AudioArtist

fakeplasticshrub wrote thank you for the response You are quite welcome! 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-

@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. 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-

@ 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-

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-

Here's one I'm working on................. http://soundclick.com/share?songid=7257319 Hey tilimo, The recording is very good. Very nice full bodied low end on the accoustics as well as crisp well defined top end. Your voice is good as well, I'd like to hear you bust out with it a bit more but I know thats not exactly appropriate for this tune. Vocals are also well recorded, I'm curious what mic and signal path you used. Over all I'd say that this is well done. I would have liked that breakdown part to get a bit more intense but again I realize that's not what you were going for. Good Work.