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Hey there everyone!

If anyone has a spare couple minutes I'd love some input on some of my work. Any and all thoughts you have on performance, recording, mixing etc. are welcome.

 

So, this is my band,

http://www.myspace.com/onegoodreasonband

 

The originals are Divided Monologues and Empty world. Ignore the covers unless you really want to hear that. We switch off who sings lead pretty much song to song just so you know.

 

And this is my solo side project stuff

http://www.myspace.com/mtkyt

 

So thanks in advance if you get some free time to listen!

-Gabriel-

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@ and (op)

Just uploaded new stuff the other day:


http://www.myspace.com/cardboardboxstudios

 

I like most of this, I dig the instrumental, spacey, yet grittiness.

This stuff reminds me alot of Don Caballero, if you've never heard them check it out, I know for a fact you'd like them.

 

Overall sound- Definitely sounds overcompressed/smashed-too loud

some of this is certainly because of mp3-ifying, also IMO a bit too much very low end. The overall balance of the instruments and tone is good. I like what you've done with the toms. The cymbals sound broken up/dist., again some of that may be the mp3 but I noticed some dist. on the end of Communiss that was intentional. If that's your vision of how you want it to be then that's cool.

 

Song-Wise- I think you could trim the fat, so to speak, on some of these tunes. They're kind of drawn out. IMO you could shorten things up a bit and keep the changes comming thus making it overall more engaging. Some people have short attention spans, like me.

 

Favorites- Communiss and GS Shweik as Malignerer

 

I like the music pretty well really, If you feel I'm badmouthing your art then I apologize but, since you really didn't specify I figured I'd give you my 2cents on the music, performance, mix, master.

This reply is a long time coming for you so I hope you don't hate me for my opinion.

-Gabriel-

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@fake plastic shrub

Have I made the best use of what I have? This was the first time I've used the firepod and cubase to record. This recording was the last one we'll do using POD and drum machine. I played everything and programmed the drums, even though we are a full band and play out, because it's been easier. I tried to place every part in the mix using decibel boosts and cuts, have i done ok on the levels? how could it have been done better?

 

A late response is better than none right?;)

 

Before I even scrolled down to read your info I was thinking, 'Man, this reminds me of some old-school Kyuss.'

I friggin' love that band and everything Josh Homme has done subsequently.

But really, change the font color on your page or update to the new Myspace format, my eyes can't cope with that kind of strain anymore.:p

 

But seriously, I really dig the tunes.

 

Recording and Mix- First off, there is some clipping going on somewhere, sounds like it could be happening during tracking or could be in some EQ or elsewhere in the mixing. It's not everywhere / on every insrtument, so find it, watch the peak meters like a hawk and just keep it in mind. Also not neccessarily your fault, the tracks sound a little mp3-ifyed. (I complain about that alot.)

 

I know you used the drum machine on these so my advice would be to be more vigilant about maintaining consistency with the volume levels of the individual drums before even laying them down to 'tape'. Then again I would much rather hear real drums anyway. I felt that on some songs the snare got eaten up and others it was sitting nicely in the mix.

For that matter I really felt the drums were kind of quiet overall. I know drum machine gets a bit tiresome to listen to sometimes, but they were kind-of buried at times.

 

The Gtr. riffage is pretty sweet, I really liked it, but they were a little too upfront. Gtr. tone sounded nice.

 

Vox also were a bit upfront and need some reverb,delay, something. I know you got that whole Kyuss influence going on and Chris Goss's vox were pretty dry ,most of the time, but wetten them up some, it will help seat them in the mix some more.

Sometimes the vox got thinner from track to track. Try getting the singer to maintain a consistent distance/position relative to the mic from session to session and save some presets for mixing to try to maintain more consistency.

 

Overall, I'd say 1. I like your music, and 2. you've got the basics down and your mix isn't unbearable, definitely room for improvement, but not bad.

Keep at it, try new stuff, learn from your shortcommings and improve.

 

Hope I don't offend you.

-Gabriel-

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@fake plastic shrub



A late response is better than none right?
;)

Before I even scrolled down to read your info I was thinking, 'Man, this reminds me of some old-school Kyuss.'

I friggin' love that band and everything Josh Homme has done subsequently.

But really, change the font color on your page or update to the new Myspace format, my eyes can't cope with that kind of strain anymore.
:p

But seriously, I really dig the tunes.


Recording and Mix- First off, there is some clipping going on somewhere, sounds like it could be happening during tracking or could be in some EQ or elsewhere in the mixing. It's not everywhere / on every insrtument, so find it, watch the peak meters like a hawk and just keep it in mind. Also not neccessarily your fault, the tracks sound a little mp3-ifyed. (I complain about that alot.)


I know you used the drum machine on these so my advice would be to be more vigilant about maintaining consistency with the volume levels of the individual drums before even laying them down to 'tape'. Then again I would much rather hear real drums anyway. I felt that on some songs the snare got eaten up and others it was sitting nicely in the mix.

For that matter I really felt the drums were kind of quiet overall. I know drum machine gets a bit tiresome to listen to sometimes, but they were kind-of buried at times.


The Gtr. riffage is pretty sweet, I really liked it, but they were a little too upfront. Gtr. tone sounded nice.


Vox also were a bit upfront and need some reverb,delay, something. I know you got that whole Kyuss influence going on and Chris Goss's vox were pretty dry ,most of the time, but wetten them up some, it will help seat them in the mix some more.

Sometimes the vox got thinner from track to track. Try getting the singer to maintain a consistent distance/position relative to the mic from session to session and save some presets for mixing to try to maintain more consistency.


Overall, I'd say 1. I like your music, and 2. you've got the basics down and your mix isn't unbearable, definitely room for improvement, but not bad.

Keep at it, try new stuff, learn from your shortcommings and improve.


Hope I don't offend you.

-Gabriel-

 

Wow thank you for the response, you're on the money on so many things. The drum machine I'm working on levelling it all out before recording, I think that's the key, although our next recording will be with full band (just put up a new song, our last with the drum machine, wish i'd seen your post first!).

I've used very little reverb again on the new song, just a touch on a second track of vocals, because I was worried that with all the processing I was doing to get an ok sound, nothing was going to cut. I think I'm going to persevere with blending two vocal tracks from now on so I get clarity from one and a nice sitting point from the other, sound like a plan?

I agree the drums were back too far and the guitars too far forward on Burn The Red especially, I've got the drum machine further forward this time, cos, you know, it's nothing to be ashamed of.... right?

Ha no you didn't offend me at all, hugely grateful for a set of discerning ears, I agree on the clipping issue, and have been more vigilante with the master volume automation, and trying to remove before i add frequencies. Now all I need is a full rehearsal studio and a bass that HAS had its strings changed in the past 3 years!! And everything I've learnt will have to be replaced again :)

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fakeplasticshrub wrote

thank you for the response

 

You are quite welcome!:wave:

 

I think I'm going to persevere with blending two vocal tracks from now on so I get clarity from one and a nice sitting point from the other, sound like a plan?

 

That is a great plan. You can do this either with 'true' doubled vocal tracks or just make a duplicate and run one dry and the other wet-(w/efx)

 

I agree on the clipping issue, and have been more vigilante with the master volume automation, and trying to remove before i add frequencies.

 

Two suggestions on this.

1- As for as Eq'ing goes, I alway prefer the less is more route. Try to pull back the freq's that seem the most obnoxious/loud first. Then boost other freq's later if needed.

2-I may be just misunderstanding but, I would try to accomplish all the balancing of the instruments with volume automations on the individual instruments themselves. Leave the master faders alone until you're done with the mix or if you see it clip at some point during mixing.

 

Anyway, it's cool to hear someone from across the pond who's into Kyuss.

Keep working at it, even when you're great you can still get better.

Cheers!

-Gabriel-

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  • 1 month later...
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this is on itunes now, and has a blue/silver/white cover

 

I'm 17, and I wrote and played the parts for every instrument, wrote the vocal parts but had someone else sing for me. I also produced, mixed, and mastered it myself as well.

 

I'm always up for constructive criticism. Thanks, JW

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Wooden Ships, a CSN&Y cover. This was recorded live on the back deck at Waldo's restaurant in Vero Beach, Fl. 50' to the right was the restaurant, 50' to the left was the Atlantic Ocean. The band, Voodoo, consists of two guitars, bass, drums and a "sit in" third guitar player. It was recorded using a total of 15 inputs through a Presonus Firestudio and a Presonus Digimax FS. Recorded and mixed in Reaper. No overdubs were harmed (or used) in the recording process.

http://soundcloud.com/richard-king/wooden-ships

 

More from that night and some other nights going back to 1976 can be found here: http://soundcloud.com/richard-king

A video of the band that night (with a different singer):

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Hello,

in order to get rid of the cable mess when using a laptop, my edirol ua25 and 2 microphones just to record sessions I searched the web and found the Alesis AM3 USB Stereo Microphone. Yeah, great, just one cable and you get good stereo quality to record in audiograbber, which I use because it is convenient in cutting automatically when silence and calling lame.exe to make mp3's.

This audiograbber works fine with edirol + microphones, but I hoped to get rid of cablework.

 

Setup of the AM3 was easy, record levels were fine in audiograbber - line recording. When listening to the recording I noticed noise, some artifact which left me unsatisfied.

 

To check out all options I used different recording tools, and recorded in wav, saw 44100 Hz, stereo 16 bits. This sample - converted to mp3 - is attached.

 

The noise level depends on the volume level on the microphone, the more level, the more noise. Since google found no forum entries on this issue, I called the alesis supporter who told me that it would be a faulty device. So I had it replaced. Still the noise on the recordings.

 

I have found some nice guy on youtube -

- who did some recording with an AM3 and hey, there is the same noise.

So what should I do? Is this noise always there with this device? A product property? What goes wrong?

 

You see, a setup with a stereo USB microphone is attractive, I'd rather sort the issue out instead of returning the device to the dealer.

 

I would appreciate any help from you guys out there. If I get it to work I will issue a howto on the cheapest recording platform for everybody to use 4 free.

 

Great harmonies to everybody!

Eckart

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Hey folks.

 

Was recently recording some simple songs, instrumentals only, through a Creative ASIO Line In on my pc to take down ideas while I wait for funds to grow for a new USB interface.

 

I ended up doing a few songs this way (save for some shouts and quiet backing vocals, which I recorded with a Guitar Hero USB mic, I'm so cheap :p) and was looking for some opinions on their quality this way. Obviously not professional in any way, but are they usable as demos for the moment,in your opinion? Would more work help? I'm not expecting greatness from them!

 

Thanks for your input. :)

 

http://soundcloud.com/seven-ways-to-sunday

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Here's a song called "Kristin" that I recently recorded in my living room on home studio level gear:

 

http://www.thesymbols.net/kristin

 

You can download it or just listen - it's the first song on the player at the bottom of the page.

 

Looking for any comments, suggestions, or critiques. Could be about the mix, recording, musician performance, composition, arrangement or whatever.

 

Thanks in advance for any advice.

 

- Jasco

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A cover of Edgar Winter's Frankenstein recorded LIVE at The Riverside Cafe in Vero Beach, Fl on Saturday Feb 19, 2011: http://soundcloud.com/richard-king/frankenstein Band consists of Electric Violin, Guitar, Bass and Drums. Their version of Black Magic Woman from the same evening: http://soundcloud.com/richard-king/black-magic-woman Enjoy and feel free to comment.

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Hello, this is my first time asking for feedback for recording. I am brand new to this. I mean new as in this is probably my 6th attempt ever.

 

I used reaper and some various fx plug ins. The vocals were recorded with a Blue Yeti mic.

 

I guess I am looking for some tips to improve. How to make the tracks blend together more like they belong together.

 

Thanks for any tips for a beginner.

 

http://soundcloud.com/lemony1/the-only-exception/s-cjune

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Hi there,

This is a loop I made for "Dream A Little Dream Of Me" so I can solo over it, thought I might enhance my mixing skills while I'm at it.

 

this is the setup:

Acoustic Guitar Track(DI with EZmix[including some reverb])

Electric Guitar Track(DI with Guitar Rig 4)

Drums Track(EZDrummer with Jazz EZX Plus EZmix)

Upright Bass Track(Kontakt 4 Upright Bass + EZMix)

There EZMix on the master as well.

 

no further EQ, Comp, etc. had been done to any of the tracks.

 

DALDOM_Full.wma

DALDOM_Strait.wma

 

I've Uploaded 2 versions.

The strait one without any of the instances EZmix and also without any delay or reverb I've added through guitar rig.

The "Full" one with all the EZmix instances I mentioned and also with some delay and reverb through guitar rig.

 

 

I'm not "afraid" of using EQ, Comp, etc. it's just that EZmix is easier when I want some pumping backing track for practicing right away.

I have Sonar X1 Producer(With Pro Channel and other EQ,Comp Tools) and also Guitar Rig 4 with the new NI compressors.

 

BTW- I've only included the melody of the song, long solos seemed to be useless for mixing purposes ATM.

 

EDIT:Links Updates to sound click

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First time posting here. I had been playing professionally up until a few years ago. I started at 13 and now at age 59 (60 this August), I find myself with a little studio in my basement, time, inspiration that comes and goes, and too many guitars.

What I'm looking for is a critique of my mixing, production and EQing attempts. I've been working with this equipment for a while and feel I may have finally gotten some good mixes but have no one to tell me whether I'm on the right track or not.

 

I record everything myself in real time, including drums, bass, and keyboards, to a click track (no vocals).

In posting tunes before on other forums I've had people comment on the drums being off the beat as they analyze the song through a daw program and I'm well aware of the fact that I play a bit behind.

I don't use 'backing tracks', loops, or drum machines, I'm making an effort to make it all sound human.

I don't use any of the current software tools. The mix gets burned to a disc and then uploaded to my pc. Fairly old school. But that's me.

 

Equipment: Portistudio 01 8-track

Blue Sky EXO Moniter system

Audio-Techica mic

Fender Super Champ XD

Variety of Fender/Squier guitars and basses

Yamaha DTX drums

 

On this tune I used a CV50 Tele on top, CV60 Strat for backing w/chorus, Ibanez 5-string bass.

The amp was on channel 2, voice 1 (Bassman) gain at 8, treble at 8, bass at 10. Amp is patched out to an ext cab with a Celestion 80w 12". Mic is placed behind the cab just above the opening in the semi-closed back cab. A Boss NS-2 was employed.

Bass was direct and the drums were panned about 10 to 2 o'clock

 

Thanks for any suggestions and I hope you actually like the tune. "Little of This-Little of That".

 

http://www.myspace.com/proazza/music/songs/little-of-this-little-of-that-81448307

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http://www.myspace.com/proazza/music/songs/little-of-this-little-of-that-81448307?ap=1

 

Looking for critique on mixing, production, etc. Anything I could've done better.

 

All instruments recorded in real time. CV 50 Tele on top and CV60 Strat in the back. Yamaha DTX drum kit and Ibanez 5 string bass. Recorded on a Tascam Portastudio 01 8 track.

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Randooser-

 

Great riffing. I'd open up the sound by putting two amp sounds on the same guitar, juxtaposed right and left, and a VERY background long delay. Additionally, work the closed/half-closed hi-hat a little more instead of straight open cymbals. Couldn't hear the bass on my laptop, pump higher frequencies on it so you can hear it on a cheesy little speaker/ a cheesy speaker should be your final mix BTW. If you had no bass and were going for a guitar-only sound, pump up the guitar frequencies on the bass end so you can hear THEM on a cheesy speaker.

 

Great concept, just a little sprucing up is all you need. It's mostly post-production from here on in.

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3 Songs

 

Hey, I wouldn't mind getting some thoughts/opinions on these mixes. I mixed it ITB with no experience when I started out. We're a 4 piece and recorded the songs live with punch-ins after.

 

My concerns deal with the overall blend and quality of instruments and vocals, especially drums. I think my overheads are a bit loud sometimes, but after hearing these mixes over a thousand times I begin to lose my mind a little, so any objective thoughts are appreciated.

 

Further disclaimer: These were all multi-tracked in a big live room.

Mic's generally speaking

Drums: about 10 separate tracks

Bass and two basic guitars each with 1 mic.

 

and then quite a bit of layering for guitar overdubs, leads, etc. ; say between 3 to 8 extra tracks of guitars per song.

 

We produced it ourselves, no label. The sound goal is probably somewhere between indie and major.

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http://soundcloud.com/mlts9984/lord-over-all-1

 

Here's a song I wrote; Thankfully I had someone else to sing it for me. it's done in logic pro, I tracked everything on a focusrite saffire 40, most of the guitars were mic'ed, a few of the lead parts I redid direct with logic's amp sims. The vocals were done with an AKG 214ce into a focusrite voicemaster

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