Lost Again

good song-I like that guitar on the left-does that cool lick before the chorus-oooh drummer messes up coming into the 2nd verse. Your drums kinda sound like mine(and thats not too good) How did you mic drums and with what? Good vocal track very solid...~2:50 that one guitar doing the 2 note lick sounds kinda loud--I'd watch overall volumes of the guitars compared to the vox..ya the more rythm guitar could come up or the lead could come down a tad....snare sound is kinda hurtin---the 2nd guitar solo needs to come up. Sorry for all the neg. the song is good and most of the things I hear are just volume issues(except for the drums)(and I feel your pain)
 
Don't apologize-that's exactly the kind of feedback I was looking for. The drums were recorded almost a year ago at the start of our recording venture. They were bussed down to two tracks, and there is no way of getting the original snare & kick track. The drums, mics, & equipment we were using then were sub-par & our knowledge of them was limited. Plus our drummer has since improved & bought a new kit. Due to no click track on this one (obviously) there is no re-recording the drum track. I agree with you on the guitar volumes. I've been playing with those some & think they still need tweaking. The one thing I'm surprised you didn't mention was backup vox. I've been trying to decide whether to re-record them or just leave what we have. They were originally recorded as scratch vox with an old radio shack mic in a noisy room. I think the timing on them could be better.
 
coplinger said:
The one thing I'm surprised you didn't mention was backup vox. I've been trying to decide whether to re-record them or just leave what we have. They were originally recorded as scratch vox with an old radio shack mic in a noisy room. I think the timing on them could be better.
Okay...First...COOOOOL song. Nothing in it bores me, and I'm bored pretty easily.

About the backups...I do a LOT of background vox; I mean, a LOT. So if you ever wanna' hear what an off-time bg vocal sounds like...just ask me. I have THOUSANDS of examples.
These are JUST FINE. I'm not getting "noise," or the noise that I am getting is getting sucked up into the rhythm's distortion. Also, they're not written as totally stacotto (sp?) backing vox that track the lead syllable for syllable and word for word in the chorus...these do their job (padding and depth) very well to my untrained ear.

TOTALLY SUBJECTIVE COMMENT: At first, I sorta' thought the lead vocal (which is really strong) sounded a little..."mature" for the tune. That opinion went away before I could even type it.

Okay, short version: 1. Really good song from a groove/first listen standpoint; 2. Backups = fine. 3. Lead Vox = better than fine.

I miss the SpinDoctors. I'd buy this (unless somebody were giving it away for free :D).

Good luck with this, it's a solid song. (oh yeah, there probably are drum issues like Stratomaster said, but I'm not the guy to ask).
 
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Nice job coplinger. I hear nothing recording wise that bothers me except maybe levels. Could just be a volume issue in mixing too. I like the song and the parts of all the instruments. Great vocals, I wouldn't touch them. But I have to agree with some of the comments about the guitar volumes (especially on the solo) and the drums and bass do seem to be a bit distant (drum micing is a bitch aint it). Very good overall though, keep it up! :D
 
One more thing

I looped it about 10 times (not exaggeration), and I like to tell people when I do that, because to me, that's a good indicator of how "annoying" a song is... Cool tune.

Shutting up now.
 
Very good tune but the drums are the only detractor. Most eveident is that their levels needs to come up. The next problem with them is compression. It sounds like the snare is over compressed. It sounds like a popcorn fart. I mean no disrespect to you my friend, it's a great tune and deserves a little better. Just MHO.
 
I liked the song and performance. I wouldn't change the station.. :)

Wheres the drums though? I hear a cymbals, a cardboard box, and a someone hitting a sheet of paper... It sounds like you compressed the crap out of the snare and gated it? The kick has no real attack or body. The cymbals sounded kinda washy... but that could be the mp3 process.

The bass seemed to disappear when the guitars were really coming on.

The vocals kicked ass. Ignore Chrisharris's mature voice comment.. what does that guy know about maturity... :D Just screwing with ya Chris/Melonhead/Jamal/B.Sabbath!!!! I know what he meant... but Huey Lewis had a mature voice too, so what...

The guitars were excellent sounding. I really dug the semi-dirty tones. My only complaint is that the guitars dominated the mix, especially during the chorus when the guitar up the middle comes in... way over powering over an important vocal section and the back-up vocals. Maybe pan it more to one side and bring up the vocals. Also, the lack of drums and sometimes the bass really made a difference in how dominated the guitars seemed.

Despite all my nit-picking, the song does kick ass. I'm on my 5th listen now, so that says something!

How did you record the guitars anyway? Very impressive. You captured some excellent tones.
 
right off the bat.....GREAT GROOVY FEEL MAN!!!..

VOCALS great.......harmonies ...nice...
drums well you know....lol.........as others stated..."that guitar tone rocks.."...i agree whole heartedly.......that chord progression in the chorus is nice....man that guitar tho....sweeeeeet......and the vox just keep getting better.........great song man!!


thnks
jamal
 
chrisharris said:
At first, I sorta' thought the lead vocal (which is really strong) sounded a little..."mature" for the tune. That opinion went away before I could even type it.
I know you were kidding JR '97, but since I'm in a state of TOTAL PARANOIA right now, I just wanted to make sure that my post is clear. What I meant was, I changed my mind about the vocal sounding too "mature" for the song. In fact, 1/2 way through the second listen, I was pretty much a big huge fan of this tune. I think my initial impression was based on the fact that this song reminds me of something that Counting Crows might do...and that guy's voice (while great) is about as mature as...as...well, let's be totally safe and say it's just not mature.

______________________________

Last Summation: VOCAL = PERFECT.
 
I had the band over tonight & we all got a kick out of reading the posts. How did you know we were using a cardboard box & a paper kick drum? And the popcorn fart was especially hard to record. Our vocalist now has a huge ego (to match his age).
We all pretty much agreed with everything said. We got a better mix on the guitars tonight & we are going to try & re-record just the snare & then mix it in with the other drum track. Kind of a scary proposition. I'll re-post the song complete with changes later this week. Thanks for all the help & kind words.
 
Do you have any tracks left over? If so, you could have the drummer overdub a new performance until it was as perfect as could be! I don't know what your set-up is or if this is practical, but if so, it would be worth a go!
 
JR#97-
The guitars were a mexican tele through a digitech pedal & a Tech 21 amp, and a '73 strat & a DeArmond Starfire semi-hollow through a Line 6 amp. We ended up miking the amps with a sm57 instead of running direct, and in some cases had a marshall v67 as a room mic that was mixed in. The models on the line 6 were the Fender Champ & Blackface. Some of the guitar parts were doubled.

Crawdad-
It's a possibility, but I think we'll try just the snare first. If it was just this track, I'd say definately yes, but most of the tracks we laid down have these same drum problems. Maybe that'll just become part of the '5foot6 sound' Engineers from all over will be calling us to find out how to get that 'popcorn fart' sound.
 
coplinger said:
JR#97-
Maybe that'll just become part of the '5foot6 sound' Engineers from all over will be calling us to find out how to get that 'popcorn fart' sound.
I like you.:D Stick around.
 
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