It's been said before, but, once again, ladies and gentlemen, in the words of the immortal Zappa:

Want to be a composer? ... If you can think design, you can execute design--it's only a bunch of air molecules, who's gonna check up on you? Just follow these simple instructions:
1. Declare your intention to create a "composition."
2. Start a piece at some time.
3. Cause something to happen over a period of time (it doesn't matter what happens in your "time hole"--we have critics to tell us whether it's any good or not, so we won't worry about that part).
4. End the piece at some time (or keep it going, telling the audience it is a "work in progress").
5. Get a part-time job so you can continue to do stuff like this.

Take particular notice of point 3.

Sorry you feel that way, hope you get better

Unless your friends and family have the same taste in music as yourself, they're really a poor gauge of quality. It's pretty hard to get any feedback from such persons, let alone honest & critical/constructive feedback. There's too much familiarity. I've been frustrated with a lack of feedback from such persons myself. We want to have feedback from those we trust & are close to, but it's actually harder to get musical & artistic feedback from such persons because we tend to have very different personal tastes and an unwillingness to hurt each other's feelings with honest responses. Post links to your stuff in music sharing forums like those here at kvr. The more/wider exposure, the better. Try to reach people that have no interest in babying your ego or in hiding their true opinions (which they do in order to feel "polite" or whatever).

As for suck or not, there's so much room for debate and varying taste. There's so much out there that sucks, in my opinion, for various reasons, yet has a market, a following & respect among other musicians. There's so much out there that I enjoy and admire which seems to be largely unknown. There's too much scope for a black & white suck/no suck. It's better to look for the audiences that seem to like stuff at all similar to what you create. If you don't feel at all similar to anything else, aim for the next nearest thing and plug your stuff.

If YOU enjoy listening to what you create, and if you feel comfortable playing it in public or mixed company, then that's a good sign. If you don't enjoy listening to your own stuff, try to determine why and then aim to create what you like to listen to (an historical problem for me, hah). There's also the expensive route toward feedback & exposure, such as services like Taxi.

PS: if you feel you're terrible at it, that will show through and affect people's responses. If it's just an insecurity, work past it because it will hold you back (self-censorship and negative impact on productivity/motivation). If you seriously have objective issues on music making, identify them and focus on improving those areas. Seek assistance from teachers and/or fellow musicians. Study music that does those things right, try to find out what the steps are to mimic/reproduce such things and practice at it.

It's a super competitive business. If you're in it only for fun, then it doesn't matter as much whether you're making stuff people want to buy/hear. If you're in it to earn a living, put out the effort to become the best you can be and to find your specific market/audience or it won't happen. Feeling discouraged sucks. I appreciate that deeply. I deal with motivation issues all the time. But music is something I enjoy & get pleasure from, so i tend to return to it after every break. I recognize I don't wish to do what it takes to compete in the music business so I never concern myself with it.

It's not even really a "music biz" anymore. It's more of a straw-draw than ever.

When I was a "musician" there were so many outlets. Now, it's all done in this secret handshake/magic wand/tweet o facebook/youtube/ way and you have to get really lucky to do anything.

And of course, it's REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY over saturated. Every idiot with an iapp that makes a beat thinks they are the next big thing.

Sorry I missed over this at first. Good stuff here. But remember, people played with zappa were pretty much musical geniuses. It was a pretty exclusive club. You are being really hard on yourself if you hold yourself to his standard.

1. Get your stuff on SoundCloud. It's much more accessible to people, even on mobile devices.

2. Share your stuff more to get feedback (see my previous posts).

3. Self promotion annoys me, too, but it's a necessary evil if you want an audience. Especially if you want sales. There are plenty of ways to self-promote that don't have to be annoying. Put a link to your music in your forum signature(s) and be helpful on forums (give people feedback when they ask for it). Ask politely for feedback and always return the favor when you get it, etc.

4. Try to make friends with musicians in the real world. Having non-music-oriented friends doesn't help Go to shows and hand out free CDRs to people if conversation turns toward the topic of being a musician and tell the recipients that you seek feedback.

5. Collaborate with other musicians. It's a great way to learn about other music styles, people and yourself.

Yeah, you could rightly claim "easy for him to say". Zappa set incredibly high standards for himself, but he was open to all kinds of "air molecule manipulation". He wanted his compositions played perfectly, but he also let Vinnie Colaiuta bark like a seal, and often got people up on stage to just make some noise. He relished the concept of making noises, and was only ever dismissive of what he felt was MOR and AOR ("cottage cheese").

It's the attitude of "follow your instincts, and don't worry about whether anyone will like it" that I admire.

Great wisdom.

@ariston: True!

There's good reasons for that.
It will depend a lot on what ones own expectations are.
It's a natural reaction to put down the popular ones in everything.
The psychological reasons for that go deeper than my post can go though.

If someone hates commercial music, he/she doesn't have to wonder at that no one buys his/her own music.

Commercial music is music that most peoples like. That doesn't mean that you cannot make good music for less people.

It's all about your own goals. I don't think that commercial music is bad. Maybe it is a bit superficial, but that's what most peoples are, too.

Think of Enigma. It is extraordinary music, and it's commercial, too. You can make out-of-the-common-music and sell them nevertheless, that's no contradiction.

I agree with everything in this post except this. I feel like the tweet-o-facebook-tube-forum method is just another way to make yourself available - not necessarily an obscure or secret way - and there aren't any less opportunities. There are tons of "indie" media outlets now because it's easier to publish a video game, movie, animation, or even a blog that needs intro/outro music. I think the emphasis has shifted, but it has always been difficult and will always be difficult to get noticed making music. Granted, this is all from a "doing music in my spare time" point of view and I might be really really wrong, but just my 2 cents.

And I feel bad for contributing to the oversaturation part of things as yet another teenager who makes mediocre electronic music, but we all gotta start somewhere

Not necessarily. Music at the top of the charts may well be the music that sells more copies than music not in the charts, or in different charts, but it doesn't follow that most people like it. "Popular" is a misnomer. You need what? - in the region of 60 000 to 150 000 sales to get to number one in the UK, depending on the competition, out of a population of 60 million plus.

Now I realise that all that that demonstrates is the number of people who like it enough to part with money to obtain it and that rather more people will like it if they hear it on the radio or on TV. But still, that's a long way from most of the population at large. It's maybe the best-selling, maybe the most popular among the recording-buying public but that's all.



Haven't heard any Enigma since my teens (when their first few albums came out) as I grew out of them. They might have broken the mould a bit for popular music, but I'd hardly call them extraordinary

Why do you care so much about what other people think of your music? Do you still enjoy making music? If so, why would you sell all your equipment?



Kill all those hipsters who make dubstep!