The 10 Critical Mistakes New Music Producers Make

Turning pro is one of the bravest decisions you will make as an amateur producer.

Although the thoughts of having your name on the lips of fans can be enchanting, the journey can be pretty enervating. Moreover, you may or may never fulfill your potentials. But then, you most likely didn’t just wake up one day and decide you were going to be a pro. You must have done extensive soul searching and affirmed through your actions over and over again that you were going to be a professional producer. Just like those you idolized growing up, you want to be one of the greats. As such, it’s only reasonable for you to hold yourself to high standards and approach your development as a producer with grit and tenacity.

The truth is there’s a very thin line between success and failure, and if you will ever make it as a professional producer you would have to be mindful of every single step you take. Whether it is researching plugins or devouring production techniques, you must be ready to get better, learn the tools and commit to the process. While it is normal to dread mistakes, the biggest victory will come when you show up and do the work you know you need to do without minding the result. Notwithstanding, there are common yet deadly mistakes that most amateur producers making a leap to pro tend to make. Here they are:

Not finishing songs

While it can be tiring to go through the music production process from start to finish, giving up at a time only makes it easier to quit next time. You must learn to finish more music! No matter how good your music production skills are, your career as a pro can only be rated based on the number of finished songs you’ve in your portfolio. Finishing songs will improve your skills as a producer like nothing else. As such, your primary goal when starting out must be to avoid anything that can prevent you from finishing songs.

Fixing the imperfections later

Whether you’re in a hurry or you haven’t quite become the over-analytical perfectionist yet, it can be a very tempting error to resolve to fix imperfect sounds later. Apart from being a recipe for time wastage, it also affects the quality of your productions. Some common errors that can lead to imperfect sounds are:

• Muddy low-end
• Untuned instruments / samples
• Using low quality audio materials
• Missing sounds in Mono

Even though tools abound that you can use for making corrections simpler, it is best practice to have the ideal recorded sound to start with rather than trying to force good sound out of a mediocre production.

Overlooking the importance of sound choice

Mastering the process of choosing the sounds that enter your productions is one of the best skills you need to succeed as a producer. Occasionally, you will be lost between experimenting and going for a specific sound. Your ability to choose the right sound will determine the quality of your music production. Here are two tips to improve your sound choice game right away:

• Create a favorites folder where you save sounds you really like
• Sample sounds from other songs to give your ears a point of reference
• Choosing science over art

A lot of newbies make the mistake of believing that creating great music starts and ends with adequate knowledge of the kHz frequency ranges of all musical instruments. However, what these people tend to underrate is the importance of actually listening with their ears. They forget that the ears are the single most important judge that you can have for gauging a song. Understanding the science of music production is crucial, but it can only be as important as appreciating the fact that music is from the heart and for the heart.

Refusing to reference

Referencing is an art you must get used to if you ever want to make it in the music production world. As a newbie, referencing other works of music or art can help you source for ideas each time you’re stuck. It can also help your songs sound professional and meet up to commercial standards. The good thing is that referencing can be done at any stage, including:

• During pre-production for sound choice, vibe, and arrangement ideas
• During composition for structure, arrangement, and rhythm guides.
• During mixing to achieve an identical balance to a track you admire
• During mastering for loudness and commercial polish
• During release to understand the strategies for heroes use to share their music.
• Producing with the Limiter On

Another common mistake many newbies tend to make is adding the limiter on the end when the track doesn’t sound big enough. This mistake is rife among producers that are looking for ways to compensate for what they lack in production experience. When you produce with the limiter on, you’re actually ruining any chance of successful post-production work because the dynamics get squashed. Unfortunately, it can be pretty hard to undo the damage. As such, it is best to totally avoid a limiter. And if you ever need to use it, it should be only as the last processing tool during mastering.

Fear of standing out

Most new producers are in the habit of occasionally comparing themselves to others. For some, it is the fear of producing songs that won’t resonate with the audience. For others, it’s trying too hard to imitate their idols, thus, leaving no room for originality. However, it is important for you to always remember that you’re different, and this should always be your strength. As such, you should always strive for originality. The reality is that, you’re much better off taking the risk of sounding like yourself, than trying the endless yet futile endeavor of imitating an established sound every time.

Processing without a purpose

One common issue among amateur producers is the lack of intention. It is very important that you’re intentional about when and how you process each sound. Aside from saving you tons of time and making your music clearer, being intentional also helps you free up precious CPU. Here are few tips to help you start processing with purpose:

• Time right: You might be tempted to reach straight for plugins and start loading them onto every track immediately an idea comes to your mind. The disadvantage of this is that, it diverts your attention from the composition at hand and moves you into the analytical side of your brain. Learn to restrain and compose the song first.
• Use track volume and panning to set things in motion. But it is important you move quickly when doing this to keep your brain in composition mode. Once an idea comes to your mind, and it is structured out into an arrangement, you can use EQ, compression and saturation to start balancing sounds more precisely.
• Use reductive EQ rather than boosting to sculpt your sounds
• Perfect your understanding of the concept of compression by knowing when and why to compress.

Leaving your education to yourself

Relying on books, blogs and online videos to teach you everything can be very dangerous to your growth as a professional music producer. You can spend years trying to educate yourself on the intricacies of a DAW or buying VST’s, samples and sound libraries and making many mistakes and learning along the way. But learning from an experienced music producer will save you from wasting a lot of time and efforts trying to make your music sound as good as the ones you hear on radio. Another good thing about learning under a mentor is that it gives you the opportunity to access the best software and the most effective tricks of the trade so you can be downright impressive in your music production within a short span of time.

Letting results overshadow the process

One of the biggest mistakes you will ever make when starting out is thinking every effort you expend will be a success. As a producer, you must understand that becoming a successful pro takes time and effort. To make it to the top, you have to be prepared to try, fail, learn and try again. Letting the end results define your inputs will affect your ability to learn, iterate and develop yourself. On the other hand, learning to trust and enjoy each step of the process will make you rapidly become a better producer faster than you can ever imagine.