why should people listen to our music?

There are millions of very competent musicians and engineers in the world.

Many of them have staggering technical skills.

And many of the songs these technical wizards create aren't worth listening to, apart from being used as technical references. For lovers of music, these songs offer nothing compelling.

Much like all the "shred guitarists" who can play thousands of meaningless notes per minute, if we as producers try to distinguish ourselves by way of technical prowess we are heading down a dead end. Perhaps we can get work as an engineer or teacher, but it's unlikely our songs will resonate with the average listener.

On an individual level it's not ideal that we're now competing with a million other producers rather than a few thousand. It means, on average, more is required from us to separate our music from the millions of other songs which are created each year. In the end, the artists who have something meaningful to impart will find it easier to connect with listeners.

Production is important, but I believe that songwriting is more important than ever. (I'm trying to help out on the technical/production side with insidemixes - hopefully this will shortcut the path to great sound for a number of people, allowing them to focus their attention on their unique voice).

We are not average listeners, and we would do well to remember this. Average listeners like catchy melodies, lyrics, grooves, hooks. If we want to connect with them, we should spend much more time working on these skills relative to our engineering skills.

If you think you can't write catchy melodies, spend some time listening to catchy melodies. Hum along to them to get a feel for the note placements and intervals. Then spend some time coming up with new melodies - start with an empty head (heh) and let the notes come. Maybe it'll be simple, maybe it'll be complex. Happy, sad or some other mood. Maybe the melody will have some large intervals. Maybe some note bending. Whatever, get it happening in your head until it's ready to put into your sequencer in a rough form. Plenty of time to tidy it up later on.

Get ten melodies down. If you haven't written many melodies before, most of them will be fairly average and aren't worth pursuing. But perhaps one or two will have a bit more merit. It's much easier to gauge this the day after writing the melody down - it'll be much easier to sort good ideas from bad ones, and come up with improvements to the good ones.

Do this process often, learn what works and what doesn't, and you'll get to a point where you're writing very catchy melodies.

Of course, I don't mean to discount other learning aids - videos, lessons, books (such as "how music works"). These can be helpful for many of us.

The same process applies to writing great lyrics and to coming up with danceable grooves and memorable hooks.

At this point, where we have so many excellent tools at our disposal, where we have access to so much quality information relating to our art, we should be giving the world a larger selection of fantastic music than at any time in the past.

So let's keep at it!
Fabian