“The Strip” – song in progress

User demos
Viewing 9 replies - 1 through 9 (of 9 total)
  • Scott
    Participant

    That was fun! I like how you did the intro with the acoustic, and then went into the rawk thing.
    Nice touch. MAde me think of 80’s style Metal – I dig it.
    Thanks for sharing it with us!

    Scott

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    Brandon Mogg
    Participant

    Good job mixing everything together, everything blends. I’m wondering what the vocals would sound like with the delay and verb dialed back a bit.

    On the party noise, it’s fits, but I would recommend changing up the tone, pushing the drive a little more, maybe using a different pickup selection on the guitar. It sounds like there’s 3 competing guitars there all using the same tone, which is why that part may feel a little boring. Emphasize the solo a little more and make the interlude build up.

    batsbrew
    Participant

    waterboy
    thanks for checking this out….!
    you know, i never played any 80’s metal, so i don’t know what that ‘formula’ entails, but i’ve listened to it for sure, i don’t konw, i’m just tryin’ to boogie!
    LOL
    thanks scott

    mojque
    thank you.
    i’ll tell you, i did a bunch of stuff to this this weekend, including dialing back the vox delay (it’s just a slapback, but no verb was there.)

    did a LOT of tweaking and changing this weekend.

    as per a lot of good advice from reviewers, i changed some things, starting with losing the conga at the beginning of the opening of the tune, it was cluttering the beginning.
    i left the hand claps, and let the conga come back in when the vox starts, that cleaned up the clutter quite a bit.

    some other tweaks:
    changed the snare this weekend. went to a 14″ rogers, from a slingerland.
    sounds much more meaty. tweaked the main ride cymbal as well.

    i edited the entire drum track, for subtle changes all over.

    tweaked ALL the drum eq’s, and took out the reverb on the snare, and left on the room mic for drum effects. added a compressor on the top snare head. usually, all the drums are dry, and go to a drum bus, that i put a special channel effect on, that uses 2 compressors in series, along with 2 eq’s in series. it’s a great channel plugin.

    i added a NEW 2nd verse with 2-part harmony, and added lyrics to the funky bridge breakdown….

    remixed the whole thing, made the guitars LOUDER, put a limiter across the drum buss which allowed me to make the entire send to the master buss hotter without changing the peaks (no higher than -6db EVER).

    rolled off the bass guitar starting at 55hz, gentle Q, and that really cleaned it up, and left it fat.

    the whole thing sounds much better now!

    batsbrew
    Participant

    “The Strip” – an updated version (posted june 22 2010)

    http://www.lightningmp3.com/live/42116-6-21-10_THESTRIP.mp3

    i got great feedback on this tune, from many places, and i appreciate that.
    spent the weekend updating this mix, with new tracks and lots of edits.

    ok, a few mix tweak notes for us geeks:

    vox: dialed back the vox delay (it’s just a slapback, but no verb was there.)
    i added a NEW 2nd verse with 2-part harmony, and added lyrics to the funky bridge breakdown…. 2 part harmony there as well. i used a ADK Hamburg condenser to capture vocals, ran it into a ART DPS mic pre, out of that into a DBX MC-6 compressor, and into the soundcard VIA the digital out of the ART.

    percussion: mixed out the conga at the beginning of the opening of the tune, it was cluttering the beginning.
    i left the hand claps, and let the conga come back in when the vox starts, that cleaned up the clutter quite a bit.
    total EQ tweaks on the shaker, also added LIMITING.

    bass: rolled off the bass guitar starting at 55hz, gentle Q, and thatcleaned up some of the low end issues.

    Drums: changed the snare- went to a 14″ rogers, from a slingerland.
    sounds much more meaty. tweaked the main ride cymbal as well.

    i edited the entire drum track, for subtle changes all over.

    tweaked ALL the drum eq’s, and took out the reverb on the snare, and left on the room mic for drum effects. added a compressor on the top snare head. usually, all the drums are dry, and go to a drum bus, that i put a special channel effect on, that uses 2 compressors in series, along with 2 eq’s in series. it’s a great channel plugin.

    MIX:
    remixed the whole thing, made the guitars LOUDER, put a limiter across the drum buss which allowed me to make the entire send to the master buss hotter without changing the peaks (no higher than -6db EVER).

    batsbrew
    Participant

    yeah, i’ve been polishing this turd for a while.
    but it’s a great learning experience for me.

    (2) questions:

    i’m really on the fence about the panning scheme of the rock rhythm guitar part.
    i like it as is, but it definitely is NOT following the more modern method of balancing tracks.
    it’s mixed more like a classic rock track, early-mid 70’s style.
    also, i’m trying to stick to a L-C-R mixing scheme these days, but most of my songs have arrangments with multiple tracks evenly spread left and right, this is a single rock rhythm track, more like an old beatles track, or van halen track.

    i used 2 classic rock tracks as a touchstone for the way i mixed this.
    some zeppelin, and some VHalen.
    (i.e.- rhythm guitar hard panned to the left.)

    on the hard panning:
    i DO have the acoustic to the right, playing along with the rock rhythm on the left, for some balance with the guitars.
    and, i have a short hall reverb send on the rock rhythm, reverb only, hard panned to the right, opposite the rhythm track, to fill the sound out, tho it’s pretty low in the mix.

    does the hard panning of the rock rhythm bug you?

    would it be more effective closer to center?

    or leave it the way it is, and bring the reverb up?
    or possibly change the reverb to a 8ms delay, and bring it up even in the mix —to balance out the rhythm track?

    my general feeling about it is, i like it hard panned, i like the clarity it brings to the mix, it’s really only an issue when listening in headphones, i’d prefer folks listening to it thru big stereo speakers anyway.

    on the arrangement:
    i used 2 songs as a touchstone for arrangement
    (i.e.- acoustic intro length, relevent to when the whole band kicks in, and relevent to the overall length of the song)
    zep’s “over the hills and far away”, and VH’s “ice cream man”.

    some folks have said the acoustic intro is too long, tho i think it’s perfect ( i would….! )
    LOL

    my feelings on THIS issue is, i really like how the longer acoustic intro is almost like a song unto itself. it sets the mood of the song perfectly, just like when i landed in vegas…
    it was kinda upbeat, a little fast, but a bit laid back, because it was day light. as soon as it got dark, the whole mood changed, and it got very intense, and the song is a living breathing version of what i actually experienced there.

    whew
    i need a producer.

    heheh

    batsbrew
    Participant
    jgro002
    Participant

    Wow, this is REALLY fantastic…

    My thoughts:

    It’s great that you dialed back the vox delay – I think that was the thing that stood out most for me as being ‘wrong’ in the first mix (‘wrong’ being only MY personal preference of course). The vocals sound very in your face now which is great.

    The new mix sounds really good. On the panning – I personally think it’s great the way it is. It kinda sucks that modern rock tracks have guitars triple or quadrupled tracked on both sides (playing the same thing) because it ends up not sounding like a band anymore. I think it makes for a much more interesting mix if your ear can focus in on a sound that’s only coming from a single spot in the stereo spectrum. And on this track there are lots of things coming in at different points in the track, it makes it really interesting to listen to.

    Actually, that brings up another point – the arrangement on this track is fantastic (as in the way you’ve written all the parts and how they relate to one another). If you pan this like a ‘typical’ modern rock track it’s going to detract from the arrangement. Incidently, the acoustic intro is great the way it is too, don’t change it!

    So seriously awesome job man. I was blown away by the playing, and the mix.

    Jeremy.

    iMac 3.06 GHz 4 GB OSX 10.6.5, Focusrite Saffire 6 USB, Logic Pro 9.1.3, Lacie D2 Quadra

    Dave Lanciani
    Participant

    I also get that “80’s” vibe, mainly in the vox. But very cool. The parts are much cooler and arranged better than most of the “hair-metal” from the 80’s.

    And I tend to agree with the point about how all modern guitars are hard panned left and right (I do it myself, too…) – that it does take away from the live jam feeling. Anyone know who the first rock guitarist was to do those hard LR overdubs?

    http://www.dimaensionxblog.blogspot.com http://sites.google.com/site/deadsidemanor/ "Jazz isn't dead, it just smells funny." Frank Zappa

    batsbrew
    Participant

    jgro002
    hey, thanks for re- listening!

    yep, deciding on this panning thing is a pain….
    some folks, are just dead-set on hearing things like ‘everything else’
    they want evenly panned, multitracked rhythm guitars, which to me, homogeonizes the sound.
    i listen to older classic rock recordings, and hear distinctly different things all over the place, and only rarely doubled, that’s more common with lead vox than anything else.

    still, if the arrangment is such, that it throws a listener off, then maybe it’s wrong.

    but hell, listen to the 1st van halen record!!
    LOL

    all the guitar is in the left speaker, with nothing but pre-delayed reverb in the right!

    back then, if you played that album in your buddie’s camaro, and the left speaker was out, you had zero guitar!! heheheh

    so, i don’t know, i’ll keep experimenting with it, but trying to ride the fence between being creative with mixes, knowing that a lot of folks are stuck with ear buds in their heads, listening to ‘headphone’ mixes, and knowing my best mix sounds best thru a big cranked home system, is chafing my ass!
    LOL

    thanks jeremy

    Dimaension X
    thanks man.

    hm, music recording history.
    i know the beatles experimented a lot, and did multi tracks and all that…

    but i’d have to say it was Les Paul.
    guy was a genius.

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