"Blaster"

JohnnyAmato

JohnnyAmato

New member
Instrumental that I recorded literally like three years ago on my old Tascam 24-track, and it's been sitting around ever since. Transferred the tracks to ProTools and spent the last two days re-doing the drums with Superior Drummer, and mixing it.

Pretty straightforward; drums, two hard-panned rhythm guitars, one lead guitar, bass, and an underlying synth.

Ears are shot, need a break. Think it's pretty close, any input would be appreciated, thanks!

Blaster | Johnny Amato
 
It's a little light in the low end but otherwise sounds really good. I think the obvious place to add some weight is the kick. The bass sounds genre correct, but the kick a bit thin and hollow.
 
Thanks Nola. I didn't take any more lows from the kick than I normally do, but I did make it a little more clicky so it poked through better. That must be what you're hearing- thanks I'll look into it.
 
Good playing as always. I hear what Nola is saying. To my ears the mix sounds midrangy and light on the low end. Obviously the point is to highlight the guitars and especially the lead guitar. But it might be worth trying to boost the bass and kick just to see how things sound. If I were to put on headphones and turn it up, I think that guitar would start to sound ice-picky pretty quick.

The only other thing that jumped out at me was that crash symbol. Something odd about it--a very one-dimensional sound with almost no decay. It sounded like the same sample being triggered over and over, with little or no variation. I'm guessing velocity is at 127 all the time? Maybe try varying that, or bring in other crash samples to mix it up.
 
Robus said:
Good playing as always. I hear what Nola is saying. To my ears the mix sounds midrangy and light on the low end. Obviously the point is to highlight the guitars and especially the lead guitar. But it might be worth trying to boost the bass and kick just to see how things sound. If I were to put on headphones and turn it up, I think that guitar would start to sound ice-picky pretty quick.

The only other thing that jumped out at me was that crash symbol. Something odd about it--a very one-dimensional sound with almost no decay. It sounded like the same sample being triggered over and over, with little or no variation. I'm guessing velocity is at 127 all the time? Maybe try varying that, or bring in other crash samples to mix it up.
Click to expand...

Thanks Robus, I'll mess with the bass and kick a bit later on, bring 'em up and see what I can do. I already pulled a decent amount of offending mids from the rhythm and lead guitars, but I'll look at those again, too.

Yea I used 6 different crashes throughout the song, but I'm pretty sure I know the one you're talking about; it's placed throughout randomly with the other ones, and I wasn't liking it either. It almost sounds like a choke, even though the sustain is all the way up on it, strange. Solo'ed it doesn't choke at all, the mids in the song must be drowning out the sustain somehow. I kept it in there for more cymbal variation, but for some reason that particular one just isn't ringing out or cutting through the way it normally does. You just helped to convince me to cut it out altogether and just use a different one in those spots. Thanks!
 
To my ear it's not too midrangy. But that's all a personal taste thing. I thought the low end was fine.

The only thing I didn't like (can you guess?) was all the reverb on the lead guitar. Sounded like an 80's hair metal band. Great playing tho.
 
Sounds very good to me. Great playing-some cool techniques-sweep picking, arpeggios. some wide interval stuff, impressive! I like the guitar tone and it seems to carry the tune. The rhythm section seems like it could be more prominent, i'd like to hear the bass a bit more-you play some transitional riffs that are easily missed unless you listen for them. The drums are programmed and a bit mechanical but are getting the job done-yeah so i guess my only mix critique would be to turn up the bass. Cool tune-i really like the very last lick of the song-nice.
 
Very Eric johnson- sound to this, I don't think it's lacking low end or mid-rangy at all. Maybe throwing a slight shelf EQ on the master bus would take just a little of the 'ice pick' from happening.
 
Great guitar playing!
I thought it all sounded very good. I thought the lead guitar sounded 80's....but that, IMO, is what the song called for.
Cool tune and nice job Johnny.
 
Wow. Hot stuff, fantastic fret work. I love those guitar sounds. Mix is upper-rangey on headphones - maybe some more bass presence could balance it out. Regardless, great jam
 
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