"When Your Heart" - adult contemporary

Brian Miller

Brian Miller

New member
Hey everyone,

This is my first post on Home Recording, but I've been lurking for ages. I'm the singer, songwriter, and guitarist for Escher's Enigma.

I also went to school for audio engineering, originally, and thus I produce our music in a home studio. With two EPs under our belt we are preparing to release our first full length CD.

I'd appreciate your feedback on this song for any final changes.

Thank you,

Brian

https://soundcloud.com/brianmillermagic/when-your-heart/s-uJqoO
 

Attachments

  • 02 - Escher's Enigma - When Your Heart.mp3
    7.4 MB · Views: 21
Last edited:
The instrumentation sounds well balanced to me. The drums are a little bright for me, but I think that's probably just my taste and more than likely is right on for 'adult contemporary'.

I think the vocals need some tweaks though - they're a bit flat in spots, like around the chorus. I think they could also come up a hair in the mix too. Hope this helps :)
 
I think it all sounds pretty good. I would clean the lead guitar tone up a bit and give it more of a Dickey Betts type sound...that type of tone soars on tunes like this but that's personal preference. Great job on this one man.
 
Like jimistone says: I think it all sounds good. Nice playing, well constructed song. Vocals were fine. If there was pitchiness (which I didn't pick), it is no real big deal.

Some nice touches, like the bass having a moment of glory just before the end.

Were I to mess with the mix, I'd think about finding a different sound for the lead guitar and maybe bring the little guitar licks back into the mix a bit.
 
Drums sound wonderful and blended well with the bass. I'm cool with the guitar tone, though maybe more prevalent during the verses than I like. I too thought the vox could come up a bit.

Other than that, all good.

Thanks for sharing.
 
Thanks for all the feedback! I'll take some of this into consideration. The guitar tone is very much in line with my music and I'm hesitant to change it, as I suspect this is largely a personal preference. I hear guitar tones all the time that I don't like, but many others do.

Regarding the level of the guitar licks gecko, do you mean the descending riff at the beginning of the song?
 
Hey everyone, here's an update. We've added driving rhythmic acoustic guitars to help move the song along, adjusted the drums a bunch with Greg's help and some other considerations, like making the snare a bit more powerful, backing off some of the verb, etc.

We also backed off the guitar licks in the verses, as many suggested.

How does this sound?
 

Attachments

  • 02 - Escher's Enigma - WYH alt verse.mp3
    7.6 MB · Views: 14
Very nice, but the vocal is definitely being swamped in the chorus, especially for a fairly commercial pop song! :D
 
Thanks guys, that's what I thought too, but had not convinced the other guys of it. I was hoping to confirm it with unbiased feedback here. Now my question is, do you think I should lower the overdrive rhythm guitars, raise the vox, or both?
 
Raise the vox a touch, for mine.


GRATUITOUS ARRANGEMENT ADVICE - feel free to ignore:
Consider adding a harmony or a shadow vocal in the chorus - it's a really simple melody going between two chords - it's not "killer" enough IMO
Consider turning off the solo guitar playing the not quite audible lines at the end.
Consider adding "lead guitar figures" in between the vocal lines at the final chorus if you want to bring it home - "And now it's gone (widdly diddly diddle) I'll carry oooooon (wonkety wonk wonk wonk wonk)" - that sort of thing
Consider retracking the guitar solo - when the guitarist is doing the bend up / play second note thing and double stops, there are discordant tones, as happens - I'd also make it a touch brighter / angrier.

:thumbs up:
 
This is a very tight performance and very tight recording. In particular I like the quality of the bass which is nicely defined and can be felt.

I like Armistice's "Gratuitous arrangement advice". The song is in fine shape as it is, but those tweaks would help, rather than hinder.

More gratuitous advice: maybe chorus vocals could come up a bit (or guitars down a bit). I understand the chorus is supposed to be big. Sometimes I like voices to be swamped by bigne4ss, but other times (like this), I like voices to soar over the top.
 
Armistice: Thanks for the feedback. Some of your suggestions I can try, some of them I can't, or I won't. The tracks for this song were recorded 5 months ago. This is the end of the mixing process for a full length 10 song release. So I'm not going to record new guitar licks since I don't remember which guitar, which equipment, which setting, etc.

I was able to fix the slightly off pitch double stops via Melodyne Polyphonic (godsend). Although I liked it the way it was and was aware of the slight dischord, having it fixed certainly doesn't sound worse.

I can do some harmony vox for the chorus.

Rather than licks in between the chorus lines at the end, I might try a dirty organ, electric piano, synth, etc. That way I don't have to try to recreate the tone of the guitar from the first time around.
 
Brian Miller said:
Armistice: Thanks for the feedback. Some of your suggestions I can try, some of them I can't, or I won't. The tracks for this song were recorded 5 months ago. This is the end of the mixing process for a full length 10 song release. So I'm not going to record new guitar licks since I don't remember which guitar, which equipment, which setting, etc.

I was able to fix the slightly off pitch double stops via Melodyne Polyphonic (godsend). Although I liked it the way it was and was aware of the slight dischord, having it fixed certainly doesn't sound worse.

I can do some harmony vox for the chorus.

Rather than licks in between the chorus lines at the end, I might try a dirty organ, electric piano, synth, etc. That way I don't have to try to recreate the tone of the guitar from the first time around.
Click to expand...

Cool - I just thought it needed a bit of something more in the chorus and a sense of building towards the end. Have a try... if you don't like it, nothing lost.. :thumbs up:
 
Finally saw this.

I listened to both mixes. I thought mix #2 was a bit of an improvement. My comments are only on mix 2.

I think the bass is a little boomy. There is something around 100hz that's bugging me.

The cymbals get sizzly in the quiet parts of the verses. They're probably sizzly everywhere, but it only shows up in the verses.

Vocal sounds great to me.

The accent distorted guitars sound really muffled. I'm guessing that's your preferred sound. My ears like a little more bite.
 
TripleM said:
Finally saw this.

I listened to both mixes. I thought mix #2 was a bit of an improvement. My comments are only on mix 2.

I think the bass is a little boomy. There is something around 100hz that's bugging me.

The cymbals get sizzly in the quiet parts of the verses. They're probably sizzly everywhere, but it only shows up in the verses.

Vocal sounds great to me.

The accent distorted guitars sound really muffled. I'm guessing that's your preferred sound. My ears like a little more bite.
Click to expand...

Thanks again for your comments. In this case, we may just have a disagreement (and there's also a disagreement among members - such is the nature of music). You're the first and only person to say the bass is boomy, as others have complimented it as being full and tight.

The hi hats in the verses (which is what you seem to be referring to) is what I spent time working with Greg on. They are coming exclusively from overheads, so during the verses, the OH are automated down 2db, but I can't go much more than that without affecting the entire kit's sound. Also, they don't sound 'sizzly' to my ear. They sound very lush.

And the distorted guitars too - I prefer a warm guitar tone to a bite and always have. Eddie Van Halen or Satriani rather than Zakk Wylde or Paul Gilbert, if that makes sense. But I also don't have any sense that they're muffled, so I guess our ears are just different regarding tones. Such is subjectivity!

Appreciate your time making these comments. I'll have a final version up in a day or so with the last set of changes, reflecting some of the members' feedback here. After 6 months of tracking, mixing, and mastering, we're ready to be done and send it off. Could tweak till the end of time!
 
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