First original song... any opinions?

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NotThatBright

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This is the first song I ever wrote and recorded. I wrote it after a friend of mine got busted for DUI... I took to calling him "Drunk Driver" for a while, and he's the "DD" in the song. The lyrics are meant as a joke, not to be taken seriously. I'm pretty new to playing instruments, so the music is nothing special.

Any comments are appreciated. Feel free to say it's crap, I'm thinking it might pass as filler material.

As I said, lyrics are a joke, so if drunk driving is a sore subject for you, please don't listen.

Thanks!

https://soundcloud.com/user92696274096/drunk-driver/s-aKLnQ
 
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Drums need to be worked on before the rest will fit IMO. Tune that snare man. Sounds like a wet paper bag. lol!

Sorry, you asked.

The guitar tone definitely needs work as well.

Pretty sure Greg_L will be the guy you should look to for advice on this tune.

Vocals way on top of the mix with the other tracks the way they are.

My two cents.
 
jimmys69 said:
Drums need to be worked on before the rest will fit IMO. Tune that snare man. Sounds like a wet paper bag. lol!

Sorry, you asked.

The guitar tone definitely needs work as well.

Pretty sure Greg_L will be the guy you should look to for advice on this tune.

Vocals way on top of the mix with the other tracks the way they are.

My two cents.
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Hey man, don't apologize... I appreciate you taking the time to critique it! I'm not sensitive, you could savage the hell out of it and I'd be fine with that.
 
Ok then, let me start thrashing.... :)

Just kidding man.

It would be very helpful to describe the room and gear and how you are recording everything here.
 
jimmys69 said:
Ok then, let me start thrashing.... :)

Just kidding man.

It would be very helpful to describe the room and gear and how you are recording everything here.
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The drums are in a basement, in the middle of a lots of crap you'd expect to find in a basement. Not much I can do about that. A Shure 57 for an overhead, cheap mics ($29) on all drums except the kick, on which I have a D112. Given my constraints, getting a good snare tone may be tough or impossible. I'm fine with that, though, I just want to get the best I can without going nuts. I may have overcompressed the snare in mastering, which really emphasized the hihat bleed. I'm going to redo that and see if it helps.
 
For guitar and bass, I have a 40-watt peavey vypyr 2. I have two tones on it that I generally go with, usually playing the same rhythm piece with both tones and putting one as the left guitar and one as the right. The bass tone I use is pretty low with some gain on it. I play the bass the best out of the three instruments and am very weak on guitar, so I probably subconsciously turn the bass up too loud to drown out the guitar somewhat.
 
Well if re-recording drums is not a possibility, then maybe we throw in some enhancement to make it get there.

Just sayin...
 
I'm going to give this a quick remix with less compression on the snare and I'll post it. Any advice on the guitars?
 
That is, advice on the guitar tone? Can you tell if that's overcompressed? I have the compression on the mixer on a relatively high setting when I put the mic up to the amp to record it.
 
I have not had many situations where I would actually use a compressor on a high gain guitar. You used a compressor on the mic input channel of a mixer? If I got you right there, then I say DON'T do that man!

What is your signal chain? Why is it that you feel the need to use any compressor on the input chain to DAW? If you don't have a $3000 one, then don't even bother is my first thought. Especially if you don't know why you are using it.

It is obvious that your compression or limiter is killing the dynamics of the tune. Whether on the master bus or somewhere in the mix. It is not doing you any good there. Whatever that is, kill it until you get the sounds right first.
 
"You used a compressor on the mic input channel of a mixer? If I got you right there, then I say DON'T do that man!"

You definitely got me right there! I started recording without really knowing anything about it... bought a $550 Tascam DP-24 off amazon and I was off and running, making stuff up as I went along without doing any research. Here's the compression setting I use with guitar and bass:
View attachment 89075

The max number is 20 for each of those settings. I pretty much chose that setting at random months ago because it sounded ok (I thought) and I didn't have to turn up the amp that loud to record. Now I'm learning many of these things that I thought were inconsequential apparently, are, in fact consequential! :)
 
So I should not use the compressor on the mic input ever? Not even for vocals, or just for guitar/bass recording?
 
Drunk driver puts his foot on the gas
Drunk driver likes to drive real fast

The sound's okay I guess but mistakes were made earlier on.
 
jimmys69 said:
I have not had many situations where I would actually use a compressor on a high gain guitar. You used a compressor on the mic input channel of a mixer? If I got you right there, then I say DON'T do that man!

What is your signal chain? Why is it that you feel the need to use any compressor on the input chain to DAW? If you don't have a $3000 one, then don't even bother is my first thought. Especially if you don't know why you are using it.

It is obvious that your compression or limiter is killing the dynamics of the tune. Whether on the master bus or somewhere in the mix. It is not doing you any good there. Whatever that is, kill it until you get the sounds right first.
Click to expand...

I put a new mix up (first post)- I took most of the compression off the snare. Not sure if it sounds better or worse- maybe I need to also increase the volume of the overhead now (cymbals), or maybe EQ it with some more treble?

---------- Update ----------

jimmys69 said:
I have not had many situations where I would actually use a compressor on a high gain guitar. You used a compressor on the mic input channel of a mixer? If I got you right there, then I say DON'T do that man!

What is your signal chain? Why is it that you feel the need to use any compressor on the input chain to DAW? If you don't have a $3000 one, then don't even bother is my first thought. Especially if you don't know why you are using it.

It is obvious that your compression or limiter is killing the dynamics of the tune. Whether on the master bus or somewhere in the mix. It is not doing you any good there. Whatever that is, kill it until you get the sounds right first.
Click to expand...

I put a new mix up (first post)- I took most of the compression off the snare. Not sure if it sounds better or worse- maybe I need to also increase the volume of the overhead now (cymbals), or maybe EQ it with some more treble?
 
I screwed with it and got it sounding better, probably as good as I'll get it given the mistakes made when recording. Taking it down now... thanks for the advice.
 
NotThatBright said:
I screwed with it and got it sounding better, probably as good as I'll get it given the mistakes made when recording. Taking it down now... thanks for the advice.
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You should've left it up! No need to be embarrassed in here! I wanted to listen to that. :mad:
 
Bubba po said:
You should've left it up! No need to be embarrassed in here! I wanted to listen to that. :mad:
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Yeah man. Don't pull down your tracks. We are a community here that wish to learn from and help others.

Put that shiz back up! :)
 
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