This is so true it’s almost not funny 
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IS Improvise a Song is really Finnish a Song ? I don’t think so… it can help to find all the parts you may need or want … but i think it’s not the same process… but it can help no doubt as harmony is really a main part in the process especially switching smartly from mode to mode
There’s a song in Finland called “improvise a song”? I don’t know, we don’t get Finnish radio here in Australia.
Sorry, just being cheeky.
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Anyway few keyboard lessons to learn intervals and harmony… doesn’t hurt 
And it’s more interesting than what people thought, i recommend it… I remember when trying to know what synth sounds i really like (to try to learn from it) it was chords 80% of the time… When analyzing STABS & CHORDS from Sample it was 7th or 9th Chords 70% of the time…
So if you don’t know how make it, how you can progress in what you like if it is what you like of course…
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OR… You could start making Ambient now and move on to Techno/Dance when you’re older…
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I read some wise words about that in an interview with a great artist - but can´t remember the name. basicly it says, don´t go for 100%.
A ver good track is finished at about 99%. It`s art, it can´t be 100% finished. Art always ask questions and there are always other people who would make it different. But it´s all about you! If it would be 100% and nobody asks a question about it, it wouldn´t be art anymore.
The last 5 - 10% are the hardest for sure and it takes time to finish these last steps. But sometimes it´s also good to leave it at 90% and just bring it out. This is also about learning. See what´s good and what´s not, learn from that and start a new project.
I find that out for myself in the last years. I´m working on an album since 2015. Over the time, the track selection have changed - but in a good way. I recorded some tracks / track ideas that I really really liked in the beginning … just to figured after 1 year of working and listening again … their are not good enough or there was just something wrong in the recording. So basicly I got lost in trying to finishing that tracks / track ideas which blocked me for being creative. So I decided to stop working on these tracks and not taking it on the ablum which set new creativity and motivition free. And now track selection is finished and I´m happy about it.
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I use the markers feature in Ableton a lot to divide my arrangement up into sections. I’ll usually record patterns into Ableton from my A4/Rytm using Overbridge and then drag them like ten minutes down the timeline. Then I’ll cut them up into phrases/16 bar loops and start structuring the song. I’ll usually get a decent working structure and try flesh it out to 4/5 minutes in length after the initial jamming/recording/chopping process.
I’ll put it on my phone then and listen to it a few times over the following two/three days. The flaws in the structure and where the song needs to go usually comes to light when you come back to it with fresh ears, especially when you listen to music from artists’ whose arrangements/sound you like in the meantime.
Then the real work begins in my opinion. I’ll start to structure the song in a more concrete way, adding in fills, duplicating certain loops and putting fx on them or glitching them to add some variety in different sections. This usually takes one or two sessions and then I’ve a much more coherent piece. Usually I’ll leave the song for at least a week then and start on something new before coming back to do the final edits. I like working on a few different songs at the same time to keep things fresh and so I don’t get bogged down in overarranging and over-editing stuff to the point of ruining it.
I like to think of it like I did when I was in a band - the initial jams are cool, but the real work comes afterwards when you practice it for a week or two and really hone it down till it’s really tight.
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I’m a thief. Most of my songs/ideas are like a narrative from watching people day by day and imagining what they’re doing and thinking and why.
The music is just the wallpaper, furniture, park benches and bus stops.
The music is over when I’m through stalking them. 
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Please discuss any tactics you have to make yourself finish a track…
I record live on 2 tracks so once the recording is done, I can’t waste time on meaningless details, unless I want to do another take which is always faster than tinkering about that reverb tail or that small adjustement none cares about. Then light editing (comp, eq, cut weak parts, etc). So basically I finish a track by deciding it’s good enough.
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Just put in the time. Accept that most days, creative work is very hard. Appreciate the days when it’s not. Like this guy right here.
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That’s because a track is never actually finished.
You just stop working on it at some point.
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Art is never finished, only abandoned
– Leonardo da Vinci
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I find it a constant and uphill struggle to ”force finished tracks”. If I have to spends days on the arrangement / finalizing / tweaking, it almost always kills the ”song” for me. My best work has always been from realtime recordings, one long take with perhaps a few edits here and there. These have at keast a semblance of emotion/energy, but usually sound like demos lol! If I try to ”force” an arrangement on a lego-block pianoroll/timeline view, the music always loses its vibrancy and energy and becomes a shitty cover version of itself. And when the ”house of legos” is finally ready, I’m sick of the track and want to delete it from existence and start from square one…
So finishing tracks is hard for me because I haven’t found a pleasant workflow for ”tracking” all the sounds simultaneously yet. All the instruments have been in place for the longest time, but the (multitrack) recording workflow is still lost somewhere…
Someone said you need to put in the work to come up with something that makes people wanna move? I disagree with this, IME a good beat and a groovy bassline get people moving… now keeping them moving without killing what was good and groovy in the first place, that’s the hard part 
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I used to record on 8 tracks but it made little sense with multitimbral machines with no seperate outputs… 
To get anyone started I will just quickly share a tip that pushed me into the right direction of finishing tracks! Take a song that you really like for the moment, if you’re just starting up a new song. Or take a song that you like and that you think is similar to the one that you’re struggling to finish!
put that song as an audio clip inside your project (in your DAW). Listen to the different parts and create a MIDI track below this audio track. In the MIDI track you create empty regions, all marking the different PARTS of your favourite song, so you name them after the parts ofc.
Now you have a complete map of the compositional structure of a really good song that you like. Try to mimic this composition to some extent (do I need to say, don’t copy cat OFC) in your own project and you should be heading towards making complete songs in short time!
hope this wasn’t confusing? I’m at an airport in bali, a few bintang deep. Cheers! 
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Think that pretty much nails it for me also.
Accepting that (on reflection) I might ruin an otherwise perfect recoding with too much knobbery, a flakey transition or mixing something too loud no longer worries me, it provides me with insight on how to improve the next time… Creativity is not precious, if you achieved it once, you can do it again, only better.
By focussing on improving my skills as a musician/performer: knowing where to start, peak and end an arrangement is important, but listening to what is happening in the moment and refining my performance, following where it leads (even if unexpected) often produces the most satisfying end result. Creating an atmosphere and capturing the moment is all.
When I switched to using a computer, there was too much thinking/looking and not enough emotion/listening. Deciding to go back to a hardware only setup allows me to achieve more with less, I enjoy myself far more and create far more.
Whether ITB/OTB, could it be the music we make relies too heavily on thinking and not enough on feeling? Therefore a thinking mindset fools us into feeling what we are producing has lost direction or is not worthwhile, which leads to an inability to know how to finish?
Thankfully we all have different ideas about what works best. This is just my personal opinion. Maybe it will help someone to believe in the value of their work, worry less about perfection, enjoy what they do in the moment and hopefully finish more tracks… even if its only a 2 minute minimal piece, when you were thinking about crafting a 10 minute opus.
Worst case scenario, everything you produce can be sample fodder for your next track.
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oh man, love that bintang!!! Where are you going to in Bali?? Also Gilis for some diving?? Indonesia is great!!!
Btw. traveling can be also a great inspiration for making music. I mostly named my tracks after placed I´ve visited (Bondi Dub, Birds Over Hong Kong) and there is a new one “Forest Of The Monkeys” coming out … and guess which place I had in mind? 
I think great artist are beasts in arrangements and finishing songs. Learning some basic music theory helps the arrangement so that songs sections flow fluently.
Lot of people don’t like Trap music. They generally have simple melodies (not always) and song structures. Trap producers (and for other genres too) usually finish their songs in 10-20 minutes, arrangement included. I think that we can take a lot of these type of producers. Maybe the concept of recipe in music doesn’t appeal to a lot of people but I’m not sure it is very useful to reinvent the wheel.
Try to learn some recipes to finish your tracks. Then when you’ll become proficient at it, I’m sure you’re going to find a personal way to arrange your tracks and experiment with it.
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I wanted to answer the OP but you already describe my favorite way of working. I do extacly the same and like this, you can write tracks fast, you learn how to play live and you have fun. If a track is bad, no problem, move on and start something else.
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Good stuff, thanks folks!
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