Moderators Lee Knight Posted June 19, 2013 Moderators Share Posted June 19, 2013 Pardon the pop. It's pretty sweet. This started as the Ram thread "Let's Write a Song". Then he crafted a verse and I took up the challenge to help write some silly pop lyrics. The Rasberries were Ram's model. I think I turned down the overdrive and turned up the Las' There She Goes-like sugary sticky gooeyness with a little The Pretenders' Kid. But hey... we all have our issues. Music is all Ram, performance and arrangement is me. (Of course, Ram... you have veto power) Input please. https://soundcloud.com/albert-s-j-lee-knight-3/hadtohaveyou-06-18-13edit-eql2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Oswlek Posted June 19, 2013 Members Share Posted June 19, 2013 Awesome! I love it, and it would definitely spend some time in my mp3 player.On the first listen, I felt like it needed a little more variance between the V and C - seemed like a wall of sound. Awesome sound, but a wall nonetheless. On a second listen, things seemed more defined, so maybe it was just me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members LCK Posted June 19, 2013 Members Share Posted June 19, 2013 Lee Knight wrote: Pardon the pop. It's pretty sweet. Music is all Ram, performance and arrangement is me. (Of course, Ram... you have veto power) Input please. Fabulous. That hook will be stuck in my head all day... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators Lee Knight Posted June 19, 2013 Author Moderators Share Posted June 19, 2013 Cool, thanks. I tried an experiment with reverb. The only reverb is a 10 second spring reverb. Now... that's fun. A little goes a long way. All the performances were tight and then I just smeared them to hell and back. I'm kinda liking the effect. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members oldgitplayer Posted June 20, 2013 Members Share Posted June 20, 2013 Nice poppy song and arrangement.I agree with the other comments that it needs a lift at the end. After 3.30 mins I felt I hadn't been given enough - that it was too even. (It's a pop song).Some details: Imagining myself as a 21st Century teenager that gets bored quickly, I think 0.32 - 0.38 is a bit empty (too subtle for a teen) with just the duh duh de duh. You introduce lead guitar later in the song in combination with that part and that sounds better.Also at the descending bass line 1.16 - about 1.24 : Maybe some guitar fills there as well. (You have them later in the song)Sooo - if you brought the guitar work at the end forward to these spots, and put additional instruments at the end - maybe that will give it some poppy grunt. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators Lee Knight Posted June 20, 2013 Author Moderators Share Posted June 20, 2013 Great input guys. Yeah, I definitely stopped at the bare minimum of the full arrangement on this one. i didn't want to commit to too much ear candy early on if I had to make major changes later. So I stopped at a single parallel harmony, etc. But your detailed locations are very helpful Phil. And thank you very much Davie I appreciate that. The drums are a full recording I downloaded from drums on demand. Then I cut them up a lot,, do a lot of time correcting, and supplement them with triggered midi drums in Battery. Some of the fills I've played in through midi and some of the fill were on the original recording I downloaded. But none of the fills that I downloaded occur where they were originally, everything's been sliced and diced to fit my arrangement. But every song I do tends to be different as far as the techniques I use for the drums. It looks like I'll be working on a project coming up here where I'll get to record a live drummer again. Yippee!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members blue2blue Posted June 20, 2013 Members Share Posted June 20, 2013 Lee Knight wrote: Pardon the pop. It's pretty sweet. This started as the Ram thread "Let's Write a Song". Then he crafted a verse and I took up the challenge to help write some silly pop lyrics. The Rasberries were Ram's model. I think I turned down the overdrive and turned up the Las' There She Goes-like sugary sticky gooeyness with a little The Pretenders' Kid. But hey... we all have our issues. Music is all Ram, performance and arrangement is me. (Of course, Ram... you have veto power) Input please. https://soundcloud.com/albert-s-j-lee-knight-3/hadtohaveyou-06-18-13edit-eql2 My thoughts (as always, YMMV): I think it needs more prominent vocal back-ups. I think the doo-doo-doo's were far too submerged -- you probably ought to make space in the mix for them. But maybe they should come after the solo. And I think the middle solo should be tightened to 8; the ideas are good but the performance feels a bit disjointed, as it stands. With the first 8 and the outro vamp, I think the lead makes a nice statement and, with the right arrangement framing it, maybe a wait-for-it hook. I think maybe the mix should be manicured a bit internally to make it seem less dense, and give it forward momentum. Right now it seems like it starts at 9 and sort of varies between 9 and 10 in density. And that means that I come away with more a vague sense of the song/mix than having that clear memory of the different elements that I might have got had they each received a little more individual focus at times. The audience's attention needs to be lead. And, as I know you know, but I'll say anyhow, in case the NSA needs it explained, you do that from section to section and sometimes within a section, by removing some stuff and leaving others or at least juicing the dynamic balances appropriately. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members hitiangel Posted June 20, 2013 Members Share Posted June 20, 2013 Great music! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators Lee Knight Posted June 20, 2013 Author Moderators Share Posted June 20, 2013 blue2blue wrote: My thoughts (as always, YMMV): I think it needs more prominent vocal back-ups. I think the doo-doo-doo's were far too submerged -- you probably ought to make space in the mix for them. But maybe they should come after the solo. And I think the middle solo should be tightened to 8; the ideas are good but the performance feels a bit disjointed, as it stands. With the first 8 and the outro vamp, I think the lead makes a nice statement and, with the right arrangement framing it, maybe a wait-for-it hook. I think maybe the mix should be manicured a bit internally to make it seem less dense, and give it forward momentum. Right now it seems like it starts at 9 and sort of varies between 9 and 10 in density. And that means that I come away with more a vague sense of the song/mix than having that clear memory of the different elements that I might have got had they each received a little more individual focus at times. The audience's attention needs to be lead. And, as I know you know, but I'll say anyhow, in case the NSA needs it explained, you do that from section to section and sometimes within a section, by removing some stuff and leaving others or at least juicing the dynamic balances appropriately. Great stuff Mr. Blue. The denseness was something I'm trying on for size. I think I need to control it more and pick and choose where it belongs. So, excellent points. The bass, I'm not sure if you can hear it, is a modern take on the old 80's synth bass. I stacked a couple of newer hippish NI Massive sounds and tweaked some effects to get a cool octave jump disco-like line. The intention was to have some of the verses just a single vocal, that synth bass, and drums. And then build from there. But once I started catching on that it had a certain quality not unlike There She Goes... I took it there and further. 10 sec spring verb. Lots of guitars. Piano to add chime to some of the guitar lines. Sparse and tight went out the window and you don't ever hear the bass. Over the top, turn it on and GO! Like you say, 9-10. Not much of a range. How I can deal with the denseness: I'll try dropping down to that bass, drum and vocal for V1a while killing the spring verb, then bring some guitars in for V1b, than back up with everything for the re-intro, then back off the verb again for V1c while adding another guitar... then the chorus back BIG and washy while taming it a tad so it a wash but not out of control. I hear ya. I'll use a more standard build of the instrumentation. I think you and the others are right. And that'll include muting that spring verb in lots of places. But I'll tell ya, that wash still gets me. It's like phantoms in the cracks of the guitars. I love it. So I want to manage a balancing act here. And keep the ears interested. From washy and dense to tight, sparse and dry. The solo... the thing is, I can't really play like that. I did play it but that was from 10 takes and me picking the phrases I managed to barely pull off. So the disjointed nature is a byproduct of me not really having the ability to play what comes into my head and where I hear it, and rather just trying any semblance of a twang pop solo riff and hoping I pull off one idea here and there. So... ...I really like your idea of condensing it to 6 bars. I think cutting out the two least interesting bars will really help it along. And perhaps even joining the 2 bar sections together better with fill-in riffs from other takes. Very good call. I agree about turning the Bah bup bup bah vocals up. And I most likely will want some oohs and ahhs to fill it out. That along with the other suggestions above in previous posts and... Cool. I'm on it. Thanks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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