I think that every song is different. But the point should be, at least for me: "Does the song satisfies me?" A reknown jazz guitarist once told me that I should not consider something finished unless I want to listen to it again and again. If this does not happen, I must still work on it.
I found that sometimes I did my best things under a strong pressure, a couple of times I tried the RPMChallenge, and I found the best of me there, because I was extremely focussed on the music. However, it is not possible for me to mantain that state of awareness for more than a month.
Other times I gave roundabouts during lots of times on an idea, til it satisfies me or til I understand that that idea is not good at all.
I think that keywords here should be "self respect" and "respect for your music". Of course, an honest perspective about our music work is necessary. Do you really love what you hear? then it is finished. You don´t like it, just put more work on it.
And of course, your own oppinion is the only one that counts in this process.
I spend like.. way too long on a song. I feel like I can't be proud of it if I don't put in ample amounts of attention to detail.
lI'm not sure if it's worth it.
you learn more by finishing something than you do by just starting a bunch of random things.
When I was younger I'd knock out a song in one night. I'd love every moment of it. But now it seems like I'm more worried about the song being shit, so I'm never happy with it and never finish. Or finish in a month.
If I like a song I spend less time on it. It just spills out. But even if I feel luke warm about it, there can be a payoff to grinding it out.
danimal cannon wrote:even the title hurts me a little inside
Can't imagine why, it's basically the personal for of the thread title...how else could you word it?
Time spent on song VS ENJOYMENT OF THAT SONG.
Time spent on a song doesn't actually tell me anything. There's a reason a graph has multiple axes. You need to measure a correlation between two things.
Thanks I'll be here all week
I will say this, though; as I've gotten better with LSDJ, I've found myself able to pump out 75% of a song/remix in one night, and find that these times have led to some of my favorite works of mine. I'm able to run with an idea pretty freely as the idea is still fresh in my head..
With that said.. I still spend months of broken apart work finishing that last 25% haha
I have no idea how you guys finish songs in one sitting. 
I've only written a couple of tracks using LSDJ, and the one's I've finished have taken me at least a week to get done. Most music I write takes about that long, if not longer (<--the normal case). I guess I just try to make every little second of the song as interesting as the one before it, so it becomes fairly time consuming, but in the end I would say it's absolutely worth it. I've found that there's very few feelings like finishing a song (chiptune or otherwise), listening over it a couple of times, and saying "man, I worked really hard on this, and I'm so happy with the way it turned out."
That being said, the opposite feeling of being unable to finish a song sucks. But we all already know that.
Frostbyte wrote:Can't imagine why, it's basically the personal for of the thread title...how else could you word it?
Time spent on song VS ENJOYMENT OF THAT SONG.
Time spent on a song doesn't actually tell me anything. There's a reason a graph has multiple axes. You need to measure a correlation between two things.
Thanks I'll be here all week
I mean, the graph was mainly a joke with a hint of truth to it...If I start writing a song and I hate it quickly, I'm not going to spend much time on that song. If I get excited by it, I'll spend more time on it to get it to work better.
i wish 0-100 scale was percentage of time.
100% time, happy.
The songs I'm most satisfied with are usually the ones that I get done in 1 or 2 sittings.
Edit: Like... the ones that take longer often feel less inspired, more contrived, like I forced something out of it without really having anything meaningful to say. But then, as I work on it, I figure out what I'm trying to say, so it all works out anyway.
But still, it's the short ones that I like best usually.
Last edited by SketchMan3 (Jul 8, 2012 11:17 pm)
Fearofdark wrote:For me the graph is the opposite way around
there's a lot of things wrong with that graph.
THANK YOU
This is obviously a troll thread, but try to reimagine the title: "Is it worth putting actual effort into your craft?"
Yeah.
If you're not putting work into your music, you're not doing it right
If you're not putting work into your music, you're not doing it right
+1
It's also equally valid to reimagine the thread title as "Is it worth continuing to jerk off once you've blown?"