The truth about music producers,

DJs in the music industry



What every DJ and music producer should know
about the job when starting out


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 Ta ble o f c o nt e n t s

Introduction 4
The difference between music producer and DJ 5
The profession 7
Becoming a DJ is hard 7
Mental health 7
What is Noise induced hearing loss? 10
What is too loud? The guidelines 12
Hearing protection 13
Earplugs for everyday life 13
In-ear monitors for DJs 13
For the music producer 13
DJ-ing is a business 14
The first person you hire 15
Getting to know people 15
Ghost producer 16
The truth about TV talent shows 17
Where to get your music from 18
DJ pools 18
Streaming 18
Download portals 18
Youtube 19
DJ equipment 19
Where to start 20
Producer equipment 21
Sound card buyers guide 23
Midi connection 23
The difference between 24 bit at 96 kHz and 16 bit at 44.1 kHz 23
Connections: USB-C / USB 3 / Thunderbolt 23
External connections on the sound card 24
Low latency 24
Pre amps 25
Balanced inputs 25
Optional useful features 25
Soundcard FAQ 26
Good sound card brands 27
Sound card checklist 27
Where to start 28
DAWs 29
Online free DAW 29


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 Audiotool 30
BandLab 30
Offline free DAW 31
Pro Tools 31
Ohm Studio 31
Soundbridge 32
T7 32
Garageband 32
Cakewalk 33
Studio One Prime 33
LMMS 34
QTractor 34
Rosegarden 34
Audacity 35
Reaper 35
Podium 35
Stagelight 36
Free DAW conclusion 36
Plugins 36
Standards 37
Plugin misconception 37
Most used plugins 37
Instruments 38
Arranging song structure 38
Arrangement in electronic music 39
Arrangement order 40
Computers for DJing 41
Computer for putting files on your usb drive 41
Computer for DJing with your laptop 41
Computer for live performance 42
Computer for music production 42
Resources 42
Recommendations 43
Specifications 47
Value exchange - Don’t be that guy 48
DJ-ing and music production 49
The social media DJ 51
Music rights 53
Bootleg or remix 54
Hire a lawyer 54
How much??? 55
Kinds of contracts 56
General tips for contracts 56



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 Introd uc t io n
In this e-book I want to give you a rough blueprint of the profession of a DJ and music producer,
in a way that I would have liked someone to tell me when I started out.

The book was written with three goals in mind:

■you gaining a little bit of insight about what the job as a DJ and music producer entails.
■gaining a little of knowledge of the skills of a producer/DJ.
■prevent you from stepping into common pitfalls. In other words: this book saves you a lot of
money and sleepless nights. Being ambitious and naive is a recipe for disaster.
I won’t go into all the technical details of the actual skills of DJing or producing, that is a topic for
another book.


This e-book talks about general topics surrounding the profession, but I especially want to into
detail about topics that nobody talks about, because it diminishes the shine of the glossy image
of the DJ.

For example, topics like:
■hearing loss
■mental health
■contracts and the sneaky tricks they pull on you

The goal on my Youtube channel is positivity.


Unfortunately, the music business is not all about sunshine and rainbows.

In fact most of the time it’s not.

You are here for the truth!

Well, here it is…



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The difference between music producer and DJ

There is a common misconception that I have to clear up before we can continue.

A DJ makes music, right?
And when he is in a club he makes music on the spot, right?
No, and no.

A DJ plays music that others (or himself) produced before the DJ gig.
The Music producer is the person who makes the music so a DJ can play it.
For Example:
When I’m operating the cd player at a party of my friend and play “Madonna - Like a prayer”, I
am the DJ.

When I am Madonna (or collaborated with her), I am the producer.

(I am aware that I’m oversimplifying things here, but it’s just to make a point).

Where the confusion comes in is when a DJ also

produces his own music.
And since 95% of the famous DJs distribute
music under their DJ name, everybody assumes
that they are always the same person. 

That can be, but doesn’t have to be the case.

To clarify what a DJ does.


A DJ tries to make a smooth transition between
one song and the other. 

If the DJ does his job right, most people won’t even notice that the DJ ‘pasted’ 10,20,30 songs
together.

A DJ can only manipulate a song and make a (fluent) transition.

In other words, a DJ needs to have existing songs to work with.

A performing DJ can (depending on the equipment):

■influence the volume
■influence the low/mid or high frequencies
■influence the key of a song
■influence the speed of a song
■influence the order of parts of a song (digital only)
■mix in pre-recorded sound effects like a bass drop, horn, riser etc
■scratch
■making a basic beat from scratch with a drum computer
■do a basic mashup, like playing a vocal over an existing song
■use effects like echo, delay, reverb etc.

But a performing DJ can not:

■make a song from scratch



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To make matters even more confusing, there is a grey area.

There are DJs that indeed make a song ‘live’. They have a program like Ableton Live in which
they have prepared little pieces of a song in advance and can combine them on-the-fly (and
even play an instrument on top of that).

He can mould a song tailored to the needs of the audience.
But in this book I’ll assume a clear distinction between the music that a music producer makes
and a DJ uses during his DJ gig.

In the 70’s and 80’s DJs were only DJs, and

music producers, only music producers.
But that started to shift in the 90’s when it was
easier to make music with computers and DJs
also started to produce music.

Nowadays, most DJs produce music, and a lot
of producers are standing behind DJ decks.
It has even gotten to the point where you
have to produce music in order to get DJ
gigs.



The job of a music producer can be much
broader than only making the music on the computer.

The music producer is the central cog in the wheel of creating the music, he is the one
responsible for creating a track.

A music producer can collaborate with multiple other producers, singers, songwriters, musicians
etc and has to coordinate the different parties to make a track on cohesive piece of music.


I’ll expand a bit more about DJs and producers in the chapter “a foot in the door”



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 The p ro fe s s io n
Becoming a DJ is hard

A lot of people mistake it for a simple job, you only have to play music, right?

All the money, chicks and fame will automatically flow towards you.



Sorry, that I have to burst your bubble here.

Becoming a paid DJ that travels around the world and makes loads of money is hard, especially
nowadays.

Everyone is a DJ, and every kid seems to be inspired to become the next Martin Garrix.
And although Martin Garrix seemed to pop up out of nowhere, make no mistake, Marti(j)n
worked very hard for his success.

Many countless unpaid hours he spent willingly to perfect his craft.

The success of Martin Garrix only sky rocketed after the release of his track Animals.

Overnight success is the dream of many music producers/DJs, but it’s only 0,5% that actually
succeeds to do that.

The other 99.5% don’t have that one hit that makes his/her career, it grows gradually.

Denzel Washington (yes, the actor) said something about working hard:

“I’m a 20 year overnight sensation”


Another famous quote from the book Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell is:
“it takes 10,000 hours to perfect a craft” 

To put that in perspective: with a 40 hour work week, it takes you 250 weeks to get there, that is
almost 5 years of unpaid labour.

And in the meantime, you have to work to pay your rent, electric bills and want to have some
food on the table.

You have to love DJ-ing to the bone, so you can set everything aside.
You have to be in it for the love of music.

You have to be in it for the long run, not a quick success (a quick success is a huge bonus).

Mental health

A topic that people in the industry don’t like to talk about is mental health.

Mental and physical health is a big problem for artists like DJs.
Do you remember Avicii?

Stress is a natural survival mechanism.



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But the way we think about stress in most societies is unhealthy.

Stress is the number one cause of cancer, and stress is the number one cause of death (when
you count also stress-related illnesses like heart attacks).
And still, most job ads mention stress as part of the job.
Stress was meant to be a coping mechanism in case you were chased by a tiger.
That tiger would eat you if you were not responding fast enough.

Stress was not meant to increase the workload so someone else can drive a bigger car.

Why can’t that order wait until tomorrow instead of needing to be shipped today?
When you think about it, stress is forced upon you, by someone else, mostly because of a
financial motivation where you rarely profit from yourself.

The person that drives the bigger car doesn’t know that you stressed to get the work done.

Being a DJ means that you have to be in

shape for you next gig. 

You can’t do much else the day of the
gig, because you have to give
everything in the couple of hours you
are working.


Also, the late hours are excruciating.
You start at midnight and work until
early morning, then get some sleep (can
you sleep during the day??), and then
travel to your next gig.
But at least that’s a rhythm, right? Wrong!

If you travel between time zones, there is no rhythm: night = day, day = sometimes night, night =
night … sometimes.
A lot of DJs drink and use drugs.
How long do you think you can continue that unhealthy lifestyle?

You body is not built to do that.

In a regular 9-5 job, you work and have the evening off, sleep and go back to work the next day.
In a regular job your boss has a problem if you burn out (at least here in Europe).
He has to pay you when you are doing ‘nothing’ at home. 

He has to pay for your illness, so it is in his best interest to keep you healthy.

But with DJ-ing you have obligations

and expectations.

You signed a contract with your
manager (booking agent, tour
manager, etc etc) in which you
promise to take every gig.
Are you ill? That’s your problem, you
have to perform, you signed for it.
And if you cancel, you can get away
with a fine (if you are lucky), but you
also disappoint your fans.


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Have you ever thought about how big the pressure is when other people’s salaries depends on
you doing a gig, and you are the ‘only’ one who doesn’t want/can’t do it?

There are only a few that do not cave under that kind of pressure.

Most suck it up for a couple of hours by taking a pill and a tray of Red Bull … and everybody is
happy.
As a DJ, you are responsible for you own mental health, and not everyone (like Avicii) is capable
of doing that.

Everyone wants to be a big star overnight and there are just a couple of ‘lucky’ ones that
manage to do that.
But for the rest of us…

You learn a lot along the way up, also not to step in pitfalls like bad record deals.
In my opinion it is better reaching the top slowly and healthy than fast and burned out.




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 Your ea r s

Being able to hear is the most important asset as a DJ and even more so as a music producer.
Your entire career depends on how well you can hear.
The number one physical health issue for DJs is noise induced hearing loss.

If you are experiencing the first symptoms, you are already too late, because it is irreversible.

What is Noise induced hearing loss?

A common misconception is that high pitched sounds are the cause of hearing loss.

That is not the case, it is the bass.
In your cochlea, tiny sensitive hairs translate the sound they perceive into an electric signal by
vibrating.

That signal is translated by your brain to a sound, so you can ‘hear’.
But, when you expose those tiny hairs to sound that is too loud, those hairs get ‘scared’ and lie
down.
The hairs that are lying down are touching each other and make an electric short. 

That short causes a high-pitched tone in your ‘ear’.

When you are younger, you have bigger chance of recovering from that and the noise will
disappear after a couple of hours (if the sound wasn’t too loud).

This is still dangerous, even if your ears recover, because there will come a day when it is
permanent.
If it’s permanent you have tinnitus, that means: always having a high-pitched sound in your ear!
If you have tinnitus the hairs in your cochlea can’t vibrate enough to perceive a clear loud sound,
a.k.a. you have hearing loss.



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Tinnitus can drive people crazy!

Imagine you have to listen to a high-pitched sound all day long: when you are in your car,
talking to your girlfriend, when you are having sex and especially when you go for a quiet walk
and when you go to sleep.

I said that the bass sounds are the culprit.


This is because the hairs in your cochlea that receive bass tones are the first hairs that receive
the sound waves in your cochlea, so they are the first that are getting damaged.

Further down the organ the higher pitched sounds are perceived.

If you have tinnitus you are not stone deaf. 


The way you perceive sound is different, which is especially challenging for a the music
producer.

Higher pitched sounds are more hurtful, like “s”-sounds or the sound of the crappy speakers in
your 2000 dollar Macbook Pro, or the sound of glasses you put in you dishwasher.
The funny thing is, although you hear less, you have an extra big dip around the 4000 Hz in the
frequency spectrum.

This means you have to compensate for that in your music productions.


But hey, you can make it easier on yourself and just wear hearing protection in a club.



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What is too loud? The guidelines

What is loud, what is too loud, and where is the threshold?

Clever scientists have figured out when you have an increased chance of getting tinnitus.
In the table below you can see how long your ears can safely take that sound.
If you don’t know what decibel values mean: with every 6db the sound is twice as loud.

■80 db 8 hrs
■83 db 4 hrs
■86 db 2 hrs
■89 db 1 hr
■92 db 30 min
■95 db 15 min
■98 db 7 min - 30 secs
■101 db 3 min - 45 sec
■104 db 1 min
■107 db 56 secs
■113 db 14 secs
■116 db 7 secs
■119 db 4 secs
■120 db pain limit

You can download and install a decibel measuring app on your phone, walk into a club and see
for yourself how loud it is.

In one of the biggest nightclubs in Ibiza I measured up to 107db with my phone.

Look up in the table above how long it takes for you to get tinnitus.



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Hearing protection

You can protect yourself against hearing loss by wearing hearing protection.
Good hearing protection can ‘shave’ off a couple of decibels so you can safely cope with loud
sounds longer.

Earplugs for everyday life

For everyday life you can use earplugs.
The cheap hearing protection under $50,- is a false feeling of safety.
Good hearing protection is custom fit to the shape of your ear, so it doesn’t ‘leak’.
Most custom fit earplugs come with so called ‘filters’.

The filter determines how much decibel reduction you get out of your earplugs.
Good filters reduce all frequencies over the whole frequency spectrum evenly.
If you look at a frequency graph of good filters, you should see pretty much a straight line from
left to right of what they filter.
With bad ones that same line is a very interesting mountain landscape, in other words: you can’t
trust it.

In-ear monitors for DJs

There are in-ear monitors for artists like DJs.

I know it’s “not cool”, and “you miss the
connection with your audience”,

but I we are both adults here and I hope by
now you see the bigger picture.


You have to put them in before you enter the

loud noise of the venue, otherwise the hairs
in your cochlea get ‘scared’, lie down and you
have to turn the volume of your in-ear
monitors way up.

This defeats the whole purpose of hearing
protection.

Good in-ear monitors cost about $500 - $1000,-

For the music producer

Take a break once every two hours, not only to protect your ears, but also to prevent ear fatigue.
Furthermore, do not produce for more than eight hours a day.
Also, don’t sit too close to your monitor speakers, and reduce the volume of the speakers.

You can use the measuring app on your phone and the schema above to put things in
perspective.



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 G e tting t o k n o w t h e

b u s in e s s
I hope this chapter is good first step of getting an idea what is going on in the world of DJs and
music producers.

Listening to others that have more experience than you can be helpful, as long as you shape
your own opinion about the topic at hand.

That said, always consider the source (what ‘color’ does the information have and from which
perspective)

DJ-ing is a business

DJ-ing is a business like any other, but with a unique set of features.

A lot of beginner DJs see only the (fun) creative side of things, but it is a business with big bucks
involved.

Only if you play your cards right, can you make a few cents.

It is a business that needs office space, needs a website, needs an accountant.


DJ-ing (and music production) is a brand, that you need to build from the ground up.

It is also a business where you hire employees.


This might include another producer (ghost producer), a manager, booking agent, or another
DJ …



There a DJ brands that don’t even have a face (literally), just a mask.


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With a mask (or a white bucket with two X-eyes), you can two gigs at once on two different
locations

Clever or stupid?

The first person you hire



Over the years I learned a thing or two about running a business.

As I stated before: DJing is a business and in every business someone is responsible for the
financial administration.
The best business advice I can give you is:

Hire an accountant/financial advisor
A good accountant will pay for himself.

A good accountant knows all the nooks and crannies about tax law and knows exactly what he
(or she) can subtract from your income on paper in order to pay less taxes.

He also knows where you can save costs.

Hiring an accountant is especially smart if you are small business owner (read: small DJ/
producer).



For example:

Your accountant will bill you $1000,- per year for his services, but if you have to pay $1500,- less
in income taxes, that is a hefty $500,- profit.

You don’t know how to subtract X and Y, someone like an accountant does.

Getting to know people

When I started out DJ-ing I knew no-one.

Nobody in my surroundings could tell me what to do, teach me something or even see if I like
the job. I had to figure it out all by myself.

It is important to realize that your career

depends on other people. 

Other people make your career and it is other
people that have to give you a chance.

But how do you get to know people?

Of course social media is a way, but it is always
better to have a personal connection with
someone.
Go to fairs, expos, DJ meetings, take a course …
Networking is the key.


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By accident I met a recruiter of one of the biggest clubs in Ibiza during my holiday.

He is in charge of hiring DJs.

I never asked him for a favor, because I consider him a friend, I asked him only one question:

How do you get a foot in the door with a discotheque like yours.

His answer was:
1) learn Spanish
2) you have to know the right people.

Ghost producer

The ghost producer is like a ghost writer.


For a fixed amount of money a ghost producer makes a track.

Common practice is that the ghost producer signs a contract with a DJ in which he states that he
waves all his copyrights on the song. 

Then the (big) DJ can put his own name on the record.


The idea of a ghost producer may be far-fetched in your eyes, but it happens more than you
think.
My estimate is that roughly 90% of the DJ mag top 100 uses ghost producers, at least for part of
the music they release.


When a famous DJ switches to another genre of music all of a sudden, is that a creative change
or direction or just a switch of ghost producer?



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The truth about TV talent shows

The glitter and glamor of a TV talent show where they search for the next XYZ, is not as
glamorous as you might think.

Most talent shows are rigged.



In some talent shows the viewer can decide who becomes the next lead in a musical.

A company makes a million dollar investment, do you really think that they let others decide in
what (or who) they invest? 

Do you truly think that investors/shareholders of that company let them make such an
irresponsible gamble?

Professionals behind the scenes make that decision, audience engagement only makes the
show more popular (and more money). It is just like Youtube :).

Who says that the votes are actually the real numbers? You have to take their word for the
numbers they provide themselves.

In the TV business EVERYTHING is fake, staged and scripted.



In some talent shows you can win a record deal.

Those are the worst record deals you can get, because they are NEVER in the best interest of the
artist.

In this book I talk about value exchange; that’s also the case here: the equation has to be
balanced.

The record label has much more to offer to the artist (promotion) than the other way around.

You have no leverage to negotiate a good deal, as an independent, self-sufficient music
producer you do!

A lot of talent show winners end up behind the counter of a super market for five days a week to
pay the rent, on the weekend they have to do six shows for free.

A lot of them burn out.

Nobody talks about it, because those contracts probably all contain a non-disclosure
agreement.



How many talent show winners actually have a career after the contract ended?

Just a few.








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 Lea rning t he b a s i c s k i ll

of a DJ
In this chapter I’ll give you a quick overview of the skills you need to learn as a DJ.

Where to get your music from

You can buy your music in a record store, but more popular is buying digital versions online.

DJ pools
There are many different kinds of digital subscription services out there, called DJ pools.
In those DJ pools you can download an ‘unlimited’ amount of songs in a month for just a fixed
price.

No, you can’t find the big hits on there.

Streaming
Streaming is not yet ‘mainstream’ as of the writing of this book, but it probably will be in the
future.

Although there is software (not hardware yet) that supports DJ-ing with Spotify, Spotify excluded
the commercial usage (which is DJ-ing) of their software in their terms of service.

So, technically it’s illegal and music rights organizations can force you to quit your performance
if you are stubborn and do it anyway.
Serato DJ supports the Tidal streaming service.
Although it has a smaller library than Spotify, but it’s still streaming.

Rekordbox DJ supports Beatport Link, the streaming service that streams the whole music library
of Beatport.


Download portals
Download portals are the most popular for getting your music.

The most famous are probably iTunes and Beatport.

Beatport is a site especially for DJs, with a lot of underground music



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Youtube
Don’t do it. Just don’t.

Besides that it is illegal, the quality is poor.

You may not hear it on your mediocre quality speakers at home.

But on the quality speakers in a club, you will.


DJ equipment

It is handy to know a little bit about the equipment of a DJ.


I’ll divide them in 4 categories:

• DJ software

DJ software is a computer program that acts as two music players so you can mix between
the two.

There is software (or trial versions) for free, but most of them are starting from $100,-

Famous software is : Traktor, Serato and Rekordbox DJ.


• The DJ controller with a computer


The DJ controller is basically an extension
for your DJ software.

A DJ controller has start/pause buttons,
volume faders, equalizers and a platter so
you can scratch.

DJ controllers vary from $75,- up to
$800,-.


• The standalone DJ controller


There are DJ controllers out there that don’t need
a computer to operate (only for preparing songs:
analyzing, categorize in playlists etc).

A lot of standalone DJ controllers work with a USB
drive that you can put your music on.

A standalone DJ controller costs about $800,- up
to $1500,-

Most famous are Pioneer controllers.


• DJ players

The difference between a standalone DJ
controller and DJ players is the fact that

Standalone DJ controller is the cheaper all-in-one
solution.




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 A standalone DJ controller represents 2 players and a mixer.

DJ players need a separate mixer to use the players.

The current industry standard club standard DJ players and mixer are: 

2x CDJ 2000 NXS 2 player and 1x DJM 900 NXS 2 mixer from Pioneer.

A player can cost $2000,- per player and the mixer also $2000,-



I did an entire course on the CDJ 2000 NXS 2 player because it’s so extensive.

You can find the course here:

https://www.cdj2000course.com

Where to start

I’ll give you an overview of a couple skills that you can dive deeper into.


■learn song structure, (drop, break, intro, outro), see also: https://youtu.be/L5j67gjMfZg
■learn when and where you can mix in and out
■learn beat matching
■learn frequency mixing with equalizers
■learn mixer effects (and how to use them), see also: https://youtu.be/h9WLrz_hmLE
■learn harmonic mixing with song keys (advanced skill), see also: https://youtu.be/
gPIkoFRBUss
■learn scratching (more advanced skill)




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 Lea rning t he b a s i c s k i ll

o f a mus ic p ro du c e r

In this chapter I’ll give you an introduction of the skills of a music producer.


Producer equipment

A couple of things to start with:


• Computer

You need a computer that is powerful enough to make music with.

You probably can use your current desktop computer or laptop.


• Software (DAW)

Software for music production is called a DAW (Digital Audio Workstation).

Famous software for music production: 

- Logic Pro X (Mac only)

- Ableton Live

- Studio One

- FL Studio

But there are many more DAWs out there.

The software ranges from $200,- up to $800,-.

There is free software out there, Studio One Prime for example

Most payed software has trial versions so you can take it for a spin for a couple of days.


• MIDI keyboard (optional)


Although some software uses your regular keyboard to input notes by hand, a MIDI
keyboard is far more easier (also if you can’t play the piano).

Even if it was just to type out a rhythm.

On top of that, a lot of MIDI keyboards take pressure sensitivity into consideration, which
regular keyboards never do.

If you buy a new MIDI keyboard, make sure it has an USB connection instead of an ancient
MIDI connector (which only fits on a sound card).




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 • Sound card (optional)

An external sound card is useful if you want to record from a condenser microphone (which
needs 48V phantom power), have a MIDI keyboard with a MIDI connector, want to have low
latency and have a better sound quality.

Make sure that your sound card has a low latency.

Latency is the time that the computer needs to compute your sound.

If you are recording vocals, low latency is important when the singer wants to hear the music
(so he/she knows when to start singing).

A review of the 2i2 sound card you can find here: https://youtu.be/wSL5ikN9CZg

A review of the Audient ID14, you can find here: https://youtu.be/HlIPJuOQZhU



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Sound card buyers guide

Midi connection
In the good old days, MIDI keyboards were connected via a MIDI connection, hence the name.
Back in those days, only sound cards provided that MIDI connection.

Nowadays, all new MIDI keyboards are connected via USB, so you don’t need to worry about
that MIDI connection.
But if you have an old MIDI keyboard, you need a sound card that has such a MIDI connection.

Most sound cards nowadays don’t have that connection anymore.

The difference between 24 bit at 96 kHz and 16 bit at 44.1 kHz

Both refer to the resolution of the sound signal, the higher resolution, the more quality.

When you record a singer or a band, you convert an analog signal to a digital signal.
How much of that analog signal is stored in digital information?
The more information you store, the closer it comes to the original sound, the more quality you
have.

The more bits, the higher the resolution (the amount of information you store), the more analog
sound information is stored.
The amount of Hz refers to the number of times information is stored.
24 bit at 96 kHz means:
How many 24 bit samples are recorded in one second?
96 thousand per second.

The higher the bits and Hz, the more precise the digital information is, but the more hard disk
space it eats and the more processing power it needs by your computer.

I don’t want go into much detail here because it get’s complicated very fast.
What you need to know is, a regular old-school audio CD “only" stores 16 bits samples at 44.1
kHz.

At the moment 192 kHz is the best sample rate on sound cards we can get.
If you record in a higher frequency and bits, you have the luxury to downscale if you want to
reduce quality and storage space.
But the other way around, you can never upscale to improve quality.

Connections: USB-C / USB 3 / Thunderbolt

This get’s confusing, I know, I can’t help it.



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The engineers that designed these standards weren’t thinking about the user who has to make
sense of it all.

Modern sound cards nowadays have a USB-C connection.

That connection says nothing about the technique that the device or the cable supports.
Multiple standards can be transferred through one cable, or just one standard.
But the cable could look exactly the same in both cases.

USB 3 is one of the most common standards for USB-C.

Even USB 2 can be supported with a USB-C connection (although USB-A or USB-B is more
common).
But also Thunderbolt 2 can be passed through that same USB-C cable.

Important to know is that your computer, sound card and cable must support a certain
technology (USB 2, USB 3, Thunderbolt 2), preferably with a USB-C plug.
Because, like it or not, USB-C is the future.

The reason why you want to choose Thunderbolt 2 and USB 3 over their predecessors is
because of lower latencies.
You want to have the lowest latency possible for your sound card.

External connections on the sound card

The most important connections are:
• the studio monitor speaker connections (Jack connection)
• the capability to connect a condenser microphone (XLR connection). A condenser
microphone needs 48V phantom power.

A headphone jack with volume control is very handy

Low latency
Latency is the time it takes (delay) to reach your ears.

When you record the roundtrip of a sound signal needs to “travel” from the sound card, through
the computer with your DAW and all your plugins and back to the sound card for output.

The lower the latency, the more convenient it is for producing music.
For a singer it’s very important to hear directly what he or she is singing.
The lower the latency, the more your computer has to “work” to process the signal, so you need
a more powerful computer.

In your DAW you can set your sample rate.

The lower the sample rate, the quicker the sound will reach your ear, but the more system
resources it will eat of your computer.



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Pre amps
Pre amplifiers determine the sound quality of your recording together with the quality of your
microphone.

Look for good quality pre amps in your sound card.

Balanced inputs
Balanced connections combined with balanced cables have an extra wire in them that makes
the signal less susceptive to interference.

With unbalanced connections the cable will act as an antenna that picks up surrounding
frequencies.
Long cables are more likely to pick up interference because the “antenna” is bigger.
If you use unbalanced cables/connections, make sure the cable is very short.

Optional useful features

The following features are nice to have:
• Direct monitoring - to reduce latency by the computer
• Second headphone jack if you want to record a singer. You can connect one headphone for
the producer and one for the singer.
• Talkback function for the singer. When you record vocals in another room it’s easy to talk to
the singer via the headphones of the singer.
• Sound level indicators for recording and headphone. My 2i2 has a led indicator, which works
but, not my favorite.
• Mono button for mixing. Mono is more common than you might think.

Speakers in stores, the gym or your phone for example are mono.

When you collapse a signal back to mono, both channels are combined to one channel and
can give phasing issues.

Stereo widening plugins are notorious for causing phase issues.

It would be very annoying if your kick is suddenly gone in mono.



The mono function is also in your available DAW, but a physical button is just a time saver.

If you can switch with a touch of a button between mono and stereo and you don’t have to
open a plugin on your master chain that takes you 15 seconds to find.

Switching back and forth you have to do a lot for a proper mix.
• Extra monitor output to connect shitty speakers.

As a music producer you need only to listen to your tracks on good speakers, but also on the
worst.



Often little gimmicks are perfectly hearable on your monitors, but totally disappear on car
speakers and speakers on a mobile phone.

If you can connect a pair of shitty speakers (buy the cheapest online for a couple of dollars)
and easily switch with the touch of a button between your good monitors and the shitty
ones, that is convenient.

Otherwise you have to export the song to mp3, upload it to your phone via google drive and
listen, same for car speakers.


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Good quality doesn’t need to be expensive
You may think you need a 1000 dollar sound card to produce music.
Absolutely not.
For 150 dollars you have a great sound card.
I mention them in the top 5 later in this video

Soundcard FAQ
Do I need a sound card for music production?
In order to get sound in and out of your computer.
You might think: “my computer does that by default”, indeed most computers and laptops have
sound cards built in.
So, not for getting sound, but if you want to record from a microphone and connect monitor
speakers, if you want low latency, then yes.

Does audio interface improve sound quality?

It could, but it depends on the quality of the sound card.
Most onboard sound cards don’t support higher resolution sounds for recording and displaying,
and dedicated music production sound cards often do.

Especially in recording quality you see the most improvement in recording quality.
With proper pre-amps (pre amplifiers) you can record a better quality sound than with an on-
board sound card.

What is the difference between regular sound cards and music production sound cards?
Regular sound cards are not built with the music producer in mind.
• Things like reducing latency was not on the priority list of the manufacturer.
• Also do regular sound cards have support for monitor speakers and phantom power.
• Music production sound cards are built to have a flat frequency response. So all frequencies
are represented equally in the frequency spectrum. Regular sound cards tend to have boosts
or dips in certain areas.
• Most music production sound cards are external devices, so you can also use it with a laptop
or an Apple computer.

What is the difference between a sound card and an audio interface?

Two different names for the same thing.
Some might imply that a sound card is internal and interface external, but it’s technically the
same thing.
It converts analog audio to a digital signal and digital back to analog.
In one form it’s outside the computer, the other inside.

The card thanks it’s name to the expansion card format in the PC.
A daughter board is inserted into the motherboard to extend its functionality.
Sound interface “sounds” a bit nicer and more official than sound card, but it’s still the same
thing.



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Good sound cards?

Good sound card brands

Tascam, Presonus, Native Instruments, Focusrite, Audient, Apollo (twin), Steinberg, Arturia
AudioFuse, RME (babyface) and Apogee

Sound card checklist

• 24 bit / 192 kHz or 96 kHz
• Connection (USB 2/3/Thunderbolt 2)
• Separate power connection or USB powered?
• Separate volume control for headphone?
• VU level meters? Clip indication?
• The number of inputs? XLR / Jack? Are they balanced?
• Support for 48V phantom power microphones?
• Extra monitor outputs? (optional)
• MIDI connection (if you have a MIDI connection on your MIDI keyboard)
• Number of headphone connections? (optional)
• Support for IOS? (only if you want to work with IOS)
• Mono button for easy mixing? (optional)



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Where to start

The subject of learning to produce is much broader than DJing.


With DJing there is only so much you can learn, with producing it’s almost endless.

Let me give you some pointers to start:

• Choose a DAW and learn it


DAWs are complex pieces of software that you need to spend a lot of time in order to know
your way around.

The easiest way to get to know a DAW is to make a mixtape. 

I made a video about mixtapes, you can find it here: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=KkpLKOdLe50&list=PLO0we5bJUGNKVM9tcVxwBK8Cyz9rgALYY

I also made a video about a couple of DAWs:

https://youtu.be/7LpmruHsbi4


• Learn about plugins


A plugin is a type of software to extend the functionality of your DAW.

• Difference between MIDI and audio tracks


A DAW works with layers. Every layer (called a track) is representing a piece of information
(=sound) in the music.

Audio tracks are for existing audio like sound effects.

MIDI is the music you make with instrument plugins.


• Automation

In order to change a certain parameter over time, you can use automation. 

This is effectively automating a button, for example the volume of a track (or the amount of
reverb).


• Bus

You can group the sound of certain tracks in busses. 

This is useful to manipulate multiple tracks at once, for example: change the volume of all
tracks in the break.

But you can use a bus also for effects.

Placing a reverb effect on every single track will ‘kill’ your CPU very quickly and this is totally
unnecessary. 

Make a bus with the reverb effect and send the output of tracks that need a reverb, to the
reverb bus.

• Side chaining

Side chaining is using the output of a certain track (or bus) for another track.

The most used application is the pumping effect you hear in a lot of electronic music. You



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 can use this to cut away the bass frequencies when the kick hits for example.

Cutting the bass frequencies is done to prevent phase cancellation (frequencies can cancel
each other out).

DAWs

DAWs exist in different shapes and sizes.


When you choose a DAW that has everything, it may be overwhelming to start (not so say
costly).

When you choose a DAW that has basic functionality, you can get started quickly, but you’ll be
missing features when you advance.

In this chapter I’ll take a brief look at some free DAWs.

Most ‘free’ DAWs are not really free, with the majority having major caveats, that make them
unusable in practice.

Their sole purpose is to let you pay for extended functionalities or their commercial package.

Nevertheless, maybe they are worth checking out to get an idea of what is available.

I noticed that a lot of people confuse audio editors like Audacity with DAWs.
The difference between a DAW and audio editor is that a DAW is much more than only an audio
editor.
Making music you do with software that supports midi keyboards, virtual instruments and has
knowledge of the BPM of a song.
An audio editor only lets you record, edit audio and add effects.

But when you want to add a sample on the off-beat of a 106 bpm song, that is difficult (or at
least: time consuming).
A good DAW has a proper audio editor built-in.



Online free DAW
Nowadays it is possible to produce music inside your internet browser, but there are major
downsides to this method:
• you need a stable internet connection with a lot of bandwidth.
• Producing on the road (or plane) is probably out of the question!
• The software runs on someone else’s computer (they call it: in-the-cloud).
• If the companies go bankrupt, or they decide to charge you a lot of money tomorrow,
they can.
• You can’t use your own plugins and that means that you are bound to whatever they
provide.
• The system requirements it takes (there is no way to change the sample rate on your
sound card for example)



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Audiotool
When I first used Audiotool it crashed within the first 5 minutes of use, and later it crashed again.
I disabled all the browser plugins (as Audio Tool suggested), but it crashed and crashed again.
So eventually I gave up.

From what I could see is that this free DAW is really resource intensive.
I couldn’t run it properly on my computer (it's a couple of years old), and it was full of cracks and
pops.

The software is node based: you connect plugins via wires.

So you have to wire the sampler to a mixer, and then connect it to the master chain in order to
get your sound.

The plugin workspace is in the middle and the tracks are on the bottom.
I noticed that you are zooming in and out of the plugin workspace a lot, and the workspace gets
cluttered quickly with only a couple of tracks.

I could not find how to save, bounce or export your file to your hard disk.
I could not find how to configure your sound card, change bit rates or inputs.
I could not find how to use 3rd party plugins. There are synthesizers and samplers with step
sequencers in the software, but regretfully I couldn't try them out.

If Audiotool is not crashing, it seems to be okay, but it’s pretty limited and won't satisfy your
needs as a professional.

BandLab
The second free DAW Bandlab is also an internet browser DAW, that only works in chrome.
It also works on your phone, however!
Bandlab is a much more straight-forward DAW than Audio Tool.

You can drag and drop samples from your computer straight into the timeline.
You can also record straight from your sound card.

It lacks a sample browser and it lacks support third party plugins, and with the limited number of
things you can dial in on the stock synthesizers, you are definitely lacking features.
It’s also missing a proper mixer.

Bandlab DAW is user friendly though, and I can immediately understand how things work.
You can store unlimited projects, unlimited collaborations and there are royalty free loops/stock
effect plugins in the software.

I think there is a big potential in this piece of software, but it's not matured yet.
It's basic, that maybe pretty good for beginners…but that's also the downside, you’ll be missing
features for music production in no time.



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Offline free DAW

Pro Tools
Before we go any further I want to mention Pro Tools, first.
Pro Tools is the DAW that is used in professional recording studios.
There is a free version called Pro Tools first.

With only 16 tracks, no 3rd party plugin support and with only 3 projects you can save, it’s more
of a trial version than a free DAW.
I don’t think that Pro Tools is particularly good for beginners even in the paid version, but I
wanted it to be in here because it’s industry standard.

Ohm Studio
Ohm Studio is free for Mac and Windows, but it has some severe limitations.
For example, you need to have a working internet connection, although the software is installed
on your computer.
No internet connection? You can’t start the software!
You also have to save in-the-cloud and you can only save a maximum of 10 projects for free, and
if you want to record in 24 bit and export to WAVE you need Ohm studio Pro.

Ohm Studio is responsive, has no track limitations AND you can use 3rd party plugins.
You must use 3rd party plugins, because there are no stock instruments in the software.



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Soundbridge
Soundbridge is a free DAW for Mac and Windows.
Soundbridge is free if you donate, as a nag screen carefully explains.

The Soundbridge DAW is pretty straight forward, and I think you’ll pick up very quickly.
The software is responsive and you can change bitrates and soundcard inputs, although it’s very
basic.

Audio stretching and pitch shifting is very easy in the edit window, if Soundbridge doesn’t crash.
Fading in and out points of a sample is pretty easy too.

You have a unlimited number of tracks, and you can use your own plugins.
There are also stock effect plugins in the DAW, but I couldn’t find any instrument plugins.

This DAW is basic, but has enough features to get you started.
Soundbridge is also an option for the more advanced producer.

T7
T7 by Traction is free, but of course they like you to upgrade to their paid DAW Waveform for 70
dollars.
T7 is available for Mac, windows and Linux.
You are greeted with a nag screen, but if you click unlock and enter your user credentials you
can continue.

It’s worth mentioning that the DAW makes no distinction between audio and midi tracks.
There are no limitations in the number of tracks in T7 and yes you can use 3rd party plugins.
You can even add a video for scoring film music.

There are a couple of stock plugins in the software, like a sampler and a couple of effects
plugins like a compressor.
The software sometimes doesn’t respond to mouse clicks, and sometimes a right click on a
plugin opens a menu and sometimes the plugin, and I had it crash on me once by adding a
plugin.

In conclusion, it’s functional, it’s complete and it’s free.

With that said, however, it doesn’t suit my idea of a DAW very well and has some user interface
issues.

Garageband
The next free DAW I want to mention is Garageband.
You can download Garageband from the App store if you have an Apple computer.


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The application has a number of limitations, other than that it is only available on Mac.
The first one limitation is the limit of 32 tracks, which is workable if you use your tracks wisely.
Besides that, you can only add 4 effect plugins per track.
The 4 effect plugins are workable, but doesn’t give you a lot of wiggle room.

You can get pretty far with Garageband as a free DAW, but there will come a time that you need
to upgrade to it’s big brother Logic.
The upgrade to Logic is $200,- for a fully functional professional DAW and it can read your
Garageband files.
Definitely check it out if you own a Mac, and by the way, there is even a Garageband app for
iPhone and iPad.

Cakewalk
Cakewalk by Bandlab was previously known as Sonar.
Bandlab (the new owner), makes the previously discussed online free DAW: Bandlab.
Because it’s a windows application I couldn’t test it regretfully.
Judging by the scarce info on the website is, that it is completely free without any limitation on
tracks or whatever.,

It supports VST plugins.

I guess you have to download it to figure out what is does and doesn’t do.

Studio One Prime

The next free DAW is Studio One prime.
Studio one prime is a stripped-down version of the paid version: Studio One Pro.

The paid version of Studio One is my preferred DAW of choice, and out of familiarity for me it’s
really easy to say that it is therefore the right choice, but I’m not going to do that, because the
Prime version has some major downsides.
The first one is the lack of 3rd party plugin support and you are stuck with the stock plugins.
The stock plugins are by no means bad, but the only instrument plugin is Presence, which is
limited.
With no samplers included, no proper compressor and no way to add those yourself, the DAW
is pretty handicapped.
The other obvious limitation is the limited number of busses, but that is maybe less of an issue
when you are starting out. To get you started there are loops and sounds bundled with Studio
One Prime.

What I like about Studio One is that you search for plugins and drag and drop them on the
timeline.
There is no track limit or storage limits in the free version.

If you want to upgrade:



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Studio One Artist is $100,- (which has more features than the free version) and the full version
Studio One Pro is $400,-.

LMMS
LMMS or Linux Multi Media Studio is available for Linux, Windows and Mac.
I don't find it particularly user friendly, I needed at least 6 or 7 tutorials to get me started.

LMMS can export WAV and Ogg lossless file formats and it can export stems (multiple tracks at
once).
WAVE, AIF and FLAC for importing is supported, but MP3 is regretfully not.

The software supports partial VST plugin support under Windows and supports the Linux Audio
Developers Simple Plugin Api (LADSPA for short). 

That results in a slew of really simple plugins in the software with limited functionality.
Since I can’t get my own VSTs or AU's to work, I have to rely on what they provide for me.

I heard rumors that they are adding VST support for Mac, but I have not seen it in the version I
tested.

LMMS is definitely one of the more extensive free DAWs, but it lacks recording features. You can
get around that by using Audacity for example, but that makes LMMS not a one stop DAW.

LMMS has no limitations when it comes to number of tracks, but the lack of support for VST
plugins for Mac and the fact that I couldn't get my midi keyboard to work, is a deal breaker for
me - so I don't think that it's the best free DAW if you are a beginner.

QTractor
For the Linux enthusiasts out there, you can take a look at Qtractor.
I have no usable Linux workstation to test it, so I have to go by the tutorials and screenshots on
their website.

Qtractor has recording capabilities (in contrast to LMMS), even multi take recording.
The DAW allows you to have unlimited tracks, unlimited busses, unlimited number of plugins
per track, piano roll, support for midi keyboards and automation possibilities.
There is VST instrument support in QTractor, but no support VST effect plugins.
It reads MP3s, and supports OGG, WAVE, FLAC and AIFF for reading and saving.
What I get from the online tutorials and screenshots, it has also a multi window approach.

Rosegarden
Another free “DAW" for Linux is Rosegarden.
Rosegarden is mainly a Midi sequencer, meaning that is was first built as a program to make
music with notes and sheet music. Later, they added audio support, but I suspect the support to
be very minimal, although it supports audio routing and recording audio.



dexxterclark.com 34
Rosegarden only supports some typical Linux plugins and it doesn't limit you in number of
tracks, but it does limit you to only 5 plugins per track. In most cases that's enough.

Audacity
A lot of people seem to think that tools like Audacity or Audition are DAWs, but those are multi
track audio editors, not a DAW.
In Audacity you can record your voice or a real life instrument and apply effects with VST and AU
plugins, but you cannot instantiate a VST instrument like Serum, change notes with a piano roll
or connecting a midi keyboard and Audacity has no knowledge of BPM, so good luck trying to
put a sample on the offbeat of a 106 bpm song!
You can import a midi file, but you cannot play it.

Audacity is fine for recording a voice-over or a podcast, but not for a music producer.

Reaper
You could consider the endless 'trial' of Reaper as free.
When I set my computers system clock to 2037, Reaper indeed still seems to work.
It’s not technically free, but you can use it for free, when you click away the nag screen.
There is a paid version of the software if you want to use it commercially.

In Reaper is no distinction between track types, so a midi track, an audio track, a video track and
a bus track are all the same thing.

Reaper can be a bit intimidating when you are starting out with music production, because of all
the huge menus and the options on the screen, but a lot of options are pretty self-explanatory,
when you know the basics of a DAW.

Exporting can be done in a slew of formats: WAVE, AIFF, MP3 and OGG Vorbis.
I’m surprised by the amount of plugin standards they support: VST Audio Units and even ARA.

With no apparent limitations Reaper is a good DAW to grow with. It is feature rich and definitely
competes with the big professional DAWs.

Podium
Podium is a DAW for Windows that is based on a subscription, but there is a free version of
Podium - with a couple of caveats.
First of all, the free version is not updated since 2014.
Second, there is no 64-bit support in the free version and you can only use one processor core.
In other words, the free version doesn’t take maximum advantage of your computer’s hardware
and the paid version does.

Regretfully, it has no Mac version, so I can’t test it for you.



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It supports VST plugins, Midi and audio recording, multiple computer monitors and automation.
The stock plugins in the software are: an equalizer, reverb and pitch plugin.
Those are only effect plugins and no instrument plugins, so you need to have 3rd party VST
instruments.

Stagelight
Stagelight by Open Labs is a DAW for windows and Mac.
Stagelight comes in 3 flavors: the free DAW, the platform unlock and the ultimate unlock
version.
There are also iPhone and iPad versions of the software available.

The free version can handle only 2 effect plugins instead of 8 in the paid version.
You can’t export stems, and there is no VST support in the free version.
There are basic versions of their instrument plugins in the software, so you are bound to those to
make your music with.
There is also an equalizer, compressor and delay stock plugin in Stagelight, but you are
definitely missing a limiter and reverb plugin.

I couldn’t figure out how to side chain, and judging by the forum, it isn’t possible at all!
This made me quit further exploration of the software because if it can’t even do that, it isn’t
worth my time, or yours for that matter.

The DAW is pretty basic, which may be good for a beginner, but if you want to grow with a piece
of software, take a look at something else like Reaper.
On top of that, the free version is so handicapped that it's hardly usable.

Free DAW conclusion

I think that the browser DAWs are good to start with as a beginner music producer, but most of
them are so basic that you can’t grow with them if you advance.
Of the free browser DAWs, Bandlab stood out for me.
From the offline DAWs, I like Soundbridge a lot, but my overall winner is definitely Reaper.

You may have noticed there are major downsides to pretty much every free DAW, and you don't
have that problem with paid DAWs.

Plugins

Plugins are little programs that extend the functionality of your DAW.
Most DAWs come equipped with stock plugins, but they allow 3rd party developers to take
advantage of the functionality of the DAW to implement additional features.

When we look at the functionality we can distinguish these plugins in different genres:

• Instrument plugins: to create sound



dexxterclark.com 36
 • Effect plugins: to make a reverb for example
• Midi effect plugins: like a chorder tool (press only 1 key, the plugin will make a chord)

Standards

The “language” that a plugin “talks” to your DAW is determined by the standard.

There are 3 main standards on the market:

• VST - Mac and PC

• AAX - Pro Tools only - Mac and PC
• AU (Audio Unit) - Mac only

Plugin misconception

A lot of producers are talking about VST’s when they actually mean: ‘plugin’.

Not every plugin is a VST, but a VST is always a plugin.
Just like not every animal is a cow, but every cow is an animal.


A plugin is the umbrella under which VST falls (along with AAX and AU).

Most used plugins



There are a couple of categories of plugins that every music producer uses

• Equalizer

Cutting away (or boosting) frequencies so it isn’t annoying or clashing with other
frequencies.

Fabfilter PRO-Q is a really famous and often used.


• Limiter

Reducing volume peaks so the sound doesn’t clip (distort).

Fabfilter PRO-L is famous en often used.


• Compressor

Reducing the dynamic of the sound in order to glue the mix together, make it “louder”,
increase the impact of a sound, or to sidechain.

The Glue compressor and Fabfilter Pro-C are famous.


• Gate

Take away the sound when it dips below a certain threshold.




dexxterclark.com 37
 • Instruments

Most well-known are Serum, Sylenth1, Nexus, Spire and Massive, but there are many more
out there.

Instruments
Instrument plugins produce sound in different pitches, so you can make a melody.
There a multiple types of instrument plugins.

Sampled instruments
The sampled instruments are pieces of software that play notes of recorded instruments.

So they recorded a C note on a piano, then a D note, then a E note.

Of course, that could also be a piano, organ, a wind pipe, a trumpet etc.

Kontakt by Native Instruments is a really famous and good plugin.

Because these instruments load in the whole spectrum of notes into the memory, they tend to
need a lot of memory, but not a lot of processor power.


Samplers
Samplers are pieces of software that pitch up or down a sample (recorded piece of sound).

Instead of having recorded a separate C, D and E note (as with sampled instruments), you only
have 1 sample.

The quality of the sound degrades considerably more if you pitch it more than a few semitones.

Samplers tend to ask more of processor, but do not need a lot of memory.

Most DAWs have stock samplers in them, but they are also out ‘in the wild’

Synthesizers

Synthesizers solely rely on the processor to make the sound.They do very complicated
mathematical calculations many times a second to produce your sound. Multiple voices (which is
another term for more synthesizers in one synthesizer) is even more demanding.

There is virtually no limit in how much computation power they can drain from your processor,
so they can be very heavy on the processor, but they do not tend to use a lot of memory.

Serum is a very well-known synthesizer. It can produce a slew of great sounds, but it is very
demanding in terms of processing power.

Arranging song structure

When you start producing, you need to know about track arrangement.



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Every song consists of building blocks that vary to make the song more interesting.

The most common terminology to divide songs into blocks is: verse and chorus.
The chorus repeats and is the most recognizable part of the song - it is the recurring theme of
the song.
A song has a couple of different verses. Mostly 2, 3 or 4.

Every verse has the same melody but a different lyric.

This is just an over-generalization that doesn’t apply to every song.

Sometimes there is also a bridge in a song.

The bridge appears only once in a song, mostly between 2 choruses at the end.
A bridge has a different melody to change things up, and make the song less boring.
Sometimes a song has an intro(duction) and an outro.

Arrangement in electronic music

In Electronic music, we apply the same structure albeit with different names:
■The verse = break
■The chorus = drop or hook

The break can have a totally different melody, instruments and tempo every time.
There can be a bridge, but it does not have to be there.

Drop vs break
The drop is the loudest part of the song and it needs the be the most fun and appealing part of
the song.
The break is quieter and has fewer elements (most of the time).
The drop is the most bass heavy, as where the break is mostly less bass heavy.
When you produce, you leave 6db headroom for your mastering engineer in the drop, and
leave about 10/12db in the intro, outro and break.

In a drop, there can be a bar with an absent kick or one sound element less, this is done to make
the drop more interesting, but it doesn’t necessarily make it a break.
To make the drop more interesting after 8 bars, the producer introduces an extra high hat
(totally optional, but widely used).
A drop can even have another melody halfway through the last drop, only to jump back to the
original tune later in the drop (maybe you can call that the bridge).


The break is mostly announced by a riser in the drop and is mostly introduced by a bass drop.

Some genres of electronic music don’t have a clear distinction between break and drop, like in a
lot of techno and tech house songs.
They do have recurring themes, so you could consider those a drop.
Most of the time they change up quieter and louder parts (i.e. parts where the bass sounds are
missing, to keep it interesting), you could consider those a break.

Buildup



dexxterclark.com 39
In electronic music, we add one more component ‘in the mix’: the buildup.
You can consider the buildup part of the break (depends on how you look at it).
The buildup announces the drop.
There can also be a gap of a full bar between the buildup and the drop, just to make the impact
of the drop even bigger (the power of silence).

A typical buildup has the following elements

■repeating a melody or repeating a part of the melody
■the snare sounds that become more frequent over the course of the buildup
■the riser
■low cut filter
■extra reverb

Arrangement order
Let’s take a look at the order of these structural elements that a typical electronic house song is
made of. Nothing is set in stone, however, and there are a lot of variations out there.

intro 16 bars
break 16 (or 24/32) bars
buildup 8 bars
outro 16 bars


Notice that these number of bars are always a multiplication of 8.

Notice also that 16 bars is exactly 30 seconds in a 128 BPM song

The difference between an original mix or extended mix and the radio edit is the absence of the
intro and the outro.
The intro is for a DJ to mix in and the outro to mix out.



dexxterclark.com 40
 Comp ute rs fo r m u s i c

p rod uction a nd DJ i n g
What kind of computers do you actually need for DJing and producing music?

In this chapter I give you some guidelines on what to look for in a computer and some
recommended specifications to have the optimal configuration for the task at hand.

Computers for DJing

You don’t need a computer for spinning music when you are a DJ.

You can suffice with a suitcase full of vinyl records and you are good to go.

A digital DJ can use a laptop on his gig, but he can also choose to use USB sticks with some MP3
files. Even then, he needs to have something to put the MP3 files on the usb stick.
So, as a digital DJ you need a computer.

Computer for putting files on your usb drive

If you only want to put some files on your usb drive to spin at the club, an old computer will
suffice.
A computer of 10 or 15 years of age with a usb connection will be probably fine. 



Bear in mind that some players you have extra functionality when you prepare the songs with
special DJ software, like Pioneer Rekordbox.

The the player shows you waveforms, beats & bars and you can set cue points and use hot-cues
to jump in a song, and you can even pre-define (automatically triggered) loops.
The computer you want to use needs to be able to run that preparation software, such as
Rekordbox.

Computer for DJing with your laptop

For DJing with a laptop you need a slightly more powerful machine - after all, you don’t want
your music to crackle during a gig.
You need special software to DJ, like: Rekordbox DJ, Serato or Algoriddim Djay Pro.
This kind of software is not resource intensive.

A 5-year-old computer with an i3 processor and 4GB of RAM is probably just fine.



dexxterclark.com 41
Computer for live performance
Ah, now we are getting somewhere!

There is special software out there like Apple Mainstage and Ableton Live that lets you ‘create’
songs live. I say ‘create’ with quotes, because you essentially copy/paste bits of a song that you
prepared earlier and choose the parts when you are performing.

You can even play the keyboard over those prepared pieces.

This way you can perform a 1 minute song, or extend it to a 5-minute song (if the crowd is up for
it) with the same basic elements.


The computers for that kind of performance need to be very powerful, of course depending on
what you are trying to do. Because you are basically doing music production on the fly, the
computer needs to be at least as powerful (or even more powerful) than those for music
production, therefore, see the special section on ‘computers for music production’.


Computer for music production

Let me start off by saying that you can use your old computer to make music.

You don’t have to buy a new one, just use your current computer and see if the performance
annoys you. If you keep the operating system in mind (Windows or Mac), every DAW works on
pretty much every computer.

I started out producing on an 8-year-old iMac. It wasn’t fast and I had to render out everything
because it wasn’t powerful enough, but at least it did the job.

Resources
The things that eat up the most system resources are plugins, not the DAW itself.

The difference between sampled instruments, synthesizers and samplers you can find in the
chapter about ‘software for music production’.

How much memory and processing power do they need?

processor memory

sampled instruments not much much

samplers average not much

synthesizers huge amount not much

reverb / delay / echo / eq huge amount not much

compressor / limiter not much not much



dexxterclark.com 42
Recommendations
Desktop or laptop?
If mobility is necessity choose a laptop, in any other case, choose a desktop.


Components are first developed for a desktop.

That means you can first buy them for the pc, and later for the laptop.

The components for a desktop pc are cheaper than a laptop, so if you are on a budget, choose a
desktop.
Also, manufacturers do concessions in speed in order to fit all the components in the small
space of a laptop.

They tend to choose 5400 RPM hard drives in stead of 7200 RPM, or choose to use slower
memory.



You can properly cool components in a desktop, but not in a laptop.
Components in a computer tend to get very hot when they operate at maximum performance
(which you are doing with music production).
So, in laptops you are bound by lower speeds to keep the components operational.

PC or Mac?
I could write a whole chapter on that topic alone.

There are up- and downsides to operating systems on both platforms - I’ll only emphasize the
headlines here.

When you want to have the most bang (speed) for your buck, you should go for the Windows
computer. Apple computers are 1-4 processor generations behind on the latest one, which
means you pay top dollar for an old computer. The Apple name is factored into the price of the
machine.
In most Apple products, you can’t upgrade component later. 

A couple of years ago you could swap hard disk or memory, but that is not the current trend.

Time after time Apple’s service is questioned, and I’ve had my fair share of troubles in this
department.

My advice: buy a PC.

If you want to buy an Apple, you can take a look at the Mac mini. It is somewhat complete and
priced reasonably.

Processor
The processor (or CPU - Central Processing Unit) is the most important component in your
computer for music production. If your computer cannot handle the workload of all your fancy
music, the music starts to crackle, because it cannot deliver the music data fast enough.

To prevent the crackles, you can render out instruments and effects (you convert things like
reverbs and synthesizer sounds into rendered audio files, which don’t take up a lot of processor


dexxterclark.com 43
power, so you can play the sounds in real time). Rendering takes time, and takes the whole
creative flow out of your music production.


For example, when you have made a kick-ass melody that takes up a lot of CPU power, a
powerful processor can handle it real-time, so if you want to change just one note (or change a
reverb setting). You can immediately hear the result.
With a slower processor, you have to render out the melody (otherwise it starts to crackle).

This render can take for example 3 minutes. When you are not happy with the change, you
change the note back, you have to render out again for 3 minutes.


So, the more powerful processor you have, the quicker you can work.

Cores vs Gigahertz
The amount of Gigahertz is important for the speed of your processor, but we have reached a
limit of the maximum number of Gigahertz a processor can produce.
So, in order to increase processing power, we add more cores. A core is effectively another
processor in the same shell.

You might think that if you double the number of cores, you double the speed - but that is not
the case. The cores have to communicate with each other and tasks have to be directed (or
synchronized) to specific cores. In practice, it’s much more complicated, but I want to keep
things simple here.

Overclocking
Overclocking is basically increasing the number of Gigahertz to make the processor quicker, but
that comes at a price: a processor becomes unstable and will act in an unexpected manor.

Your computer might act weird or even crash - not the way you want to go for your music
production.

This is the reason why you can’t overclock a Xeon processor, because it is used for servers which
aremeant to be stable.

Turbo boost
Intel found the perfect marketing term for their products: turbo boost!
It’s a fancy word for: “you never reach this speed”.

In theory the processors should work quicker than their basic clock speed (Ghz).

A 1.5 Ghz processor would raise the clock speed to 4.2 Ghz, more than twice the speed!!

That is nice in theory, but in practice you never achieve these speeds, especially in a laptop.

Things like thermal throttling become an issue. The processor becomes so hot, that it would
destroy itself if it actually reached that speed. In order to prevent that, they limit the speed of the
processor.

You can cool a processor properly in a desktop computer, but not in a laptop because of the
size of the machine and the noise that fans would produce.



Look at the actual clock speed of a processor, not the turbo boost frequency.


Cache



dexxterclark.com 44
A computer has 3 types of memory, in order of speed: the CPU cache, ram memory and storage
(hard drive or SSD). The cache memory is the fastest memory there is.

If a processor can find repeated tasks in the memory, it doesn’t have to look in the slower ram
memory. So, the more cache your processor it has, the quicker it is.

i3,i5,i7, i9, Xeon

Intel invented a difficult naming scheme.
The types in order of speed:
■i3
■i5
■i7 / i9 / Xeon

The generation of processor is important.


Generally processors are 10-30% quicker each generation.

An i5 can perform the same as an i7 of the previous generation.


The i9 and Xeon can be quicker than the i7, but the architecture can be behind.

Intel’s development is done on the i7 processor, then the i3 and i5 are derived from that.
Later, they added some features (like extra cache memory) and made it quicker and called it
Xeon and i9 (this can change in the future). The Xeon and i9 tend to be updated later in the
lifecycle of the current generation, which makes them typically lack behind a bit.



Xeon processors are meant for servers.

So you can’t overclock them, they don’t have an integrated graphics chip in them, but they can
have more cache memory, and you can add them parallel on specialized motherboards.

Xeons are expensive.

The i9 is meant to be the more powerful version of the i7, meant for heavy duty multimedia tasks
like video editing and music production.

If you want more information on a specific type of processor, go to: ark.intel.com.


Search for your type and model number and you’ll see the specs.

If you want to compare speeds, there are speed comparison tests available on the internet, but
most of them are not targeted towards music production (bear that in mind).

AMD Ryzen
AMD has a similar naming pattern with 3’s, 5’s and 7’s to compare themselves to their big
competitor. On average an AMD processor is cheaper and is somewhat quicker than Intel’s
counterpart, but, I’ve heard some producers talk about compatibility issues with midi keyboards
and plugins. Personally, I haven’t experienced it.


If you want to play it safe, choose Intel. AMD is definitely an option if you want to have a budget
computer for music production.


Memory


dexxterclark.com 45
Sampled instruments take up a lot of memory, which is available in different speeds.
The more Megahertz, the quicker, but the practical speed difference is not that earth shattering
as you and I would like it to be.
Bear in mind that your motherboard has to support the memory speed, otherwise you won’t
take advantage of it.

Storage
Samples and music projects can take up gigabytes of disk space but most space is taken up by
sampled instruments. For example, the Native Instruments Kontakt library takes up 500 GB
alone. After you’ve installed Kontakt, you still need some space for your OS, music projects and
your samples.

A lot of producers work with external hard drives because they run out of space, and working
with external hard disks is a pain in the butt.


They are fine for making backups, but they are slow and need to be connected all the time in
order to use them. On top of that, you need to have them with you all the time and not lose
them in your hotel room. And where do you put them? In the bag? Duct tape them to the lid of
your laptop? An external drive takes the mobile features out of a laptop.


A hard disk is based on the technology of a spinning magnetic platter.


Those things can crash and are slow compared to a SSD, but the price per gigabyte is lower
than one of an SSD. A SSD cannot crash, but can freeze sometimes.

A SSD is basically a big usb memory drive, that can have a limited amount of writes.

The memory cells can have 1000 writes for example, and then they break and can’t store data.

In order to extend the lifespan, the memory controller will move data around so all the memory
cells are written an equal number of times. Putting a SSD to the brim full with data is therefore
not recommended, it will slow down drastically, because it needs to have space to move the
data around.


Screen
How much you can see, determines the size and the resolution of the screen.
The more you can see in one glance, the less you have to scroll, the quicker you can work.
This can be a problem for laptops, because they tend to have really small screens.

17” is recommend for a laptop, 15” is the bare minimum, and I would not recommend a 13”
screen.

A lot of DAWs and plugin makers don’t take the extremely small screen size into consideration.
Buttons can be located outside of the screen, or you miss other important elements.
If you choose a laptop, make sure it has a connection for an external monitor.
Then you can produce on the road and if you are at home, you can connect a big screen.

For desktop computers and external monitors, I would recommend 27” monitors or bigger.

You can choose two or three monitors, then you can put your timeline on the first monitor and
your mixer on the second, and your piano roll on the third.

There are even ultra-wide monitors on the market, then you can see more of your timeline on 1
monitor, ideal for music production.



dexxterclark.com 46
Specifications
Below you can find some recommendations on specifications for computers

budget mid-range high range pro

CPU latest generation
 latest generation
 latest generation
 latest generation


i3 or AMD Ryzen 5 i5 i7 i9 / Xeon

CPU: cores 2 2 4 as much as possible

memory 4 GB 8 GB 16/32 GB 64 GB

graphics card (GPU) [type doesn’t matter [type doesn’t matter [type doesn’t matter [type doesn’t matter
for audio] for audio] for audio] for audio]

Storage Hard disk 256 GB SSD 1 TB SSD 1 TB SSD

Monitor 15” 15” 17” 17”



dexxterclark.com 47
 G e tting a f o o t i n t h e

do o r
Value exchange - Don’t be that guy

Bigger DJs are surrounded by thousands of people who all want a piece of the pie.
Not only managers and record labels but also hundreds and hundreds of suck-ups.

Don’t be the next person that also wants to have a piece of the pie.
If you want something from someone (like a big DJ), make yourself an invaluable asset to them,
then maybe, only maybe, you can ask a favor in return. 

It is often said that time is the most valuable asset you have (because you have only a limited
amount of time on this earth). That is especially the case for someone who is famous and spent
days, months, years building his/her career.

There has to be a value exchange in order to make their time worthwhile.

If they charge $500 an hour and you ask them for an hour of their time, you are basically asking
for $500.

Would you give $500 to someone you just met?


When I met the DJ recruiter for one of the most famous clubs in Ibiza, I also met a friend of his. 

When I asked him what his job was, he said: architect.

Technically he didn’t lie, because he studied architecture.
Later, I found out that he was the manager of one of the biggest DJs in the world.

He was just very careful, because he knows what people want after he tells what his job is:
favors.

It’s not about him anymore, but about who he works for.




In my short YouTube career I’ve received so many questions on every major social media
platform and even email on a daily basis, that it is impossible to answer them all.

I have even been asked to send DJ equipment and even computers for free (I am not kidding).
Besides running my existing business, making content for 2 YouTube channels and building a DJ
career, I have next to no time left. 

I’m just small and not famous, but also my most valuable asset is time.
I work 60-80 hours a week to get all the work done, and still I’m short.

And yet, people still want favors, taking out of the equation: the person you ask a favor from.




dexxterclark.com 48
There just have just been a handful of people who were kind enough to help me out here and
there (with this e-book for example), and hereby I want to thank them for that.

If you want my time, make yourself valuable to me, then ask something in return.


Also, who do you think I will hire if I have the means to do so? 

The people that ask favors?

Or the people that provided value to me, people I know, people that have proven to be
trustworthy, people who I can communicate with, people who I know are reliable and get the job
done?



Again, time is the most valuable asset for superstar DJs and producers.

If you want something from them, give them something useful in return.

It’s no shame in asking them what that is.
Who do you think they are gonna hire if they need help?


DJ-ing and music production

In the early days, DJ-ing was about DJ-ing, but not anymore.

Music production goes hand in hand with DJ-ing nowadays.

You earn your money with DJ gigs.

But you get booked because of your music.


So, in order to get gigs, you need to produce music. 


But what if you can’t/don’t want to produce?

You can hire a ghost producer!

A lot of DJs became famous with someone else's music, because daddy had a fat wallet.

You can buy your success in this business.

The holy grail for DJs is playing at festivals (Tomorrowland).



dexxterclark.com 49
The record labels are the ones that put DJs in festivals.

To gain some experience as a DJ, start DJ-ing at birthday parties and weddings.

It’s not ideal, you don’t get to spin the music you want, but hey, you have to start somewhere.



dexxterclark.com 50
The social media DJ

Okay, there is actually a second way you can get booked nowadays: if you are famous.
For example, if you are the granddaughter of the owner of a big international hotel chain, or you
have a big following on social media.

If you can bring a loyal following to a nightclub by announcing it on social media, the venue is
more likely to hire you.

The venue knows upfront that they sell more tickets when they hire you.

When you want to get signed by a record label they look at your value to them.

If you have a big social media circle, you’ve upgraded your value. You will also have more room
to negotiate and up your earnings.


In the end, it all comes down to money.

Therefore, it is really important to start thinking about social media early on in your career.

I choose YouTube because it is the most powerful way to create a loyal fan following.

YouTube is the only social media platform where content lives “forever”.

The Facebooks, the Instagrams and the Twitters are only relevant one single day.

My YouTube videos from years ago are still watched because the information has not aged.



Building an audience on social media is a challenge on its own, and outside the scope of this
book.

Therefore I wrote a book about starting a YouTube channel.

You can find it here: https://www.socialvideoplaza.com/book-tube


The book answers questions like:
■How to make (more) money on YouTube?
■How to get more views on YouTube?
■How to get more subscribers on YouTube?
■How to grow on YouTube?
■How to make a business out of YouTube?
■What is the formula for going viral?
■How often should you upload?
■What is the ideal video length?
■What equipment do you need?
■What type of content works?
■How to work with and understand the algorithms?


The book has a special optional addendum for DJ’s and music producers.



When you go the website https://www.socialvideoplaza.com you’ll find a blog with all kinds of
YouTube tips and tricks.




dexxterclark.com 51
 R i gh ts, c o nt ra c t s a n d

law y e r s
This chapter may seem the most boring of this e-book, but trust me, it is actually not!
It’s all about the big bucks, chicks and the fame … are you AWAKE NOW?
I’ll spice it up with some of my real-life experiences, so you don’t have to make the same
mistakes as I did.


When a company wants to hire a marketer because of his connections, he gets a salary at the
end of the month and can quit or be fired at any time.

But it would be weird if that company signs a contract in which the marketer who becomes co-
owner of the business, and if he is not doing his job right, he can’t even be fired.

On top of that, he has the same deal with a couple other companies.
Absurd? No! This is exactly how the music industry works!


When a DJ hires a manager, they sign a contract for a limited time span and share the profit.

When interests collide (for example a DJ is overworked) things can get messy.
Although the music business is trying to be taken seriously, they still work in a radically different
way than a regular business does. Stepping into well-constructed legal traps happened to the
biggest in the industry: Martin Garrix, Laidback Luke etc. etc. etc.


It is not a coincidence that most of the bigger DJs have their own record labels.

They have been screwed over too many times, so they started one on their own.



dexxterclark.com 52
Music rights

Regretfully the domain of the music rights is a jungle of complicated implicit and explicit rules
and laws.

When you buy a CD in the store (or a MP3 on Beatport), you pay for the music.

That doesn’t mean that you own the music, you only have a license to play the music at home.



When you are a DJ, you spin music in public venues.

As a DJ you don’t have to pay for the license to play in public, the venue/festival pays that fee for
you. That is the reason why music rights organizations want to have your set list, so the money
can flow to the rightful owners.

A couple of royalties are involved.


• Performing royalties (PRO)


The right to play music in public, like a festival, venue, club etc.

PRO = Performance Rights Organisation
• Mechanical royalties

The right to reproduce the music, so CD’s, DVDs, MP3 etc.
• Sync Royalties

The right to use music in a TV commercial, TV series, video games.

Synchronization royalties are very lucrative for a music producer.


When you are a producer, you have to take into account that other people that are working on
your song, also have partial rights to the song.

Most of the time people agree on a split of the revenue made by the song based on the input.

The agreement that they draft is called a split sheet.

The following parties can be involved in making a song:
■producer(s)
■singer(s)
■songwriter(s)
■recording artist(s) (i.e. someone who plays the guitar)

Always consult a lawyer.




dexxterclark.com 53
Bootleg or remix

When you are producing a song and you use elements from other songs, you need permission
from the authors, even it’s a soundbite of just one second.


Getting permission can be a challenging task, because you need permission from every person
involved in the original production. Your first stop is always the record label that released the
song. When you are remixing an older song, record labels could be glad that you want to remix
the song (if it wasn’t a super hit).

It’s not uncommon that you agree upon sharing the revenue.



The difference between a remix and a bootleg is the legality.

If you have permission then it is called a remix, if not, it’s a bootleg.



Making bootlegs in your bedroom can be a good way to start practicing your skills as a music
producer, but releasing a bootleg publicly (on Soundcloud for example) is not very wise.


Hire a lawyer

Regretfully not everyone has your best interests at heart.

You wouldn’t be the first artist that signed a piece of paper that you later would regret, because
you didn’t know what you were exactly agreeing to.

My absolute best advice in this whole e-book

is:
Hire a lawyer!
Scary, right? An actual lawyer!
Yes, those guys (and girls) are terribly
expensive, but hear me out.
They are trained to be biased and fight for
you on your team. They can tell you exactly
where your weak spots are (legally), where
the opponent can hit you and how you can
protect yourself against it.


Hire a music specialized lawyer. 


“General” lawyers don’t know enough about
the sneaky caveats of music related contracts.



dexxterclark.com 54
Example 1: business collaboration
When I started a collaboration with my business partner in 2015, we decided to sign a
partnership agreement without consulting a lawyer. Later, we decided to split and the
arguments of what belongs to who started.
After consulting a prejudiced mediator, we eventually both lawyered up to negotiate about the
specifics of the contract. The bill of taking the path via the mediator and two lawyers costed 20
times more than when we had paid a lawyer upfront to draft up a partnership agreement.
He got the better end of the deal, I lost half of my business and my savings.

I could have spent 10 vacations in a 5-star hotel on Ibiza.

This is an abbreviated version of a story that took almost a year. 


Do you know what something like this does to your energy level and your mental health? 

Not to mention, the stress it caused on friends and family?

Example 2: record label

In 2017 I took music production classes with a firm that also ran a record label, and at the end of
the course they had a ‘unique’ offer:


For a couple of thousand dollars I could produce my own record under their supervision, they
would master and distribute it.

The money had to be payed upfront (huge red flag). After the record was finished (one week
before the deadline of an album) they handed me the distribution contract. At first glance, I
could spot no issues with the contract. 

I was still shaking on my legs about the ‘stunt’ that my former business partner pulled on me, so I
decided to hire a specialized music lawyer. First of all, the lawyer didn’t know the record label
(another red flag). What he told me next was terrifying, the contract was full of carefully
constructed traps and loop holes that weren’t visible to the untrained eye.

I even decided to ask for a second opinion with another firm (“it couldn’t be that bad”).
Well, the second lawyer told me an even worse story than the first.


The record label was clearly in the process of screwing me over, and they were not willing to
adjust the contract to reasonable terms. I never signed the contract and they didn’t want to
return the money.


Looking at the bigger picture: yes, it could have launched my career, but I would have been
stuck with them forever and I never could make a jump to an even bigger career.

I can’t stress this enough: hire a specialized music lawyer!

How much???
A mid-range lawyer in Europe costs about €250-350,- per hour excluding VAT, excluding 3-5%
office fee. I’ve heard horror stories of lawyers in America who charge even more.



dexxterclark.com 55
Kinds of contracts

There are different of kinds of contracts.


I’ll name a few, which can overlap:

■ Recording and distribution contract.


This contract specifies where, how and for how
long your music is distributed across the globe.


■ Music publishing agreement


Who gets how much?


■ Music production contract


An agreement to make 1 or more songs.


■ A 360 agreement (as in 360 degrees of an angle).


A 360 deal is a full-service agreement in which one company fulfills multiple roles. 

For example, a record label that is also your manager and booking agent.

In a 360 deal is a huge conflict of interest, because a manager has to look out for your best
interest, but he won’t if he works for that same record label.


General tips for contracts

Some general guidelines for contracts

■ The fact that the other party wants to sign a contract, means that they are interested. 

Knowing that, has value. Use that to your advantage and negotiate.

Always negotiate, it’s a business transaction, creativity is meant for the studio.

Always let a lawyer negotiate for you. He knows all the ins and outs.


■ Never sign away (copy)rights, only provide licenses for a limited time span. 

You need to make money in the long run.


■ A license term with a record label usually

is 3-5 years (sometimes 10). The longer
the term, the more you should profit.


■ Don’t accept silent/implicit extension of a

contract, only explicitly with written
consent at the end of the term.


■ An independent record label takes usually



dexxterclark.com 56
 about 50% of your royalties.


■ Make sure that there is no conflict of interests between third parties like your record label
and manager (like in 360 deals would be the case).


■ Be aware that people need to make money. No-one does anything for free (everybody
needs to pay the bills).

A manager believes in your talents, because he thinks he can make money with that, not
because you are a nice guy.


■ If someone forces you to sign (deadline for example), it is a huge red flag.


■ Discouragement from the other party to involve a lawyer is a huge red flag


■ Realize that the other party did more negotiations and signed more contracts than you.
They know all the ins and outs. They are the ones with a financial motive to screw you out
of your own money.


■ Costs of the lawyer of the other party is not yours to pay, its an investment for them in this
collaboration.


■ Don’t agree to produce a certain amount of songs within a certain term.


It is very hard to be creative on-the-spot (which results in unnecessary pressure and loss of
creativity, and thus, quality).


■ Enforce one or more evaluation moments. Make sure you can cancel contracts before the
term ends if you are not happy with the collaboration.


■ Make sure that everything regarding money is specified in the contract. 


If costs increase, make sure they can only increase within a certain margin.

Make sure in the contract that you have to sign explicitly for every increase in cost that is
not specified in the contract.

Terms like ‘costs’, ‘other costs’ and ‘expenses’ are too vague and need to be specified,
because a lot of record labels have huge imaginary costs.



A really popular line in a contract is something along the lines of:

“Distributor agrees to pay Artist 50% of the profit minus costs”.

The real-life translation for this line is: the distributor doesn’t have to pay the artist a cent.


■ Make sure to include that you need to sign for every change of agreement.

And no-one can make decisions without your written consent.


■ Don’t trust the explanation from the other party regarding to their own contract. 

They are the ones that built the traps in the contract. You can only trust your own lawyer.




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 ■ Make sure that the responsibilities of all the parties in question are specified.

Make sure there is no gap or overlap between the parties you are collaborating with.

This screams for a lawyer.


■ Twice a year you need to receive “statements” from the record label in which they specify
how much you earned.

Make sure that those statements are actual invoices, the term “statements” doesn’t mean
anything for the tax agency.


■ Specify in the contract the timeframe in which they have to wire you the money


■ Make sure in the contract that you can request the financial administration of a record
label.

Ensure that they are obligated to hand it over within a certain timeframe.

Ensure that when the books are not in order, that there is a penalty for that.

Also they need to pay the costs of the audit by an third party accountant (those things can
cost over $10,000.-)


■ The sunset clause (what happens after the contract ended) can be very annoying. 

Managers like to include these terms.

If you accept it, do it only for a very short term. 

Specify the term and percentage.


■ Make sure that the law of your country is applied. 


Foreign laws need foreign lawyers and foreign courts if things do not work out.

Traveling back and forth is costly, time consuming and very uncomfortable.







$ 




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 Co lo p ho n
This information is compiled and written by Dexxter Clark.

You can contact the author via the website: www.dexxterclark.com

Many thanks to Brian Davies who proof read this book.

The images in this book are published on the website: pexels.com

The license of every picture is listed on this website as:
■Free for personal and commercial use
■No attribution required

More information on this license type, you can find on: https://www.pexels.com/photo-license/

Although information in this e-book is compiled with great care, the author does not guarantee
the information in this e-book to be complete, correct or updated.
No claims can be derived from the information in this e-book.
The contents of this e-book are protected by Dutch copyright law.

It is prohibited to duplicate, change, delete, forwarded, distribute or publish (partial) content
without written consent of the author.



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