Beat Capturing, what sort of programs? Options

[afonynys]

hello,

i was wondering about programs that i could use to capture the beats/rhythms in my head? Sometimes they're very fleeting, and i am utterly confused on how to transfer them on to my computer so quickly.... actually, i'm very confused on where to begin, with anything, but i won't go into that... are their some free programs that might do the trick?

ThAnkS

afonynys

[rickenbacker]

Hmmm, do you mean rhythms or melodies or both? Personally, I like a dictaphone for quick vocal interpretations of anything floating around in my head - I'll sing out a rough snatch of melody or a drum beat or a bass line or whatever and come back to the tapes at a later date and try and recreate it properly. If it's worth it.

You can do the same with the Mac's internal mic - record your warbling into something like Sound Studio 2. I do that if I don't have my dictaphone with me.

If you actually want to get it down properly, you can't do it any quicker than it takes to play it. If your song is three minutes long and features two guitar, bass, drum, vocals, backing vocals and a couple of synths, logic and mathematics determines that the absolute quickest you could possibly record all that yourself would be 24 minutes - and that's with no pause for plugging in, retakes, level settings etc. Impossible, in other words.

I think I know what you mean, though - you're sitting on the bus or something and from nowhere a complete song starts swimming around your head, whole sections and instrument parts easily flowing one to another and the idea is coming so naturally you've got to get it down or you'll forget it. But by the time you get to your computer, powered up, booted your sequencer, set it up to record, loaded a synth or drum machine, the whole process is defeating your muse and you can almost feel the inspiration dying within you. If only you could fire out 8 tracks at once.

My advice is not to panic. And buy a dictaphone. Seriously - you might feel a bit of a dickhead trying to sing a drum beat or a bass line, but it's the most instantaneous method of capturing the rhythms in your head. I even use the record facility on my mobile phone if I get an idea somewhere odd.

I remember Jason Pierce from Spiritualised saying that what he's always aiming for is the amazing songs he hears in his head just as goes to sleep or when he's drunk or stoned or just as he wakes up - and he can never quite capture them as heavenly as they sounded in his head. So it's an eternal quest for him to somehow get as close to this fleeting glimpse of sonic perfection as he can.

Blimey, that was a long post. Hope it helped!