Critique my sci-fi metal

mharr552000
The Culling -
The vocals are WAY to upfront. This brings the delivery & the lyrics in for very close scrutiny. Something neither suffer well I'm afraid.
The backing track is wellset for the genre.
Treat the vocals in the accepted manner for the style - buried, effected, verby & the result will be much better.
The solo was a little thin for my ears. The playing was fine but the tone wasn't.
Keep at it - just some tweaking to do.
Cheers
rayC
 
RayC - you give this guy genuine feedback and give mine a bunch of nonsense? Hm.

Anyway, I have a hard time understanding how this is sci-fi metal, aside from the lyrics maybe. I don't hear any sci-fi element to the sound, which is something you might want to work on. Arjen Anthony Lucassen's "Star One" is a good example of sci-fi metal, although it might have too much of a retro/prog flavor for your liking.

3 things soundwise need some work.

Vocals - find a style that compliments you. Ever try screams/growls? Popular in metal.
Guitars - Too processed sounding. Try some amp emulation at least.
Drums - Try to think like a drummer when programming a drum machine. Study how drummers play.
 
Try copying your vocal track to another track.
Pan one 75% right the other 75% left, add verb to both, add 25 ms delay to one or the other and see if this is something that you like.

It will widen your vocals out and get them out of the center channel.

As far as the guitar sounds, that's your call, you are th artist here but I think they are too compressed and pre amp gainy. (Is that a word)

Lets have some space ships, Godzilla, belching Zombie noises thrown in here and there. :D
 
Mistral said:
RayC - you give this guy genuine feedback and give mine a bunch of nonsense? Hm.
Click to expand...

Your post is a bit confusing Mistral. It's as if you are creating a conversation about Metal and not asking people to actually critique your high quality music. Go back and read it, you will see what I mean. On to this...

Everything seems fine except for the vocals. OH, the weird drop out parts dont work for me, maybe a small drum fill in those sections.

The vox seem a lil displaced. I cant put my finger on it, they sound like they would go better in a country song.

The playing is good, the energy high, the tune is good and the panning/overall quality is very good. :cool:
 
more lasers!!

Pretty sweet sounds and guitar work here.
Saying sci-fi I was waiting for some powerful synth to come in and some sound effects. Nothing wrong without it though.
The vocals are a bit distracting. I would try to fit them in better, maybe some reverb would do the trick.
The solo rocks! Mixwise it doesn't sound mixed as good to me as the rest of the music throughout.
Cool stuff though, some super sci-fi potential here :D
 
Thanks for the critiques and compliments. On with my rambling reply:
So my vocal performance sucks and my lyrics are lame? What is it about them specifically? They seem off key in spots. They were tracked in December. I can't sing what I hear in my head. I don't have the vocal range.
Having every line rhyme is kind of wierd. That wasn't intentional, it just sort of.....happened. I have a hard time with lyrics. Most of them sound pretty stupid to me. It amazes me that I wrote 13 songs worth in 6 months.
There is a touch(20%) of reverb on the vox. It's the only track in the mix with any. I can pick it out in a few spots. It's pretty subtle.
I don't care for the growling and screaming much. I do some screaming(more like yelling), falsetto and Cookie Monster stuff for backing vox on some songs, but that's all I'm in for.
I had a few lines of lyrics, then I watched a lot of Stargate SG1 last summer. That's why I called it Sci-fi.
The guitars were recorded around May/June of 2005, so I'm pretty sure they were done intirely with a Marshall MG10 set at GAIN-5, VOLUME-5, TONE-10. I don't know if they were miced or line out. Since this song was done so early, it's hard to say. Micing the amps didn't last long though. My son 7 year old son thinks it's funny when I rock out. He falls to his knees, throws up a pair of devil horns and starts screaming, "All Hail Chicken Fries!!" My wife, on the other hand, is not the least bit amused by it. The guitar on the left and the first half of the solo is a B.C. Rich Mockingbird NJ Classic and the guitar on the right and the last half of the solo is a B. C. Rich Warlock NJ with a Floyd Rose. A guy I work with loaned me a Digitech RP50 that I used with the Warlock for the rest of the songs.
This isn't one of my better drum programs. It was done early on. I tried not to do things that would be impossible for a real drummer to do, like hitting two cymbals, a tom and a snare at the same time.
 
You get a better recording sound than I do so I will address song writing.

Your music is fun but I think it would be even more fun if you added an element of unpredictability. Your music is symmetrical. Maybe overly so. I bet you could make good use of odd time signitures. Try some 7 or some 5.
 
Guitars /drums sound cool to me.....vocals seem a bit "dry and in your face"..but I'm not one to judge as I cant sing.Wicked guitar playing ..I was kinda reminded of bits of megadeth and Buckethead at times.I guess its personal prefrence, but to me I would add a bit of delay to the vox and maybe follow EL34's tip about copying and panning the vocal tracks.
Pretty cool tune.
 
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