5 Tips To Keep Your Beats Interesting

A lot of times I hear solid beats made by producers, but after 30 seconds the beat fails to keep me interested enough to listen to it for any longer. So, today I'm going to share 5 tips that have helped me maintain relatively interesting beats.

1. Change those drums. This is probably the simplest tip on this list, but it's one of the most overlooked when making a beat. Repeating the same 4 bar drum loop for 4 minutes will get boring quick. Add drum variation throughout the beat. Take things out to build tension or add drum fills/snare rolls to transition into different sections of a beat. A really easy trick is to copy your existing drum pattern and change around the kicks, snare, ect. Keep doing that over and over and you'll end up with a bunch of different drum variations.

2. Copy. Paste. Change. Usually, when us producers are arranging a beat, we'll simply copy and paste whole chorus and verse sections. Too many producers will just stop there leaving each chorus and verse to be the exact same. Doing that is obviously going to make things too predictable, so take the extra time to add, remove, and rearrange things for additional verses and chorus sections.

3. Transition effects...use them. It surprises me how many producers don't use transitions in their beats. No cymbal swells to build into a crash. No synth effects to transition into the chorus. Just nothing. Transition effects are a great way to let the listener know a new section is coming in and keep things feeling fresh. Of course not all beat needs transitions, but the next time a beat is feeling a little stale try adding some in.

4. The power of Low pass filters,  High pass filters, phasers, flangers, ect. Using a filter can turn a regular old beat into something amazing if used properly. I've noticed a lot of people have gotten hip to filters, but only use them in an intro or outro. Think of filters as another way to build tension and create release at parts of a beat. Using a filter right before a chorus can cause it to hit harder or using a filter on a sound can cause a nice contrast between the verse and chorus sections. Phasers, flangers, and chorus effects are also great things to play around with. Adding them on certain sounds at different times in a beat can make things sound new or even adding them on the overall beat at times can beat a good way to transition into different parts of a song.

5. Expand your musicality. This tip takes a lot of effort. Especially, for me. I'm lazy at times...I must admit. Anyhow, really focusing on changing up musical elements in a beat is truly one of the best ways to keep a beat interesting. We'll often settle for a 4 to 8 bar musical loop and just omit things at parts to change things up. Sometimes, it's best to take things a step further by adding a unique intro, prechorus, bridge, and outro. Doing that, adds a sense of realism and keeps the listener on their toes.

Well, I hope my half decent written tips has helped somebody out there and if anybody has more tips to keep a beat interesting be sure to let me know and I might to a part two to this. 

Written by Dar'rell Banks