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Synthwave Song Structure And The 8 Bar Rule (Keep People Listening)
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Nov 18, 2021
🥁 FREE SYNTHWAVE DRUM SAMPLES 🥁 https://www.orpheusaudioacademy.com/DrumSamples ✏️ SHOW NOTES ✏️ How should you go about arranging your synthwave song? Obviously, it's your song so you can do what you want, but when it comes to synthwave... There are generally two different song structures you can choose from, and I break down each of these in this video... And also share a secret songwriting technique that you can use to keep people listening. ⛓️ LINKS MENTIONED IN THIS VIDEO ⛓️ 🔗 Watch my entire Synthwave Creation Playlist: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLCTBya8Kp1II08XyIakiqCNwul1gPUDP3 🔗 Create Synthwave chords: https://youtu.be/idqp1mGfg5A 🔗 Best Synthwave Drum Plug-In: https://youtu.be/rXpqK_pcq3A 🔗 Arcade High Video On Structure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOLbGznGWpU 🔗 Because The Night: https://open.spotify.com/track/32xJ7Ays4uyxMuZFxfH0Zj?si=311f1dc9bb974f85
View Video Transcript
0:00
How do you structure a synth wave song? Well, there are really two major structures to choose from
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when you're going to write synth waves. So be sure to stick to the end because I'm not only going to
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share with you what these two structures are, but a key arrangement slash music structure, song
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structure technique that will keep people listening all the way through your song
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Hey, I'm Reagan Ram with Orpheus Audio Academy.com, helping you make better music and grow your fan-based
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online and today we're talking about synthwave structure. And so the first structure that you can
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choose from is kind of the pop song structure. This is very common in synthwave music because
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synthwave music does receive its origin from not only soundtracks of 80s sci-fi and fantasy movies
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but it also derives from also 80s pop music as definitely has an influence on synthwave as well
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So that's where you find songs in the pop structure and synth wave
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And this is becoming increasingly mainstream, right, with the weekend and their song
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they did Blinding Lights. That was a very synth wave song, but with the pop structure
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And of course, that did really well. So here we are in Logic, kind of using this to kind of demonstrate one of these structures
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So this is the pop structure here. And I've got a song put in here because the night by the midnight
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And this was originally a song from the 70s, late 70s, by Patty Smith
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Really great song. And the Midnight took it and did a cover of it and made a really awesome synth wave version of this song
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This really follows the pop synth wave song structure very well. And right, this is a structure that's used in pop music, not just synth wave
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And so this is a really great foundation, great place to start when you're writing music is kind of following this structure
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Looking up here at the markers, first off, we have the intro, we have the verse, we have a pre-chorus, chorus
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chorus, verse, pre-chorus, longer course, the chorus is doubled here. Then we have a bridge section, then we have again that doubled chorus and an outro
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So this is what you're going to want to follow when you're doing the pop song structure
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I'll get more into what these cuts mean here in the track in a second, but this is what you're
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to want to follow and so you're generally your song is kind of going to follow a
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rising in energy as it goes along so it's going to start start off softer less complicated
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and as a song progresses it's going to be increasing in energy so there's also a general flow to this
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right you're going to have ups and downs and energy throughout the song but overall it is
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increasing in energy as you progress through the song so right you have this intro part here which is very very chill is not a whole lot going on And the bass comes in after four bars and then you hit the first verse where there no drums at all here
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and then you have the pre-chorus the drums come in and it kind of builds up into the chorus
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and that is kind of the peak of the song and then you go back to the um we go to the second verse
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you're returning to a verse this is the first part of the song that's repeating but it's also not
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exactly the same as the first verse. There's actually drums here now. So that is kind of a good
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key to keep with you as you're writing your songs is as you're repeating sections, don't just copy
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and paste, but add in something new. Another thing is there's a new vocalist. In the first verse
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there's a female vocalist, Nikki Flores, and then in the second verse, the male singer comes in
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So that's adding in something new, something interesting, but you also have the drums here. So the energy is up. So you have this increase in energy and it dips down a little bit. But the dip
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at the second verse is not as though as the dip in the first verse. So it's still increasing in energy
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as you go. Then you have the pre-chorus again. And then you have the chorus, but then the chorus
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doubles. And you have this really awesome saxophone solo basically carrying on through. So the vocals
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drop out and then the saxophone takes over for the second half of that chorus. That chorus has been
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doubled. Then you have the bridge section here and so this is really great. There's a great harmony
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here and great energy and then it dips down in energy again to, you know, probably as low as it's been
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since like the intro and then it builds up real quickly with a little drum fill into the chorus again
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So that's really nice contrast right there. Keeps the listener listening. And then you have again
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that doubled chorus with a new saxophone solo outro and then you finish with the actual outro here
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So this is a really great song structure, really something you can do. And this is kind of the main pop song structure that is used, not just in synthwave, but in pop
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songs overall. Now, the second kind of synthwave song structure that you can adopt is the more EDM type structure
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or like the bangor structure of a song. So with the EDM or bangor structure, you kind of have a doubled song
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song. So you have your buildup pre-hook hook, then you've got a little break section in the middle
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of the bridge, and then the song kind of repeats with a new build-up pre-hook and hook
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So you kind of have a mirrored song a little bit. But even with this, you're going to have
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your second half, right, the second half of your build-up hook, pre-hook, and hook
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That is going to be still slightly different. You're going to want to change things. You don't
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want to just completely copy and paste because that gets boring. So, but this is kind of what you
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want to follow. So you've got your intro section. And you have your buildup. This kind of replaces the verse section of what you would have in the pop song structure
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Then you've got your pre-hook or pre-chorus section again here. And I found that in EDM music and or synthwave songs that follow this structure this kind of takes the place of the chorus at least vocally because a lot of times when the hook comes in it just an instrumental part and you have some kind of instrument taking the lead playing the melody there
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So that is what happens in this song here, which is this structure is following the structure for Atlantis, 1977 by FutureCop
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And then you have a bridge section in here as well that kind of breaks it up
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and then it kind of repeats. Now this buildup section in this particular song
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it's a lot different than the buildup earlier. So these buildups are like completely different
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which you can choose to do or you can choose to have a similar section
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Right, there's some flexibility here as well. Of course, there's always flexibility in music. Then you have the pre-hook, which is half as long as the previous one
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and then you get right back into the hook, which carries you on through the rest of the song
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And with this extra long hook here, this is really more like a coda because it's more than doubled
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And so it's kind of the hook plus the coda of the song and then it has the outro and so that's that's kind of the banger structure. And so those are the two kind of approaches you want to take. And right you normally that the edm type structure of song, maybe you're picturing a more upbeat. But I found this is actually, um, can be very common with even like softer more soundtrackish synthwave music because, um, there's less changes going on, which is very popular approach with synthwave is kind of more of that ambient type sound, more of that chill
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sound, you're going to have less things changing over time. So you kind of have these just one kind of
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major part of your song that then doubles with a little bridge section in the middle. So that's
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that's one structure, but then you have that pop structure as well. But back to this, there's another
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really interesting arrangement technique, song structure technique here that I don't want you to miss
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that is really important to keep people listening all the way through your song. So this technique
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I don't know if there's another name for it, but I've heard other people talk about this as well. And I just
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know it as the eight bar rule, which is every eight bars you want to change something up at the very
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least. So this song, because of the night here, done by the midnight version, definitely follows this
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So you have your intro where it's actually changed after four bars, which is good because
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if you have a slower intro, especially like you have here, you want to change something up
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sooner to keep people interested. Because if you just had eight bars of this kind of a little slow
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pad sound. People might get a little bored and click away. But you have the bass come in, so you feel
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like it's building to something. Then you get the first verse, right? So this, by the way, I'm kind of
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using this to measure eight bars. That's eight bars right there. Then you got the verse. So the intro is
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eight bars. And you write into the verse. That's another eight bars. And so you get your first section
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Then you have the pre-chorus, which is actually longer than eight bars, which interestingly
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So this is kind of something unique, right? It's not exactly cookie cutter. I'll get to that in a second
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But everything kind of remains the same rhythmically from the verse to the pre except the drums come in here but then also the melody changes so that what you kind of the difference here is from the verse the pre you get a different melody and then there a little extra two bars here where builds up into the
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chorus which is really cool on this song so then you have the chorus which is another eight bars
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verse again another eight bars so it's changing every eight bars then you're back into that
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pre-chorus again the melody shifts And then you have the extra little two bars that builds into the chorus
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Again, you get the chorus back. So eight bars of the chorus with the vocals and the lyrics
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And then you still have the chorus going, but instead of just repeating the chorus and singing the exact same lines again, you've got the saxophone that takes over here for
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these eight bars. That's really cool. Then you go into the bridge, and this bridge is actually 12 bars
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So what do you do there? Well, here they've broken it up
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And again, this is originally, you know, the song structure by Patty Smith. So give credit to her
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Again, you have the eight bar principle here. So you have eight bars of kind of the main bridge what's going on
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And then you have an extra kind of orphaned four bars here where it breaks away
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And you have a kind of different little pattern where it gets kind of softer
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And it's giving you that contrast before it builds back up into the chorus
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So you got that chorus again, eight bars. And then again, after eight bars, it changes up back to the saxophone
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and then boom, outro, and what do you know, another eight bars
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So that's a really great way to help you keep your song moving
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is just to change something up, change up the rhythm, change up the melody, change up instrumentation, something
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so that it keeps people listening, the listener doesn't get bored. And also it creates great relistenability for your song
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because everything's new and different, and so you can listen to it over and over again
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which I have been doing with this song since it came out. I've still been listening to it. And it's really great song structure
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and it works really well for synth wave as well. And so even if you're doing a different
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if you're doing that EDM structure as well, also keep that in mind. You want to be changing something up every eight bars
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And speaking of synthwave, I have a free gift for you. If you click in the description below
11:02
you can grab my free synthwave drum sample pack. This gives you a bunch of drum samples
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from the Lind drum machine, which is very common in the 80s, and you hear it a lot in synthwave music
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So you can just click on that, in the description and you can grab those free drum samples. So once you've decided on your
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song structure, now you're ready to go and write your synth wave song. And let me know in the comments
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How do you start writing your music? Do you start with drums first, the melody, chords? What do you
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do? I personally like to start with chords first. And so if you're wanting help with writing
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all those awesome, dreamy synth wave chords, then have another video that you can check out. It's
11:39
playing on the screen right now on how to create those awesome dreamy synthwave chords. Keep creating and I'll
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see you in a future video. Bye
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