it is NOT just something we can automatically hack away, because real reverb in real churches and real rooms dont do that. It leads to a tinny, bright artificial sound. Further more, sometimes you really really want low mids and bassy reverb on your kick, to create a cinematic kick for example with lots of boo0o0o0m, but i understand that thats a specific niche case. Better solution: high pass up to 100, 150, max 200 hz -- then use shelves, bells (i prefer bells) to reduce the low mids and medium mids to taste. This has made an enormous difference in the body and "glue" and "pro" ness of my sound, and im not bragging but i already had a good sound to begin with just like yourself :) Have a great day Alice!

[@iszapp6133]

Every Alice video makes me want to re-mix my whole discography 😂Awesome tips!

[@Alice-Efe]

haha "dew it!"

[@SenzoClive]

it doesn't matter, it's part of the process those mistakes. I met a guy who was so terrible in live dj mixing, he played one of the worst dj mixes I've ever heard, but what I really noticed that day was that he was trying so hard to get it right, his whole family was there, cheering him on. That inspired me.

[@urbanimusic3319]

This is a great video! It would've been nice to have a couple of solutions to some of the issues you described though. For example, what are the alternatives to using outdated riser effects for build ups? What are some techniques for changing up the energy levels in a less rigid way? Apologies if you've already covered these in other videos, I'm quite new to the channel!

[@Ranakade]

I always had a feeling in my gut that using many reverbs with different decay times etc would ruin things. Thanks so much for this vid! ❤️🙌

[@hygro9625]

I'm all for custom risers but some of the best tracks I've heard recently by mega huge artists are still using plug and play risers. Musicianship beats artisanal effects every time.

[@AA-lq5pu]

I love that you stones and tools to demonstrate what you are saying as it makes it alot easier to grasp. This is very helpful! And your skin looks amazing!

[@theisotisback]

5:00 i actually like this tangled percussion soup and i think it can actually be used in an ambient track

[@samu2655]

There’s a lot of misinformation on the internet so I was getting ready to pick this apart but actually there’s a lot of good points made here. Really like the visuals too.

[@AdrianChazz]

You should do a part two where you tackle, in depth, how to fix these mistakes! Thanks for sharing!

[@ikennasaus4781]

You deserve your own tv show for music production.

[@brycem9063]

The DJ Khaled clip was savage!!!

[@christianvictor827]

That's a fantastic video Alice! It's like a check list for your own production.

[@gaboquintana3628]

..."sometimes you make these mistakes and it sounds great". What a great line to finish off. C'est vrai qu'il n'y a rien coulé dans le béton. Good advice thnx.

[@tauvholiik7936]

I intentionally compose interwoven muddiness of many types of heavily distorted rhythm guitars all dynamically layered together to fit the mix. I fuse many elements between orchestrated symphonic with electronic elements into several styles of progressive metal, death metal and black metal with some alternative, funk, jazz and classical influences. I compose what I want to hear. Whenever I record my guitar improvisations, I use two foot pedals to dynamically and fluidly change the tempo so that a drum draft matches my guitar playing instead of sticking with metronomes or quantized grids. Also, I deliberately layer multiple acoustic drums with modified 808 bass drums in double kick formation panned slightly so as to hear the drums as a drummer would hear them. I do not compose simple songs despite a few chorus hooks. Songs that are easily digestible are easily forgettable as well without much substance. I have also written specific guitar parts that rely upon extremely different reverbs in contrast to one another which creates a specific effect for multiple rhythm parts fused together as though multiple songs sounding perfectly fused together.

[@CalamityJay-ez2mq]

Heavy music can still be well produced though? Like Darko US sounds like bitcrushed noise but because it’s mixed properly and not muddy it’s still listenable

[@essentialdang]

Hell yeah Alice! Great video as always! And you're looking so happy, love to see it!

[@Oh-Grr]

Thank you for the ending, I was leaning into beating myself up when you pointed out that everyone makes these mistakes and that's how you get better.

[@RafiBarides]

Ok but that play dough visualization of sidechain is the best thing I’ve ever seen

[@ILLICITNOISE]

Seriously this channel is amazing. You are so good at explaining things for visual learners like myself, another great vid with great advice!

[@DreamHeaven]

I dropped for a while from your videos , and now returning back. Must say the quality of content is much higher now! Congrats , and thanks for the video, indeed my checklist :)

[@oridavidmusai7184]

I create more of a pop genre but your videos are always treasure for me. Thank you so much you’re amazing!!!

[@unleazerwave]

5:45 opened up my heart when i heard Solomun

[@PrimaudiaRecord]

Whenever I watch your videos I feel like my mixes are rubbish, and it feels great 🤣

[@GoneComposer]

Futuristic Alice is AWESUM

[@ephjaymusic]

Stop motion sound engineering explanations are so great!!!

[@karmatosed7211]

I love the newer artistic visual examples & the way your employing them! The editing & overall content is taking a noticeable step up. Love the info you included in this video as well, cerebral stuff. Happy to see ya continually improving & walking the walk. So kudos, if that wasn’t obv yet. 😂

[@ownedbymykitty270]

I have been non-amateur for over 10 years except the biggest mistake I made was mostly mixing on headphones and not having a proper high-quality monitoring setup. This was also due to my living arrangement. So many of my tracks still ended up having about 2-3 dB too much low end.

[@boulevardsound5137]

Great video! My two cents is you could've found an objectively worse amateur example. Only because I could not tell the difference (objectively) but most certainly enjoyed the amateur piece more. Stylistically, it doesn't look like you're comparing apples with apples. The techniques and information you've showcased through out the video were great none the less! Keep em coming!

[@mazharcelaleddinkeskinocak9626]

I heard your accent and I was like she is a compatriot , and I was right. Great content, keep up the good work !!!

[@DrCook45]

Hey Alice, once again, very fun video and totally inspiring, thank you so much, love from the UK :)

[@Alice-Efe]

So glad! Much love! 😊🙋‍♀️

[@winterkeep]

Really appreciated the last comment, it’s so encouraging to hear we have all made mistakes and that they are no reason to stop creating 👍

[@jsohi0082]

I love your content so much!!!! I learn so much it's insane. I do have one feedback which is putting slightly longer pauses between the transitions and when you finish sentences so I can absorb what you say better. Again, thank you for the clear explanations of the music production concepts!

[@adamswapitshop]

Awesome video. Love the use of the hook of Greece 2000 at 4:36. Classic track.

[@NICUofficial]

thank you for helping me find it, I was scrolling for this comment. last time I heard it was an on Oakenfold CD I got back in high school (early 2000s) when NO ONE around me listened to techno or trance the sound was SO familiar instantly (lots of late-night headphone listening) but I had no, no idea why I knew it I loooooved this track when I was kid. Still holds up, damn

[@dragonfruitreal]

wtf it is unreal how much i just learned from this 7 minute video

[@DmitryPuffin]

Cheesy fx point is kinda odd. If we are talking about audio effects that come with DAWs, they are pretty much doing their job. There is whole market for vintage fx, like tape delays or old reverb units. Many of them just work right in the mix. The only thing that might give that 'outdated' sound is the reverb, since it has complicated algoritms, and some of them might be hard to tweak right. Some good reverb impulses might do the job better than crappy reverb plugin. But if your are talking about risers/impacts, most of them, especially old ones, need some processing to make them work in a mix.

[@Alice-Efe]

Nono, it was not meant to use FX comes with the DAW. They are better and 80% my FXs are ableton FX devices. That meant using those "you-know-which" FX risers, and adding tons of reverb on it. Making already an overused cheesy sound, cheesier.

[@DmitryPuffin]

@@Alice-Efe Ah, Okay. Was not really clear to me. Otherwise good points stated in the video! 👌

[@astroluce9418]

I really like and appreciate how your internet personality is not only about transgenderism as it is very common today, where famous figures whole personality is connected only to their outside apperance. You instead bring an amazing knowledge of music production and strive to learn people to become really better at it. Keep doing that, because it surely is very effective and creative way to do it. Wish you all the best.😎

[@SchibbiSchibbi]

the editing is out of this world! big big compliment!

[@davedave9924]

Been watching for months. Nearly lost my mind when I put together that you’re Biskuwi from that io part. Mixed into Lane 8’s latest it’s my absolute favorite part.

[@dankwarmouse6248]

Wow i love your visualizations. They're not only really helpful to communicate your ideas, they're so creative!

[@RogueFire29]

Love it and probably did all these mistaks at some point! this is how you learn

[@chucksl21]

I love the rocks with the instruments on them! that's brilliant!

[@alzu5]

Sooooo much content in just 7 minutes this is amazing!

[@gregoiremazuel4808]

I really think your KZbin channel is the best KZbin channel I've ever follow to improve myself at producing songs ! I can hear my creations getting better and better as I try to follow some of your advices rigourously ! So thanks !

[@jenstornell]

Very good. I know music but this was a new fresh take. Great teacher actually. Thanks!

[@ramencoke]

this video editing is crazy !

[@zehdubass939]

I love how sweetly you destroy our dreams of actually being good🤣 Great content, great explanations and visual details

[@80ssynthfan48]

As a totally casual amateur, I'm joyfully oblivious to, and ignorant of most of what this even means lol. Great that you're dropping it on here though.

[@cevikkubat2922]

alice is goated, thanks so much

[@jackarts6901]

The hook is really important. Its the difference between writing a song or just a boring drum beat that needs drugs to make it sound good

[@mytraining-rk3dj]

I love your manner to provide examples to everything you are saying. They may be a little longer, but okay. Thank you!

[@tomt6480]

Great Video

[@just-groove-it-records]

Thank you, excellent video, concise explanations, great visualisations...loved the stop-n-go motion for the "side-chain" representation...beautiful!

[@y4go650]

Awesome! A video on how you made all those cool vocal effects would be cool :)

[@Alice-Efe]

I will try to make a video about vocals 🤔

[@static-san]

I love it when I come across a short concise piece of learning just when I'm ready to learn it!

[@pavendax]

after around 6 years making music i still dont know if my track sounds amateur or sounds professional

[@paulmix3858]

Great content as always! Most of the amateurish errors in one packet. I've done all of that list. But let's say "error" in a positive way because once you hear the difference you can fix them quite easily. Maybe amateurs don't do "errors" but they don't listen the mix deep enough and don't listen reference tracks carefully. I would say that the worst error you can make is to sit and mix too long at a time. Your ears get stuffed with all basses and snares and finally you don't hear anything. This get worse with own music because you always evaluate bass lines, melody and other stuff which you've made. And soon you find yourself playing new patterns and basses instead of mixing. Sorry, quite a long story but I'm excited 'cause I signed up to a Dolby Atmos mixing course that includes real mixing in a wonderful new studio here in Helsinki. Maybe old dog learns new tricks :)

[@dannymaher664]

Always good to see you my friend. Don't forget you owe me a beer when i can walk again I'll still be coming over when that happens! Take good care all the best for now. Dan UK

[@mageprometheus]

Thanks Alice. Love and light. 💜

[@aaron_d_henderson1984]

I don't get it, all of these examples sound exactly the same (except for maybe the panning one). do I need to have audiophile hardware to hear your video properly? or is this something only the top 1% of pro's in the music industry can actually hear a difference in?

[@wolfgang4468]

Very helpful. Especially 4:04 was a surprise for me. Thank you very much!

[@HAZARDOUS88]

Thanks for the tips, love the side-chain animation lol

[@Franatom]

how did I not find this channel sooner!?

[@xanjelx]

On some tracks I pan the snare just sliiightly, to emulate the sound of a real drumset (same with ride and hats).

[@earthwokker]

did you know there are a ton of people who are in love with you because of how much goodness you provide to the giant ecosystem that is music? if not now you do, if you did just a reminder

[@theusednotes7999]

Some really interesting points there

[@DavidMilesMusic]

true I have dt770's and I notice that when I listen to my tracks in my studio on krk's, even little monitors the sub bass is massive. TOO massive...thank you for this video

[@lukejbonner]

Thank you! Your tips are so helpful and your video production is amazing 🙂

[@senhorlampada]

grym video. och ser snyggare ut varje dag ❤

[@cedhawkins5013]

Excellent video...clear and concise

[@russellholloway7465]

Love your videos really well explained, thank you 😊

[@templarassassin3844]

30% этих советов накрываются медным тазом, если мы пишем экспериментальную музыку

[@ozziereaker]

love your videos Alice I am with You Years, ur such a big person!!

[@Londoloza031]

you look cuuute!! thanks for all your informative content ✨

[@anonymerhiphop5427]

Thank you Alice for the great content! It's always good to be reminded of it, even if you already knew it. It's a lot of fun to follow your videos.

[@Alice-Efe]

Thank you for being a channel member for so long and following the channel. All the best to you! ☺

[@meusince199]

Learned so much in 1 video. Thank you.

[@alpenjon]

Really straight forward and competent tipps - bought the techno course recently and it was well worth it. Good strategy to offer free stuff in this level of quality as well. Good balance makes a good producer as well as a good teacher and enterpreneur.

[@Alice-Efe]

Aww thanks a ton!

[@PerjantaiPrkL]

Awesome tips! Greetings from Finland :)

[@speedcrawlmusic]

So helpful thank you! 🌞

[@nukiolbartes6279]

Awesome. i have been watching lots of your videos last few weeks and trying to apply some of the techniques to prepping my eurorack setup. Like highpassing some samples to declutter low freq area. Layering Kick into transient, body and sub and controlling them deliberately on different sections.. Considering getting Sub... : D Among others.. Thank you Alice!

[@filiprangus5826]

Great video, Alice thank you

[@FlemmeDetout-qd6fn]

hey i wanted to say thank you because i've improved a lot thanks to your videos.

[@colleczone-fr]

Love the examples that you built to illustrate every recommandation. Thank you Alice.

[@Alice-Efe]

Glad it was helpful, I enjoy making them. ✌

[@briancase6180]

Great video; lots of information. I would just say that starting with little vocal chops that are out of tune is a great technique for inspiration. You can always just delete them or tune them, but sometimes I find i get really fun ideas for contrasting harmonies that I would never have thought of without that little "stake in the ground." So, yeah, make these mistakes on your way to learning how to avoid them. That's part of the process.

[@neepo]

ty alice, exactly what i needed

[@DaveTherrien]

Another great video - always informative AND entertaining!

[@steppabanton9753]

Great content. Great video. Big ups

[@NathanielSkinnerMusic]

Sometimes I just need someone to tell me these things so I actually think about them and don't fall victim to the mistakes. Thank you!

[@pmtoner9852]

Thanks! I love the handmade visual aids

[@Alice-Efe]

Thank you! and appreciate the donation as well!

[@alexk4709]

I’m already really good at sounding amateur but I’m hoping these tips will take me to the next level! 😄

[@eyvindjr]

Thanks for the video! I that if you are writing music in the classical tradition, only writing "in key" will probably make you sound amateur. I completely agree you have to know what you are doing, but I find it a bit sad that writing "out of key" is generally considered a mistake in electronic music

[@Nedirbuciddiyet]

Amazing content!! Thank you so much for these great videos!

[@willemclaesen5983]

Great video. Do you avoid risers/sweeps altogether?