STILL SPENDING MONEY ON MUSIC PRODUCTION EQUIPMENT OR SOFTWARE, WHY?

Music production can be a beautiful thing. The creative process alone is breath taking. To create a completely finished product , where you started from nothing but a blank canvas is amazing, and that's what we do. In this process it's natural to grow , meaning you learn new things, you expand your music production knowledge and you need new tools in the process. With that being said, do you tend to buy more music production gear, or buy more software than you actually need? It's not a uncommon thing, I know several music producers that were to the point of hoarding equipment and software to so call "advance their production", but it didn't work.

Learn All The Possibilities Of What You Have

There is no need to keep buying things when you are not totally proficient at what you already have. I know the temptation is there, especially with all the options we have now. Should you get the all access Slate Digital effects? Should you get more vst's by waves? How about trying that new bundle from Fab Filter. These are the decisions we make all the time even though we haven't even learned how to use our stock Eq's to their fullest potential yet. Let's be clear, all those products I named are solid, but if you are not good at cutting or boosting , or if you don't know why you should even be doing it, those products will not help you in that process. It reminds of a story I read about in a book (Earl Nightingale -Lead The Field), where a farmer sold his land to go search for diamonds in other territories, well the new owner that bought the land one day went to the stream behind the farm just to check out what he bought, and he knelt down and placed his hand in the stream. He pulled up to be what he thought was a rock, which is was but it had color. He kept the rock in his home for awhile, until someone came over , seen it and told him , it was a diamond. He went back to that same stream behind his home and found more. The man who sold him the property had never properly looked close enough at his own treasures right beneath his nose, everything he was searching for was already there, but he sold his property to look for that same thing. This is the same as constantly buying new gear or software. Have you used your current gear to it's fullest potential? If not, you may be searching for something you already have.

Level Up At Your Skills

To avoid this constant pattern of buying or wanting to buy more gear or software to add to your studio, the first thing to do is to stop looking at gear online (ha ha). No seriously, we as music producers have to work on our skills more. Once you level up your skills , you will be able to use anything proficiently. In this case you will know exactly the reason you need a new or better EQ , or you will know exactly why you need to add more tools in your toolbox. Make a conscious effort to do this, more than thinking about getting new equipment. Get better at sound design, get better at mixing using what you got, get better at layering sounds, which is also a key ingredient in helping you with your overall production sounding better. Also try to use better sounds when making your music, as this will also help in not you having to use as many effects in your production. In all there are many things we can do as music producers to get better at what we do, and we usually have more than enough already, at least in the beginning. As you progress and learn what you have inside out, then it's maybe time to move forward and adding to your studio, until then focus on the skills !