Once upon a time, remixing a song meant actually redoing the mix. Many vintage consoles (some Neve 80-series, for example) have a button labeled “remix” that changes a few functions on the desk to optimize it for mixing rather than recording. But sometime in the late 20th century, the word “remix” began to take on a new meaning:…
The consensus amongst musicians seems to be unanimous: Led Zeppelin has written and performed some of the most high-intensity rock and roll music ever. Yet beneath the fuzzed out, thunderous madness of Valhalla and Middle Earth typically associated with rock’s golden gods, there is a wealth of musical ingenuity and innovation waiting to be uncovered by…
+ Welcome to Soundfly! We help curious musicians meet their goals with creative online courses. Whatever you want to learn, whenever you need to learn it. Subscribe now to start learning on the ’Fly. A fire roars with life on a cool summer night somewhere in the north of France, possibly even just over the Belgian border. Music drifts into the night…
Learning jazz chords is about so much more than the chords themselves, you’ll want to listen and sing and play along to your favorite songs first.
Let’s revisit one of Radiohead’s most propulsive and intricately layered songs, to deconstruct all the elements at play and how they function.
Today we’re going to take a look at the guitar lead in on “Send My Love (To Your New Lover),” the third single off of Adele’s spectacular 2015 album, 25 (we also broke down her first single “Hello” on piano here). This is a great song and a fantastic riff, and it is a total blast…
Welcome back to Soundfly’s weekly interview series, Incorrect Music, curated by guitarist, singer, and composer Lora-Faye Åshuvud (of the band Arthur Moon). In this series, we present intimate conversations with artists who are striving to push the boundaries of their process and craft. The multi-instrumentalist and composer Cale Hawkins has been steadily releasing a stream of unusual and elegant avant-pop…
Don’t rely on audio repair and noise reduction software to solve all your problems. These soundproofing hacks will help you reduce noise right at the source!
Welcome back to the dance floor, Quick Trackers! Once a month, we hook you up with a short production or songwriting challenge, aimed at helping to up your musicianship. To respond to the challenge, just email us, leave a comment, or post to social media with the hashtag #quicktracks and tag us @learntosoundfly. For this month’s challenge, let’s…
You and your band have been playing out for a year or so, and you’ve started to get great responses from your audiences. Now, it’s time to take your show to the next level and maybe even start playing nationally! Get ready for that next step by transforming your live show, and go from being a…
Words you say never seem To live up to the ones inside your head The lives we make never seem To ever get us anywhere but dead. — Chris Cornell/Soundgarden Chris Cornell left this Earth too soon. Still, judging by the life he led, he seemed like the sort of legendary artist who belonged to…
One of the greatest secrets about the blues is that it’s not primarily about the “blue notes,” or the structure, or the instrumentation. Those things are all heavily associated with the blues and appear in most blues songs, but at its core, the blues is all about storytelling. And the guitar is one of the…
Sometimes what makes a song really stand out isn’t so much the writing, per se — it’s the arrangement of the instruments on the recording or performance. The different combinations of sounds and varied dynamic ranges of certain instruments can change a cliché chord progression or melody line into a stand-out moment. When used as a…
It’s 8pm on a Wednesday evening, and a pixelated June Millington waits patiently on Skype as I pull up a write-up of her massive autobiography, Land of a Thousand Bridges (published by No Depression). As I scroll through the summary of the 500+ page book, I realize with some trepidation I’m about to interview a…
+ Welcome to Soundfly! We help curious musicians meet their goals with creative online courses. Whatever you want to learn, whenever you need to learn it. Subscribe now to start learning on the ’Fly. It’s 1965. After almost a century’s worth of benefits and remarkable improvements to our daily lives, electricity is here to stay. Light bulbs, television, computers…
You’ve heard the term before: “mix bus.” But what does it mean, how do you use it, and why is it necessary? Find everything out here.
Helpful examples and advice from musicians who have gone through chronic pain and come out of it successful, and inspirational!
A sampling of single- and multi-chord progression songs between the 1980s and 2010s reveals a disheartening trend. How to fix it?
In this edition of our Student Spotlight series, musician Mark Richardson shares stories from his life, including how music helped him beat drug addiction.
Why pay to play? Here’s ten of the most outstandinging plugins we’ve found that fit right into your Logic Pro worklflow that are all… free!
Sometimes having great songs and performances isn’t enough — you also need unique and ear-catching production. What actually makes something sound even better than it does? Well, that’s that true art of audio production. The more techniques a producer or engineer has at his or her disposal, the most opportunities for inventiveness. That’s not to…
Welcome back to Soundfly’s weekly interview series, Incorrect Music, curated by guitarist, singer, and composer Lora-Faye Åshuvud (of the band Arthur Moon). In this series, we present intimate conversations with artists who are striving to push the boundaries of their process and craft. Brooklyn’s Max Schieble has had a prolific year releasing spacey jazz and hip-hop-inflected pop music under the…
Welcome back to our new series on Flypaper, Album Histories Monthly, which brings you the story of a single album each month, in the month that it was originally released. Last month, we covered Blondie’s 1978 classic, Parallel Lines. This month: The Replacements – Let It Be Release Date: October 2, 1984 “We were all kind of long-haired, dope-smoking teens…. We’d light…
Guitarists like to spill ink all the time about distortion boxes, classic overdrives, boutique delay pedals, and bucket-brigade modulation effects. It’s understandable why: These attention-grabbing stompboxes lead to dramatic and satisfying changes in sound. Like a great vintage amp or a top-notch guitar, it’s these larger-than-life pedals that help a player define his or her…
Although a lot of songwriters have at least a basic sense of either the guitar or piano, there are still quite a few who rely solely on their voices when writing melodies and lyrics. While that’s a perfectly fine place to start, songwriters could gain a lot by expanding their instrumental horizons, especially when they…
