my first serious song!!!

[travis16vp]

http://www.nowhereradio.com/artists/...=3039&alid=599

I recorded a few songs on a porta 03 a year ago but now I bought a tascam 788 and this is my first attempt. I'm not a vocalist so I'm not proud of my singing. I'll probably get one sometime. Any comments or suggestions would be much appreciated. thanks.

[joro]

Great music man....but.....the vox is inaudible to the point that I cannot make out the lyric.....

Drums are frickin' awesome!!
are they canned?

the lead guit part could use a little more finnesse on the the performance but, all in all this is excellent music man.....

Take it easy,
Joe

[B.SABBATH]

I also record with a 788..


good song.. the cymbals sound over compressed to me.. same with the highhat, especially during the choruses.. those crashes sound nasty.. It sounds like the drums would sound decent if you got a handle on the cymbal situation.. The guitar is a bit out of tune.. the vocals could come up.. The biggest problem with this mix is the cymbals. they don't sound right.. You may have overcompressed the whole mix too.. I hope for your sake you have the original unaffected tracks so you can remove the compression..

[travis16vp]

thanks for your comments. For the drums I used a zoom drum machine but I pay close attention in programming it. I read a lot of posts about drum machines not having realistic sounding symbals. I tried 5 different kits on the drum machine and this one sounded the best. How do you guys who use drum machines deal with that kind of problem? This is also my first drum programming. Almost all of my equipment is new. About the lead guitar, I'm mostly a one guitar one bass guy but I decided to put a lead guitar on this song. The guitar is probably out of tune because it's an 80 dollar guitar that my parents bought me 6 years ago and it's still what I'm using now. Maybe it's because of the frets because I tune it everytime I record. The bass is from Steinberg cubasis but I just borrowed a bass. Should I go over the song and record a real bass guitar? I'm new to compression so I just added a little compression to the vocals only on the tascam then when I mastered it on wavelab, I just set auto for attack and release and -5db for threshhold and 2:1 for ratio. Did I get it right? I haven't listened to this song on a cd player so if someone does, please tell me how it sounds. Can you believe that I've been recording this song over and over for 2 years already? First I did it on my computer but it kept on crashing then I did it on a porta 03 but it didn't sound right when played on the computer then I did it on a better computer but when I was almost done, it crashed again. I finally did it now and I have a lot of songs left in my head. Should I do the mix all over or should I proceed with my other songs?

[BrettB]

Not bad, but the vocal are too muddy. Too much low mid (maybe proximity effect?) and not enough crisp. They are also sung a bit too lazy....I also think there is too many cymbal in the heavy parts and I would give a bit more Basdrum. The guitars sound OK for that kind of music.
keep rocking.


Brett
Madra Lyss, feel free to visit
www.belgiummp3.be/mp3/Madra_Lyss/

[boydrj]

Ha ha ... first "serious" recording

Very nice. The drum debate will probably go on as long as there are musicians (and drummers) left in the world. I thought your programming sounded fine, but definitely some real drums on this thing would kick some serious ass!

Don't fret about your vocals, they sounded good. Maybe they just need to come up a bit.

I agree with the recording of the drums with the other posts on this board, though I did think the programming was well done. We would all like to have the real thing, but for most of us $$ is an issue, what with the microphones needed, stands, etc, etc ...

One thing I have noticed is how the exact same patterns played on real drums (as opposed to the machine) can make such a huge difference. One of my favorite bands of all time, called Jellyfish (they only put out two albums) recorded most of their demos using drum machine programming. When they went into the studio, they of course would use the real thing and the patterns were nearly identical as the demo, except played on the real drums there was 100% difference in the feel and ambiance. It is hard to pinpoint, but I think the human ear picks it up right away.

Anyway, just a side note. I thought this sounded good, just needs a bit of tweaking!

[mbuster]

I like it for sure. The only comment besides that, is that it seems like you were afraid someone might hear you when you recorded the vocals. You need to belt that shit out man. Stop eating the mic and yell at it. Good pop song.

[mari]

Great stuff! Main problem though is the vocals. They're muffled. Have confidence in your voice, lets hear you put some emotion into that song. I know where you're coming from. I'm not comfortable recording my own voice either. Actually I'm totally paranoid about what people will think of it! Maybe try doing the vocal track again?

Also, not sure I like all those cymbal crashes. They seem to stick out too much. Personal taste though...?

But yeah, its a really good song. I'm humming away as I type... a good sign of a pop song.

Keep it up. Would like to hear more.

[Toki987]

You really recorded this one hot, with that much compression everyting can get jammed up at the top and you lose some dynamics in the sound. . If you get the cymbals down a little you can brighten up the vocal some too. nice melody and arrangement you got there.

[Evildick]

The song is good but you absolutlely killed it w/ compression. The intro is what your looking for in terms of wave profile. Everything after that is peaked which explains why the cymbals sound like loose change, no kick to the bass, a droning guitar, and boring vocals.

I'm not trying to slam you because this could be a really good song. I'm just pissed that I opened it in SONAR and I actually had to search for a waveform. Back off the compression a little even if the volume is reduced and let us enjoy the dynamics of the song.

The intro is a waveform that you want. Move on from there. You obviously have talent and you killed it by doing what every recording studio does. Louder is not better. I would actually give this another listen if it were remixed. Keep up the talent, but lose whoever told you to use a compressor like that.

[Khompewtur]

you've got good modern rock/pop sensibilities but the mixing had some pretty bad technical flaws.

The cymbals just come out as complete hiss to me.

What are listening on? I'm thinking that if you had studio monitors you never would have allowed that.


I like the monikers you've assigned everything. "Algernon von peel" "if monkeys could bake" etc..

[W.I.S.C.]

Cool stuff!You really got the pop-punk sound down.I would galdly do some vox for you.All your instraments sound great.Ditch the vox and get some balls and really belt the f*cker out!Or just send me the wave.(wink,wink...nudge,nudge)Yea this was cool enough for a second listen even.Keep it up.Nice first post.Pull down the highs on the drums and turn up the melody guitar.No other complaints.Great glamour shot ,too.

[travis16vp]

I know why there is a lot of compression on the song even though I didn't add a lot of compression. When I did a digital transfer through spdif to my audiophile 2496, I set the levels on the soundcard control panel and the gain level would be colored green only. I didn't let it reach yellow or green. When I opened the file the intro looked ok but the appearance of the wave file of the rest of the song looked like a long rectangle. Am I right that this is causing the compression problem? How much should I let the gain level reach? I uploaded a new file but only the bass is changed. i'm not satisfied with it yet. Once someone tells me about my gain levels on the digi transfer, I'll do my mix again.

[twist]

Hey Travis, Very nice first effort. Unfortunately, I can only echo what's already been said. Although I'm not familiar with your equipment, I think you're on the right track keep experimenting. This song deserves a good mix.


Twist

[pglewis]

Holy volume, Batman!

I set the levels on the soundcard control panel and the gain level would be colored green only. I didn't let it reach yellow or green.

[emphasis mine] Did you mean red only? That's what it sounds like. If so, back off the levels and try again. You're way over the top. Sorry I can't add much other than what you already knew.