Mix of a Live song

Nola

Nola

Well-known member
Hey guys, I took this off the mix engineer's sound board when we played live. It's a song I wrote and played guitars on with my former band. Worked the master best as possible, yet I'm not sure it captures the song.

https://soundcloud.com/suicidevan/salubrity-live-in-delaware/s-iXlIg

My question is this: do I go with this live version, or should I retrack it? I really don't like the singer of my former band's vocal, but is he so bad it's worth retracking? I have a studio copy of this song I could redo vocals on, but it's not as good a take. I felt like the live version had the most energy, but the singer is a real problem to me (i.e. anxious sounding/nasal/pitchy/off time vocal). Just wondering how others hear it. The lyrics should all be written there on SC if they can't be understood.

Thanks.
 
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If you can retrack the vocal, do it. It's pretty harsh on the ears. Most importantly, if I can tell, it's bad. Musically I like it.
 
Snowman999 said:
If you can retrack the vocal, do it. It's pretty harsh on the ears. Most importantly, if I can tell, it's bad. Musically I like it.
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That's exactly what I hear. He stinks at vocals. The vocal was supposed to be slack/relaxed and he did the opposite. I was supposed to do it but chickened out due to nerves. Wish that didn't happen because I really like the take otherwise, and it's better than the studio copy I have (different drummer who had timing issues). Ugh. My other option is to redo it all from scratch with programmed drums, but then of course I lose the live feel. :/
Lesson to the kids -- overcome the nerves at all costs.
 
Listening on ear buds...

Depends on what you want it to be. Right now the live vibe is pretty cool and if you go re-tracking your probably gonna lose that....and like you said your gonna have to start from scratch. The singing isn't "horrible" for a live sound. If he wouldn't have done the loud "wooos" it may have been ok.
The problem I am hearing and sticks out the most is the wall of indistinguishable guitars. Sounds like one blanket of distortion throughout the song. The songs itself sounds pretty good....and could be pretty cool recorded the right way.
 
Dude, this is cool. It's a record of your live performance. Had I been there I'd have been drunk and rocking out, I can tell you. If you want to re-record, go ahead. But this recording stands as what it is.

If I were to nitpick one thing, the cymbals are really dominating. I heard a lot of that in indy recordings from the day. Any way to do a small reduction in some frequencies to take the edge off?
 
Robus said:
Dude, this is cool. It's a record of your live performance. Had I been there I'd have been drunk and rocking out, I can tell you. If you want to re-record, go ahead. But this recording stands as what it is.

If I were to nitpick one thing, the cymbals are really dominating. I heard a lot of that in indy recordings from the day. Any way to do a small reduction in some frequencies to take the edge off?
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Hey thanks, Robus. Definitely like it as a capture of history performing, but I'm not sure if the song is fully realized due to the poor vocal.
Maybe the mix clinic isn't the right place for this thread since it's more about re-tracking opinions and whether the song stands as-is.
It's like, if I re-track I can get rid of the bad vocal, yet, I also lose the vibe and live drums -- I can picture it losing a lot of energy with programmed drums. I wish there was just some way to remove his vocal. Sadly I don't have the individual tracks anymore.
 
Since you're able to do something with your live recording, you can obviously export a live version with his vocal, and then retrack with your own (if you can remove his vocal). Then you can have both. Redoing the vocal will never uncapture what the audience saw or what others might hear if given both versions.

I don't know if you ever plan on playing live again. But, if an audience doesn't know your songs (or most of the time even if they do) they don't care (or don't know) whether you're pitchy or off-key. It's live and in the moment. I had a singer with excellent tone who couldn't sing a note on-key (it wasn't till I was in the studio with her, that Don said to me "these are good songs, why don't you have someone singing on-key?" that I found out she shouldn't be singing). Yet, one local music reviewer put in her story "The thing that stood out was the strong lead vocals between the two vocalists (me and her)". It takes all kinds.

Do the song the way you hear it. You record at home (I'm pretty sure right?), and you're not dropping dead (I hope not). Do it till you get it to where you can listen every time, be happy, and proud of the song. I have one song, that is a cassette recorded demo that I won't touch or redo, because even though it's filled with errors, and the vocals are too loud, the song (to me) is perfect. I could never recapture the feeling this song gives me. Yet, I've had friends ask "What the fuck is that?"
 
Thanks for the thoughts, Snowman. I'm leaning toward redoing it and using these live drums as the programmed template. Since I like the drums so much and hate the vocal that seems like the best solution. I just wanted to be sure he stunk enough to justify all that work, and you guys confirmed it, so thanks!
 
The song had all the right parts. Chugging, crunching guitars and careening off kilter guitar lines. Overall pretty tight, I wouldn't have walked away if I was seeing this live UNTIL. You already know the weak link - vocals phoned in and blatantly wrong.
 
Bruthish said:
The singing isn't "horrible" for a live sound. If he wouldn't have done the loud "wooos" it may have been ok.
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Same. The woo's are kinda ridiculous, but I didn't mind the rest at all. Much better than you made it out to be, in my opinion. Cool song and recording. I like it how it is.
 
andrushkiwt said:
Same. The woo's are kinda ridiculous, but I didn't mind the rest at all. Much better than you made it out to be, in my opinion. Cool song and recording. I like it how it is.
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Yeah, I'm not getting what's so horrible about the vocal. It sounds decent to me. Nola, you say the delivery should be more laid back, but this is not a laid back jam.
 
Robus said:
Yeah, I'm not getting what's so horrible about the vocal. It sounds decent to me. Nola, you say the delivery should be more laid back, but this is not a laid back jam.
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Hm, I think it's the nasal tone and anxiety in the voice, but if it's not as bad as I hear it that's a good thing b/c I really don't want to redo the song. I've been sorting through old material seeing what I need to re-record and honestly wasn't sure on this one.
 
If it were me, I'd retrack. The crash cymbals are really out front and really swirly. And I suspect it's more than just the typical SC swirl. The vocal is pitchy and a little harsh.

The guitar parts don't play off of each other well.

The mix sounds over compressed. Not sure if that was you or the sound guy.

Anyway, if it were me I'd retrack.
 
The vocal sounds exactly right to me for the style of the band. Yeah, there might be some digging into some words and they poke out, but run it through some pitch correction if you're that worried about it.

Don't waste your time retracking.
 
Hey, had chance to listen before you took the link down Nola, but not chance to comment. I guess it depends what your intention is for the mix. If it's as a standalone song or amongst other live songs then I guess it's fine as a 'document' of the song. If you're planning on placing it amongst home recorded mixes, it's probably worth a re-track.
 
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