"Arabian" New Bubba original - work in progress

[Bubba po]

This is a finished song, but for now it has fake drums - real ones are being recorded in a week or so, when the scion of House Po returns from college. Armistice plays some guitar in the verse. Comments welcome.



Real drums version:





Arabian

Out on the dunes
In the dead of night
The life essence quietly flows
Nodding silhouettes clank and whine
Leeching the blood from the stone

Two hundred million years it has simmered
Crushed and pressured by the overburdened mass of ages past
Disturbed and distilled, refined and reborn
To cause the engines of the world to turn

A gleaming icon purrs and roars
One thousand horses lurk in wait
A furnace rages at a cliff
An edifice so out of place
A landscape of frost cocooned within
By a million barrel wall

Two hundred million years it has simmered
Silken blackness pressured by the mass of ages past
Purified and polymerised, recast and reborn
As trinkets destined for a landfill tomb

Out in the Empty Quarter
The bones of the land split and crack
Bedrock hunched, anhydrite seal
Carbonate voids fill with black
Sleeping giant, The Ghawar Anticline
Bleeds out oppression and war

Two hundred million years it has simmered
Crushed by the overburdened rottenness of ages past
Renounce your god, renounce your life, suffer sword and cross
Or carry on within your living tomb

Wanky Guitar Solo

Fin

 

[TripleM]

I'll save comments on drums. But actually for fake they sounded pretty good.

Guitars sound very good. I'm sitting here trying to decide if I'd prefer a bit more gain dialed in. Maybe. But they sound good. They're clobbering the vocal tho. They're doing lots of stuff while the vocal is present. So it's easy for them to pull attention away from the vocal.

Bass level sounds good. You might be able to nudge it up a bit. But it'd also be fine where it is.

The chorus gets really kind of loud. I found myself turning the volume up and down. I'd get it sounding nice in the verse, then it'd be too loud in the chorus. Just right in the chorus, and it's too soft in the verse.

Repost with real drums. I'm sure it's going to sound great.

 

[Meursault]

Really cool sound. Nice guitar playing and everything fits the sound/theme really well.

I honestly don't have a problem with the drums. The tone sounds pretty good for the most part on them. I do agree that the volume changes a bit between sections and that could be dialed back a bit to even it up.

Overall, sounds pretty balanced to me.

 

[jimistone]

I like the Arabian style scales on the guitar wanking....they are played very well. The mix sounds pretty damn good I think. It may be a tad thin in the bottom end for my tastes, but I like a lot of bass and kick and all that is simply a matter of personal preference. It sounds very good overall.
Good job!

 

[Nola]

Agree with Jimi the low end could use some oomph. Real drums should open up the mix. The left guitar at times sounds a bit spiky, so maybe a compressor on it to tame it.

 

[Robus]

This is real good. Guitars and bass sound fantastic. I can here our mutual influences from the early 80s, in the big bass and sparse guitars. You need to get Dave Formula in there. The mix works. You've created a lot of air. Your lyrics always have a point.

The issue I'm hearing is the vocal performance, specifically your phrasing. Listen to lines like "the life essence quietly flows." It is stilted. You sound like you are standing in up in front of your 12th grade lit class reciting. You need to find the rhythm in those syllables, and get it locked into the groove of the song. If you sing it a dozen more times, you'll probably wind up changing the stresses and the meter.

Looking forward to hearing it with Frank's drums.

 

[Bubba po]

Thanks for all the comments, guys. I added Frank's drums at the weekend, this is the first mix with them included. I haven't re-tracked the vocals yet but I may still do so.

 

[sloop]

Snare might come up a bit.. other than that.. It sounds awesome.

 

[Bubba po]

Snare might come up a bit.. other than that.. It sounds awesome.

Thanks, Sloop - you're absolutely right, by the way. The snare was just getting a bit lost in the loud bits. I havent updated the link yet, but I've turned up the snare as you suggest.