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my arrangement system is stupidly simple (finish any song) – Transcript
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- The core hook of a track is built around three ingredients: harmony, rhythm, and melody.
- The follow float method avoids mud in the hero section by having every layer either follow the core or float across it.
- The rule of subtraction allows producers to build the rest of the song by subtracting sections from the hero section they already built.
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If you're anything like most producers, you've got a folder full of loops you love and almost nothing finished. And it's probably not for a lack of ideas. Some of those loops are genuinely good. And the reason they never become songs almost always comes down to the one thing nobody really talks about, your arrangement. I've spent years producing in major label sessions and pulled apart hundreds of pop songs, trying to work out why some ideas become finished tracks and others die in the project folder. And I found that the finished ones all do the same simple thing. So, let me show you the exact system I use
to turn any loop into a finished song. Let's dive in. Step one, the core hook. Most producers I talk to have the same problem. Every idea they start, they either hate it and scrap it, or they love it and have no idea what to do with it. The core hook, which is the one idea that your track gets built around, comes down to three ingredients: harmony, rhythm, and melody. So, harmony is just your core progression, your foundation.
Let's take this one from Stay by the Kid Loy and Justin Bieber. >> >> So then the rhythm is how these chords move. So we're going to keep the same chords but add some rhythm and suddenly it has a feel.
And melody gives it its identity. You can either lay a melody on top of your chords or do what stay does and let the melody carry the whole thing where it essentially becomes the chords. Here's just the pluck and then the chords underneath it. So, put all three together, harmony, rhythm, and melody, and that's your core hook. And because it has its
own rhythm and its own identity, it carries the track on its own. And you can hear this idea pretty much the whole way through stay, but on its own just looping, it still doesn't sound like a full song. So, next, I like to build the biggest section around it. Step two, build the hero section. That's the biggest, fullest part of your song, the one you'll spend most of your time on.
And it's where most producers go wrong. To make it bigger, they just stack layer upon layer, doubling the same sounds and then wondering why it ends up sounding muddy instead of having impact. The way I typically avoid this is a method I call follow float. I went deep on it in my last video, but the idea is really simple. Every layer either follows the core or floats across it. The sustain stuff underneath. Let me show you on It's Okay by Tate McCrae. So, we've got the pluck, which is our core hook in this song.
And then we've got the bass floating underneath. Then we've got the pads playing very basic chords underneath. This individual sound playing the thirds.
And this vocal synth a totally different color layered on top. >> >> We've then got a piano pedal which essentially follows the core hook.
And so with an element like this, you can really start to see those notes matching up with the core hook. And lastly, you've got the drums which essentially follow the core hook as well. So here's everything together in our hero section. So, that's a pretty full and rich section with no mud because no elements are really fighting each other. But there's one more thing I always add that keeps a listener leaning in. Step three,
ear candy. These are those little surprises that keep a listener hooked and they have more to do with your arrangement than you probably realize. The whole game here is restraint. Maybe something every four bars in the chorus or maybe every eight in the verse. So, just as an example, in the bare first half of the chorus, we've got these vocal chops.
And I've mixed up the sections a little bit here, so it's not exactly the same as the original record. And as you can see here, I've just used some very basic vocal chops I found that happen to sort of do a similar thing to the record. And one thing I really like to do just to separate them and push them back a little bit in the mix is use something like CLA effects just to really kind of give it that telephone radio sound. So you go from this to this.
Another place we've got some slightly cleaner ear candy again with the vocal chops is just outlining the chord tones with this little vocal chop here. >> >> It's a really great way just to give the track a little bit of space and a little bit of atmosphere. So in the track it sounds like this.
And so now you've finished that hero section. You've got the core hawk layers and ear candy. I find this to be the hardest creative work in the whole song. But here's the part that most producers forget. You only have to do it once because from here you're actually able to build the entire rest of the song without writing a single new idea.
Step four, the rule of subtraction. And this is where most producers hit the wall between a loop and a song. They open a blank project and try and write a brand new verse from scratch and either stall or end up with a verse that just sounds like a completely different song. And of course, you're free to be creative and come up with new core progressions and all that kind of thing. But you don't actually have to write those other sections at all. You can simply subtract them out of the one you've already built. So, if we first have a look at that intro, it's essentially just our core idea.
It's even got the same 808 runs and just a little bit of added ear candy, which is the one thing that you want to try and vary. We then move on to the verse and it sounds like this. Again, it's more or less the same as the chorus, but we've got a slight textural change just with these added toms over the kick.
And there's just a little bit of added flavor with these pitch bands on the bass. It's worth noting as well that it's not playing exactly the same progression. It's actually staying just on the one on the first minor chord. Again, just for a little bit of contrast and a point of difference. But as you can see here, we've still got our core hook in place.
The only difference is that it's a lower octave, but to help it progress on the second half of the verse, we've got it a higher octave. We then move on to the pre chorus directly after that same core hook still runs throughout again. And you can hear a lot of those elements that are from that big chorus still within this section. The only point of difference again are those
textural toms over the kick and these new pads that are essentially floating underneath that core hook. Also notice the filter automation that happens throughout these chords to really help them lift and add some suspense to that pre chorus. It's worth noting too that we've got those floating bases, especially with the Reese, just really kind of riding underneath those
chords and helping it become more and more expansive. And so after this section, it goes into more of a down chorus. It's just our hero section, but really stripped back.
And it's kept on that one minor chord throughout until it changes back to that main chord progression. Again, this is not exactly the same as the record, but it's still a really good example of how you can build something and a structure you can use to really follow through. So, this is that first half of the chorus, and then we're going to go right into that hero section.
Every section is essentially the same DNA at a different weight. And because the core hook runs onto all of them, they stay one song and it just feels way more cohesive. You didn't have to change the core sounds or write a completely different groove. You essentially just reshaped what was inside that hero section to start with. And just for inspiration, a typical pop layout might look something like intro, verse, pre chorus, chorus, verse two, pre chorus, chorus, bridge, double chorus. But you can really add or takeaways you need.
One thing to note is that sharing a chore between sections doesn't necessarily mean they'll flow back to back. The jump between sections can still feel a bit abrupt, and fixing that is one of the most skipped parts of arrangement. And a quick one before we go to the final step. Everything here is a part of a bigger system I teach inside of Song Design OS. my framework for taking any idea from a loop to a release ready finished song. And if you've got a folder full of loops that never turn into full tracks, that's what I help producers fix onetoone into your own sessions. If that sounds like you, hit
the link below to book a free call with me. Let's keep going. Step five, transitions. This is how you cross from one section to the next so it feels intentional. And most producers either ignore this or just cram every effect possible into every transition so it just sounds overworked. And I've really found that one move per transition is all you need. And I call it the one move rule. So let's firstly have a look at the verse to the pre chorus. As you can see here, we've just got a very basic riser.
So that one's of course very simple. Really not much going on there. And if we have a look at going from the pre chorus to the chorus, and then we've got this silence on beat four, which can be really powerful. And I usually like to automate those off with the onoff button on each group. For example, the synths. This is what it sounds like.
And of course, that evolving cut off on this pad that we've automated also plays a massive part in this transition, driving it to the next section. And if we have a look between chorus part A and chorus part B, we've got another transition here. So we started with just a basic symbol.
Then we started with a pause of silence and the symbol. And so for this section, of course, we still have the stop on the bases and the plucks as well on beat four. We've actually got it rising up until beat four. So it sounds like this. And it's nice and clean on that stop.
Now within that pause, we've also got our ear candy, which is the vocal chop. And lastly, we have what probably isn't considered a very conventional drum fill, and that's a kick playing a bit of a glitch multiple times in a row. And of course, let's not forget for just about every section here as well, we have these downlifterss, which really add impact to the next section, which is just as important as what happens before
it. So, the first one we have is just a basic downlifter, and then this kind of downlifter breath effect. and together.
And so that's really the difference between having several block sections and a song that just really flows from section to section. And at that point, you're more or less done. Just about every section's been built and everything's now connected from the core idea down to the transitions between each part. So I'm going to do a bit of a play through just from that intro right to that chorus. I still consider this a little bit rough cuz I've just kind of fleshed out the extra parts for the purpose of this video. Hopefully, it'll give you an idea. Here it is from the beginning.