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Why 6-8 minutes per track?
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Yuli
Retired
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Posted : May 25, 2009 01:34
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On 2009-05-24 11:00:25, shahar wrote
I think 90% of all trance, and for that matter, also techno & house, tracks are 6-8 minutes long.
I wonder why is that. Is it an industry standard? Is it the ideal length for our brains/bodies to digest? Is it because artists are lazy/uncreative?
Any thoughts from listeners / artists?
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I must stress that I dislike questions that begin with why. how is much better word to begin with at least for me.
I also don't agree that most of the tracks are 6 - 8 minutes long, I don't know what happens in trance music, but most of the music I spin is around 9 minutes and some are longer than that. But lets assume that what you are saying is correct and average track is 7 minutes long...
Implying that artists are lazy is a bit too much no?.. Who said that every track has to be more than 10 minutes or more than 15? If your personal wish is for longer tracks, please open the Cubase / Logic and write long tracks 
There are tracks that manage to squeeze into 5 minutes a super great musical message ( please check out Agoria - Code 1026 if I am not mistaken around 5:30 but what a track ) and there are tracks of 12 minutes that you want to switch to next after listening to 4 minutes. <
It's what it has inside what is important I think.
Personally I like, and write long tracks, but as I have mentioned the Agoria track there are heaps of short gems out there.
No need to be stuck in strange conclusions, this is my answer.
  A man with a "master plan" is often a woman |
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Yuli
Retired
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Posted : May 25, 2009 01:42
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And one more point..
I think that somewhere around 8 minutes one might start getting tired from the same sound frequencies.. We must remember that the track's beating heart is the kick and the bass, and those are of specific sound and the track's atmosphere is usually built around those two. Every combo of kick and bass are different not only in the groove, but more importantly in the different dynamics of frequencies. When those repeated for too long ( more than 10 minutes for me lets say ) then the track stops doing the "magic" but becomes a little annoying. This is one of the reasons that Live PA's of artists playing their own material might get little boring if longer than 70 minutes. Artists will usually have distinctive sound patterns and frequencies, and will have similarities in buildups and track dynamics / mixing. So listening to kind of "samey" music for too long takes the sting out of it.
We must remember that this music has no vocal, and no "real" message that can be said in words, and thus take out attention from the track dynamics and frequencies. So when it becomes too long, it's no longer uplifting.
A man with a "master plan" is often a woman |
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Soul Kontakt
Soul Kontakt
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632
Posted : May 25, 2009 04:07
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Of course it all depends on the story for a psychedelic album is a whole song from the first track to the last, it's a voyage complete in every sound...There is no need for vocal when you can have wide expressive modulating sounds combined with fat Bass and crispy hats, they do the work fine...So you can even say that one psychedelic album is like 1 full story, which takes you to places were the artists want to take you.
Boom
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shahar
IsraTrance Team
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Posted : May 25, 2009 10:59
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Implying that artists are lazy is a bit too much no?.. Who said that every track has to be more than 10 minutes or more than 15?
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I was not implying anything, just raising a topic for discussion because it interests me and offering possible explanations.
And the laziness referred not to not writing longer tracks, but to possibly not making the effort to break the formula, if there is one.
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I think that somewhere around 8 minutes one might start getting tired from the same sound frequencies.. We must remember that the track's beating heart is the kick and the bass, and those are of specific sound and the track's atmosphere is usually built around those two. Every combo of kick and bass are different not only in the groove, but more importantly in the different dynamics of frequencies. When those repeated for too long ( more than 10 minutes for me lets say ) then the track stops doing the "magic" but becomes a little annoying.
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This is interesting. But isn't a monotonous repeating kick-bass combo will get you more into trance the more you dance to it? Though maybe you have to be "in it" first, otherwise you'll loose the focus because it's boring and won't be tranced at all. Interesting to compare it to "traditional" trancing music.
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"Be the change you want to see in the world!"
M.K. Gandhi
"There is only one corner of the universe you can be certain of improving, and that's your own self."
Aldous Huxley
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Kane
IsraTrance Junior Member
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23
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1772
Posted : May 25, 2009 11:26
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On 2009-05-25 01:17, Axis Mundi wrote:
Has anyone heard of John Cage? This conversation made me think of him.
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All of my new tracks have 4 minutes and 33 seconds of silence.
You believe in the users?
Yeah, sure. If I don't have a user, then who wrote me? |
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Outolintu
IsraTrance Full Member
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Posted : May 25, 2009 20:36
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perhaps 6-8 minutes is the _industry standard_ because many artists are also djs and djs play usually from 1-3 hours. if you have in the worst case only a 60 minute set to "build a story" it's easier with tracks over 6 minutes and under 9 minutes (shorter tracks might lead to a mish mash and longer ones to not so gentle mood changes or a more monotonous result ofcourse depending on the skills of the dj). so dj artists prefer these track lenghts. non-dj artists usually want their tracks to be played out and go with the flow. logical?
i'm more distressed with album lenghts. why must a trance album always be +70 minutes?
there are always those 1-3 fillers which are superfluous. 55-65 minutes is still very reasonable and would probabaly rise many albums's quality a couple of notches.
"no one ever sweats on a plug-in" -moby |
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full_on
IsraTrance Team
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Posted : May 25, 2009 23:17
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On 2009-05-25 01:17, Axis Mundi wrote:
Has anyone heard of John Cage? This conversation made me think of him.
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I think Johnny Cage died in Mortal Kombat after a flawless victory or something. 
Why count music in minutes?
I want to know why most psy has between 24 and 36 bars...
Respect!
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...Be gentle with the earth...
...Dance like nobody's watching...
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...I don't mind not going to Heaven, as long as they've got Coffee in Hell... |
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J
IsraTrance Full Member
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Posted : May 26, 2009 00:41
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On 2009-05-25 23:17, full_on wrote:
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On 2009-05-25 01:17, Axis Mundi wrote:
Has anyone heard of John Cage? This conversation made me think of him.
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I think Johnny Cage died in Mortal Kombat after a flawless victory or something.
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I almost said something similar, but I controlled myself... 
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Yuli
Retired
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Posted : May 26, 2009 01:27
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Can I point out that my original message in this thread was edited, and dear Arafela sent me PM notifying me that my message was changed...
So if it is the "New Isratrance" way, to edit posts of Forum users, if they don't sound right, maybe it's my time to leave here.
Been here way too long anyway. A man with a "master plan" is often a woman |
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J
IsraTrance Full Member
Started Topics :
193
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3858
Posted : May 26, 2009 03:32
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On 2009-05-26 01:27, Yuli wrote:
Can I point out that my original message in this thread was edited, and dear Arafela sent me PM notifying me that my message was changed...
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Did you notice that your post is exactly the same as shahar's?
Could be a bug maybe? That happens you know...
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So if it is the "New Isratrance" way, to edit posts of Forum users, if they don't sound right, maybe it's my time to leave here.
Been here way too long anyway.
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Did something like that ever happen to you here? I don't think so.
And imo, this is the same IsraTrance from years ago. At least for me.
Perhaps it is people who are changing. |
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Elad
Tsabeat/Sattel Battle
Started Topics :
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Posted : May 26, 2009 05:20
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Who0T ?? really?
here is my debut album with times:
1 Sounds Cool (5:41)
2 Dosomethingwithyourlife (4:48)
3 Rabel Rabel (4:59)
4 Sratim Metzuyarim (5:19)
5 Work In Space (5:08)
6 Hey Hop (5:22)
7 Ghat Whore (5:13)
8 Strangless (4:42)
9 Homegrown (5:09)
10 2 Step Chase (5:32)
11 Fuck It (6:16)
12 24 Shots (6:15)
13 Sky Divers (15:15)
personal reason : thats what CPU usualy can handle with such complex music.. (last track is 4 minute tracks with silence to make it "secret".. its been 2 years if you never heard its the best one lolol time to let you know if you care)
most my favorite songs/tracks are usualy less then 5 minutes (texas faggott) , and in most other psytrance there is only 4 minutes intresting the rest is excuses like "intro" (boring pads that goes no where) "for dj mix" (minute of kickdrum.. come on now are we stupid or what) "build up" (yawn) "wait its coming" (lolz) etc... make freakin music. damm CHEAP excuses too... now put kick 1 minute with hihat on top now thats LAZY... better make 3 minute of great music with no excuses at all !
this days i try to make my tracks longer so i have more time to drink on stage rather then mixing all the time 
www.sattelbattle.com
http://yoavweinberg.weebly.com/ |
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DETOX
Moderator
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Posted : May 26, 2009 05:38
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Trance music is not a style of music that permits you to experiment a lot so all the tracks are more or less the same in the way they are structured and in the sounds that they are using.
Every track must have an intro,a built up and an outro and is seems that 7-8 minutes is the ideal time for artists to achieve this structure without making the audience feeling bored.Also keep in mind that most of the tracks have one major aim which is making the people dance.
Shpongle is the greatest example of how trance music without limitations should/could sound like but in order to produce such music you must be a genious like Simon Posford and i am not sure that the trance scene has many artists even close to Simon's capabilities.Also i am not sure that one can call Shpongle's music as 100% psy trance especially the last album that is closer to ethnic music from all around the world rather than trance.
And last but not least in order to create innovative music,both in style and length,like a 50 minute trance track for example,one must have at least basic classic music knowledge and being able to play an instrument like the piano for example and being able to read notes and stuff.Correct me if i am wrong but 99% of the trance artists in our days dont have a clue about notes and stuff so dont expect a lot of good and innovative music from people who are actually not musicians but just good computer users and technology freaks.
Toodaloo Motherfuckers!!!!! |
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insane
Silent Horror
Started Topics :
67
Posts :
1983
Posted : May 26, 2009 06:02
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On 2009-05-26 05:38, DETOX wrote:
Trance music is not a style of music that permits you to experiment a lot ...
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i think this is really not correct..
not tryin to change topic here.. but its boring when trance becomes a standard structure..
for the same reason lot of repeated "similar structure" composition has lost its charm.
every genre has its ability to experiment and bring out the best of it... imo.
as u mentioned - intro, story , outro .. is correct. but the time length doesnt have to be fixed to 7 minutes. some artists manage to continue the story for longer time... or complete the story within 5-6 minutes.
other forms of music, which have vocals etc,,, why do they stick to 3-4 mins ?
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NEMESIS - DEVILSMIND RECORDS - 2007
PATTERNS EP - DEVILSMIND RECORDS _ 2009
SEANCE - DEVILSMIND RECORDS - 2011
PATTERNS II EP - DEVILSMIND RECORDS _ 2013 |
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Elad
Tsabeat/Sattel Battle
Started Topics :
158
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Posted : May 26, 2009 06:04
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On 2009-05-25 01:42, Yuli wrote:
We must remember that this music has no vocal, and no "real" message that can be said in words, and thus take out attention from the track dynamics and frequencies. So when it becomes too long, it's no longer uplifting.
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maybe i got you 180° , but dont by this theory songs with vocal can be longer but in reality they are 4-5 minutes ?
www.sattelbattle.com
http://yoavweinberg.weebly.com/ |
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shahar
IsraTrance Team
Started Topics :
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Posted : May 26, 2009 06:59
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Quote:
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On 2009-05-26 01:27, Yuli wrote:
Can I point out that my original message in this thread was edited, and dear Arafela sent me PM notifying me that my message was changed...
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Weird.... I'll check it out...
---------------------------------------------
"Be the change you want to see in the world!"
M.K. Gandhi
"There is only one corner of the universe you can be certain of improving, and that's your own self."
Aldous Huxley
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