Dumping projects.

[Analog-X64]

I sometimes, spend 12-14 hours on a project and get frustrated near the end and I just close the program without saving. Essentially I dump it.

Anyone else do that?

[Chris Abbott]

I would never do that... I'd just save it and hope future-me could do something with it.

[Commie_User]

Sometimes; when I know, heart of hearts, I'm polishing a turd.

Happens to all of us. (Who was that, who said and always me?!)

[Analog-X64]

I would never do that... I'd just save it and hope future-me could do something with it.

Yeah, I have a few of those not sure when the future-me will do something with it.

[AndyUK]

I treat them like a learning curve.. The tune you want to do comes from these dumped ones for sure.. I can dump 10 projects to get to the one that makes me eager to finish it ( or even fancy it up ).. Dump and move on buddy.. I'm not a musician, that's for sure, but i enjoy trying to get there.. Part of the journey ??

How many hours must a guitarist put in to get to the point they can play Stairway to Heaven, then further hours to get to Layla. More hours more hours, it's all practice in the end, though less apparent on a DAW I think.

Stick with it buddy, stick with it.... There's a lot of pressure to produce, but that comes from yourself. Do you have any songs from a year or 2 ago?? Play those and compare them to the stuff your'e dumping, I'm sure the quality difference will be apparent. That's what you should listen to, not the guy beating himself up for dumping. I hear the difference in your work, so should you.

[betelzeus]

I've done that in the past , however , i try not to do that anymore ... now if i get frustrated with music ... i give up for a little while , but i always come back to it eventually ... after battling the musical demons within ...

[Zzr]

I do always save, but i often just move on and start a new songfile if i get stuck with the current one. Made me accumulate like 2500 songfiles over the years since the last HD no-backup crash, though its a very good hunting ground for general setups and sounds / scapes that might work better on a future idea.

[trace]

Happends to me sometimes.
I sit down creating something that sounds pretty good and after a few hours i just think. what the h*** is this and CLOSE!

[LMan]

I have an "Abandoned" folder which is out of sight.

[Commie_User]

Well maybe the consensus can decide. Why not everyone put a pick of their 'crap' files here for others to consider? Who knows, perhaps someone else will have that magic idea to propel it to 'properness'.


I've got one here and as I've stuck it up twice before, I had a comment. Doddsy said it was 'punkish' but I've no idea how to finish it to my satisfaction. So yeah, it's my ball rolling:

[Analog-X64]

Here is a sample of some that I never finished.

Depeche Mode cover.

As full as this one sounds, I'm not sure if I actually finished it or not. It was Version 6

Was supposed to be a trance/chill type of track

Was going to enter this for a Mobile game contest, didn't finish before the deadline so abandoned.

Was going for an original C64ish sounding tune.

Was going for a dark ambient kind of track.

I was having a hard time keeping the timing in check with this one, frustration kicked in and abandoned it.

I cant remember what direction I was going with this one.

Another attempt at some kind of industrial sounding track

Attempting some kind of EBM style

[Razmo]

I think this must be normal for many musicians, but I have a feeling that anyone thinks they are the only ones with this problem... I have it too, in an outrageous degree... I've wondered for many years what cause this ... I have numerous small "riffs" that never became anything.

For me the problem is that it's not the end result that matters to me, but the process making a piece of music... it feels like when I've made a riff, I feel saturated with it... even if I think it sounds good... it becomes an effort to finish the composition simply because most of the creative phase is over, and only arrangement remains to be done, and to me, arrangement work is tedious and boring at the artistic level. Sitting copying and dragging allready made takes around, making breaks, passages etc... it simply bores me.

Idealy for me, the soultion would be to record the whole arrangement as part of the creative process, just like a group of musicians play together for the whole duration of a song, but I cannot do that... that's one of the curses about computers and music in my opinion... you really should not edit an arrangement in music, you should play it instead to keep the creative phase for the whole piece from start to end.

I made it a habbit though, to make a recording of the riffs I make before abandoning them, so that I can always hear them again at a later date, and be able to hear how my musical skills/style progress over time... I have riffs as far back as 1996 in my "riffs" folder (as I call it).

When I listen to the riffs later I find many that I still like and want to make longer and eventualy finish... maybe even make them better or take them to another level etc. If I just closed down the project and did not save an audio file of it, I'd never be able to go back and analyze my past creations.

Sure it irritates me to death that I have so many small riffs, but rather that, than not have anything at all... Often I don't save the MIDI project file, but I always make an audio recording, so that I can remember the melodies, instrumentation etc. if I want to revisit one of them later.

One thing you have to remember is that when you work with music for longer periods of time, you get sort of "tone deaf"... you're listening to specific instruments you'd not do if you had the whole composition "out of your head" when you heard it again later... I'm sure many of you have tried this scenario, where you have created something, and you think it sound really cool! ... and then when you listen to it the next day, to your horror it sounds... well... not as good as you remembered... that's because you suddenly hear your creation as a whole, instead of the analyzing way you did the day before... it's logical because musicians actualy use the analytic side of the brain when they create music, but the creative side when you listen to it the day after.... this is also why first idears almost always are the best when you create music, because it's made with the creative side, and not the analytical.

Therefore you should always at least save an audio file of what you have made, and then give it a listen later... you'd be surprised how often your impression will change when you hear your stuff later on... if you don't make those riffs, you'd not be able to hear it.

I don't think this "abandoned riffs" is a rare happening with musicians... hell, I think it's normal in many artforms... wonder how many scetches a painter archives as "unfinished" ? ... probably quite a few which is basicaly the same.

Personaly, it was a problem for me in the past, but I've come to terms with it... something is finiashed when it's finished, and that's it.... some people spit out new compositions like crazy, others don't... it's a personal thing, so I don't think much about it anymore... also, even if you only make riffs most of the time, they are "steps on the ladder" to getting better nonetheless, so don't see them as failures, but as stepping stones instead.