I’m trying to I’m trying to make this tutorial really interesting and here I am going to share steps how you can build up your break big project using ableton. Kindly go through the tutorial in each and every point wisely.
make music like “Bicep”. I’ve had so
many requests from you guys for this – to
make music in the style of Bicep – so that
is what this tutorial today is about. I’m
going to be using the stock plugins in
Ableton Live 10 but you can follow along
in any DAW, because the fundamental
techniques still apply. But why would you
want to make music like someone else?
Well, you wouldn’t want to copy them,
obviously… they’ve got their own style…
But you can pick up tips and tricks you
can apply to your own music, and then
develop your own signature style, so it
is worth trying to replicate music you
love because you’re going to learn so
much so quickly like that. You can
download the free project file and
samples and all the presets that I used
today, for free, below and what we will be
covering will be the kick the bass… the
break beat… chord progressions… vocals…
sound design… mixing… a touch of
arrangement (a little bit of arrangemen)t
so there’s lots to get through. I hope
you enjoy! If you like this video, give it
a big fat “thumbs up”… don’t forget to
subscribe to my channel and share it
with your friends if you like it, and
without further ado, let’s hop into the
DAW. Okay so the first thing we’re going
to do is pick apart what the vibe of
biceps music is like what kind of vibe
does biceps music have so they’ve got
this kind of old-school breakbeat wavy
type vibe which I really really like and
it’s got pretty much a very few elements
but they’re just chosen really well and
put together really well so let’s do it
first the tempo if we go for that break
beat kind of tempo we’ll go for 1 to 9
BPM and then I’ve got my magic list here
as well all in one take no editing and
all of that stuff so yeah the first
thing we’re going to do is find a nice
break beat to base this on so I’m just
going to create an audio track this is
set up as my default template by the way
so a couple of MIDI channels few Mindi
tunnels and then this one as well which
I’ll explain soon anyway let’s find a
break beat now I’m going to use splice
for this because it’s just a great way
to kind of find samples and I did a bit
of research earlier so I’ve got some
recently added ones but if you just
write in something like mmm break beat
or rave something like that then you
know it’s going to come up and then
let’s have a preview like that’s all
wrong okay so if you do something like
this instead rave and then search for
let’s say drums and then write I’m sure
I saw one that said breaks oh yeah there
we go break me genres break but you say
let’s have a listen so that kind of
thing you know that old-school break
beats sound but obviously if you choose
loops instead of single shots then
you’re going to come up with some stuff
so I found one earlier anyway this one
so I’m just gonna drag that from splice
there and you can then just loop it so
let’s have a quick listen to this and
Ableton has automatically kind of got
the tempo correct just analyze it cool
so what I’m going to do is I’m going to
loop the first part of that track and
then just so that change in the tempo
sorry that changing the beat happens at
the end of the part like that so I’m
just going to duplicate that and to do
I’m gonna color that green call it break
beat and this is what we are gonna be
basing the track around primarily break
a vite oh yeah by the way the track is
called tricep you see what I did there
right okay let’s just consolidate that
and grabbing it all press command + J
and then we can just easily loop it
let’s call it great beat cut green and
then there we go now the next thing
we’re gonna do is we’re gonna quantize
this because there’s a bit of groove to
it a bit of Swing to it but I want this
beat to be pretty much on the grid so if
we zoom in close here we can see that
this beat isn’t actually on the grid so
to tighten that up I’m just gonna press
command + a to select it all you might
not even have to do that then I’m gonna
open up the quantize settings make sure
it’s set to 100% press ok and you’ll see
it’s created these walk marks and it’s
shifted everything so now it’s bang on
the grid cool okay on to the next thing
we are going to make that beefier
because we want that like a really nice
full sounding break beat and we’re gonna
do that by augmenting it with some other
drums so the first thing I’m going to do
is augment it with a kick so let’s just
find a nice kick sound and that’s just
to give it more weight so then we can
program in the kick where the kicks are
hitting in the loop so let’s do that
am i hearing that yeah and I’m just
gonna copy that and then remember at the
end of the break beat in the fourth the
fourth bar we’ve got the change up of
rhythm
and next we are going to find a snare
just to make that the snare hits even
snappier so let’s just go to snares and
have a listen it’s got to be short and
snappy like a real sounding snare so it
sounds like it’s actually being played
on a drum kit that’ll do then I’m gonna
play that from a sampler in Ableton this
is the drum rack and you’ll see I’ve got
these auxiliary channels linked up to my
main auxilary channels for my reverb and
that’s all I can add some to the snare
on its own rather than the whole drum
kit and the way you do that is click
this routing button here then you can
right click create return chain I did
that twice then you can go in here and
select your rack output and just choose
you know choose your main reverb here
and now you can add reverb to your
separate drums so you can press that
they close it up so you’ve got these
send controls now so anyway let’s
actually just show you what I did that
if we listen if we turn the breakbeat
off you’ll hear what I’m doing so I’m
following the main beats they’re kicking
the snare and programming it in and
that’s just to be able to have more
control and give them more power if
needs be
I’m gonna do a little escape there as
well cool and remember the rhythm
changes in the last part of this change
duplicating that cool there we go
perfect right on to the next thing
Bosh the vocals this is the main one of
the main sounds for bicep they’ve got
these ethereal ray V type vocals so I’m
going to add those necks and we will be
going back to this stuff soon to do the
mixing so we won’t be making it sound
better as well but what I’m gonna do now
is choose vocals and this is going to
help determine what key that we’re gonna
write this track in and again I’m going
to use splice now I’m not affiliated
with splice although they have just told
me that my master class students can get
a month’s free of splice which is quite
cool so that is something that’s just
come through for me
right so I wanted something like Indian
by Eastern sounding kind of ethnic
female vocals so it’s quite ethereal so
what I did was I just searched in splice
sounds I think I liked you see I found
this one and what I did was write in
Indian and then I wrote in I chose
vocals yeah Indian vocals female and
then it came up with these and I just
selected one
I chose this one because it’s quite rich
and nice I like this so I’m gonna drag
that in and we can see it’s in the key
of B flat it’s in the key of B flat it
tells us that here now when we write the
chords to this having it in the key of B
flat can make it a bit tricky because
there are lots of black notes and you
have to know your scales quite well if
we drop it down one semitone to the key
of a minor or a major although this
could be major or minor because it’s not
got any thirds in the vocals then it’s
gonna be much easier because we’re only
going to be using the white notes so
we’re not going to get you don’t have to
be a piano maestro to create something
in the key of a minor so let’s have a
quick listen to this
what I’m gonna do is double click I’m
gonna choose complex Pro because it
sounds nicest with vocals then I’m gonna
drop it by one semitone with the
transpose button and now and now it’s in
a which is gonna make our job for
writing the chords and the bassline much
much easier but I want to make this a
bit longer and epic so what I’m gonna do
is I’m gonna split it there I’m gonna
hold shift and I’m gonna drag it and
it’s gonna stretch that second bit
sounds a little unnatural but it doesn’t
matter because it’s the effect that
we’re really going for the main thing
now I’m gonna show you how to do some
cool gated triggering stuttering thing
like they did in their track glue I
think it was called glow of a couple of
years ago so this is cool fact right
we’re gonna choose a gate from Ableton’s
the thing is technical term for effect
open up this little tab here and we can
see we’ve got the sidechain option and
now what we can do is we can play in a
rhythm that’s gonna make the vocal kind
of cuts like it’s being transformed
scratched okay so we can hear the gates
already working there so I’ll just
create a MIDI track I’m gonna call this
trigger and then I’m gonna just load in
any simple instrument so operators gonna
be the most simple and I’m gonna tap out
a rhythm that I wants the vocal to be
kind of chopped up in or two
this latency I’m gonna program it in
almost there so it’s kind of like a
Morse code sound but we’re not actually
going to be hearing the sound itself
it’s just going to be used as a trigger
for the vocals perfect now let’s check
out what happens first I’m going to
duplicate it command + D consolidate it
then I’m going to press this routing
thing and make sure that it sends only
so we won’t actually hear it but it is
playing and now we can feed that through
the sidechain gate on the vocal tract
like so trigger and check this out
so this is without the gate oops let’s
just fade that in a bit and now with the
gate then you can choose to play with
the hold and release so you can hear the
effect I’m going for there now let’s add
some nice hall reverb on there on the
auxilary channel
make sure we’ve cut out low-end a
channel and I’m gonna do a bit of
tweaking on the vocal EQ quickly just
with the EQ eight and this is to take
out some of the low end and boost some
of the high end there might be some just
to make it a bit more breathy I’ve gone
really extreme on this EQ I wouldn’t
usually do it this extreme it’s really
breathing so this is what we’ve got so
far
we’ve got some clipping here so I’m just
gonna turn the volume down of everything
this trigger we can kind of minimize
because we don’t need it anymore
cool okay next thing to do as I said our
vocals are now in the key of a it could
be a minor or a major but I’m gonna
choose a minor and I’m just going to jam
out some chords and a minor as I said on
the keyboard a minor starts on a and
then it’s just all the white notes up to
the next a so you’re far less likely to
hit any wrong notes quick sip time let
me know if you’re enjoying this so far
give me a hell yeah in the comments
below or an arm em brother whichever you
choose right let’s continue so as I was
saying let’s get these cause jammed out
jam that F out instruments now it sounds
i’ve just really installed Ableton on my
new computer so I haven’t set up all the
collections and stuff yet
or indeed I haven’t installed any
plugins I’ve installed one plug-in sofa
and that’s why I’m doing all in Ableton
plugins so I’m just going to use one of
the sounds that comes with an Ableton
pack here we go so we’ve got a bit of a
grand piano going on
so they are all the notes within the key
of a-minor so let’s just play some
chords over this track very simple so
next is 2 we will be using these chords
very soon I’m just gonna show them show
you what they are in the piano roll
editor and again you can use my template
technique if you want to do this so you
can draw in all the white notes starting
on a and then when you press fold Bosch
these are only the notes within the key
of a minor natural so you’re not going
to hit any wrong notes and then you can
use that as a template just grab them
all press left so it’s before the clip
so you can’t hear it and then you can
just use you can just draw notes in here
and you’ll never hit a wrong note but
anyway I’m just gonna draw these in for
you so this was the first note
and the way that you can actually draw
court in or build them on that is by
checking out the other video that I’ve
got there or there and also I’ll just
show you quickly a quick way of doing it
so now I’ve got two octaves here of the
key of a-minor natural i press fold and
all i need to do is skip one note each
time skip a note skip a note as Veggie
chord again and continue this and what
I’m going to do for the baseline is just
copy the first note all the root note of
each of those chords and I’m going to
copy them into a bass sound let’s
minimize trigger and for the bass sound
I’m going to use have really simple sine
waves to give it lots of low-end power
and I’m gonna do that using a an
operator which is like Ableton’s most
basic synth so I’m just going to create
a MIDI clip and then paste those notes
in but you can hear it I’m high so I’m
just gonna go in there hold shift press
down twice
go grab them all and extend them
slightly so there’s the basics or and
the basis of our track so on to the next
thing what’s on my magic list today all
right that’s what I will do I’ll do a
little bit of sidechain compression on
the bass to help the kick the pop
through more and I’ve got this SC
channel I mentioned earlier and this is
where I’ve got a silent sound that is
being triggered from a sampler and I’ve
got it set so that you can’t hear it
I’ve got it set to sends only instead of
master and that will be used as a
sidechain trigger but I want it to be
going in time with my kicks and you can
see here that my kick pattern is
different from the 4/4 sidechain trigger
pattern so what I’m gonna do is I’m just
gonna go in there grab my kick drums
copy them go into my sidechain thing
grab all that delete it and then paste
my kick pattern you can see here and
then that’s going to be triggering from
my bass and the reason I’m not using the
kick to trigger the sidechain
compression is because the kick is quite
a big long loud sample whereas my
sidechain trigger is a very short sharp
sample which means that I can do all of
the timing control on the compressor
controls so I’m just going to and if
that sounds a bit confusing I’ll show
you now so let’s put the compressor on
open up this little thing choose
sidechain choose SC because that’s what
I called it so the signals coming from
SC into this compressor which is going
to be compressing our bass line
so that’s just
choose these sounds and we can hear
what’s happening so you can hear the
kick and now let’s bring this threshold
down on the compressor
so you can hear the sidechain compressor
is kicking in when the kick sitting and
ducking the baseline let’s just try the
bass on its own so you can hear the
depth
and that just allows a kick to breathe
through more with more power cool so
we’re getting there right on to the next
thing I’m going to add some ethereal
kind of chords like pads and then we’ll
go into the mixing stage and then we’ve
got some kind of little arpeggio riff
I’ll show you how to do as well
and another vocal yeah in fact I’ll do
that now I’m gonna choose another vocal
it’s going to be something that gives a
bit more interest it gives it more of
that Ray V sound so I’m going to call it
rave again I’m going to open up splice
and I’m gonna put in rave and that’s and
then I’m gonna put in did it do to do a
few more tags vocal alright come on
female that’d be it so I’m gonna listen
to these as I’m playing it to find
something that gels for the vibe of the
tune
Oh almost there in fact I mean you could
choose one in the correct key that would
help but it’s more the violin going I am
gonna choose that one because it’s the
right key and then I don’t have to do
any work on that I’m just using one
credit and then I’m gonna drag it into
my track I’m working on just a loop
obviously at the moment before we’re
taking it into a full track so this
vocal loop would own this this vocal hit
would only be used like rarely as a
special moment like this for instance
and again I’m going to choose complex
Pro turn it down a bit and I put lots of
reverb on
so it’s just like an epic moment that
might happen in a break there’s lots of
high-end in that though which I don’t
like so I’m gonna check my reverb and
then I’m gonna put an EQ on that too
just to tone it down a bit
and with this stutter vocal something
else I’m going to do is put a compressor
on there just to squash it all and make
it a bit more consistent it’s just to
bring up the quiet bits a bit more cool
okay on to the next thing
magic this magic list tell me what to do
make some big beats well that’s what it
says to you I don’t know what’s happened
I think I’m hungover right okay I’m
gonna make these beats sound faster by
doing a bit of mixing this is what I’m
gonna do I’m gonna tweak this break beat
I’m gonna add some compression to just
bring it all together and make it a bit
more punchy still sounded pretty good
it’s just kind of crushing it a little
bit to bring out some of the quiet
shaker sounds and then what I’m gonna do
is I’m going to add a little bit of
reverb room reverb which is on my first
auxilary channel which is a short reverb
and I’ll dial it in on the main snare
that we added
I’m putting too much on just so I can
get the length of the reverb right there
we go and we can actually add some of
that to the breakbeat as well
so that’s with no reverb on and that’s
with room reverb on I’ve got someone the
the main snare as well and then what I’m
gonna do is group all of the the kick
the drums and the break beat together
because I want them to be gels together
and sound like they’re coming from one
place so I’m going to call this drums I
call this kick and drum and it’s a bus
which means all of these are going to be
going through this channel which we are
going to be adding some processing to
and what I’m gonna do is to the
breakbeat this is the one plug-in I’m
using that doesn’t come with Ableton but
it’s free you can download it from
isotope it is the what’s it called
imager the free version so I’m just
gonna add some wits to that breakbeat
stereo with I’m gonna check it works in
mono with my mono switch on the master
channel which is just a utility so I can
switch it from mono and back see listen
to all that width that we’re adding so
if we turn off the ozone have a break
beat sound and with it now we’ll tweak
this base and sorry this bus and we’re
gonna use the drum buss effect in
Ableton which I haven’t actually used
much but I want to give it a go
so it just brings everything together
that’s some compression so some
saturation and you can dial in you know
the dry/wet amount
I’ll go 100% wet and then now we are on
to those ethereal chords that I was
talking about so let’s turn everything
on and get these chords done we already
drew them in so I’m just gonna call this
pad and then we’re going to change the
instrument to be a nice kind of synth in
fact what I’m gonna do is on this
stutter vocal I’m gonna add one of those
images as well and make it even really
whatever I’m feeling renegade that’s how
I’m rolling today all right next we are
going to do those ethereal things at
last the ethereal pads gonna color this
my synth color assign tracks to clips
sound assign color
it’s eclipse then instruments I shall go
over sounds what kind of pad sounds do
you have let’s see synth pad that’s
quite nice and ethereal that’s my
favorite word today ethereal don’t wear
it out well
it’s nice but it’s a bit low so what I’m
gonna do is I’m gonna go I just
consolidate that double-click on my pad
grab it all and then press shift and up
so it goes up an octave like so
and I don’t want there to be any gap
between them so you can select them all
and press legato and then it brings them
all to touch the one after it
just make sure there’s no low-end I
don’t once in there
where would that be he had definitely
definitely hungover and that’s so I’m
just making sure that they’re in there’s
no low end that’s going to clash with
the base
we’re really close now I might need to
tweak the levels because I’m doing this
just in one go so you know maybe the
drums are a bit loud but you can
download this anyway for free below this
video so do that and I will have tweaked
the levels a little bit made it sound a
bit better so you can pick apart my
methods so don’t forget to grab that now
let’s do this arpeggio riff riff that we
want let’s just reorganize that stuff
yeah so the arpeggio riff and this is
this is where it gets pretty cool so I’m
going to create this from scratch and we
want some blippi blippi weird way riff
that’s technical and we’re going to do
it with an arpeggio and using the MIDI
arpeggio effect in Ableton Live so let’s
get our instrument first I’m going to
choose the analog it’s a nice nice
little since
first I want this in mono because it’s
gonna be an arpeggio then I’m gonna
determine some glide so it sweeps from
one note to another like so and now this
is where the fun stuff happens if we go
to MIDI effects first we can choose a
scale and if you choose let’s see C
minor we’re but we’re in a minor so what
I’m gonna do is just change that bass up
to a and now I only hit the notes in a
minor that is what that is doing now I’m
gonna put on an arpeggiator after that
and now whenever I hold any of these
notes it’s gonna play an arpeggio but
I’m gonna double the rate to sixteenths
like so I’m gonna change the sounds like
you don’t spit in line pretty cool let’s
take off the velocity controls I don’t
really like the volume changing so I’m
just gonna choose zero there and I’m
gonna add some room reverb like as we
did with the snare
I’m just gonna make sure that there’s no
low ends that we don’t want with an EQ
but first I’m going to put on a lovely
saturator just to give it a bit of
warmth thicken it up a little bit cool
so now I’m just going to jam as the
tunes playing and you can change which
style you want the arpeggiator to work
on that’s pretty cool so let’s play and
yeah let’s play along
you can play with some of these and
effects on the Aunt Peggy
is also a sign you know like the
frequency to one of your control one of
the knobs on your controller or you
could just automate it you know like so
and then in terms of arrangement I mean
that they are the main elements the rest
is is pretty simple you’re not having to
change chord progressions you’re not
having to create loads of different
things because as I said before what
captures the essence of the bicep sound
is that almost strip back old-school
ravy we’re how sound that they’ve just
brought up to date and they’ve done
something new with it
for modern day but it does mean that the
compositions aren’t super complex
they’re just really nicely done so you
can have you know you could have parts
like this where you just take out the
bass and the pad
and then you can go into a break
and then bring everything
so that is how you make music like bicep
that was really quick as I said I did
this all in one go from scratch so you
can download this below hopefully you’ve
found some techniques that you can use
in your own music thanks for watching
stay safe and until next time Cheers and
happy producing oh don’t forget
