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alcohol

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  1. Alright, I figured I'd throw a couple things out there for critique, although it's older work of mine. I'll work on getting a soundclick profile to host these on, but until then you'll just have to hear it with that myspace "real world" sound. 19521 Chaos was a jazz / prog group from my hometown. I recorded them as my final project at school before I graduated in '07. They've since broken up, which is a bummer because I think their demo came out pretty cool. This mix was done through a Mackie 32-8 with a lot of outboard stuff... very little was happening in the box. Progress is a CT hardcore band I recorded in my basement. I did the songs "Potential" and "Over Time." Alcohol, I really liked the drum sound on your mix. The vocals had a certain comb filtering / out of phase thing going on that bugged me. Did you use any spatial processing on your mix buss? I might suggest going a little easier on that, as it can really pull your head apart when used to an extreme. Also I feel like the lead vocal is really slamming your mix buss compressor, which is desirable to an extent but it's a little extreme here. locust tree, thanks for giving a listen. Yes I did put some effects that played with the phase to give the singers voice more body and edge. I'm going to have to abandon that approach. I got to find the right mic for him. I listened to your jazz piece and the hardcore stuff. Nicely done, everything is where it should be. The hardcore stuff has a good sharp edge to the guitars, the drums sound good. I think that's the better of the mixes and sounds very good indeed. In contrast, while the jazz tune is nicely balanced the cymbals and snare sound a bit bright to my ears. It sounds like the snare is all top mic. All in all a good job and any criticism I'm giving is negligible to a job well done.
  2. I'm going to take a chance on this mix. What do you think? http://redredrockit.com/whale/2-Recordings%20In%20Progress/Take%20My%20Hand%20final.mp3
  3. I call mine, tightsqueeze studio, because with all the amps, guitars, keys and equipment it's hard to get around.
  4. Im a complete Noob when it comes to professional recording. Ive been recording with a Line 6 Guitarport and I plan on moving on the recording my guitar with a real amp and mic. My setup is going to be. Mac Book Pro Presonus Firebox SM57 Lets say, after the guitar is recorded on top of a backing track or drumloop, what comes next? How are you supposed to improve the sound? I plan on using Logic Pro or express after I move on from Garage Band. Is there a Book that will show me how to do this? There are books, I've seen them for sale and bought a couple myself. However, I learned in the bad old days of tape, going to a studio and recording demos there. The books I bought were less effective than those experiences. I watched the engineer as closely as I could without being intrusive and asked lots of questions. Since I was paying they didn't seem to mind. That observation taught me a process and all subsequent reading was then referenced what I learned by direct observation. I've done the same with mastering engineers. Mostly I like going to mastering houses for the superior quality of their monitoring situation to my basement studio and the benefit of having the mastering engineer as a kind of audio editor. Even though I have a well equipped studio, occassional recording in other studios have been a revelation, in that I can hear the difference of other approaches and equipment. For example, I recently went to a 'world class studio' to record a demo. I learned that the Royer 121 mic caught the sound of a guitar amp more to my liking than a SM57. That a U47 sounded significantly better than my KSM 32 for vocals. I found that the engineer placed the microphones on the drums essentially the same way that I did in my home studio. That the close mics on the drums sounded essentially the same, but his two sets of room mics were significant. The Royer SF-12 about 8 feet away added an improved dimension to the drums and especially flattered the bass drum. I don't have an SF-12, but I uses an Royer 121 as a mono room mic and it provides a significant enhancement The ceiling mics which were about 20' above the drums sounded poorly and the overhead mics sounded had a negligible difference from mine even though I have a ceiling only 7' high. Interestingly was how the engineer mixed. He gave me the ProTools recording on a DVD and I was able to 'observe' the results of his tracking and mixing at the convenience of my home. Was an expensive lesson but well worth it. My conclusion, I havea really good sounding studio that defies the conventional wisdom of how it should be set up acoustically. The most significant differences in the sound of recording at my home vs the 'professional' studio were the microphones and the preamps. This observation was validated by subsequent equipment purchases.
  5. It's strange. I used to like to play with the graphic EQ in my car. Now I think the car stereo sounds best flat!! Anyway, I test a good mix (mastering) by whether pushing the graphic EQ in the car and turning the volume up to a deafening level will make the speakers collapse or distort. If they don't then that is an awesome mix (or mastering). Imagine a recording that sounds good no matter how you mangle the EQ, and how loud you play it. Try Morph the Cat. Somehow they did it.
  6. Easy mastering. Put a high pass filter around 32 Hz. Take off about 3db with a compressor to taste, then pass it through the Massey L2007 mastering limiter (which is free).
  7. I was just listening to Kim Carnes, Bette Davis Eyes. Out of tune singing, and hideous midi production. If a basement studio recording sounded this band you'd be told to quit the business.
  8. I record a baritone singer. I roll off the bottom and brighten his voice with a multiband compressor. I use the MCDSP M2000. I solo the bands, set the crossover points, pull the gain completely down on the bass of the voice and set the compressors and band gains as needed. I think the Waves Ren compressor might do the same. It makes his voice sound higher than he really is.
  9. Ideal for small studio!!!160 Sq ft. 3 1/4" solid white oak, prefinished flooring. Must be nailed in. Excess from a large job. Paid over $600 for this floor. Will sell for $300. New England area.
  10. bjorked, Singer has a nice voice and everything sounds real good through my headphones. When the guitar comes in, it seems that the piano has been shifted to the right side of the stereo field while the guitar occupies the left. This seems unnatural, the switching. The guitar also seems to be louder than the piano so it doesn't feel balanced. Production wise the song feels empty instrument wise and rhythmically. I hear lots of opportunities for a percussionist with a variety of instruments to fill it up, especially since the melodic phrases are short and leave plenty of space in between. Just a suggestion to try and see if it works. It's a melancholy song. Maybe it's me, but melancholy love songs aren't so frequent in pop music. Being a pop music fan, I hear music in that perspective. I can hear you giving this song a more, desparate and intense feel. The phrase "I'd give anything" seems to feel resigned instead of having the emotional and punch such a phrase would usually be expressing. Also, in the middle of the song the phrase, "I'd give anything" is repeated once. I'd add an additional repeat in between. The phrase is a like a cry out and in the middle we hear a guitar aprgeggio? I can hear harmonies in the singing arrangement too. Production is a thankless task, because there's always some backseat driver like myself with different ideas. Overall good work though.
  11. rhythminmind, Ok, I'm ready to nitpick. I listened to several. I'm just going to pick on no. 5. For this kind of music, I think the vocalist needs to be up front. Listening on headphones she sounds behind the guitars which seem to be getting the most attention. Also, the vocal sounds just a bit thin. With either EQ or a multiband compressor, I would bring up a bit of the lower mids jjust to take the edge off the sound of the voice. The guitar solo was prominent to the right. So at that point the recording sounded lopsided. The bass drum had the high end too overemphasized for my taste. It sounded like a snare except you heard it at all the usual BD spots. The above comments were nitpicking, because I thought it really well recorded and I liked the music. Overall, I think the singer should have been up front in the mix instead of behind the instruments.
  12. Here's a submission of something I did with my son's band, Moxie Fever. I'm going to remix this so any detailed comments or criticisms are welcome. The guitar effects at the end are a mistake, please ignore those. Give Me The End moxiefever.com
  13. Cavean, I really liked it. I thought the sounds were well recorded. I was wondering how you got that reverse guitar sound in the middle. Did you add the reverb later and then duck the primary sound? Was that studio manipulation?
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