In this article, we will go through how to make a Lo-fi beat with AI with example from LANDR – one of the huge musical sources. We will come back with using Selector – the world’s first AI sample recommendation tool.
Starter Loop: Lo-fi Melodics from Skifonix
We will start this session with a jazzy guitar lick from a sample pack known as Lo-fi Melodics on LANDR.
This sample is one of the 10 best lo-fi sample packs according to an analysis on LANDR for an article.
This one stuck out to us for its quick runs and jazzy chords.
The lo-fi texture of the sample inspired us, It should be the place where you should begin building a beat.
So, in this session, we will use Selector to help us discover the loops I need to construct a lo-fi beat that complements this starter loop.
We’ll put Selector to the test and see what loops AI suggests we use in our beat.
At the end of the article, you may hear the final product!
We’ll put Selector to the test and see what loops AI suggests we use in my beat.
Selection 1: Top 06 from Apex Audio
Since we began with a guitar loop, the following thing the track needs is a percussive element to drive the beat along.
To complement the higher frequencies in the guitar loops we will discover a hi-hat loop to get the high end of the percussive elements in my beat started.
We put a hi-hats only filter on the Selector results from our starter loop and wound up with about two pages of samples.
We put a hi-hats only filter on the Selector results from my starter loop and wound up with about two pages of samples.
After going through pretty much all of them we finally settled on this washy sounding loop that seems to incorporate sidechaining and reversing effects.
It’s not your typical hi-hat sound, however, that’s kind of what I like about it!
The hi-hat loop has enough rhythm to drive the track along and the sound complements the lo-fi elements in the starter loop.
Alright, we have half a drum kit and a guitar loop to play within my DAW.
Now it’s time to add kick and snare.
Selection 2: Kick and Snare 04 from Apex Audio
We hit the Selector button on my hi-hat loop however this time we filtered the results pages for just kick and snare.
Again, the Selector returns about two pages of kick and snare loops.
Sifting through the loops we settled on this bottom loop because it leans into that classic lo-fi sound.
Aside from the crunchy and subdued sound of the kick and snare, I like the rhythm itself.
The loop uses that classic minimal R&B rhythm inspired micro delayed MPC style quantization that was pioneered by beat-making legends like J Dilla.
You hear in a lot of lo-fi beats today too.
The result is pretty satisfying once I put it in my DAW.
Alright, we have a full kit going and it complements our loop pretty well.
Now it’s time to roll the dice a little bit and try to discover something in the low end to complement our guitar track.
Selection 3: OL1 Bass from Opium Lounge
To complement our guitar loop we may put a bass guitar filter on our Selector results.
To complement our guitar loop we put a bass guitar filter on our Selector results.
Nice, we get about 26 bass loops on our Selector session.
I’m looking for something that matches both the melodic and rhythmic elements of our guitar loop and two of those samples from the Opium Lounge works best.
The bass guitar loops are both in the same key and they seem to use the same tone.
I like how the bass in these loops have funky long and short notes that may line up with the chord hits and runs in our guitar loop once we chop them up in Ableton.
What drew us to the loops in the first place is their tone. Somehow they both remind me of funk and jazz bass legend Jaco Pastorius’ tone.
Jaco’s track A Portrait of Tracy comes to mind in particular.
The bass loops come in A# minor, so once we throw it in my DAW we will have to transpose them down a couple of steps to match the guitar in D minor.
They match okay however we will need to spend some time tweaking the bass loops to make them suit the guitar track a little bit better.
Putting it all together
It might sound counterintuitive, however, sometimes putting limitations on yourself can help with sparking creativity in your songwriting.
I this case we limited ourselves to using only the recommendations that an AI tool gave.
It was pretty fun to work with these limitations and I think it produced an interesting result.
To finish our beat we will do a little bit of arranging, EQ, and sidechaining in my DAW.
Plus you can master your track once you bounce the final version.