Published November 02, 2020 by Slick for SFR Beats
So you have an idea in your head. You go online to the SFR Beats website. There’s literally 1000’s of beats to choose from. What do you do?
I’m Slick and I’m here to help you. Many artists and songwriters visiting our website for the first time may find themselves a bit overwhelmed by the variety of flavors and choices of beats they can use. Most of the time, if you don’t already have an idea in mind for a song, then you can just browse and play beats until you hear something that resonates with you, or something inspires you. We hear a lot of artists talk about how lyrics will just “come to mind” when they hear certain beats. But if you are someone who already has lyrics or part of a song, and you’re looking for music to fit it, then I’m here to help.
The first thing you’ll want to do is fully understand the kind of idea you have. Is this a high-energy song? Is this a ballad? Is this something you want played in the car? Or do you want people to dance to it? Basically you want to imagine how your song could be heard. What environment would people want to listen to your song? You have the club, car, exercising, jogging, chores, romantic dinners, sports, film, etc… Once you answer these questions, go ahead and jot them down. As an example, we’ll say you want a medium energy song… something you can groove to a bit, but also something you can experience emotionally and connect deeply with the lyrics. Great. So now it’s time to understand the kind of music that will help you reach your goal.
Tempo to me is the first thing to consider when searching for the perfect beat. Tempo can make you dance… and it can make you sit down. It can make you get lost in space, and it can also make you get jiggy with it. Mostly you’ll want to relate tempo to your heartbeat. A typical alert but non-active person will have a heart rate around 80bpm. If you’re super calm, 70 and below, and if you’re moving around a bit, up into the 90s. BPMs of 100 and higher are usually associated with activity and movement like dancing, and with exercising heart rates getting into 120’s and higher. That’s why many pop club hits will have tempos of 120 - 135bpm.
So for our example, if you want a medium energy song, let’s shoot for a tempo of say 80bpm. Here’s where the SFR Beats website makes it super easy for you. All of our beats are organized by tempo, so you can search “80bpm” in the search box and all of our beats around that tempo will pull up! But for our website, we have a lot of beats around 80bpm LOL, so how can we filter those tracks further? By considering your taste in music… by considering the “genre”.
Genres filtering can be used at SFR Beats to narrow your search results down even more. That would be the little filter icon at the top left of every list of beats. You have many choices, so just select the one you like, and you can experiment with others if you want to go a little beyond what you normally favor. So back to our example, for a medium-energy track, I’ve searched 80bpm tracks, and now I just click the filter button, then select say “Pop” for the genre selection. Boom.. I now have pop beats at 80bpm! Great. But say you’re listening to the pop selections and you’re not feeling the “deep” emotion you’re after for your song. Then maybe you can try another genre that would connect on a more emotional level with you… say Country, or even Gospel. If it moves you, then go with it!
Moods come into play when you know what kind of emotion you want your song to convey. You may want a medium-energy emotional song that has a fun feel.. So you can select “fun” in the moods filter to narrow your search results even further. If you’re a musician and you know you’re moved by certain instruments, then select those instruments from the filter. The filter is really where your gold is. It’s a great tool to find your perfect beat. For a complete list of genres and moods we offer, go to https://sfrbeats.com/genres
Lastly, you can use the “rights” filter if you care about the exclusivity of your beats or not. Really want to ask yourself what is more important to you… to have the beat all to yourself, or to find something at rock bottom pricing. If you care more about using the beat all to yourself, then select “Exclusive Rights” from the filter to see only those types of beats. If you care more about getting the lowest price, then you can select “Lease” in the filter to only see beats for lease. The choice is yours!
Other things you can do with SFR Beats search is search by similar artists you may like. I will warn you, many of us are 80’s babies, so you’ll see heavy influences from artists during the 90s, 2000’s, 2010’s lol. And last but not least you can search by keyword. So say you want to make a medium energy emotionally deep Christmas song, then put “Christmas” in the search and see if you have any beats to choose from!
So I hope that helps you not be so overwhelmed when looking for the perfect beat for your song. If you want to see Lisa the Pianist talk about finding beats, watch this video here - And if you’re still having trouble, just reach out to our custom support team. They’re super friendly and responsive to all of your needs, so don’t be shy! Enjoy creating!
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