Cream cover

First off the overall impact is very similar to the original, good job there.
Issues:
1. Bass is out of control. There is too much low end verb on the drums and the bass is smearing the whole bottom end to hell.
2. Alesis SR16....this is just a personal peave, sorry.
3. You are not hitting the high notes in this song but I commend you for the attempt, better than I could do.
4. There are a few clippy sounding distortions on the vocal and a couple passages of the song.

I like the smooth guitar at 1:04.
 
DAMMIT, YOU SUCK!!!

DAMMIT, I was gonna cover this one, eventually! [when I get off my ass]
DAMMIT, DAMMIT, DAMMIT.

WHEW!

Okay, now I'll listen to the tune!;)
 
Okay, well, that was pleasant!

God, I love that song!

First, I liked it a lot, and it showcases a great effort. It's very well put together, and fun/easy to listen to. Just like the original in most respects, and I like that a lot.

Technically, I think the bass and first rythm guitar lacked an ambient, high end "snap", or "presence". The rest of the song elements balanced pretty well & sounded 'live', except for that, IMO.

Then, the vocals are really nice, but a little too "armchair", if you know what I mean. Of course you don't, I'm speaking in riddles, dammit! [Ha].

Well, I think the vocals were phrased and pitched perfectly, even with that 'Clapton' sound, but I think it needed more gutteral energy.

F/I, instead of close-micing the vocals at 6", and walking through the vocals as 'la-dee-da', I'd recommend backing up the vocal mic to arm's distance, and REALLY PROJECTING YOUR VOICE. Back up to 3'-4' from the mic, and PROJECT! It will make a BIG difference in the overall 'tension' of the vocal track. The original vocals in BADGE had a high pitched tension to them, as if the song was pleading about something.

Also, pls extend the jam-out solo section. I know, the studio version of this song is short, but have you ever heard the "Rainbow-Concert" version? It's much longer, and indulgent, [classic of 70's rock!]. Anyway, I realize the original studio version of this song is 'short & sweet', and I'm not knocking you in the least, but a rock-monster like myself wants to hear some long, indulgent solos to the end! OKAY, I realize there is no 'fade-out' on this song, and it just 'ends', just like that, but there is a way to extend the solo portion of the song, to indulge the listener. I reference the "Rainbow-Concert" version of "Badge", that it's longer & more indulgent, and yet seems to still end the same way, on the '7th-9th' chord, or whatever.

That's my technical analysys of your really great cover!

Overall, I give this two thumbs up! It's a great song as your basic staring material, and I'm glad someone covered it! Thanx!

I was gonna cover this myself, I swear, and I still may do that, someday, TBD. Nice to hear YOUR cover, for sure, & good job!

Anyone who covers this tune, is alright in my book! Rock On!

Thanx again!

;)
 
Last edited:
jake-owa said:
First off the overall impact is very similar to the original, good job there.
Issues:
1. Bass is out of control. There is too much low end verb on the drums and the bass is smearing the whole bottom end to hell.
2. Alesis SR16....this is just a personal peave, sorry.
3. You are not hitting the high notes in this song but I commend you for the attempt, better than I could do.
4. There are a few clippy sounding distortions on the vocal and a couple passages of the song.

I like the smooth guitar at 1:04.
Click to expand...

Jake,

1. Right on about the bass, I'm just now coming out of my midrangy recording phase, and I went to far in the other direction. This to me is the biggest offender, of the whole recording.

2. Zoom 123 haha, got ya, I also have an Alesis SR-16, and never use it, as the Zoom beats it all to hell. But it's still not the real thing.

3. Hitting the high notes, I does the best I can, maybe with more practice, hell not even maybe!!

4. Clippy may be caused by the high bass level.

Thanks for taking the time to listen, and helping this poor boy out!!

Now here's one for you.

1. That avatar is way too scary, and the fear level needs to come down, at least 8db.

GT
 
Re: Okay, well, that was pleasant!

A Reel Person said:
God, I love that song!

First, I liked it a lot, and it showcases a great effort. It's very well put together, and fun/easy to listen to. Just like the original in most respects, and I like that a lot.

Technically, I think the bass and first rythm guitar lacked an ambient, high end "snap", or "presence". The rest of the song elements balanced pretty well & sounded 'live', except for that, IMO.

Then, the vocals are really nice, but a little too "armchair", if you know what I mean. Of course you don't, I'm speaking in riddles, dammit! [Ha].

Well, I think the vocals were phrased and pitched perfectly, even with that 'Clapton' sound, but I think it needed more gutteral energy.

F/I, instead of close-micing the vocals at 6", and walking through the vocals as 'la-dee-da', I'd recommend backing up the vocal mic to arm's distance, and REALLY PROJECTING YOUR VOICE. Back up to 3'-4' from the mic, and PROJECT! It will make a BIG difference in the overall 'tension' of the vocal track. The original vocals in BADGE had a high pitched tension to them, as if the song was pleading about something.

Also, pls extend the jam-out solo section. I know, the studio version of this song is short, but have you ever heard the "Rainbow-Concert" version? It's much longer, and indulgent, [classic of 70's rock!]. Anyway, I realize the original studio version of this song is 'short & sweet', and I'm not knocking you in the least, but a rock-monster like myself wants to hear some long, indulgent solos to the end! OKAY, I realize there is no 'fade-out' on this song, and it just 'ends', just like that, but there is a way to extend the solo portion of the song, to indulge the listener. I reference the "Rainbow-Concert" version of "Badge", that it's longer & more indulgent, and yet seems to still end the same way, on the '7th-9th' chord, or whatever.

That's my technical analysys of your really great cover!

Overall, I give this two thumbs up! It's a great song as your basic staring material, and I'm glad someone covered it! Thanx!

I was gonna cover this myself, I swear, and I still may do that, someday, TBD. Nice to hear YOUR cover, for sure, & good job!

Anyone who covers this tune, is alright in my book! Rock On!

Thanx again!

;)
Click to expand...

Thanks R.P.,

Jake sent me to hell, and you brought me back again!!

The bass level to me is the biggest offender. I think other things would fall into line better with the proper bass level. Sorry about that.

The voice being "armchair" perfectly put, I might add, at this point is about as loud as I could go, and still maintain some control.

Thanks to you and Jake for taking the time to do such a thorough critique, you better believe I appreciate it.

It's well worth a printout!!

BTW: Don't let me stop you from covering this tune. Go for it, I'll be the first to tune in.

GT
 
Great cover GT! Did a really great job of it to i might add. Is Jack Bruce still alive?:confused: Great stuff bro, brought back a lot of great memories...now go cover "sunshine of your love" for me:D
 
I've never heard the original (fine, I'm a Philistine).

I have to agree with the hateful bass comments.

the hi-hats/snare seem a little fuzzy/crisp/treble-y.

Well-put-together, though.

Nice drums, overall.

I didn't read the earlier posts, but I saw SR-16 in there. I used one for years. I sold it on Ebay and switched to the fxpansion DR-008, but I recorded all the samples first! I still use many of them!

Nice song. I enjoyed listening to it. Just a couple of things that bothered me. Thanks for posting!

Piltdown Man
 
I missed about the SR16...the snare is definitely similar then.
It's teh weirdest thing, everytime I search for an avatar I use words like puppy and love to find images buy I only get stuff like this, where's the ill knob? I'll try again soon I promise.
 
Good cover... (I'm guessing) ;) Never heard the original...

Singing isn't too bad there... for someone who does a lot of James Taylor-ish
stuff. Little more lively than your usual!

Some amp noises... the reverb is returning too many highs, IMO... can you
roll off everything at about 4K on the 'verb?

Bass sounds like dry hamburger in there... would like some articulation on it.

The big thing is the too-bright verb... makes what you've done sound "cheaper"
than it should, IMO.

Gooood musicianship... very smooth!


C
 
participant said:
Good cover... (I'm guessing) ;) Never heard the original...

Singing isn't too bad there... for someone who does a lot of James Taylor-ish
stuff. Little more lively than your usual!

Some amp noises... the reverb is returning too many highs, IMO... can you
roll off everything at about 4K on the 'verb?

Bass sounds like dry hamburger in there... would like some articulation on it.

The big thing is the too-bright verb... makes what you've done sound "cheaper"
than it should, IMO.

Gooood musicianship... very smooth!

participant,

Thanks so much for the listen!

Singing, thanks "not too bad" I take that as a compliment!

Amp noise, yeah I got lazy, and didn't face away from the equiptment. Sometimes I get an unexpected take that's not bad, and this one happended when I was facing the wrong direction.

"Bass sounds like dry hamburger" excellent call, synth bass, I hate it but I had to use my 32 bit smart media card, as my 128 bit card has become permanently corrupt. Not enough track memory for real bass.

"Too bright verb"
THIS IS WHERE I OWE YOU BIG TIME!! I reset the treble on the reverb, from the default setting 5, down to 0, then I made a test recording.

WHAT A DIFFERENCE!! Especially on the canned drums, now much more convincing. Everything else improved dramatically too.

Thanks so much,

GT
Click to expand...
 
freshears,

Thanks for the listen, glad you liked it!! I think Jack is still around, probably my favorite bassist of all time.

Sunshine of Your Love......hmmm.

Piltdownman,

Thanks, yeah it's hard to make canned drums sound real, I think the best you can do is just try to make them as tollerable as possible. I use a Zoom 123.

jake,

Drum machines, to me are a real challange, I think they do allright for non critical listening. I don't think my ears could take real drums, and the family would hire a hit man.

Thanks again for the listen, and very helpfull critique!

My recordings would suck much more without you guys!!

GT
 
Pretty nice.....
it has a distorted quality to it that you already know about......
Fairly decent vocals.....could use a little more 'balls' but you've got to do what you've got to do to reach those notes.....
snare drum is totally wimpy sounding.....find another snare sound and never let that one out of it's cage again! :D

Nice job on a classic song
 
Hey GT,
Nice cover man. 2 nits here that i think might add alot to the tune: (these have been covered already, so sorry for being redundant) The bass is pretty washed out and woofy. If you dont wanna mess w/ retracking, a big roll off of the lows (around fitty) might help out... ...you might then be able to bring up the level and not lose too much low end. The other is the drums (snare in particular) Its real thin sounding and doesnt sound like its recorded in the same place as the other instruments, etc. It sounds like the sample rather than the verb. Again, you might be able to remedy that a bit w/ a boost in the low end/ low mid eq. ...just thinking out loud. I like the vocs. Theyre kinda thin and conducive to the cover. ...works for me. I like the guitar in this ALOT. ...nice tones, and playing. ...pretty chorus too.
Nice stuff man!!!
g
 
nice rendition, one of my favorites. A more gentle presentation. all the stuff has been covered pretty well. I'd like to hear a bit sharper and brighter attack on the rythym guitar like when you chinkchink the chords. Maybe take the trim down and play it a tad harder to let its character be up with the drums and other guitar. The kick drum has a bit of a long envelope to it, like hearing the attack then the the tone swell right behind it in millisecs. With that much bass playing around it, the sustain needs to be real short so it pumches but dont ring with the bass. jus imho. good pickin big daddy..
 
Lt.,

Thanks for takin the time.

Yeah, my voice, this song was pretty high with little bits of falsetto thrown in.

I found it very challanging, If I tried to sing any louder, it would start to sound dishonest, I hope you know what I mean.

I've decided to try to think of my voice, as just another instrument, and not to take it personally. Damn the neighbors, I gots to sing!!

My voice is kind of like a Wards Airline guitar, not the best, but I'm struck with it.

Guernica,

Thanks much. I tried playing this song back through Winnamp, with it's ten ban eq, and set the 60 cycle slider down about 6db. It sounded a lot better.

Yeah I would love to have a 10 band finalizing eq to play with, but I don't.

The bass was synth, sorry about that, I was stuck with 32 meg smart media, and that's where I saved memory. I think the bigger the storage on these cards, the more chance for corruption. I think my next card will be 64 meg, should be enough for one song, with as much as I want to throw at it, and then dump it onto my laptop. Reformat, and start over on the next song. I usually do one song at a time anyway.

Yeah, getting good sound out of a drum machine may be impossible. I tried to get the treble setting as close to perfect, seemed to start sounding muffled, at anything lower than what I had it set at, on this song. Ended up looking fairly flat on Winnamp spectrum analyzer.

Sorry to bore you, but I love talking about this shit.

Thanks

GT
 
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