Troller turned submitter...

A

Acoustic-Fury

New member
I've been trolling around these boards for months and have finally gotten back into at home recording. I've gotten quite familiar with everybody's music here - I must say the diversity and talent is top notch.

I wrote and recorded the music for this recently - I still haven't laid down any vocal tracks...if the mood hits you, just let me know what you think about the mix and/or the song structure.

$150 Dollar Back Pack


I recorded with:
The Original Mbox on PC
Pro Tools 7.3
Blue Bluebird Condenser Mic
Shure 57 Mic
PC Drummer 5
Taylor 310ce Dreadnaught Cutaway Acoustic/Electric Guitar

I mixed it with a pair of DT 770 PRO Cans (I am currently saving up for some middle range monitors - I realize my mix here has suffered because of the cans)

I look forward in taking place in upcoming PMC's and submitting some cover tunes soon.

Thanks!
 
I love this. Some good Acoustic playing and the drummin' is great too!!

I am listening on headphones and everything sounds good to me through them. I love what you've done with the cymbals also.

I have nothing to say, except it rocks.:)


By the way, I listened to your myspace band page and the Sabre War song kicked ass.


Are you Gus or wandering Mike....?:D
 
The drums need some taming: the snare and the cymbals - I think I get where you're headed but - they're are a little annoying most particularly the very 1st one.
The chord prog is very familiar. I like the texture of the guitars.
Good start.
 
I think you mean that you've been "lurking". "Trolling" implies you've been insulting people and trying to sabotage threads. I hope that's not what you mean.:eek:
 
Or perhaps TRAWLING might be more accurate - cruising around net out hoping to catch something useful?
then again, in good aussie vernacular, he could be PRAWNING! (or would that be shrimping in amherheekun?).
 
true-eurt said:
I love this. Some good Acoustic playing and the drummin' is great too!!

I am listening on headphones and everything sounds good to me through them. I love what you've done with the cymbals also.

I have nothing to say, except it rocks.:)


By the way, I listened to your myspace band page and the Sabre War song kicked ass.


Are you Gus or wandering Mike....?:D
Click to expand...

Thanks for the kind words true! That PC Drummer 5 is a pretty quick and easy program and you'd be surprised what you could pull off. Yea the Sabre war song was a contest submittal that I didn't even place in...if I had more time I have some other things I want to do to make it more interesting. (I was short on time when I decided to enter)

I would be Gus. Nice to meet you!


rayc said:
The drums need some taming: the snare and the cymbals - I think I get where you're headed but - they're are a little annoying most particularly the very 1st one.
The chord prog is very familiar. I like the texture of the guitars.
Good start.
Click to expand...

Yes I agree rayc...the cymbals just about rip your face off at times. I have a couple of other things I'm going to try to get a better dynamic going as well. I still am trying to find my groove as far as how much compression to use - I am trying to go light - but I'll continue to work on it. Thanks for the input.

I left the main guitar in the intro, chorus and bridge clean with out any added effects. I put a little bit of compression and EQ 1 high pass (moved to taste) to make the solo parts pop a little bit. I used a light reverb, dither and EQ on the master fader.



Monkey Allen said:
I think it sounds pretty good...that's a sweet guitar you have there...I could only afford the 110 :/
Click to expand...
Thanks MA...yea I can't afford it either. I'll have it paid off by next year sometime. I played the 110 and was very close to getting it - then I picked up the 310 and went over budget...I just really liked the feel and tone of that guitar. I liked the 110 better than the 410 - that guitar is extremely bright sounding (which I didn't care for)


RAMI said:
I think you mean that you've been "lurking". "Trolling" implies you've been insulting people and trying to sabotage threads. I hope that's not what you mean.:eek:
Click to expand...
Yep...you are correct. Lurking is definitely the word I should have used. (BTW I dig Indian Summer).
 
Guitars sound fantastic. I like the hard-panned clean acoustic sound. Those drums sound awful. Why are the cymbals so warbly sounding? I'd start from scratch with the drums and re-do them. Nice little song though. Just fix the drums and maybe add some subtle bass lines and you've got a keeper!
 
Acoustic-Fury said:
Yep...you are correct. Lurking is definitely the word I should have used. (BTW I dig Indian Summer).
Click to expand...

Cool....and thanx....The only reason I haven't commented on your song is because I'm at work and can't listen. I'll definitely check it out later.
 
Greg_L said:
Guitars sound fantastic. I like the hard-panned clean acoustic sound. Those drums sound awful. Why are the cymbals so warbly sounding? I'd start from scratch with the drums and re-do them. Nice little song though. Just fix the drums and maybe add some subtle bass lines and you've got a keeper!
Click to expand...

Thanks for the comments and the honest critique Greg (I'm a big fan of a lot of your covers - "Ain't Talking Bout Love" in particular!)

Yea I'm going to mess around with the drums a little bit more - everyone's comments made me take a step back and assess something that I've just grown used to hearing.

I use PC Drummer 5 (which is a $50 dollar U.S. program)...functionality is great but the drum sounds aren't. I was thinking about getting Drumagog and using it in conjunction with PC Drummer 5...but I just purchased the Melodyne plugin and don't really have the cash flow at the moment...soon though!


lbanks said:
Good playing and guitar sounds great. The drums are the only hold back. Oh, and more bass.:D
Click to expand...

Yea Ibanks...I've got a bass line knocking around in my head that I hope to put down soon. Thank you for the comments!


Thanks Supercreep for the input! I checked out Little Purple Circles and listened to Naples a number of times - good stuff.
 
Haha, thanks man.

I can't listen again right now, but just off the top of my head I think I remember the snare needs more "crack". It has the pop, but sounds kind of lifeless. Maybe use a narrow Q setting in a parametric EQ, boost the hell out of it, and sweep it to find the crack in the snare. Then bring it back down to earth and broaden the Q and slightly boost that area to bring some crack out.......if that makes any sense. I think the kick sounded okay for harder rock stuff, but too clicky for this genre. Take some of the beater-attack out of it and go for a gentler "thud" kind of sound.

The cymbals were by far the worst part of the drums. They sounded warbly and unnnatural. Panned too wide and all over the place. Think of the drums naturally. When you hear a kit live, you don't hear toms panned all over the place and cymbal crashes in each ear. There is a stereo field, but it's subtle. try to duplicate that in your mix. You obviously don't want everything crammed up the middle, but leave the kick and snare up the middle and pan the rest gently around them. I personally like to hear the hats or ride a little wider than the crashes because that's how most kits are set up. But do it however you like it as long as its pleasing to the ear. A cymbal crash should be an accent to the beat and music. Not a distraction.

Just my 2 cents.
 
Thanks for the suggestions guys!

$150 Dollar Back Pack version 2.0 with Bass and reworked drums...


Ibanks got in my head about adding a bass line and I recorded it pretty quickly (I have to redo it in that I just miss kick hits a couple of times - I think I remember not syncing up in the 2nd verse).

I used a Fender P-Bass played through an Ampeg SVT-III head through an Ampeg SVT-15EN cabinet.

I went direct on one track and "live" on another.

Greg I really appreciate the time you took to critique the mix and I hope I did your comments some justice - after spending most of my time on that damn snare drum (I couldn't quite get the "crack/snap" out of it that I wanted without red lining the thing. I ended up doubling up the snare and compressing one side and lowering it while high pass EQing the 2nd snare track and bringing it up. What I got was almost but not quite a "crack" that we wanted but almost a "dead fish".

The kick drum was the only direction I went the opposite from your suggestion...I didn't mean it but I was just going by what was sounding good at the time - just something with me and a kick drum that you can almost "see" the roundness of the beat (that's what I picture in my head anyway...almost like a bouncing ball)

Practice makes perfect...so I guess I'll keep trying that route.

Next will be vocals - but nothing is coming to mind like usual (which is a bit unnerving...so we'll let it fester a bit. :))
 
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Sorry for the double post...

I downloaded the demo version of Drumagog and replaced the demo snare with the snare that I worked on for an hour in 2 minutes...

Here is version 2.1 with the new snare drum:

$150 Dollar Back Pack 2.1


Which snare sounds better you think?

I'm all snared out...fresher ears in the morning.
 
The Drumagog sample sounds better. I know you put a lot of time into it, but the second snare sounds worse than the original version. You got a lot of crack out of it but you lost the punch and meat of the snare. It's okay though. I didn't notice this the first time around, but the timing seems to be off a little too, which is exaggerated by the drum sounds. Definitely sounds better with the bass line in there though. Keep working with it. :)
 
The time put into it is nothing as long as I sit there and figure things out. It helps even more that you are helping me a long with it. Thanks!

You are talking about the drumagog snare hits being off, correct? I noticed that they were just lagging a hair myself during the bounce - especially during the snare rolls.
 
Acoustic-Fury said:
The time put into it is nothing as long as I sit there and figure things out. It helps even more that you are helping me a long with it. Thanks!

You are talking about the drumagog snare hits being off, correct? I noticed that they were just lagging a hair myself during the bounce - especially during the snare rolls.
Click to expand...

Each mix is off a little. The music is ahead of the drums.
 
Weird...is that because I started messing around with the EQ & compression of the kick and snare drum?

...and then Drumagog just highlighted it more?

This is probably why you want to get a good drum sound before you begin tracking...and not go back during mix down.
 
Acoustic-Fury said:
Weird...is that because I started messing around with the EQ & compression of the kick and snare drum?

...and then Drumagog just highlighted it more?

This is probably why you want to get a good drum sound before you begin tracking...and not go back during mix down.
Click to expand...

I really don't know why it is the way it is. It just sounds off to me. I'm a drummer, so when I listen and play along on my lap, I'm a little ahead of what I'm hearing with your drums, but I'm with the music. I'm not implying that I'm some human metronome or anything, but I usually track my drums last before vocals, so I'm used to playing along with existing music and click tracks. That's just how it sounds to me.
 
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