A song about a car (Opel Manta)

[powderfinger]

i really like the rhythm guitar......sounds like an acoustic going through a distorted amp almost..........

nice production.......nice playing....

have you ever done a song mixing dutch and english? i'd like to see that.........

 

[David]

Damn! I've been on the road all day, wished I'd had this one to listen to. Great voc's man...you make me wanna "spit" j/k. Nice one Ped!*****

 

[The Ghost of FM]

Cool little number! I liked the style and flavour of the sound you put down.

Being car related, the mix did sound like there was a traffic jam in the lower mids, somewhere around 800hz?

Maybe there were too many parts all vying for the same space in the spectrum?

Nice, fresh stuff!

 

[Toki987]

a really well arranged piece. Parts are all good. This doesn`t have the definition you normally get. bass is thinner and kit doesnt have the punch and meat I`m used to from you. I love the general tone on the bass and where you headed with the line, it and the drums are just a little anemic and get a little lost a bit in the rythym. You sing good too.

 

[Doug H]

Wow, really great song, the parts with the accoustic melodies come at just the right time, nice.

There's like a big spnge in the low mids somewhere sopping everything up. I think it's the bass electric combo taking the punch out of the bottom end.

Doug

 

[SLuiCe]

Needs a ton more reverb. The vocal isn't nasal enough. I don't like cars. I can't stand the lyrics. Could use some more processing.

I better scan that next bass track from you with Norton...

...twice...

SLuiCe: thanks! Norton? Which software by Norton? The antivirus software I presume?

Yeah, I figured after that ball-busting I opened your thread with, you'll probably embed viruses into the rest of the bass tracks I get from you.

You know, I'd still like to close-mic that engine for you. Maybe before you finish your next CD I'll be able to get closer than the second-floor window.

Alright off to sleep...Good tune!

 

[Pedullist]

sjcrts: thanks!

Guernica: I should've told you guys, it's not exactly a tribute to this car. I don't know the american equivalent of an Opel Manta, but think of the cars trailerparktrash probably drive in. Drums are Sonic Implants Blue Jay Large Ambient Kit I....quiet, don't tell anybody. (played 'live' on my keyboard, some programmed fills aside....I think this approach gives a better opportunity to groove along with da band)

MAC2: yeah, I rock (for the first time in my solo pop 'career'.....career....mwuahahaahahaha ). It was a surprise for me too, LOL Thanks for listening, glad you liked it.

fprod south: as far as I'm concerned this is still pop. In its definition of 'easy accessible music for the people'. Thanks. I've tried to control the lower mids.

Saz: hey thanks! Thanks for putting up that pic. Pity it isn't an orange one, LOL.

powderfinger: a song with both dutch and english? SLuiCe suggested that once I remember. I thought it might be weird, because only the dutch people on the board would understand it all.

freshears: *removes spit from face* haha, exactly. That was on my mind when I was making this song. How does it sound on you car speakers?

The Ghost of FM: believe you me: there are ALWAYS too many parts vying for the same space in the spectrum in my music. Thanks!

Toki987: thanks. I tried to solve the problems you've mentioned. See below.

Doug H: it wasn't the bass. It was a couple of unnecessary extra guitartracks (previously recorded 'soon to be deleted' parts). Accidently unmuted them. Stupid me.

SLuiCe: aw fuck you....o no.... I mean: thanks! (I'm confused sometimes. Your good looks always save your cute little ass )

ANYWAY

I did a second attempt mixing this little bastard!

Improvements (I hope):

- vocals are a tad louder
- lower midrange is cleared up (hopefully), but I've lost a few guitars I'm afraid.
- I redid the bass (but I dislike it already, I shouldn't record this stuff with slime in my ears and everywhere else you can think of....I'm having a severe cold, you know?)
- drums are back to their unprocessed state (I experimented with a pumping compressor and a distortion on the cymbals to get the driving sound....perhaps it was just a stupid idea)....kick is more pronounced but the rest of drums seem to be louder now....too loud perhaps?
- added a special surprise in the beginning (thanks Tom)
- removed the 'butter spoon against a glass' sound

Please lemme know what you guys think! (this song is driving me crazy btw, mixwise....'deceptively simple' is indeed the right term)

Opel Manta second attempt

http://www.nowhereradio.com/artists/album.php?aid=2618&alid=462

 

[B.SABBATH]

listening to V.2..

very cool song! I almost feel like I understand the vocals.. seems a bit light in the bass area, but I just might be used to muddy mixes like my own.. really like the bridge.. or chorus, whatever it is.. the change was cool! the mix seems a bit light..

 

[TripleM]

I mentioned this the first time, but it's a wonderful song. This mix is much better. Still can't decide if I like this better than Neem Vrij or not.

Vocals are cutting through much better. I didn't even notice some of those clean guitars on the first listen. They're great.

That car sound at the begining almost sounds like a toilet flushing. Just kidding. Actually, the acoustic during the intro is a little quiet. Is is possible to boost the volume through there?

Vocal syncing thing through :16-:22. Another small one at :37. Didn't catch that the first time. Is there some pitchiness around 2:05 or so? Can't tell if that's the way you wanted it or not.

Something strange at 1:35. It's some sort of "static" sound. Might just be guitar distortion. See what you think.

Is it possible to get some more definition to that bass track? Maybe play with EQ around 800hz-1000hz? Just a suggestion. On second listen, I disagree with what I just said. I'll leave it in my response just in case.

You're missing the glass clink in this verseion . Relistened to the first version. Doesn't sound like a glass clink today. I guess it's been a long week.

Great song. Trip...

 

[Pedullist]

That car sound at the begining almost sounds like a toilet flushing.

Do you hear that, Tom? He's insulting your truck!

You're right about the vocal syncing. I shall resing them for ya...I wasn't too happy about it myself either....

O, and thanks B!

 

[participant]

LOVE that guitar intro... electric rhythms sound ornrier... "creatures of the blue"... could SWEAR you sang that... "some fathers took my car"...

The mix does have better balance... drums are better... though the vocals
may be sinking down in the middle of the spectrum a bit... there's almost
too much space for them in the center of the spectrum, now, and they "sag"
in the mids now... but it's a much better mix overall...

If you've cut mids out of the vocals, or any other track, bring 'em up slightly
to buoy the vocs more... the clarity on vocs is there, it's just the body
that slightly lacks, now.

A better mix for a cool song!!


C

 

[chrisharris]

I heard the word "donkey" in there, although I'm not sure about the spelling, lol. Hell, I wouldn't have even known that "Opel Manta" refers to a car, mostly b/c my view of the world takes place between the left and right corners of the windshield on a Ford F-150 travelling down roads originally engineered by people in covered wagons. YEEEE HAW.

Looks like you've gotten mix advice out the wazoo, so I'll muddy up the waters some with my own take. When I turn it up loud, I can't keep it there; I HAVE to turn it down; and I can't say exactly what it is, but you know it when you hear it; some problem in the high mids...I have no idea what causes this (i.e., digital recording or a lack of overall low end, but it haunts/plagues most of my recordings (although, the recent stuff I HAVEN'T posted is absolutely stellar and devoid of any sonic problems...and brilliantly written, too, lol)...It's almost like the effect that the L1 or L2 has on my crap - It doesn't noticeably distort if I don't overdo it, and it doesn't add "pumping" or "breathing," but it does something to the mids. I don't know if you're even usuing anything like that, but this mix hit the meters pretty hot, so I'm making some assumptions. I'm also guessing about this being a "cause" of some of my problems...it may just be that the L2 makes my tune loud enough to clearly reveal all the warts in my recordings, lol. I dunno'.

You're way beyond levels and balance as far as I'm concerned...your mixes are fine - You're just at that point where you need the magical warming ingredient that I stumble across about once every 10 songs I record.

Kick ass arrangement, btw. Seems to be a strength of your stuff in my opinion... or it could be that you're more of a lyrical genius, but I'm working with a language barrier here, lol.

NICE TOOOOOON DUDE. (how's that?)

 

[fprod south]

Ahhh, much better. Good job cleaning up those lower mids. It's much punchier and more crispy.

 

[Doug H]

This ones better. There's still something up with it thats keeping it from shining like the gem it is. The toms seem loud to me,. There's something at the start that I thought was a snare that's pretty loud too. It could use more headroom IMO.

That guitar playing is really sweet man! It's starting come out more. Love the woodblock. Good job arranging the vocals.

Doug

 

[Khompewtur]

Very nice job overall ped. I really think i would like to hear more of your vocals in the mix. I want them LOUDER mang. Nice production, nice tom rolls.

This gets a "bontag lieben louten loven" from me.

 

[erichenryus]

i read no other replies. i like this a lot! i really like the guitars.

 

[participant]

- lower midrange is cleared up (hopefully), but I've lost a few guitars I'm afraid.

Didn't see this before my second post.

Did you pull low-mids out of the vocals, at all? If so ... try putting those back... IMO it would make the difference at this point.

 

[Pedullist]

participant: always good fun to have you listening. Especially the snippets of pseudo english you think you're hearing. About the guitars: it's actually exactly what I'm saying. I lost (read: 'muted') a couple of guitar parts. I didn't pull out low-mids out the vocals. Anyway, I was thinking about retracking it with my JoeMeek compressor turned on, to get some proximity. This was with the compressor turned off (part of my 'new' recording strategies, you gotta try everything)

chrisharris: I think I know what you mean. I used a multiband compressor to beef it up a little (I thought this song should sound 'LOUD'). Of course I don't know horseshit about what ratios to choose for each bandwidth, so I could have chosen the wrong settings. When I post a third mix, with improved vocals, I'll keep my hands off the multiband compressor and then you should tell if it's any better. Thanks!

fprod south: thanks....it's typical. I tried some processing on the drums to make it punchy and beefy (comp/dist), but only when I turn off those fx it finally punchy and beefy LOL

Doug H: yeah, that's what I thought: the kit is too loud. I think my ears were spoiled because just before mixing I had finished programming them. So I was used to louder drums than necessary. I'll look at that in the third attempt too. Eh...woodblock? I rather hope it sounds like a cowbell!

Khompewtur: even louder vocals! Argh! Thanks for listening. Thanks for the comment on the tom rolls, spend a lot of time on those (in fact, most of the time went into the drumprogramming)

erichenryus: thanks! Did you hear any weird things in the drumpart? I really did my best for 'as humanly possible programmed drums' here, so if you hear anything abnormal....please lemme know!

Time for a third attempt. But I have to sing for that. And I still have a cold. Will try it next week or something....

 

[erichenryus]

as for the drums, i pretty much never hear anything that sounds like real drums unless it's real drums. so, yes it sounds fake to me but my perspective is a little skewed cause i sit down behind a real drum kit once a week and that's what sounds real to me.

i wouldn't worry about the drums, they sounded fine. one day, when i have a lot of money (that could be in another life) i'll have a drum room to record in.

 

[dobro]

Missed this the first time round. Been busy.

So, you have an issue with lower mids, Mr Pedullist? People told me that too about the one I put up here about a week ago. I wish I could recognize lower mids. They're important, I think. They get recognized a lot when there's too much of 'em LOL.

Yeah, nice tune. It's tight and sounds right to me (except for those lower mids of course), and although I don't understand Dutch, it sounds to me the way it's being sung all serious and ballsy that it's ironic, since it's about a car. I love the doubled guitar work - I can never do that as tight as you do it here.

Anyway about that song I was telling you about - I tried to duck some of those lower mids (I learned how to say that from the thread) but in the end I decided just to retrack the bass. Tone on the bass going to disk is crucial I think. I've been way too approximate with it. "Get it right the first time that's the main thing" (billy joel)

I played your album to a French friend who lived in Holland once. "This is so Dutch," he says.

"Huh?" I reply, wittily.

"Dutch barpop," he says mysteriously, and refuses to be drawn out.

Now, I hope he's talking about the music and not you. I don't want to start thinking of you as a barpop. Anyway, if it comes to that, I can live with it as long as you keep putting out tunes like Opel Manta.

I got the Frenchie to translate the titles on your album, btw. What a revelation. About the only one I'd guessed right was 'Marie' LOL. The ones I thought were about sex weren't. The ones that looked pretty innocent were about sex. A lot of it made sense after he'd explained it though. Dutch ain't that hard. Probably be speaking some of it myself if you keep posting stuff here...