How do you guys structure the lengths of your verses and hooks on beats that are in double time, specifically 150+ bpms. If I understand correctly, anything over 100 bpm, the bars would be considered double what they are. A 8 bar hook would actually be 4, and a 16 bar verse would actually be 8 bars.

I don't know if it's just me, but 16 a bar hook on a 150 bpm beat sounds fine, but once I double a 16 bar verse to 32 bars, it just sounds like it is being drawn out for too long. I feel like a 24 bar verse just doesn't have the same feel going into the hook as a standard 16, and a 16 bar verse seems to go to fast with that high of a bpm.

I want to stick with the "standard" lengths for these beats, so I guess I'm just asking if a 32 bar verse on a 150 bpm beat isn't out of the ordinary. It could be I'm just not used to making beats with that high of a bpm.

 

I could be wrong but 16 bars is 16 bars no matter what the bpm is. I know what you mean by saying it sounds short sometimes, for Me it's usually coz the original bpm of a vocal isn't near enough to the tracks bpm,

 

A huge misunderstanding.
I understand your plight, as I've met DnB makers who think that setting the project to double (300 or 320bpm) is more accurate for quantizing! So of course two bars go by in the time you would have counted one bar of four.

And as you say, they are however many bars they are.

No, you're not wrong. You're totally correct.

 

Your moving in the wrong direction...16 bars double time will be 32 bars and an 8 bar hook 16 bars. Hence double time...hope this helps.

 

It all depends on your time signature, just count the beats, e.g. 4/4 is four beats in every bar. Furthermore, there are no rules regarding the number of bars you can have in each section. Whatever sounds pleasing is good.

 

Last edited: Apr 24, 2019

I've watched 3 different tutorials from "respected" producers who've said the whole anything over 100 bpm is double time and to double the verses and hooks. Thanks for letting me know that isn't true.

 

No worries. Maybe u just misunderstood them, and/or they aren't the 'producers' we think they are!
I don't understand how anyone can say:

...and remember if you:

...you will end up counting half-time bars to it if it's extremely fast i.e. counting at the original half-speed time.
Not to mention all your quantizing will be out of the original ballpark, with double the amount of ticks pqn than the slower bpm version.

It's possible though, due to the language you're using, that I totally misunderstand some of what you are trying to do.
Because, when you say "

, then the word 'considered' is telling...Because 2 bars would actually be considered as one, when doubled up bpm-wise.

 

I found one of the videos I watched. These guys are a collab that are signed to some big labels and made beats for Juice WRLD, Lil Skies, and XXXTentacion to name a few. Not sure how "respected" they are but they have a decent resume. The video should start at the part where he talks about double time.

Did I completely misunderstand what he said, or does he have it all wrong? He claims anything over 100+ bpm is double time, highlights 8 bars, and says it is really 4 bars because it's double time. He also has 16 bar hooks, and 32 bar verses (doubled normal standard 8 bar hook and 16 bar verse) like some of the other videos I've watched said to do.

 

Understood! Yeah that video just ended up confusing the hell out of me! Thanks again for your responses!

 

Well, no. Double-time is time signature; you can still have 16 bars of double-time, and the snares will happen on the 2 and 4 of each bar. Double-time is not what you have described. You're just doubling up the bars, which will make your composition longer and it won't 'drop' in the right places.
The OP actually posted a vid of a half-time groove, anyway. (Snare on the 3.)
Also, the vocab of the vid is wrong when he says 'arranging' the beats, when he'd already arranged them!
He seems to have made his own terminology from generally accepted musical terms! lol

 

I totally understand! I admit my music theory understanding is at a basic level, and watching videos like these that have it all wrong ended up just confusing the hell out of me. The thing is a lot of videos like these are floating around with tons of misinformation, some with upwards of a million views.

 

You're welcome! His music sounds great, but he ain't a teacher yet!
"These are not the vids you're looking for."
This is the problem with YT.
Best to learn by one's self, from personal experience.

 

Yeah, but his music sounds alright, so his lack of knowledge is irrelevant...until he tries to explain what he thinks he knows to others.
There's even a part near the end when he says something like "I would always do this...maybe..." lol.

 

When this is true, is when you would have got there by doubling your project tempo/BPM.* And thus have to double your bars up coz they will only fill half of the space in time.
And in the half-time groove vid the OP posted, then the first snare would happen on beat 1 of the second bar! Which starts to get confusing.

*Which refers to my DnB comment, which is from when we 'only' had 480 PPQN, not 960 PPQN, and people thought they wanted higher resolution, so they doubled the BPM of the project to get more PPQN.
Totally pointless nowadays, imo.
But if you wanted a slightly more accurate capture of a live MIDI piano take, this would probably be more accurate, I imagine.
But considering we have more ticks to move notes to now anyway, it's not really needed.

EDIT: Incidentally, Ableton Live started out with just 480 ppqn, whilst Logic had 960!
And the newbs wondered why we laughed at Live being considered a 'Pro' DAW!

 

Last edited: Apr 24, 2019

And so, come to think of it, although there are no rules, just lots of tried & tested formulas, 32 bars of verses at any BPM does sound like a lot. Most modern vocal electronic music, or any 3:40 pop music really, would probably have 16 bars of 2x 8 bar verses max, before a chorus or change.

 

Another way to look at it ...

 

In double time, everything doubles, so a typical 8 bar intro becomes a 16 bar intro, a typical 8 bar hook/chorus becomes a 16 bar hook/chorus, and the verses are 32 bars, the outro varies between 4-8-16 bars, the tempo is just doubled, its not complex, just twice as many beats and measures.

When the tempo is slower than 120 bpm, then you have your typical 8 bar intro (usually the drums and bass come in on the second 4 bar loop of the intro) , then you have your basic 8 bar hook, and 16 bar verses! It’s not complex! The reason most producers use double time is to speed up the hi-hats and have more 1/32 time signature glitches

 

Last edited by a moderator: Nov 17, 2023

sort of an old thread. but it isn't complex at all.

The original reason was people using Pattern Sequencers. Example, FL would give you two times the number of steps per note/measure like you mentioned. A BPM detector might detect a track playing at 180 bpm, even though the sequencer grid resolution was increased by setting the DAW bpm at 2x, i.e. 360 bpm. It was more commonplace to see early Breakcore made that way, because they would use cut up breakbeats for drums. Other electronic music like hardcore was just as fast, or faster; but they did not really need all those grid spaces because everything was done using one-shot drum samples, not looped funk breaks.