How do YOU beat musician's block?

[SODDI]

[quote="tranel"]Hmmm... not sure if this is the right forum, but here goes:

How do YOU beat musician's block? You know, when you sit there and stare at your synth/DAW for hours, noodle a bit, get a nice 2-bar loop going but nothing ever develops. The inspiration muse is utterly quiet. When that happens, what do you do?

T[/quote]

Work on something until it's finished (or as finished as it can be), then move on.

I came at this electronic music thing out of the visual arts, so I have a slightly different perspective than most.

When you look at the body of work of many painters, you also look at the preparatory sketches and drawings and rough pre-paintings, many that are the basis for great works that you may be familiar with. These are part of the process of creating the work.

They weren't "meant" to be looked at as works of art in themselves, but sometimes they are as good - and in a few cases BETTER - than the major works themselves (if you take a look at some of Seurat's little pre-paintings for "Le Grande Jatte", you'll see what I mean.)

So I "draw" my little rough pieces. I "sketch" in sound. When the sketch is done, I put it away. A lot of the time, I'm not very happy with what I've done. But I always learn something from them.

In Brian Eno's "A Year (With Swollen Appendices)" he talks about this very same process.

Plus, I'm not looking for any grand epiphanies. I want to do something good - something SOLID. The times I've done my best pieces, the overwhelming feeling is one of SATISFACTION WITH A JOB WELL DONE - like I built a particularly good bookcase or something.

As R. Crumb's Mr. Natural said, "Life is mostly hard work."

[bmanic]

Hmmm... not sure if this is the right forum, but here goes:

How do YOU beat musician's block? You know, when you sit there and stare at your synth/DAW for hours, noodle a bit, get a nice 2-bar loop going but nothing ever develops. The inspiration muse is utterly quiet. When that happens, what do you do?

I've found numerous times that the creative juices never really stop, just pause. If I am in the situation you described, I go get a cup of tea, a bisquit and then simply force myself to continue adding stuff to the loop or start arranging things if there is enough material. This kind of jump-starts the creative juices again.. I don't know why it works but it seems to do so. This is also the very reason why working under strict conditions usually helps the creative flow. It could be a time limit thing or a limited set of equipment.

Cheers!
bManic

[botkiller]

Sometimes I go back to old bits, and I find things I want to grow and continue.

Other times, I sit down and tell myself that I need to write X amount of parts, just to write them, and I'll organize and arrange them all later.

[t00nz]

So I "draw" my little rough pieces. I "sketch" in sound. When the sketch is done, I put it away. A lot of the time, I'm not very happy with what I've done. But I always learn something from them.

+1 Good way to put it... don't sit down to write, sit down to learn.. there is always something to learn even if you don't have a clue what to write.

[mr ed]

[/quote]Buy new stuff.[/quote]


ha ha best answer so far!

I just do something else, go out, go somewhere new, get in the car take a drive out of town, see some nature, etc. If you have the time and money go away for the weekend, to a new city, or the beach. Always works for me.

[eduardo_b]

Sometimes I go back to old bits, and I find things I want to grow and continue.

Which actually points to another aspect of creativity -- new or more of the same. When you look at the body of work of established artists, some have done essentially the same album multiple times and some have grown, moved on and experimented...which their fans may appreciate or find disappointing. And the consistency of excellence may be very high or it may be all over the place -- depending on who you ask.

It's the old story of someone either having one great book in them or many. This is where creativity can be a hit or miss situation that depends on talent, drive, intelligence and emotion. If one is stymied by being in a creative rut, then it will require taking real risks to break out into a new phase of creativity. Personal and artistic growth creatively can be hard to come by when one keeps re-creating variations of what has already been accomplished.

[ClearVision]

1) Get away from the computer! Staring at computer monitors is very fatiguing for me. Plus my "studio" is quite sterile right now. Even moving to another room frees my mind up enough to start thinking about songs again.

2) Once away, always have a pen and paper to jot down ideas if they come to you. Melodies, ideas for sounds. Learning music composition and transcription not a bad idea here,

3) Listen to other music, mp3 player, car audio, home stereo, again away from the computer. Sitting in front of the computer, you may analyze the music too much... just casual listening is enough to find something interesting.

4) Remember some of your favorite tunes and work out the melodies, basslines, etc in your head... you never remember everything perfect, and you might just land on something 100% original.

[EuropeanOnUranus]

Buy new stuff.

ha ha best answer so far!

It really is. G.A.S. will get you there!

[Meffy]

I just mentioned the subject line of this thread to Millicent, and instantly she had exactly the same reaction to it that I did.

Q: How do YOU beat musician's block?

A: With a drumstick, of course, like a cowbell.

*toc toc toc toc*

[hibidy]

I beat it with a stick, but usually my head hurts afterwords.

[daExpert]

If people would actually learn an instrument, they would never run out of possibilities, because instead of playing dinky monophonic melodies they could play beautiful polyphonic tapestries.

So folks, learn an instrument.

[hibidy]

If people would actually learn an instrument, they would never run out of possibilities, because instead of playing dinky monophonic melodies they could play beautiful polyphonic tapestries.

So folks, learn an instrument.

No, that is what all this computer stuff is for. If I could just learn how to do it..........

[dan_s]

If people would actually learn an instrument, they would never run out of possibilities, because instead of playing dinky monophonic melodies they could play beautiful polyphonic tapestries.

So folks, learn an instrument.

aren't a lot of instruments monophonic? like a kazoo or someshit.

[Kim Lajoie]

If people would actually learn an instrument, they would never run out of possibilities, because instead of playing dinky monophonic melodies they could play beautiful polyphonic tapestries.

So folks, learn an instrument.

aren't a lot of instruments monophonic? like a kazoo or someshit.

Actually I think most instruments - particularly traditional orchestral instruments - are primarily monophonic.

-Kim.

[dirty oscillators]

If people would actually learn an instrument, they would never run out of possibilities, because instead of playing dinky monophonic melodies they could play beautiful polyphonic tapestries.

So folks, learn an instrument.

aren't a lot of instruments monophonic? like a kazoo or someshit.

Actually I think most instruments - particularly traditional orchestral instruments - are primarily monophonic.

-Kim.

yep, woodwinds, brass... not sure about a someshit, but kazoo's as well.