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How to Build Your Reputation as a Beat Producer
There are as many worthless lyricists out there as there are people pumping out horrid beats in their bedrooms and filling up SoundCloud and YouTube. Let them work together. You are the one high quality producer out of the thousand that has any lick of musical talent. The problem is that nobody knows you're there. They don't make their way to your music profiles to […]
The Aztec Death Whistle Will Give You Horrific Nightmares
The Aztecs made countless types of noisemakers and musical instruments. Using clay, sugar cane, turkey feathers, ores, frog skins, and much more, they were able to create sounds to be associated with many life events, but most jarringly, the Aztec death whistle. They had conch shells for ceremonies, ocarinas for making animal grunts to attract deer, flutes for traditional music entertainment. Some researchers even believe […]
Roadie 2 Review - Does the Automatic Guitar Tuner Stack Up?
The Roadie 2 guitar tuner is now available with several substantial upgrades over the original Roadie. But do they make that much of a difference? And can an automatic tuner really be trusted to be fast and accurate? Get the inside scoop here, including a video review so you can witness our hands on experience yourself… Whether you're a professional guitar player, a beginner still […]
Weird Instruments - 21 Musical Monstrosities That Actually Work
Weird musical instruments abound. Strings, brass, percussion... even ones with animals in them exist in the present, and that's not even counting the theoretical ones throughout history that got a little too bizarre. 21 Weird Instruments Let's take a look at the strangest and most unusual instruments out there, in no particular order. Now, there are some crazy choices we could include, like the bagpipes […]
CD Baby celebrates 20th Birthday & $600 Million in Artist Payouts
If you're like me, you probably remember the old days of uploading your songs to MySpace and Soundcloud. It was cool to hit the charts and get a ton of plays, but there wasn't a readily available way of monetizing those plays. The best you could do on these streaming sites was link people out to your own shoddily built website and hope people trusted […]
5 True Music Myths People Want to Be False
The history of modern music is draped in the power of music myth and rumor, from the “Paul is dead” buzz to Led Zeppelin’s filthy mud shark incident. Sometimes, the stories that serve as the foundation for such mythos are so fantastic, so cool, or so flat out weird, it doesn’t much matter whether they’re true, they’re false, or they exist in the space in […]
Can We Mix the Kick Drum & Bass in Stereo?
A fantastic email came in today that was so good that I dropped everything else I was doing to address the question at hand regarding stereo bass. The question involves the information found in one of our most popular and earliest articles called Mixing Bass and Kick for Low-End Balance. With nearly every genre now emphasizing the low-end to drive the groove and create the […]
How to Set Up Your Audio Interface to Record Audio
Our most recent question that was generalizable enough to benefit the entire community is a very fundamental hurdle that nearly everyone runs into: how to use an audio interface. Being a musician usually involves learning an instrument and some music theory, of course. But rarely do we anticipate needing to learn our way around computers to enhance our hobby. And that's what happens when you […]
How MTV’s TRL Met Its Slow, But Inevitable Demise
You couldn’t get away from Total Request Live at the turn of the 20th century. Their formula of counting down the day's top videos was the anchor of MTV's programming for years. Even if said videos skewed immensely heavy toward throwaway bubblegum pop or rap-rock/nu-metal that in retrospect hasn't aged too well, TRL still dominated. But by the time it left the airwaves in 2008, […]
High-Level Song Arrangement Tips: From 'Meh' to Masterpiece
So you've written a great song. Now what? Most songs call for more than simply the original skeleton of voice and piano or guitar. But just how do you arrange when you're starting with these bare bones? What do you add to the orchestration and where do you add this to the song? Here we'll offer some tips to help you create a quality song […]
Managing Stage Fright: Does Practice Make Perfect?
Anxious music students and seasoned performers are often asked, “How long do you practice every day?” Having treated many performers with stage fright, it is important to take a closer look at this question. The answer is not a simple number of hours (or, in some cases, minutes) that one practices, or even how carefully one practices. Yes, careful and mindful practice is important. Nervousness […]
Beginner Jazz Guitar for Non-Jazz Guitarists
Learning to play jazz guitar might seem like rocket science to some, and while there is a world of information and approaches out there, taking things in small steps will yield the best results. Remember that music is not a competition. It is art for its own sake. In this lesson, I'll attempt to give a general overview of the basics while being as comprehensive […]
A School Boy's Yearbook Ambition to Sell a Million Records (Alice Cooper)
This is one of those stories that has a surprise ending, so stick around for the reveal! Strange and interesting things are happening around us all the time. It used to be that you'd hear about some story that happened to your friend's cousin's neighbor's dad and you'd dismiss it with a chuckle because it was too far fetched. But now, with the internet, these […]
Musical Anhedonia: Deriving No Pleasure From Music
For most people, music is an exercise in catharsis. A snappy tune by The Beatles may bring a smile on our face. Spinning Adele’s “21” after a breakup provides a layer of empathy to our distress. Note that we said, "most people." That's because there are some people that don't like music regardless of artist, style, or genre, because it's like watching paint dry to […]
What Do Speaker Spikes Actually Do & Do I Need Them?
We received a question recently that nearly drove me bonkers as I started to think more about it. I had formulated and sent my own answer back before reading some opinions on a few audiophile forums. Let's just say I'm not surprised to have read professionals in that crew stating the exact opposite conclusions from the same set of facts. Audiophiles don't exactly operate in […]
How to Soundproof a Room for Studio Quality Recordings
With advances in technology driving the cost of music recording microphones, interfaces, and computers down, everyone is building their own home recording studios. Why not, right? Why pay $500 for a 5 hour time block in your local studio when you can buy a really nice mic for the same price? Double that and you've got nearly everything you need to record vocals, guitar, keyboard, […]
Chuck E. Cheese's Robot Band is Breaking Up for Good
This is sad news indeed for many of us musicians, old and young. The animatronic band that graced the stages of Chuck E. Cheese locations across America are finally throwing in the towel to enjoy a well-earned retirement. Chuck E. Cheese & ShowBiz Those of us born in the late 70's and early 80's will remember ShowBiz Pizza Place and Billy Bob the Hillbilly Bear. […]
How Long Does it Take to Develop Calloused Guitar Fingers?
Most of the questions we receive usually reveal a gap in our content and today's question was no different. What we did manage to do this time was publish a full length post related to the growth of calloused guitar fingers before we managed to post the Q&A itself. If you want the long explanation, you can find that here: How to Build Guitar Calluses. […]
Fletcher Munson Curve: The Equal Loudness Contour of Human Hearing
Working with studio headphones and monitors that feature the flattest frequency responses is important. They reduce the possible variation our listener's will hear due to their own stereo systems, equalization preferences, and the influence of their listening rooms. Untold hours and billions of dollars have been spent in research and development in these industries alone. Then two physicists stepped into the game and changed everything. […]
How to Build Guitar Calluses: Take Care of Your Fingers!
Forget about the tall tales, the marketing schemes, and the urban legends. Nobody wants their fingertips raw and wounded from playing guitar. Mainly because that means you have to stop playing until you heal. As a beginner, it's bad enough to need to restrict your practice time because your fingertips are tender and squishy. You might only play for 30 minutes but the next day […]
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