Hey guys, It's time for another quick little pro tip. And today, we're going to talk about how to choose the best music for your videos. Now, this is one of the most crucial steps in your editing process, and really, it can make or break your video, depending on if you choose the right song or not.
First, Where You Can Get Your Music
Before we get into the three tips, let's talk about where you can get your music. And right now, I'm almost exclusively using Epidemic Sound, and there are a couple of reasons for that.
One is that they have a ton of songs on there. I think they have the most music out of these kinds of YouTube licensing platforms right now. And the music is just high quality. They keep adding new songs, so I like that part.
But also, it's a monthly subscription, so that you can drop it at any time. And it's only around $15.00 a month, so it's not super expensive, mainly because you don't have to pay it off all at once, with some yearly subscription or big licenses. You can pay it off as you make videos. $15.00 a month isn't too much, so it's pretty affordable. So that's what I'm using right now.
There are many different sites. But Epidemic is a perfect place to start if you don't have any platform to get good music right now. All right, so here are three essential tips that you need to know to choose the best music for your videos.
Tips on Choosing Music for Your Videos
Tip 1: Watch Your Footage
Number one is to watch your footage. I like to put all my footage in a timeline and scrub through and see what I captured. Is it a cloudy day, is it a sunny day, is it a tropical feel, is it more cold and arctic, are people smiling, are people more serious? What's the overall mood in the video?
So then I can take all these things into account when I'm choosing the song. Because you never want your visuals and your music clashing.
For example, if you have many laughing, smiling faces, you don't want some sad severe song or just some slow-paced thing. You want something a little more upbeat and a little bit more happy, maybe hopeful.
So you need to scrub through your footage and see what kind of stuff you've got. Because even if you're planning to use this song, and you've filmed with this song in mind, the day could have looked or turned out completely different from what you intended. And so you shouldn't force some music onto your footage if it just doesn't fit. You never want your visuals and your audio to clash.
Tip 2: Don't Go too Niche
Number two, don't go too niche. So we all have different musical tastes, and when you're choosing music for your videos, you have to balance your preferences and what other people might like at the same time. You can't necessarily go with the kind of music you like, especially if you're into a very niche, a specific type of music. For example, hardcore metal or something like that where most people don't listen to that, but a good group does.
But the point of putting out videos is to have as many people watch as possible. So, therefore, you also want music that appeals to just the more significant majority of the public.
There's a time and place for this kind of music, but most people don't listen to it, so that it will throw off many people. Some people are going to love it, and that's good. But a lot of people maybe aren't going to like it. So try to choose music that isn't too niche.
Again, it's a balancing act, and you should be kind of aware of the trends that are going on. Right now, I'd say kind of the electro-dance is super popular, and pop, of course, is always popular, especially indie pop right now. Anything like that works well.
Tip 3: Look at the Tempo and Structure of the Song
And then number three is to look at the tempo and structure of the song. So, let's say you want a fast pace edit, then you can't choose a slow-paced song or vice versa. You need to think about what kind of edit you want and choose a theme according to that. Is it a more epic, high-paced video, or is it a more slow-mo, heavy, smooth, calm cinematic video? If you don't choose the right song, you'll fail at making this happen.
But even more, you want to look at the structure of the song. Some songs are just the same the whole way through, and other pieces have these different kinds of parts. One of the big things that I look for is build-up. So a nice build-up into a chorus. That's going to help your B-roll montages or accentuate certain parts of your video.
But of course, if the song is just the same the whole way through, there are no build-ups. You can't do those same kinds of things in your editing process. And that's not to say that every song needs to have a build-up. But if you need that build-up, well, then look for it in the structure.
So I not only listen to the song, but I also like looking at the waveforms and seeing the structure of the song, where the build-ups are, what happens here, and what happens there, to ensure that the songs have a lot of variety. I usually like songs with more variety because it gives me more options in the editing process. So tempo and structure play a massive role in what kind of song you should choose for your video.
Summary
All right, so there are three tips for you to choose the best music for your videos. I highly recommend spending a lot of time selecting the right songs. Sometimes I like to go on music listening binges. I'll listen to a whole bunch of music, and I'll download all the ones that I like so that I have this excellent library of songs that I can use and just quickly go through and find the right music for that edit. I highly recommend doing this, especially when you're in a time crunch. You have just a nice list to choose from. You don't have to spend a whole bunch of time looking for songs.
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