Pop Punk remix thing...

zed32

zed32

Re-Attached Member
here's another one of those AcidPlanet remix contest thingies that i did. i recorded and mixed everything yesterday, got it uploaded this morning and i'm pretty excited about it so far.

it's some new song by Simply Red, the original is here:
http://www.acidplanet.com/Play/PlayClip.asp?clip=simplyred/simplyred_SoNotOverYou&t=7612

so i just took the lead vocal, then turned it into a punk rock song, check it out:
http://www.acidplanet.com/artist.asp?PID=993393&t=9033


i think you might have to register to be able to download the MP3, but the streaming version isn't really that bad. anyway, let me know what's good and bad about the mix. i know its super loud and maybe distorted, but hey i'm trying to keep to the pop punk theme! are the vocals maybe a bit too up-front? i put some reverb on the snare to liven it up, but is it too much?
 
The concept is awesome and I think the remix is really cool on its own. It turned out great in my opinion.

As always, there's a couple of things that you could tweak. The vocal isn't too loud but there's a disconnect between the intimacy of the vocal recording and the pop punk style. I'm of two minds about it because the more I hear it (2nd listen now) I'm kind of digging that about it, but you could reduce it by maybe adding some short and subtle slapback echo or something. (That might not work.)

The other thing is that the drum programming is great but it's still really obviously a drum machine. It depends on what your drum machine makes available what you can do about that. It would be great if you could alternate between two snare samples on the fills, that's the main tipoff.

As before, overall I think it's really good.
 
thanks for listening! yeah the vocal was tricky to get it to sit, i tried a couple different effects and ended up just smashing it through a super-colored compressor or two (or three) to make it sound a bit more grungy.

the drums were actually done in DFHS, so it's all multisampled, but i guess i could mess with the velocities a bit more in the snare fills. i think the compression on the snare really kinda kills the character of the multi-sampled hits, but hey if you listen to similar modern music, that's how everyone's snare sounds haha. i just got kinda lazy with the velocities while programming the fills, so every snare hit in the song is like 100% full strength. :D :D

thanks again for checking it out. i appreciate the tips. i might go back tonight and mess with the drums a little bit to make it somewhat more realistic.
 
Good quality Zed...sounds pretty good.
I agree teh vocals could use something in order to sit a bit better. They are pretty crisp, and a bit of some effect might smooth the edges a bit. Try a few things, and see if anything grabs ya.
Other than that, you did a good job putting the music together. Nice guitar tone, and good progression. :cool:
 
I think a big part of why the vocals don't sit is that they are just slightly out of time in most of the song.

Also, maybe try fattening them up a bit with eq and maybe make them a bit wider.

Just my two cents.

Sounds pretty good though! :D
 
NL5 said:
I think a big part of why the vocals don't sit is that they are just slightly out of time in most of the song.

Also, maybe try fattening them up a bit with eq and maybe make them a bit wider.

Just my two cents.

Sounds pretty good though! :D
Click to expand...

yeah, the original song was like 77BPM, so i bumped it up to 88BPM (but then basically doubled that for the drums) and i think that might have kinda made the timing a little screwy. also, in the original, since it's kind of a mellow tune, i think the singer was pretty lax on the timing anyway. i can try and get more nit-picky with the timing and see if it helps. there's still like 30 days for the contest so i still have plenty of time to get it good. thanks for the tips man! i like your work. :D


Dogman, the edges are kinda hard because instead of giving one big vocal track, they actually split it up into like 16 different parts, and some of them come in kinda abruptly, and the compressor adds a serious edge to it. i think i might try some volume automation or something, and maybe do some more EQing. thanks for checkin it out. :D


so thanks everyone for listening, now i got some more ideas to work with to get this thing sounding awesome. :cool:
 
Very cool treatment; but the vox out of sync thing really needs to be addressed.. It's just distracting enough to keep me from enjoying it thoroughly...
 
OK i sat down and messed with it a bit, i aligned the vocals better so they are pretty close to spot on. i added a chorus plug to the vocal track, brought the guitars up a tiny bit, and used a different compressor on the bass to tighten it up a little bit. also took a small amount of reverb off the snare.

the mastered version is so over-compressed it ain't even funny!! but hey that's what the kids are into these days, haha. :D :cool: :cool: i almost got it as loud as American Idiot! hooray for the volume wars! :D


here's the link again:
http://www.acidplanet.com/artist.asp?PID=993393&t=7895
 

Attachments

  • Smash.jpg
    Smash.jpg
    61.7 KB · Views: 48
zed32 said:
OK i sat down and messed with it a bit, i aligned the vocals better so they are pretty close to spot on. i added a chorus plug to the vocal track, brought the guitars up a tiny bit, and used a different compressor on the bass to tighten it up a little bit. also took a small amount of reverb off the snare.

the mastered version is so over-compressed it ain't even funny!! but hey that's what the kids are into these days, haha. :D :cool: :cool: i almost got it as loud as American Idiot! hooray for the volume wars! :D


here's the link again:
http://www.acidplanet.com/artist.asp?PID=993393&t=7895
Click to expand...

Things seem to sit better now...a bit more cohesive.
Good job man... :cool:
 
thanks again dudes. i notice that the sibilance is a little harsh, so tonight i'm gonna go through and try to fix it with some volume automation. :cool:
 
Wow. I'm just gonna fire my drummer and buy your drum machine. Are those stock beats and fills, or did you actually sequence them?

Anyway, totally dig the track. I heard the original, and I was lamenting opening this thread... but then heard your track, and was totally blown away. You rock.
 
dkerwood said:
Wow. I'm just gonna fire my drummer and buy your drum machine. Are those stock beats and fills, or did you actually sequence them?

Anyway, totally dig the track. I heard the original, and I was lamenting opening this thread... but then heard your track, and was totally blown away. You rock.
Click to expand...


haha thanks. i sequenced them with the Cubase MIDI drum editor thing and Drumkit From Hell Superior. glad you like it haha, pop punk is really not my type of music, but the vocals just wouldn't work well with a heavy metal remix this time. :D
 
Sounds pretty good zed. Theres something about the guitar tones that doesn't sit well with me, but I can't pinpoint what it is. Like maybe they need some mids scooped out or something. Overall though, pretty good. :)
 
haha well i scooped the shit out of the guitars already, so i was kind of afraid to do it any more. but i think it's just my amp. lately it hasn't been sounding as good as it used to, i'm thinking of getting a retube kit from Eurotubes for it.

i used 4 tracks for the guitar, two of them without very much gain, and two of them with the gain cranked pretty hard. the EQ settings on the amp varied a little bit between the 4, but in general they were already scooped on the amp. but what i was noticing while mixing is that the distortion just doesn't have that sharp, glassy edge to it that i wanted. it just feels kinda "slushy" for lack of a better word, haha. if i tried scooping it much more than i already have in the mix, they just sound dull.

i actually mic'd the amp this time, which i hardly do because i don't want to piss off my neighbors, but this song was really easy to play so it only took me a couple tries to nail each guitar track. i used my strat with Hot Rails bridge and Cool Rails neck pickups (2 tracks of each) running thru my Traynor YCV80 turned up to about 4.5 (super loud) with the grille off and a SM57 off-axis and a few inches from the speaker. also the amp was on the floor, i dunno if that makes much of a difference. the amp really wasn't sounding the best in the room to begin with. anyway i need some more experience with micing the amp to hopefully get better results, i've only actually mic'd up an entire song maybe two or three times. otherwise i go DI and use amp sims and SIR cab impulses. :o
 
zed32 said:
but what i was noticing while mixing is that the distortion just doesn't have that sharp, glassy edge to it that i wanted. it just feels kinda "slushy" for lack of a better word, haha. if i tried scooping it much more than i already have in the mix, they just sound dull.
o
Click to expand...
Yeah thats what it is. They sound sort of dull. Not crisp enough.
 
yeah dude that's just my amp. :o :o :o :o


i swear it used to scream so much harder though, back when i first got it. but i was a noob and i kind of abused it. I used to turn it on full power without warming it up, and then leave it on for stupid amounts of time. there was also like a 8 month period where i didn't even turn it on at all. so i think the tubes are probably not in the best shape anymore. also the speakers in it suck. i wanna get maybe some Vintage 30's and the High Gain retube kit from Eurotubes. the amp almost sounds like a solid state now to my ears when it used to sound such much nicer. :o
 
Dude, that's a really cool piece. :)

The bass drives real nice. Haven't heard the original.

This sounds really nice.
 
Hey zed,

I managed to get it to play. Nice work, I can't pin point any particular area that needs addressing by listening on my pc speakers at work. The vocals definitely sit and gel with the music in your latest mix. I like the snare tone.

Nice work zedekiah! :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top