Question 1

Where do I send loops to CJ Beatz for the live cookups?

Accepted Answer

Email them to loops4cj@gmail.com (number 4). I’ll mess with pretty much everything—loops, one-shots, whatever—just send it over. If you can, include the BPM in the file name because it makes it way easier.

Question 2

What DAW does CJ Beatz use for making beats live?

Accepted Answer

For live cookups like this, I’m using FL Studio because the drum workflow is just quicker and more efficient for me. I’m still Logic gang though—I like Logic more for engineering sessions and making sample loops. These days it’s really a combination of Logic and FL depending on the job.

Question 3

How do you find the BPM and key of a loop during a cookup?

Accepted Answer

Sometimes I’ll just find it myself, but I always tell producers: put the BPM in the loop name because it saves time. On this stream, the first loop ended up being 149 BPM, and later I’m checking key too so I can add stuff from Arcade that actually fits. If the key/BPM matches, layering different loops is way easier without a ton of pitch tuning.

Question 4

How do you arrange your beats into a full song structure?

Accepted Answer

Most of the time I’m thinking intro, hook, verse, hook, verse, hook. Sometimes I’ll do a bridge or half a verse and then go back into the hook, and sometimes there’s barely an intro—just straight into the verse. And real talk, a lot of artists will rearrange the beat anyway once they download it.

Question 5

What is the frequency stripping technique you mentioned from 40?

Accepted Answer

Instead of just EQ’ing and dampening frequencies, I’ll go into the audio editor and literally strip certain frequency ranges out. I learned that idea from 40 talking about removing frequencies altogether, and it hits different than a regular EQ. In this cookup, I used it to carve space and create a different texture for the breakdown.

Question 6

Do you use Arcade to start beats or just to add layers?

Accepted Answer

I’m not really using Arcade to start a beat from scratch. I’ll build the foundation first, find the key, and then use Arcade to add specific elements as an undertone. In this stream, once I locked the key, I found a part that fit perfectly and recorded it in as a layer.

Question 7

Can you stream to YouTube, Twitch, and Facebook at the same time like CJ Beatz?

Accepted Answer

Yeah, I’m doing it with Restream.io so I can push the same live stream to multiple platforms at once. It’s not a sponsorship—I just needed something that works from my computer. If you’ve got followers spread out, it’s a solid way to reach everybody.

Making Beats Live - Send Loops to loops4cj@gmail.com

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