Vajrakilla - Burial type beat (dark garage)

[vajrakilla]

I believe this arrangement has a lot of potential but isn't quite there. I think its too repetitive in a lot of areas and lacks significant energy when played live. I would like to find a way to bring the energy up a tad, while keeping the main feeling of the track (is this possible?), as well as make it less repetitive. Any ideas?

Thank you!

https://soundcloud.com/vajrakilla/buria ... al_sharing

[kevingham]

Hey, I like where this is going, I've got a lot of love for Burial, lots of dirt and texture. I think to break it up, drop more little gaps in the sounds you have, just edit litttle bits out here and there, a beat or little rythmic gaps to get some variety going. Also, I think it needs a front sound, a real hook, lead type sound. Burial would usual do this with a simple synth sound and/or a vocal hook. It doen't need to be really complex or anything, just something that hooks you in. He would always make his most front sound dripping with texture. As you can hear in his music, he would process the vocal so it became completely broken (but beautiful).

[vajrakilla]

Thank you for the feedback! By dropping sounds, do you mean just erase elements for a brief moment? Im confused by what you mean about rhythmic gaps - like, make gaps in the rhythm?
As for the lead sound, that's something I haven't actually thought of; thank you. I also like that you talk about how the songs "drip with texture". I think thats something I could also focus on. I appreciate the feedback!

[kevingham]

Yeah, so by dropping out some sounds for example the synth sound which is a harp/ digital piano sound which (sounds like it is 3 notes going up then down with a delay), this could do with more variation. Chop a note out here and there, reverse a note here and there, maybe time stretch a note, basically just give this more variation. There are some other pad sounds as well which you could do the same. If you are working in Midi, just go at it with the draw/pencil tool and pitch shift a few bits or anything really, add variatey that way, but also when you're happy, render it to audio and chop at it a bit then too. Think how you have added little bits of variety to the breakbeat with small edits here and there, do that, but to everything

[AsPeeXXXVIII]

Cool tune! Love the bass sound especially. It is admittedly pretty repetitive, but I didn't find that to be much of a problem. I do think, though, that if you wanted to make the track less so, kevingham's ideas would work well - namely the "rhythmic gaps" and dropping of sounds for some sections.

[vajrakilla]

Thank you, kevingham. The last sentence really spoke to me. I think I overthink the variation within the melody, and instead start to add more elements. I'll see what I can do over the next few days and repost.

[vajrakilla]

Thank you AsPeeXXXVIII! The bass sound is a sine noise bass with a ton of reverb over the top. I also agree that kevinghams ideas will work and I'm a bit more inspired to try.

[Guitarrist]

cool vibe and atmosphere, as you both said, the track only needs a few more elements.

[Googly Smythe]

Not really my thing, but...
...the easiest way to make any track more interesting is a simple key change, up a tone, or so, for a few bars and then back down.