Is your recording / mix any good? Find out here!

[senorblues]

Not sure if this is the right place. . . . .

 

Here's a link to a collection of solo clips. "Solo Piano" is a live studio "stereo" recording with a ZoomH4N recorder. "Blues 1 & 2" the vocals are recorded separately. "Woodstock" adds a percussion shaker track triggered by the piano. "Americana" is a first attempt at stereo separation. Processing so far is pretty much limited to fading the clips in garageband. I'm open to suggestions both at the source and in post.

 

 

 

 

[bill5]

Do you have any that are just one song? To be honest it's hard for me to get a fix on something with small snippets bouncing from one to another...

 

Anyway, it appears this thread is basically history anyway, so if you have interest (and hope it's OK to post this?), Gearslutz has very active similar threads here:

https://www.gearslutz.com/board/song...demos-158.html

https://www.gearslutz.com/board/song...-here-183.html

Edited May 4, 2018 by bill5

[cooltouch]

This thread appears to have gotten quiet, but I thought I'd go ahead and add a tune I've been working on. Here it is at SoundCloud:

 

 

This tune is an instrumental and was created in Band in a Box using its MIDI instruments. Then I imported the MIDI file into Cakewalk's Sonar Platinum, where I used Cakewalk's TTS-1 synth for most of the voices, and the Sforzando VSTi for the melody instrument. Once I had the mix pretty much set the way I wanted it, I exported the sounds to a .wav file, which is what you're listening to in the link above.

 

Actually, it's more or less complete. There's really only one aspect about it that I'm thinking I might be able to improve on, and that's the EQ on the melody instrument, a nylon string guitar. It sounds a bit too bright to me, but I'd like to know what others think.

 

As for the rest of the mix, I'm open to suggestions. I think it's worth noting that I found a website a while back that gave a quick method for improving ones mix, and it wasn't one I'd been using. Before taking this guy's advice I had been setting all my instruments dead center in the mix. So they ended up all piled on top of each other, and it sounded like it. This guy said that the instruments needed to be separated from each other, so that's what I started to do. In the case of this tune, the bass and drums are located approximately in the center -- the drums are located dead center and the bass a few ticks to the right. The solo guitar is located a few ticks to the left, and the rest of the instruments are located much further from the center. The piano is hard right, the rhythm guitar is hard left, and the vocal Oohs are about 45 degrees to the left.

 

I used a BlueTubes BT Equalizer Model GEQ-12 on the melody guitar and boosted the highs, because the default sound of the classical in Sforzando is very muffled. It really needed some work to bring it out, but I think I might have taken it a bit too far.

 

For the final mixdown to audio, I added BlueTube's BrickWall BW2s-XP, which is a simple, but effective compressor/limiter, set to its "CD Mastering" setting. I like that setting. It gives my tracks a lot of punch and an added volume boost without pegging the meters.

 

OK, I guess that's about all I can think of. If you like that tune, I have about 66 others up at SoundCloud that you can listen to, if you should feel so inclined. Just go here for the complete list of them:

 

https://soundcloud.com/michaelmcbroom/albums

 

[pogo97]

I recorded a CD in 2013 and have sold them all. I'll have a chance to remix etc. before I have another batch made. For one thing, nineteen songs is too many and I think it should be cut back to twelve songs. But I'm most curious about the mix and (probably the weakest part) the mastering.

 

Here's a sampling from spotify

 

I can suggest a couple of songs to focus on if you'd like. I probably can't erase the budgie chirping on some tracks, but I'm okay with that.

 

 

 

 

Edited June 8, 2019 by pogo97

[Phil O'Keefe]

I recorded a CD in 2013 and have sold them all. I'll have a chance to remix etc. before I have another batch made. For one thing, nineteen songs is too many and I think it should be cut back to twelve songs. But I'm most curious about the mix and (probably the weakest part) the mastering.

 

Here's a sampling from spotify

 

I can suggest a couple of songs to focus on if you'd like. I probably can't erase the budgie chirping on some tracks, but I'm okay with that.

 

 

 

 

Which song(s) are you concerned about? I listened to a couple, and I thought they sounded pretty good.

 

And there's always the question of "when's it finished?" After something's already been released, I'm less interested in re-doing it, and more interested in working on whatever the follow-up is going to be. YMMV.

 

 

[pogo97]

 

Which song(s) are you concerned about? I listened to a couple, and I thought they sounded pretty good.

 

And there's always the question of "when's it finished?" After something's already been released, I'm less interested in re-doing it, and more interested in working on whatever the follow-up is going to be. YMMV.

 

 

Thank you, Phil. That may be a signal for me to relax. It's true that I've written more songs, maybe a half-dozen, since then. Maybe I should do a "greatest hits" before I retire.

Edited June 11, 2019 by pogo97

[SteinbergerHack]

Over the holiday break, I decided to start playing around with some recording.  I ended up getting roped into doing some large group mixes for a virtual benefit concert....and figured out that I'm in a bit over my head. 

I know the basics of how things function, but knowing what to do with them to make a recording sound good is where I am a stone-cold beginner.   Below is a link to a really rough song that I've put together to us as a learning tool.  What I'm looking for is an idea of what's wrong with this mix, and what I should be listening for to make it better.  Nay and all input is welcomed, and feel free to be brutally honest.  That said the playing/singing isn't the point - I'm specifically using this to work on my recording/mixing skills.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/1zsjvpyh2gtgyyv/Amie - Rough Mix 1.wav?dl=0

[davie]

On 1/1/2021 at 9:48 PM, SteinbergerHack said:

Over the holiday break, I decided to start playing around with some recording.  I ended up getting roped into doing some large group mixes for a virtual benefit concert....and figured out that I'm in a bit over my head. 

I know the basics of how things function, but knowing what to do with them to make a recording sound good is where I am a stone-cold beginner.   Below is a link to a really rough song that I've put together to us as a learning tool.  What I'm looking for is an idea of what's wrong with this mix, and what I should be listening for to make it better.  Nay and all input is welcomed, and feel free to be brutally honest.  That said the playing/singing isn't the point - I'm specifically using this to work on my recording/mixing skills.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/1zsjvpyh2gtgyyv/Amie - Rough Mix 1.wav?dl=0

Phil doesn't seem to be active on the forums anymore.

But I'll try to give you my feedback on it. I think it sounds pretty good. Not much I would change. Maybe the boost the high-mids on the vocals to make it a bit more in front of the rhythm guitar. Something more of a recording/production decision, I'm hearing the rhythm guitar moderately panned to the right? I feel like you could get some more openness in the mix if you try hard panning the rhythm guitar and balance the left side using either a double or miked in stereo. Again, another production suggestion, maybe the second half could use the introduction of hand percussion (eg. shaker) or something, the song doesn't seem to progress enough sonically during the second half, especially for a song over 4 minutes. I think the singing works well in this track and within the context. A minor detail I noticed in the vocals at 1:19, which sounds like it could be a mic plosive or rough edit on the Be of Could Be. Maybe double check that part, re-record that phrase, or automate some EQ to attenuate it.

I hope this helps.