alone and acoustic, baby...

[groucho]

So, I spent half a day tracking this tune with bass, drums, guitars, etc. and then afterwards, just for the hell of it, sat down and did a solo acoustic take of the same song, and wouldn't you know I ended up ditching the "full band" version altogether. The singing's a little rough I think, since it was the end of the night and my voice was tired and I wasn't being super careful, but I ended up kinda liking the vibe. Any mix comments? Just guitar and voice, but for some reason that fucks with me more than mixing "band" stuff.

Thanks,
Chris

"Done Got Tired"
www.venusburning.com/chris/Done_Got_Tired.mp3

[M.Brane]

Sounds pretty good like it is.

Couple nit-picks:

I think you could get away with giving the guitar more body on this since it's the only accompaniment. The vocal is much larger sounding by comparison.

I don't dig the 'verb on the vocal. It has a nasty tail that distracts from your voice, and emphasizes the sibilance.

[WATYF]

Originally posted by groucho
Any mix comments? Just guitar and voice, but for some reason that fucks with me more than mixing "band" stuff.

I'll take a listen when I get home... but I feel your pain man... my acoustic/vox-only stuff is so much harder to mix then my "larger" productions. You'd think it'd be easier... but it's just so hard to get a good balance...


(unless, of course, you're Erland... in which case you just sit down and press "record" and everything sounds perfect. )


WATYF

[ashulman]

Reminds me of Tom Waits. I like the way it constantly shifts back to minor. I don't really have a problem with the mix. Maybe you could bring the guitar up and the vocal down a tad but not much. FX sound fine to me.

[Pedullist]

Nice....Tom Waits meets Jeff Buckley (I'm probably the only one who hears that )! You've got some voice man! Do you...errrrr......smoke a lot? LOL

Beautiful desolate atmosphere. The bedroom sound is perfect for this.

It would be nice if you could get it warmer, but I don't know how. It would probably mean 'new mics' or 'new soundcard'...

I didn't expect this...very good!

[TripleM]

Not much to add. I like the idea of giving the guit an EQ boost in the low mids to warm it up. I don't think it will interfere with the vocals because they were so stron. Were there some plosives in a few spots?

[groucho]

You know, I think you guys are on the right track. I think I went a little too far with the "raw" kinda sound here. So I did some gentle eq work to try to warm it up a bit and lessen that clunky "bedroom" sound. I also brought the guitar and vox closer together volume-wise (I agree that the vox were a little loud).

Oh, and Pedullist: I quit smoking 4 months ago I figure any minute my voice is gonna start smoothing out...

The new version is at:
www.venusburning.com/chris/Done_Got_Tirednew.mp3

The old one's still at the same place.

Any comments on the new one? Thanks, guys.

Chris

[SLuiCe]

Congratulations on quitting smoking. I quit last fall after 10 years. Never looked back. Good feeling. Great, actually.




I like the verb room you chose here. The only thing taking away from the vocal is the sibilance that's being dragged out from the verb. Slightly unnatural like that. Is there any way for you to cut some 4500-6k from either the track or even the reverb? It's not bad really. I wouldn't want to sacrifice the details of your voice that you captured very well for a little ol' Ess. Just maybe something to play with.

The song itself reminds me of something from Blue Valentine...maybe even the title track. But it definitely has a its own unique qualities. I too am a big Tom Waits fan. I have most of his studio stuff and a few live boots that are great.

The guitar is also really nice.

Good stuff man. Thanks for sharing.

Tom

[groucho]

Sluice (& others who mentioned the sibilance) - you're right on with that comment. I cut a little in the 3-6k area from the reverb and I think it makes a difference. So, the "final" (for now) version is now at:

www.venusburning.com/chris/Done_Got_Tired.mp3

and the rest have been pulled down (I was getting confused). Any further complaints welcomed.

Man, if you guys only knew how normally pig-headed I am about advice of any kind. But I've been getting some great hints here lately.

Oh: and yeah, I wish I'd quit the cigarettes a decade ago (or never started perhaps). Amazing how much better I feel. And it definitely has affected my voice control when singing - more breath! I loved cigarettes like the compulsive addict-type I am, but I'm never going back.

thanks much,
Chris

[SLuiCe]

Yes, that's the first thing I noticed after quitting- I was able to start learning voice control.

Sssssssssssssssounds a lot better to me!


I like your voice a lot by the way. I'd like to harmonize sometime. This one is a bit free in terms of tempo so it's difficult. But I think the contrast could be cool.

Anyway, I dig the song a lot man.

[SLuiCe]

Actually Lt. Bob's sax would team up nicely with your voice in a song.

[M.Brane]

Guitar sounds much better.

I still think you could cut some highs off the 'verb. I'm just not diggin' the bright tail.

The rest is great!

Whatever you do, don't start smoking again like I did. I quit for 5 years, and like an idiot started up again. I've tried to quit a couple times since then, and it's about 100x harder than it was the first time.

[SLuiCe]

Yeah, take it from us... we're experienced quitters.

[WATYF]

Sounds cool man. Very imtimate "in-your-face" vocal. nice guitar tone.

A little accompanyment wouldn't hurt (light perc at certain points... maybe some organ peeking in here and there... acoustic bass git... whatever)... but I dig it the way it is.


WATYF

[M.Brane]

Originally posted by SLuiCe
Yeah, take it from us... we're experienced quitters.

Wasn't it Mark Twain who said: "Quitting smoking is the easiest thing I've ever done. I've done it a thousand times."

[fprod south]

Sounds great to me. Can't think of any critisms. Very intimate feel. Cool song.

[chrisharris]

Yes, time is indeed like medicine, and I'm assuming that you'd be referring to the old "time heals all wounds/hearts" thing, b/c that makes sense and is normal, but ME, I had to think about it a bit, lol..."Well, you only need it when you run out of it?...Is that what he's saying? Or could he be referring to having a SURPLUS of time (medicine), and DEFINITELY NOT NEEDING ANYMORE?"


...oh wait; "time heals;" that's all he's saying - and I'm a complete dork for making this hard....

-Don't bother re-reading any of that, man...it won't make any more sense the second time, lol... I just took a little journey all by myself there, lol.

SONICALLY - There was exactly one thing that stood out to me immediately in a negative way, and it was the "space"?? on the acoustic...When it first started, it sounded so dry and upfront to me, that I thought it was gonna' be a kind of a cheap sounding tune...Then the vocal comes in, and *Presto*, instant perfection between the 2 elements, and it stopped reminding me of a home recording from then on...So then I go back and listen to the guitar again, and it didn't sound too dry to me at all?...(probably b/c I still had the sound and space of your vocal in my head, though. This is all an incredibly long-winded way of saying that I want more ambiance on that guitar track when it's solo'd at the beginning...not so much that you notice a shift when your vocal starts, but more than is there now.

I wanna' give this one a day or 2 and comment a little more on the actual song, b/c I think there are some killer passages in here ("think" = "believe and know to be true" in this case) ...but I don't have the big picture of the song yet...and I'll probably wanna' post something even weirder when I do

...oh like you're even still reading this reply, lol.

[groucho]

Thanks for the further comments guys. Y'all been very helpful this time around. And Sluice: you can harmonize with me *any* old time.

Mr. Harris: It feels damn good to be over-analyzed...(note the "anal" in the front of that word) "Time is like medicine"... well, I was trying to say... um, er... that is to say that what I *meant* was, um...

Shoot, you've got me confused now. So many possibilities.

Maybe what I meant was that you just gotta swallow it.

Hell, that's not right...

(trails off, paralyzed with indicision, rocking back and forth and drumming fingers in an unvarying pattern on the stone floor...)

-Chris
PS:hey chris, you know damn well I read (and think about) whatever damn rambling you put down for me... I'm taking a look at that guitar "space" issue.