Here are four things I’ve learned in studio/writing world this year:
Be a magpie. It’s pretty standard to gather your ideas on the go (phone recordings, photos, lyrics), BUT in order to strike gold you must organise them. This is the vital part to making sure you can spontaneously draw from these potential gems on the fly. Get them on to your computer, sample drive or drum machine/sampler ready to grab (in folders that are easily accessible and possibly categorised, e.g. “rhythmic loops”, “wonky voice”, “speech”, “ambient swells”, “hits”, or “nature sounds”). So much gold dust is lost in the ether because it’s been forgotten about.
Make the boring bit fun. So you don’t get caught out mid-creative flow, make time to set up first. E.g. midi set-ups for immediate control-ability, and gear location consideration. Make a thing of it - set aside a couple of hours, put on some music (or a film/series if it’s not too distracting), nice drink and nibbles nearby. Your future self who just wants to grab a fader and record filter or reverb automation in real time with FEELING and as though it’s an epic modern dance move will thank you.
Enforce some perspective. When you find yourself in a rut or going around in circles and not forwards with an idea, either take a break from it all together, or throw it into a different context. E.g. listen back to it from the opposite corner of the room, sitting on the floor, looking at something unrelated (or from just outside the door), do a cover of it (play it with a different instrument or piece of gear to see it in a new light), park it and move on to a different piece/track entirely, take a talk around the block, drink some water, stand at the window and look as far into the distance as the surroundings will allow you.
Nerdy spreadsheets really help. I’ve been keeping tabs (pun not intended) on my progress for projects with spreadsheets. Columns include song title, tempo/key, arrangement to-do’s and tick box columns like “mix ready?” and “vocals tracked?”, Make it pretty yet simple and understandable at a glance. The time it takes to put this together is worth it for how much time you’ll save on trying to remember where you are with a song you haven’t visited in a few days. Plus it’s a really good way to mentally process and summarise your activity after you’ve worked on a song or at the end of the day.