Do samples kill the *real* electronic music?

[lucidsamples]

Few days ago I've read on Magnetic Mag blog, an article by David Ireland.

The thing is that I am not mad or something. It's this moment when you realize that you stand before something that you can't change. I really like using samples. Not only because I'm selling them. They are very useful tools and make my everyday music life easier.

Now there is this large group of people who just buy them to instantly become Deadmau5 or other star. You can't say "don't buy samples" to them and on the other hand if you post everyday production tips and tutorials and try to help them learn new things, they just refuse to listen.

Nowadays Internet is full of mediocre or worse songs and if you try to find a good one it is like you would listen to one track all over again for few hours and suddenly find 3 minutes of something interesting.

Is music production *that* easy now? Did what we've been repeating about easiness of music making come true?

I thought writing a reply post about samples in music production would help my deal with the problem and get back to work but I guess it necessary for me to hear out more of your voices.
Can you help me? I know there are more sample packs creators out there on KVR. What do you say?

[whyterabbyt]

Whatever do you mean by *real* ?

[dark water]

Samples don't kill music.
Unimaginative producers do.

Btw 'real electronic music' is a whole different rabbit hole!

[egbert101]

<delete>

[AnX]

Dr Who Theme

/end thread

[imrae]

It's not your fault if people aren't creative. But it might be the fault of sample producers if they market their samples as "all you need to X".

Not every aspect of a track needs to be original for the overall work to be creative. In fact, it's really helpful if a lot of it is following some established conventions because it makes it easier to focus on the original/new part and benefit from context of existing work. It doesn't matter if a shaker loop in the background playing a standard pattern was played in for that specific recording or not. It doesn't matter if multiple tracks have literally the same 909 kick sample with no further processing.

The problem is when people put an entire track together "by the numbers" and forget to put any original ideas in. Actually, that isn't a problem either, it's a good way to learn. The problem is when people seek validation and maybe commercial gain from their wholly unoriginal work. *Then* maybe the art suffers.

It's absolutely possible to do "painting by numbers" with analogue gear anyway, it just takes longer.

[Apratim]

no samples or preset do not kill electronic music
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project files and the always "collab bro"guys do
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i think even piracy helps electronic music sometimes

[stardustmedia]

Samples are also a big part of the electronic music.

You don't want to hear what I've heard too many times, musicians/producers created with a massive rig of real analog gear...
It was cruel, awful, painful, pure terror, ... even if the 909 cowbell didn't sound exactly the same with each hit

Who cares about the instrument, if the tune rocks? Right, NO ONE!

[AnX]

KvR cares

[Tj Shredder]

Samples are real at least if you recorded them yourself...
I always used samples, but never ever bought any sample pack or sound set, and will never do. It would drive the fun part out of the creation process...
In the past I did a lot of sound design as well, and some of my friends did use the sounds, but I am not sure if I did them any favor with it...
No, samples cannot kill real music. They can enhance it, and we just need to adjust our filters to ignore the junk and noise which is coming along with it...
Creating your own sounds is less time consuming than trying to find a sound that fits to your needs within that universe of sounds offered. And its way more fun...
This is true for synthesized, sampled sounds and loops...

[DSmolken]

They sort of do, but not in the way that article is talking about. The current general trend is towards "realinstrumenty" sounds, which often means samples of violins or guitars or whatever even in genres such as house, or maybe even the real thing. Synth sounds which are common these days are often not that complicated, either - there are a lot of simple sounds which could be easily made with a basic analog subtractive synth. That is another big reason why producers might not be doing complex sound design in synths as much as they used to.

Of course, the existence of samples greatly "harms" my musical output, because I'd rather make virtual instruments than songs. I produced all of three tracks last year, and put about 300 hours into making a virtual singer. But other than a couple of singers who wish I had time to produce their songs, and DJ friends who wish I had time to fill in for them, I don't think anybody minds.

[e@rs]

No.

But Deadmau5 does.

[DSmolken]

No.

But Deadmau5 does.

Wait, he has something to do with music? I thought he was just famous for blocking people on Twitter?

[malachy5]

Real Electronic music was always about sampling, taking a mix of different sources and recombining them in new and interesting ways. The story of Little Fluffy Clouds is pretty amazing and it still sounds good (to me anyway).
https://www.whosampled.com/The-Orb/Litt ... fy-Clouds/

And that track taken to it's logical conclusion in Frontier Psychiatrist by The Avalanches;

[ATN69]

I think everyone use samples in one form or the other. I don't use sampled melodies or chord progressions from sample packs but I do use samplers and sample libraries coming with it. Kontakt is one example. I also use drum samples, one shots and kick free drum loops. Personally I don't care if do, or don't sound like the main stream out there. I make music for myself as a hobby and I do it for the fun of it. If other people like it then I am of course happy, but if they don't I am happy anyway.

I been listening to hours and hours of uplifting trance because that's one of the genres I like. Some times I recognize sounds and parts, melodies, etc, that I also made and used in my tracks. I also noticed that many tracks can sound similar to other tracks. Some times I can even recognize presets from different plugin synths that artists used in their tracks. When I started working with Trance, house, etc, I had concerns that I would unintentionally make same chord progressions, melodies and things that someone else already made, but I came to realize that it's unavoidable at this point. There are so much out there already so it's very hard to be unique.

As for creativity I would say that any type of sounds, samples or presets, can get my creativity going. Many times I create my own presets from scratch but equally often I take a factory preset and tweak it until I get the result I want.