2 EPs later and I'm checking in to share the latest...

[Pinky]

"Unenjoyment" is now available for download. Be sure to download the full MP3 version with album art. There's also a FLAC version available, and it's always free.

In 2002 I embarked on what has become quite the journey into homerecording. This forum along with other online sources for info have been the primary support and inspiration. I've always done the best I can with the minimal amount of gear (cost, quantity, and sometimes quality). There's a certain satisfaction in getting a good sound from sub-par equipment. Call me old school like that. This forum has become a reference more than a hangout for me (I spend most of my time talking music on the rush fanboard 'counterparts'). I see a lot of the same names are still here giving their valued input and I applaud them for their help in my previous attempts and what they have most likely done to help other peeps like myself achieve their best.

As far as playing I've always been a hack and for years relied on the talents of others I worked with to overshadow that fact. Time, practice, staying away from drugs, and other factors have slowly allowed me to come out of my shell musically and song by song I feel like I'm coming of age as a musician and player.

This EP is a collection of mostly hard rock instrumentals with some voiceovers and sound bites thrown in. The opening track is a tribute to yesterday, in the style of prior Boogiemen songs. It's quickly thrown aside for the next chapter in the project's evolution. The other notable is (besides some drum programming on track 6) I did everything on this recording. In the 17 years I've done music off/on this was the first 'solo' effort.

All of the EPs, albums, and songs are available on the website. I hope you enjoy it.

 

[LemonTree]

I love stuff like this when people come back and showcase their music. I'm grabbing the flac of the album from your website now. Will check in later after a few detailed listens.

Thanks for sharing,

Alex

 

[WhiteStrat]

Headin' off to download it as well. I'll check back in. Thanks for the heads up.

 

[Pinky]

I'd be very interested to hear what you have to say. I don't hang with many musicians besides the few online collaborators and one friend locally, and we're all in-the know when it comes to each other's work. Which means, no objectivity.

I'd also like to mention that my favorite track is #5, Warpath. Which may have also been the easiest to perform and longest to produce. There's a lot of sound effects on that track and it took a long time to arrange them tastefully. I still wanted the music to be the showcase but had to reinforce the message with the sound bites.

There's also a music video for Unfun on the website.

The se 8 tracks were recorded from July-October this year in my free time. Maybe 100 hours total time, including writing and performing. I may participate in the 1 month contest next year (write and produce an album in 1 month).

 

[TaintedDb]

Not my bag but keep trying!

I'd be very interested to hear what you have to say. I don't hang with many musicians besides the few online collaborators and one friend locally, and we're all in-the know when it comes to each other's work. Which means, no objectivity.

I'd also like to mention that my favorite track is #5, Warpath. Which may have also been the easiest to perform and longest to produce. There's a lot of sound effects on that track and it took a long time to arrange them tastefully. I still wanted the music to be the showcase but had to reinforce the message with the sound bites.

There's also a music video for Unfun on the website.

The se 8 tracks were recorded from July-October this year in my free time. Maybe 100 hours total time, including writing and performing. I may participate in the 1 month contest next year (write and produce an album in 1 month).

 

[Pinky]

Not my bag but keep trying!

Anything in particular? Production, music? Your response is a bit vague. You want me to keep trying, but I would need to know what I'm aiming for...

 

[TaintedDb]

Well… it’s hard to comment as I really hate negative people posting when you are posting your music and letting your guts hang out in the wind.

As far as your production: To be honest I did listen on my laptop so I won’t comment on mix though I suspect they are not very tight.
As far as song “writing” the songs lack focus and the “EP” lacks focus from song to song. You said yourself that you keep away from musicians and only collaborate with people in “the know”. I think that is a mistake. I think you should play with and write with as many people as you can. Your playing is not right up to snuff but I commend you for staying sober and working on your craft (there, my positive comment). That being said, there are those out there that would appreciate what you have done so don’t let me be a buzz kill. The build up of your first post really had me waiting to be blown away and i was sadly let down. BUT... keep at it.. I would never discourage anyone.

 

[Pinky]

Okay, I think I understand. Just out of curiosity...

1) What style of music do you usually kick back to?

2) would you consider listening at a time when you have a better playback environment?

3) Did you listen to all of them, bits and pieces, skip around?

__________

You're right about the build-up, but I guess I see these as something special in the sense that I arrived here 7 years ago being pretty clueless on how to accomplish this and can now produce music with minimal cost and effort. The songs are intended to be fun, rocking instrumentals.

I welcome constructive criticism. Usually that means being somewhat detailed so the 'constructive' part of the criticism is useful for me to apply to future pieces (as applicible).

 

[Greg_L]

Well, I truly applaud your effort, but this really misses the mark with me. I've listened to the whole thing from beginning to end, and to be perfectly honest, I think my ears need a few days rest. It's loud, distorted, sizzly, harsh, etc. The guitars (I'm assuming those are guitars) sound like they were recorded direct through a distortion pedal and nothing else and it's super-squashed. Also, if you're gonna put up mp3 downloads, which is cool, at least make them medium quality mp3's. One of those songs clocked in at 92 kbps. That's pretty poor. I'm not trying to be harsh or rude or anything, I'm just saying. It's tough to listen to.

What is your monitoring setup?

 

[TaintedDb]

don't get down on my post. You have a talent but it's not shinning for me in the music. That's more what I want to say and my thoughts are that playing with other people is a GOOD thing and you should not be avoiding that. My first CD i played 90% of the tracks and it really suffered as a result and I never realized it until I had a real lead guitar player come in and just absoutly whale on my tracks and make me see what they could have been. Also, multiple people being involved seems to shape the tracks and entire project in one direction. You can take what I say with a grain of salt, i am not a repsected Homerecording.com member, i don't post very often or share very much, yet.

 

[TaintedDb]

1) What style of music do you usually kick back to?
To varried to say. Anything from NIN to Matchbox20 to Alanis to Prince and Rush.

2) would you consider listening at a time when you have a better playback environment?
I will be in studio this weekend. I will listen again but i suspect the same result.

3) Did you listen to all of them, bits and pieces, skip around?
I listened to every song all the way through. Shcocked considering your opening post build up to be honest.

 

[Pinky]

don't get down on my post. You have a talent but it's not shinning for me in the music. That's more what I want to say and my thoughts are that playing with other people is a GOOD thing and you should not be avoiding that. My first CD i played 90% of the tracks and it really suffered as a result and I never realized it until I had a real lead guitar player come in and just absoutly whale on my tracks and make me see what they could have been. Also, multiple people being involved seems to shape the tracks and entire project in one direction. You can take what I say with a grain of salt, i am not a repsected Homerecording.com member, i don't post very often or share very much, yet.

Well, I agree 100% about collaborating! I recently finished an album with another home recording artist Mike Vieira and it involved numerous other musicians tackling various roles. I did the mixing, mastering, much of the bass, and some guitar work. He's actually selling CDs so the feedback has been positive. Unfortunately he's not an engineer and we're 3,000 miles apart so there's a lot of flaws in the production and I did the best I could with what was provided to me. There's definitely a freedom when only having to focus on your part from song to song, and handing off music to others and seeing the innovation that comes back. But with this EP I wanted to pursue some ideas that I didn't think would require other musician's time. I wanted to save their effort for something less 'me' and more 'us'. I have a covers collaboration already in process with the same musicians I did the mike vieira project. That should be invigorating.

 

[Pinky]

Also, if you're gonna put up mp3 downloads, which is cool, at least make them medium quality mp3's. One of those songs clocked in at 92 kbps. That's pretty poor.

They're all high quality VBRs. Which track was it? I'll need to unzip the package and make sure something isn't damaged... fwiw, some media players (like windows media player) don't recognize the VBR bitstream properly and report false track times and bitrates. It's an issue with those players, not the files. Winamp displays the info properly, in comparison.

I have 4 playback sources and each of these songs play fine on them. The first track is probably the harshest, and if it could be completely retracked it would, but the recording isn't bad enough to warrant that sort of time. Most of the distortion is fuzzy on purpose, it's how I prefer it. I go with a wall of noise approach versus stringed kick drums like most metal bands. There may be room for improving the compression I'm using on the electrics. Doing heavier material is new to me, and I'm sure there's a few things I can do (possibly just with some EQ trimming) to get more umph from the distorted guitars. Yes, all guitars are through the Boss ME-50 effects pedal. I also have a Line6 Chorus/Reverb pedal which I use sparingly. The Boss has onboard compression which I keep set in the middle so I have some wiggle room later. But some tracks have very little compression on the instruments.

Not sure about the loudness though, I tread as far from ear fatigue as I can. Most songs clock in betrween -10 and -11 RMS, with -9 peaks. This is well below industry averages. Turn the volume down?

 

[Greg_L]

They're all high quality VBRs. Which track was it? I'll need to unzip the package and make sure something isn't damaged...

I have 4 playback sources and each of these songs play fine on them. The first track is probably the harshest, and if it could be completely retracked it would but the recording is bad enough to warrant that sort of time. Most of the distortion is fuzzy on purpose, it's how I prefer it. I go with a wall of noise approach versus stringed kick drums like most metal bands. There may be room for imporving the compression I'm using on the electrics. Doing heavier material is new to me, and I'm sure there's a few things I can do (possibly just with some EQ trimming) to get more umph from the distorted guitars.

Not sure about the loudness though, I tread as far from ear fatigue as I can. Most songs clock in betrween -10 and -11 RMS, with -9 peaks. This is well below industry averages. Turn the volume down?

Lol. Dude, -10 is pretty freaking squashed. I'm not a dynamics-rule anti-mastering nazi by any means, but what you got here is not pleasing to the ear. It's not the songs or whatever. It's purely the production. At any speaker volume, it's gonna sound heavy duty squashed and ear fatiguing. Combine that with not-so-pleasant source sounds and I'm very curious what your monitoring situation is that you don't hear what we hear.

 

[Pinky]

Lol. Dude, -10 is pretty freaking squashed. I'm not a dynamics-rule anti-mastering nazi by any means, but what you got here is not pleasing to the ear. It's not the songs or whatever. It's purely the production. At any speaker volume, it's gonna sound heavy duty squashed and ear fatiguing. Combine that with not-so-pleasant source sounds and I'm very curious what your monitoring situation is that you don't hear what we hear.

Unfortunately I've read or been part of probably a hundred discussions on dynamics over the years. The end result of most of those threads was that some people are more sensitive to compression than others. You sound like one of those musicians. And there's absolutely nothing wrong with it, it's mostly a result of which era the listener is from. Older musicians hear more aggressive production and run away, which many younger listeners don't seem to mind and actually prefer the heavier feel. I'm in the middle (34) so I appreciate the best of both worlds. I would never want to hear Aja or the Beatles back catalog produced like Death Magnetic, but there's a time and place for properly applied aggressive mastering techniques. Point in case would be Porcupine Tree's Deadwing or In Absentia, loud by most measurements and sound IMO (and many other's opinions) phenominal. I've also heard albums that had minimal mastering compresison used that still sounded like muddy shit (Porcupine Tree's Fear of a Blank Planet. or the last Foo Fighter's album). In some sections of my songs there's little or no compression (just normalizing), and in other parts I go with something beefier.

That at least explains things a bit. I know the recordings aren't that bad.

 

[Pinky]

If you would, can you try one track at www.mikevieiramusic.com and see if those also sound ... whatever? I mixed and mastered all those tracks for someone, even played on a bunch of them. Those have been scrutinized by A LOT of ears, and have gotten high scores for the production (relative to what we had to work with of course - still not studio quality by any means). I'd be curious to know if those still sound harsh to you. They're mastered identical to the tracks I'm sharing.

 

[Greg_L]

Unfortunately I've read or been part of probably a hundred discussions on dynamics over the years. The end result of most of those threads was that some people are more sensitive to compression than others. You sound like one of those musicians. And there's absolutely nothing wrong with it, it's mostly a result of which era the listener is from. Older musicians hear more aggressive production and run away, which many younger listeners don't seem to mind and actually prefer the heavier feel. I'm in the middle (34) so I appreciate the best of both worlds. I would never want to hear Aja or the Beatles back catalog produced like Death Magnetic, but there's a time and place for properly applied aggressive mastering techniques. Point in case would be Porcupine Tree's Deadwing or In Absentia, loud by most measurements and sound IMO (and many other's opinions) phenominal. I've also heard albums that had minimal mastering compresison used that still sounded like muddy shit (Porcupine Tree's Fear of a Blank Planet. or the last Foo Fighter's album). In some sections of my songs there's little or no compression (just normalizing), and in other parts I go with something beefier.

That at least explains things a bit. I know the recordings aren't that bad.

I completely agree. I'm perfectly okay with modern mastering and super-loudness. I'd squash my own stuff louder if I had the gear to do it and still have it sound good. I shoot for about the same loudness as you do: -11-ish with peaks around -9.

 

[Greg_L]

If you would, can you try one track at www.mikevieiramusic.com and see if those also sound ... whatever? I mixed and mastered all those tracks for someone, even played on a bunch of them. Those have been scrutinized by A LOT of ears, and have gotten high scores for the production (relative to what we had to work with of course - still not studio quality by any means). I'd be curious to know if those still sound harsh to you. They're mastered identical to the tracks I'm sharing.

I just skipped around a few of those songs. Those mixes seem better overall, but not by much. Most of them have a smoother flavor that's more ear pleasing than the stuff in this thread. The compression (not necessarily loudness) still seems pretty aggressive. Drum hits are too sharp, the cymbals sound harsh and tinny, and vocal sibilance jumps out - classic tell-tale signs of heavy handed compression.

 

[Pinky]

I just skipped around a few of those songs. Those mixes seem better overall, but not by much. Most of them have a smoother flavor that's more ear pleasing than the stuff in this thread. The compression (not necessarily loudness) still seems pretty aggressive. Drum hits are too sharp, the cymbals sound harsh and tinny, and vocal sibilance jumps out - classic tell-tale signs of heavy handed compression.

The vocal compression is likely my fault, unfortunately most of the drums came out of a drum machine or were tracked elsewhere and sent along. Very little if nothing at all were done on my end with the drums.

Mike sings at varying volumes and intensities and I had to lean heavily on compression to even out his tracks. Merely tweaking the gain on the vocal sections wasn't sufficient (or easy). He also isn't using the best mics in the world, they're only adequate. I think if he splurged on a decent pre amp for his main condensor mic we would probably avoid most of the issues with the vocals (that are apparent to my ears as well, so you can only imagine what the original voclas on some of those tracks sounded like).

Do you think the mastering compression used is the root cause of what you're hearing, or is it individual instruments?

I appreciate having an objective set of ears that knows how to articulate what they're hearing!

 

[Greg_L]

Do you think the mastering compression used is the root cause of what you're hearing, or is it individual instruments?

I'm not 100% sure. I do believe that "mastering" a mix that's not quite the best it can be will bring out the worst in a mix, so it may be a combo of both instances. These might have been a bad mix to begin with, and bad mastering techniques or over-limiting. Also, if you're using free or cheap mastering software or plug-ins, they can also contribute to the harshness. I really doubt professional mastering houses use limiters they ripped from the internet. So, you gotta watch the final limiting for loudness. One thing that was suggested to me a while back is to use limiters in series. Instead of cramming the mix through one limiter set to kill, gently slide it through several limiter plugs with each one gradually increasing the loudness until you get what you want. That method works for me. I get decently loud mixes that still sound like my un-mastered mix - only louder. It's not drastically altering the sound. It's just louder. But if like you say, you were given tracks that may be of questionable quality when you got them, there's not much you can do about it. I'm a big believer in getting the source sound right. If it's right, then the song mixes itself and "mastering" is a breeze even with modest gear.