Moderat break the #1 rule of music production
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- čas přidán 5. 08. 2024
- When you learn to produce music, you realise that there are some "rules" so widely used that they are almost invisible, because everyone follows them. Let's look at a song that snaps us out of some of those most fundamental patterns in music production: Moderat - Fast Land.
The Foundations course ► courses.underdog.brussels/cou...
Oscar's other courses ► courses.underdog.brussels
Patreon ► / underdogmusicschool
Discord ► / discord
Contents:
0:00 intro
0:44 the drumgroove
1:04 level 1 - the melody
1:48 level 2 - the 7st oscillator
3:18 level 3 - breaking the rule of 4
5:32 a word of warning for the DJ
6:02 level 4 - sound design in a VST
8:29 my loveletter to moderat
The Foundations course ► courses.underdog.brussels/courses/foundations-of-electronic-music
Oscar's other courses ► courses.underdog.brussels
Patreon ► www.patreon.com/underdogmusicschool
Discord ► discord.gg/trDbVcDHB3
I remember starting out as a DJ, trying to mix my faves: Moderat, Boards of Canada and Aphex Twin. It didn't go well. :)
Hahaha I can only imagine 😂
That's like trying skiing for the first time directly on the black slope. Without snow. With crocodiles :D
Can we just take a moment to appreciate the attention to detail of having the lights on your face matching your track colours. 👏👏👏
Very interesting! Makes me think of something else that happens sometimes in electro music. Starting the track without the kick, only a bunch of percussions together forming a rhythm. But then when the kick arrives, your whole understanding of the loop you were hearing gets destroyed, because you were "imagining" the kick to be somewhere else than where it actually is. I love that effect, I'd love to hear your take on it!
That's so epic, it's really rare but when it happens it's an amazing moment
@@sebsobseb not that rare I don't think! here's an example: Je parle français - French 79
I'm sure this is called 'metric ambiguity' such a great technique to add a suprise to your music.
metric ambiguity
I remember hearing Rick Snoman call it such in a tutorial I believe, it's how I was also introduced to the concept!
Modeselektor did this with their song "Shipwreck". It loops in 5's.
:-) i do this all the time; there is no reason to be only 2,4,8,16.... so great that you show this to the people...
Yessss 🙌 always a pleasure seeing you in the comments!
@@OscarUnderdogwe could do a interview type of thing, and I can explain why I like to do things different and have fun
@@Robert_Babicz I'd LOVE that! How best to contact you? oscar@underdogmusicschool.com reaches me!
Also it's nice when some elements repeats every four bars and some every 3 bars so they meet together in different places.
Excellent video, thank you for shining light on Moderat. They've been at the top of their game consistently with Moderat, ii, iii and MORE D4TA all sounding as fresh today as the day they came out
I was a bit let down with 4 but neon rats is an absolute monster. Modeselektor's last album is awesome too, obviously it's a bit more techno-ish than moderat but that shit slaps.
Your most videos aren't made for beginner producers which is just what I want as I'm an intermediate producer. I love your videos! You really explain certain things in music way more than others on CZcams.
Keep doing what you're doing! ❤️
If you have time you can host a Demo feedback session (livestream) where you listen to your subscriber's tracks and give feedback! I would love to get feedback from you :)
You also can make the last bar of a verse shorter (than 4/4) before the chorus hits, example:
czcams.com/video/nkppN14ugMo/video.html
Then again, one could try different time signatures for a single bar to make a track far more interesting:
czcams.com/video/D_yLqkfLdN8/video.html
(Ok, I will.stop now lol)
Probably my favorite underdog video thus far. Great work Oscar, thanks for the insights.
Wonderful, Oscar. Thank you so much for always bringing up the interesting stuff. I learned quite something from you, already. 👌
I think it's telling of the quality of the content that I have never been the least interested in producing or listening to four on the floor club music, but still tune in for every episode to learn something new from you
Love this 😁
same here
Pretty impressed by Oscar's selection of Moderat to analyze their music this time around (dude, you're freakin' awesome).
I think it was brilliant decision to shed some light on their super interesting sound design. Would love to see the same analysis happening for another recent masterpiece of Moderat, entitled: 'Drum Glow'.. there's just so many delicious layers in this track that makes you almost addicted to every little element they designed in their sound for it!
One of my favourite albums from 2022. Great to see this analyzed! 🙂
Great sound! Bringing that oscillator 7 semis down creates a really nice texture! Also love Massive Attack's "Teardrop"... Totally agree that it sounded like that!
thank you Oscar and wonderful sound design at the end!
I fucking love this band. Thanks for covering this, would watch a whole series about them and Apparat
I really like the way you explaining. This is the best advertisement for your course.
Amazing as always! U-he diva is brilliant! Thanks Oscar! You do great work ❤
Oh yes, Moderat! One of my top influential electronic music producers. ' Les grandes marches' ' Rusty Nails' ' Bad kingdom ' etc... Maybe you'll talk about Boards of Canada someday ...
And yes again, thank you for your (wonderful) fuse shirt!
Thank you, I still love your videos. You make a great job, keep pushin'!
You know, I never really got into boards of canada! I'm not sure why, maybe I just didn't hear the right song at the right time... I know they're a classic but I'm not really familiar with them!
@@OscarUnderdog Olson, Roygbiv, Peacock Tail. I think these are the emeralds of the creativity of Boards of Canada! It would be very interesting to see a breakdown from you. Their tracks are simple and complex at the same time. The sound design is amazing!
Add some early M83 to that
Turquoise Hexagon Sun is nostagic and hypnotic. Julie and Candy and Music is Math are stuck in my head so often. And I think Fast Land kinda reminds me of Pete Standing Alone a bit.
'Music is math' is a great start, that's right ! ' An eagle in your mind ' is the absolute masterpiece ( to me ..)
M83 is a good idea too, such as Jon Hopkins.
I really love Dominik Eulberg too. A breakdown from him could be very interesting ( Bienenfresser is just an amazing track !!)
What makes this bold technique more interesting, is that it works for the listener. It's not strange to listen to that long note because it's playing for 4 bars. So a listener that's used to electronic music will be caught off guard when the note continues, but it then it (kinda) makes sense to go back to the beginning at the 7th bar.
I think you've hit the nail on the head, it's like two four bar loops have overlapped for one bar
@@simonwood8095 That's a very good description of what is happening :)
Great video. Love Moderat. Saw them end of last year.
This sounds like Boards of Canada "Pete Standing Alone".
Brilliant tutorial - Thanks!!
Waouh thisnis big!
Thank you for the EQ/verb/decapitator/OTT tips, tryin' that right now :)
Thank you so much for this video. I celebrate this song for the first time with all its remixes. Great.
Amazing band, amazing track - amazing video! Thank you especially for explaining the "-7st."
3 bar loops are somewhat common in hip-hop: "Electric Relaxaation" by Tribe Called Quest, or "Statkes Are High" by De La Soul. Also in some indie rock: "Cut Your Hair" by Pavement, or some Pixies songs (forget which ones). For techno "Maze" by Actress has a 6/4 bassline against a song that's otherrwise in 4/4 for some pretty big scale obvious polymeter.
Thanks for that one! I love this song so much and now i understand, why it's so hypnotizing! Ich could hear that song in a 15min Mix and somehow it wouldn't get boring!
Thanks Oscar. In the track "Neon Rats" Moderat uses 10 bar loops instead of 8. This creates such a beautiful tension....
When you are not making dance music, you have a lot more freedom on what you can do. I think this is like using all the freedom an art form can offer you, the world is full of rules so why set so many rules when making art? That's why i am a fan of any heavily experimental type of music, specially industrial.
Well expressed!
that's awesome. it's like a 7/8 time signature, but not with single beats but entire bars
Love that. Thanks!
Excellent one !
Nice technique. Two songs that come to my mind are Front 242 - Kampfbereit (from their first album): 5 bar structure. And Massive Attack - Teardrop: 3 bar structure which gives it an uneven, forever tumbling vibe to me :)
Very nice composition trick there. Very Krautrock!
Also, should anybody not know these pioneers, listen to NEU!. You won’t regret. School for thought for days on end!
Cheers, from Brazil.
I love NEU! Can't recommend them enogh!
Great content as always! It would be cool if you made similar analysis of Venetian snares crazy time signatures.
THX Oscar! Moderat my Favorites!
If by 'most music' you mean techno, EDM and dance/club music in general yeah everything goes in powers of 2.
But Moderat don't limit themselves to be dance music producers I think they are artists and musicians trying to push boundaries even though they are influenced by dance music of course. I tend to group them together with Royksopp, Jon Hopkins, Rival Consoles, Floating Points..If you analyse these kind fo artists (IDM we might say?not sure..) what you describe in the video (e.g. odd number of bars loop) is actually very common, and I love it. It's disruptive, creative and innovative while keeping the coolness of dance music. Thanks for the nice video I think for many people might be very mind opening!
You know... these videos are absolutely awesome... thank you for doing this for us amateurs ;)
Best on youtube by FAR. (Wondering if you're planning a dubstep/riddim tutorial? :D)
Moderat 🎉🎉🎉!! I am loving your industrial techno course so much that I lose track of the time ❤
Great vid! Although it's definitely less of a radical move, it makes me think of how ØRGIE (a French hard industrial techno producer) sometimes does large breaks that are not multiples of 4, so it subverts your expectations as to when the music is going to start again. It's very noticeable on Théâtre du Chaos and I'm pretty sure it's also the case on Arcanes Célestes, which is possibly his most famous song. I actually heard the latter at a party on Friday (after an amazing L A V E N performance 😍) and it's funny that as a dancer, you have to think when you recognize it and the drop comes "ok it's five not four, remember, five not four"...
😁 I love the image of you partying your ass off but also going "five, not four, five, not four"
Loved Apparat when I was young, got into Moderat when I was older. Didn't know they were the same person until now :). Also: "The 7st Oscarilator"
Reminds me on a classic track by E-Dancer. Love it.
Cool track and analysis! I feel like this happens quite alot but only rarely it really works. If it does work however you have an epic song. Reminds me of classic songs like Solbury Hill, Golden Brown etc. I also think the recorder 6.1 had something similar going on. Just to name a few
From which sample pack can i get the Kickdrum used in the video?
Kind Regards
Tim
Weuw, didn't know.
But kind of makes sense? That last note is 4 notes & long, so it feels normal?
Thx!
On the same album "Neon rats" is also an outlier with a 10 bars loop instead of 8
Hi how you doin oscar
Wish to ask do you do the (production) stage with headphones cause am stuck with them now
Awesome. Love Modeselektor / Apparat / Moderat
It is a nice 4/14 measure. It give you that syncopated rhythm. And the pitch bend is perfect to create tension through dissonance to resolve to that initial chord. Moderat has always fell on the fringe edge of electronica and melodic techno
sick beat! :D
That track is literally putting me to sleep.... SO hypnotic haha.
i think in this particular case its working very well because the whole lead sound doesn't really sound like a loop. so much stuff going on it is constantly evolving and everything. at least i can say if i would have heard the song without this video, i wouldnt have noticed
Just listened to the original, and to be honest, it feels like that 4-bar section is the "normal" part, and the 3-bar section is just a build up to it. They may be breaking a rule of electronic dance music, but this doesn't feel unnatural at all.
Thanks for highlighting it!
Recently I started a track where the lead had a finish with such a long note. I didn't know where to start the cycle again because where i've felt it to sound good was always an odd number. And interestingly starting the new cycle after any of the length (5,7, 9 or 11 bars) sounded good because the percussions carried the song on their own. I stopped working on it because I din't dare to break the rule of '4bars'. I think I'll give it another go. Thank you Oscar!
Awesome, glad this specifically helps 😁
finish it! If it sounds good it is good! I almost stopped working on an idea because it was weird piano chords in a 7|4 meter, but luckily I followed it through and it turned into a hectic IDM number
@@Divinewave Sure, it's just a bloody mental thing, you know.
Back in the 2000's I was making something similar. I used to play 3/4 melodies playing on 4/4 and with breaks of 5/4 or 4/5. Obviously this can take lots of time and sometimes doesn't work as planned. After watching this, I'll be back trying the same technique with these modern tools, because, let's face it, old software don't compares with what we can do now.
When I was DJing I occasionally amused myself (and friends in the know) by dropping Might Dub Katz - It's Just Another Groove when playing back to back.
I loved that tune (I was a huge fan of Norman Cook) but its weird meter confused the hell out me when trying to mix with it. The main sampled loop cycles round after 15 beats instead of the usual 16, I think.
omg that turnaround
Moderat often do this. A quick example that came to me is in the same album. In Neon Rats, the general structure of chords is organized in 10 bars! I guess the chords are something like Dm | Dm | D/Em | Am | Am | G/B | Fmaj7 | Fmaj7 | Fmaj7 | Fmaj7 |
What an amazing band
cool track
Fun fact
The last note of the progression start on beat 4 and then plays on beat 1, 2, 3 which makes that note play over a 4 beat time 🤔😏
So cool man, thanks for breaking this one down Moderat is fire. I love that fuck you DJs attitude
I knew it was going to be something like that, Aphex did measures of 5 bars on one of his tracks, and few of his tracks are in measures of 6.
Interesting you mention Massive Attack's Teardrop when talking about the drums... and I think you know why ;)
Haha not really - is there a link between the two bands? Or you just think it was heavily inspired by them?
@@OscarUnderdog oh! It's because Teardrop also breaks the rule of 4s many times throughout the song. I thought it was a subtle nod to that fact :)
Waiting for this looong. Moore moderat please
No sidechain on Diva?
gonna use it in a long, rythmical break to undermine the expectation of the drop. rest of the track in factors of two.
The adagio for strings track from tiesto is a 5 bars loop
Lert It Happen by Tame Impala is another good example of weird loops. In fact, it repeats after three measures
Project One - Fantasy or Reality is 3/4
beautiful track
I do not know what type of electronic music you listen too, but there is sooooo many artists doing all sorts of different bar repetitions..
Rank 1 did this as well, track called 7 Instead Of 8.
I like you Oskar
There is a higher harmonic your version is missing. Considering u-tube compression, probably more. There is at least a minor third and seventh in there.
It's weird. But tho not so weird at all. The 7 semitones down is a perfect quint fit to the melody... maybe not so usual in EDM, but absolutely quite normal in arrangements in all kind of other musical genres.
Breaking up the song structure in other portions than the common 4-8-12-16 and so on, is of course unusual. But I remember a bunch of long house tracks in the early years of house music, where it happened too. Things like a hihat pattern suddenly slipping in - somewhere on I don't even know what takt or beat - making it quite hard to count if you would like to mix the record into another one.
Yeah! I know plenty of artists have employed these techniques over the years, this was just a cool case study to remind us of what's possible :)
Modeselektor feat. Tommy Cash - Who i thinks its Modeselektor breaking the rules :D
Very old technique; can also be applied after bar six etc.
I'd say there are only a few DJs skilled enough to mix this. All other skip songs that are hard to mix. Too lazy. But you can always add an intro and outro that goes on 4, 8, 16 etc, then bring in the melody and go nuts with the signature and what not :D
1. Only just discovered moderat.
2. Germans are known for that. I rember around 2000 my pal got hold of a record, it was german techno. It had this realy strange time signature with one extra bar, it was imposible to mix it with anything else, which was a shame cus it was a great track...
this is remember tear drop Massive attack ( trip hop sound Drums)
out here doing the real psas.
Yes... More woozy and wonky beats!
It sounds a bit like massive attack.
I am still on BOC, sorry :)))
Geogaddi has plenty of these odd-numbered bar loops, mostly in 5's. Music is Math, Sunshine Recorder, Julie and Candy, and The Beach at Redpoint all have 5 bar loops. I think Alpha and Omega has a 7 bar loop.
@@karmacamera675 and some chord/harmonic issues...
@@DrKairo Correction: After listening to it again, it seems like Alpha and Omega also has a 5 bar loop. I wonder what that number could possibly mean to them. 🤔
There’s one track that must be BoC that sprang to mind as soon as I heard this 7 bar loop but for the life of me I can’t find it…
Haha, maybe this is the reason why my phone player AIMP stretches music and makes it speed up.
Feels like I changed speed to 1.2x.
Does it mean that Moderat song broke my players? 🤣
Releasing a single which is 11/4 with a melody length of 3 bars, I learned that it works just if you are famous 😂
thats not a power chord, power chords are either 7 semitones up or 5 down. In C should be G not F...
For anyone interested in music in 7 I cannot recommend enough the album fear inoculum by the band tool
czcams.com/video/CcQGqlDy6eE/video.html
I feel that 7/8 or 7/4 is one of the easier measures in tool tracks
@@heuxheux true that! When I played their songs with my old band I just told them to not count the music but feel it, it's the only way to be able to play tool hahahah
@@heuxheux the very invincible has several parts in which they play 7/4, 6/4 ,5/4 and get the breakdown in 4/4, amazing stuff
There are some very intelligent breakdowns of all the different timings their drummer is handling seemingly effortless during a live performance. It's awe-inspiring and, frankly, beyond us mere mortals to achieve. I wonder how the mind of Danny Carey perceives music and timing, it must be amazing.
loop first 8 beats and your there , but 99% of the time i remove these kinds of tracks from playlists .. just saying
Damn I guess you have never heard Tool then.
yo
J dilla shit
🤍🤍🤍
That's why it's not a rule and it's never been. There are no rules in music, there are just guidelines. Even more, the IDM genre doesn't care about the 4 bars structure used in dance music.
The mistake is thinking that that is a rule. Where is it written? That most electronic dance music is made in 4:4 and equal temperament doesn't make it a rule.
Clickbait i know, but with education comes responsibility. First rule of electronic music composition, or any music/art for that matter is that there are no rules, right? But this video is probably aimed at people that are starting out. For you this might happen naturally when you notice that cutting your sequence to the grid makes the music fall short. Even half a beat longer can make a huge difference on groove/feel when it comes back at the beginning, if it repeats. If this is a "rule", that explains why so many boring, predictable and genre-based music is flooding the stream. Take a break from CZcams and go make something you can call your own!! Just trying to be constructive. Have fun!!
I hate moderat. Incredibly boring music for me.
I have just read your comment and it was so boring I had to go take a half hour nap. Hope you're not as dull in real life 😴