Very obscure Alice Cooper cover.....

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RAMI

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This one was more a labor of love than anything else. I've always wanted to do this tune, but it had piano in it and I never had a piano until a few weeks ago.

This is pretty obscure except for die-hard Alice fans. I was tempted to present it as an original just for fun, before telling people it was a cover, but I decided against that. :)

Anyway, as usual I'm playing and singing everything. No MIDI or sequencing. It took me about a week of practicing that piano part before I was ready to record it.

It wasn't as easy to mix as I thought, since I didn't go with the usual doubling the rythm guitar, etc.....So I had some decisions to make as far as placement, etc....

Let me know how the mix is. Thanx.

MY STARS (Alice Cooper cover)

Here's the original, in case anyone wants to hear how it's really supposed to sound:

Alice Cooper - My Stars 1972 - YouTube
 
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Really good!!! You really got that one right!!! If I had to suggest anything it would be to put maybe a little space around the high guitar leads, but that's a total nit and it's great as is! Vocal is awesome!
 
jjjtttggg said:
Really good!!! You really got that one right!!! If I had to suggest anything it would be to put maybe a little space around the high guitar leads, but that's a total nit and it's great as is! Vocal is awesome!
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Thanx a lot jjjtttggg (You need to buy a vowel :D )....You have good ears because the only thing I didn't put any reverb on was the lead that you're talking about. I put a little delay on it, but no reverb, so you probably have something there. I'll definitely give that lead some space.

Thanx a lot for the listen and the advice. :cool:
 
I love it. You've worked out your valve amp.
The only thing I would suggest - & hesitantly - is a little high end on the piano for the bits where it plays after the guitar riff.
Very different mix to the original - mainly the placement of the piano & the volume of the rhythm guitar but I like the xtra meat in your guitar.
What, no tubular bell? No Nikto Barada?
Seriously though - terrific cover.
Good work Rami!
 
rayc said:
I love it. You've worked out your valve amp.
The only thing I would suggest - & hesitantly - is a little high end on the piano for the bits where it plays after the guitar riff.
Very different mix to the original - mainly the placement of the piano & the volume of the rhythm guitar but I like the xtra meat in your guitar.
What, no tubular bell? No Nikto Barada?
Seriously though - terrific cover.
Good work Rami!
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Hehe....thanx Ray. Yup, you know the details of this tune. I simplified the ending, and the "KLAATU" line would have seemed too....I don't know what the word is....contrived? I wish I had a tubular bell, I'd have put it in. Maybe I still will.

I decided to move the piano over because I wanted the rythm guitar to play a bigger part in the song.

Thanx for the help on the piano. That's still a brand new thing for me, so I need all the help I can get on it.
 
Nice job! You wouldn't have been able to sneak it by me. As the younger generation says, "He(AC) is the shit!" One of the reasons I picked up a guitar(actually drums) in the first place.
 
XploZiveToyz said:
Nice job! You wouldn't have been able to sneak it by me. As the younger generation says, "He(AC) is the shit!" One of the reasons I picked up a guitar(actually drums) in the first place.
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Thanx.

Hehe...yeah, the album sold who knows how many million copies, so there's a good chance I wouldn't have fooled at least that many people. :D

Funny, I owned a guitar first (and now I'm a drummer) because of Alice Cooper. :cool:
 
RAMI said:
Thanx.

Hehe...yeah, the album sold who knows how many million copies, so there's a good chance I wouldn't have fooled at least that many people. :D

Funny, I owned a guitar first (and now I'm a drummer) because of Alice Cooper. :cool:
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LOL! My poor parents! They had a thirteen year old kid that wanted to be Alice Cooper. No wonder my Dad drank! LOL!
 
Really nice job! That must have taken you days to figure out all those parts. The dry guitar didn't really bother me. A lot of lead guitar lines from those days were recorded very dry (and not doubled). It actually gave it sort of a retro feeling. It's cool to hear your version and AC's original.
 
You're probably the only person in the world that has recorded that song other than AC! That is not an easy song to cover. There is no way I could have done the piano parts. You are a determined MF! LOL!
 
XploZiveToyz said:
LOL! My poor parents! They had a thirteen year old kid that wanted to be Alice Cooper. No wonder my Dad drank! LOL!
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Ha! Yeah I had posters of the guy, with his make up on, etc....on my wall. I couldn't understand why my parents seemed so worried. I was so naive. To me, it had nothing to do with gay or not gay. I didn't even know what gay was. To me, rock stars had long hair and wore make up and that's how you got chicks. It was rock and roll, that's all.


jm67 said:
Really nice job! That must have taken you days to figure out all those parts. The dry guitar didn't really bother me. A lot of lead guitar lines from those days were recorded very dry (and not doubled). It actually gave it sort of a retro feeling. It's cool to hear your version and AC's original.
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Thanx. OK, that's good to hear about the guitar. I'll experiment, but my first instinct was to keep that guitar pretty dry. Thanx alot

XploZiveToyz said:
You're probably the only person in the world that has recorded that song other than AC! That is not an easy song to cover. There is no way I could have done the piano parts. You are a determined MF! LOL!
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Never thought of that. Maybe I am the only person to cover it. Yeah, the piano was a challenge, especially since I don't really play. I know my chords, etc....but only got a piano a few weeks ago. I was going nuts trying to figure out how he did that intro part, because you have to take your left hand off and finish the arpeggio with your left hand over your right hand. At one point, I stepped on the sustain damper pedal by accident and realized...AHA! with the pedal, I can take my left hand off whenever I want. From there, I was able to record it.
 
RAMI said:
Ha! Yeah I had posters of the guy, with his make up on, etc....on my wall. I couldn't understand why my parents seemed so worried. I was so naive. To me, it had nothing to do with gay or not gay. I didn't even know what gay was. To me, rock stars had long hair and wore make up and that's how you got chicks. It was rock and roll, that's all.


Thanx. OK, that's good to hear about the guitar. I'll experiment, but my first instinct was to keep that guitar pretty dry. Thanx alot

Never thought of that. Maybe I am the only person to cover it. Yeah, the piano was a challenge, especially since I don't really play. I know my chords, etc....but only got a piano a few weeks ago. I was going nuts trying to figure out how he did that intro part, because you have to take your left hand off and finish the arpeggio with your left hand over your right hand. At one point, I stepped on the sustain damper pedal by accident and realized...AHA! with the pedal, I can take my left hand off whenever I want. From there, I was able to record it.
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See? I learned something new about piano just by reading this thread! Yep, our poor parents were definitely nervous! After I saw the Elected video with the Rolls Royce and monkey, I went out and bought a white top hat like the one he was wearing in the video. I thought I was one cool MF. Turned out I was just goofy! LOL! But I sure got a lot of pussy from all those Southern Baptist country girls down there! LOL!
 
Sweet song. Yeah, don't know much Alice Cooper, so would have fooled me.

My right ear is clogged up and have to keep my volume down, but don't notice any mix issues.
 
Seafroggys said:
Sweet song. Yeah, don't know much Alice Cooper, so would have fooled me.

My right ear is clogged up and have to keep my volume down, but don't notice any mix issues.
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Thanx SF. Hope your ear gets better. I hope the left side of my song sounds good, though. :)

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I got to be honest. I've been having trouble with my kik for the last 2 or 3 tunes I've done. I don't know if I need a new skin, need to tune the one I have better....or if it's all psycho-acoustic and I just latched on to an imaginary problem that I'm only creating in my mind. But I'm driving myself a little snakey. I ended up working on it to death and now I don't know if it's too boomy, not boomy enough, or just right. I've lost perspective. I probably have to not listen to anything I've recorded for a while and then listen again with fresh ears and a cleared mind.
 
Not much to add - it sounded great. Tone of everything is awesome.

I think you could maybe raise the level of the lead vocal. It's a bit low in general and in a couple of spots it gets really covered up.

Weird song.
 
I don't know hardly any AC songs, so I have no idea how it's "supposed" to sound. This is probably the most ambitious thing I've heard from you though and I think you did a great job. Nice job on those piano bits.

I think for the mix the lead guitar needs some kind of reverb, or maybe a little high end roll off. It's a bit brash compared to everything else. The vocals can come up some too IMO. Great job overall though. :)
 
TripleM said:
Not much to add - it sounded great. Tone of everything is awesome.

I think you could maybe raise the level of the lead vocal. It's a bit low in general and in a couple of spots it gets really covered up.

Weird song.
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Thanx a lot TM. The vocals are low, you're right. They're sort of part of the mix in the original, too, but I tried to get away with putting them as low as I could. I probably over-did it a bit.

It is kind of a weird tune, I agree. One of those album tunes that I didn't even notice at first, but grew on me over the years and eventually became one of my favorite tunes on the album.

Greg_L said:
I don't know hardly any AC songs, so I have no idea how it's "supposed" to sound. This is probably the most ambitious thing I've heard from you though and I think you did a great job. Nice job on those piano bits.

I think for the mix the lead guitar needs some kind of reverb, or maybe a little high end roll off. It's a bit brash compared to everything else. The vocals can come up some too IMO. Great job overall though. :)
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Thanx Greg. I'll bring up the vocals and I realized I also have to bring down that lead guitar a bit, too, aside from just wetting it a bit more. Thanx man.
 
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