@Mikael there is one thing that I see a lot of people struggle the most ā¦ the sound-quality.
If you ask me after hearing a lot of trailer music I would suggest you to buy these types of tracks and work with them as a reference ā because thatās the quality you want to have.
But itās doesnāt mean that all the tracks on the same album are well produced. You need to analyse and pic up only the best of the best, otherwise you will end up getting average mixing results, because not every single track was mixed to āperfectionā and not everyone is able to pull of great mixes out there. Every track is different in track counts, instrumentation and what not and you know how hard it can be if you compose and mix your own music too, as you just lose perspective. Here is another great track that I personally like.
The biggest issue I have with trailer music is that on the one side itās very simple, the instrumentation, the harmonies, the breaks etc. but thatās the struggle when you start doing it yourself. You oftentimes (at least I feel like that) that you end up with something that you have already heard beforeā¦and thatās the biggest pain, at some point it gets very tinny in terms of what is out thereā¦thatās why many publishers ask to be more diverse and more interesting, more special. And then you try to be special and understand how fu$Ā§&ing hard that is!
I think that @Geoffers suggestion with smaller labels is good, as you are able to grow and learn. But I think as well, if you feel like that one of your tracks might be something special indeed, then I would try to put into a bigger known library, as they will help you to make it even more special for sure.
One of the biggest issues that creatives usually have is the āegoā. I think at some point, especially this type of music you need to get rid of very fast, otherwise you will quickly end up being very disappointed.
Lately, I have scored an advertising spot and before the project I told myself that itās not my spot, itās the spot of the director, so no matter what I do musical-wise, I will only listen to him and not what I personally like. There is a whole team behind it. When you do this, itās far more enjoyable, as you donāt care much about what you think, so the writing comes more easier. You donāt need to express yourself. Your job is just to help the vision of the director and the team.
But if you start saying: āYeah, but I think itās better to do this and thatā¦ā, puhā¦that can go very wrong. I know, splitting the creative & expressive part from that serving part is something that I see many people struggle. So before telling that a composer did something really weird, itās not him oftentimes, itās more likely the vision of the director.
Lately, I have played āLast Of Usā, and there were moments were I thought, I would never put that music here at that scene ever in my lifeā¦but itās not my gameā¦itās someone else, so Iāll better shut up and just play it or watch it without putting my ālikingsā into it. Itās something I had to learn over timeā¦itās something I only could understand after working with people who had no idea about music but shared their emotions. Itās not easy to find a balance, but itās the only way to succeed when working with other creators.
madness I know. Youāll find composers such as Mark Petrie and Alex Moukala on those books. Alex does YouTube tutorials, definitely worth a watch! Also Mark is a lovely guy and recently had 6 tracks synced in a month and 2 didnāt even have any amendments. Thatās unheard of and basically shows the standard weāre talking about here. Plus, he wrote this track and then just for giggles, booked an orchestra to perform it ā>