Future music magazine from 2010 with a OP1 review, November 2012 when I bought one new for 674€ that changed everything 
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serious or kidding?..I can be gullible sometimes:)
The cold, hard truth.
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Very cold
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In general, I agree with “less is more” as being an “aha moment” for me. I produced more dense “big room” tracks for other artists, but it was when I started doing my own live sets, with more limited hardware setups that I really got into the joys of creating and performing electronic music that breathes, and is more about streamlined rhythmic and musical ideas and soundscapes than about pummeling a dance floor into submission with layers of sound and fury.
Discovering how much I personally connect with Elektron devices (DT/DN for me) and how productive I can be with them was also a revelation.
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I just had a bit of a revelatory experience earlier this evening. I’ve recently bought an Analog Heat and spent some time this evening just putting a 909 kick through it and messing about with the settings.
Shitting Christ, I wish I’d recorded it.
Up until this evening I’ve always arranged tracks in a very standard structural mindset (drums, bass, melody and pad/SFX) but playing around with the kick through the Heat refocused my mind on harmonics.
It’s not about filling up the frequency spectrum with stuff, it’s about finding the most interesting harmonics in each sound and bringing them out, preferably in some sort of pleasing rhythmic pattern.
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When I developed the ability to play triplets with my left hand against the standard jazz ride pattern with my right, it was as if hand cuffs had broken. It blew my drumming wide, wide open. I’ve yet to have a moment like that happen again, and that was over 20 years ago…
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…but I care. Would you like a hug? Jk
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…it’s a.never ending stoooooryiiiiieeeeey…ahhahahahaa…
…transpose…
…never ending stoooooryiiiiieeey…ahhahahahaa…
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Serious! Keep it short, unless you have a good reason.
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Regarding electronic music, programming less and playing more on keys helped me getting more efficient. This was a true revelation to me, I lost so much time trying to sequence everything!
Regarding music in general:
Playing regularly with other musicians is inspiring.
Playing regularly for an audience helps identifying things to be improved.
I also like listening to music looking for inspiration. I use a booklet, where I write down things that I need to work on.
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There’s no right or wrong way to do things. If it sounds good, it’s good.
There are no good or bad sounds, just different sounds and different contexts for them to live in.
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High Pass Filtering for more headroom in the mix, this has saved so many mixes for me! ESPECIALLY on reverb and mic’d sources. I used to think that many sources needed a more low-mid-end than they actually do…
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…well, THE stereotype of first wise words when it comes to overall sonic wisdom…
fact is…once u put a single toe into the ocean of audioproduction, learning never comes to any end…
welcome to eternity, welcome on board…
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Oh, and someone said this in another similar thread but I thought it made perfect sense. Make sure you have good sound treatment in your studio, transparent monitors, and subwoofer.
If you are monitoring your mix/making music without hearing/feeling the lower frequencies, it will prob sound wrong when played through a larger system with a full frequency range. This helps keep your tracks consistent and your kick drums thumpy. Heads will bob in agreement.
So, what’s the next piece of gear that you really need? Sound treatment and a subwoofer. Not as sexy as a brand new Elektron box but absolutely vital.
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I don’t always follow my own advice, but for me the most profound musical moments have always been shared with another person. Nothing beats playing music with other people, theres no money in the world that can buy what it feels like to have two or more brains working together, sonically weaving and colliding in ways you simply don’t expect. Every time I’ve been absolutely flawed by my own music has been when improvising with someone else, and u both somehow change keys at the same time, both somehow just create music together on the spot. Often wound up laughing so hard when those moments happen, you cant even play anymore haha. It’s something i could never create by myself, like overdubbing a bassline. If theres any advice I could give, it’d be to play with others, start bands. Theres a real strength to it in so many ways, no less the fact it takes the focus off yourself.
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I had one today, listening to jazz.
There was this reaaaaallly simple drum brush pattern with little details and changes here and there. It was a joy to listen to, so playful and simple
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At ~40, sadly I don’t encounter a ton of people up for “starting bands”, my art-crew is more visual… I do wonder what sort of fun ways there are to ease myself in to this.
This is true. The older you are the smaller your circle of friends becomes typically. However, I was thinking about the possibility, however remote, of meeting some people to play music with. I randomly searched for a website to meet other musicians. I was just kind of doing it passively and created an account without expecting much.
The next day I got a call from a fully formed band who are all over 40 years old. Now I’m their lead singer and we have several gigs lined up. I guess I’m saying that you never know until you make the effort to reach out to other people. Who knows? It might just work out. 
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“How come all of your songs just do the same thing over and over again…”
This began to make me self-conscious enough to buy studio monitor headphones to use for critical listening of looping parts.
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