"Blue Sky Man" First Pro Tools Recording!

JohnnyAmato

JohnnyAmato

New member
Finally bought and installed Pro Tools 12 along with Superior Drummer, also bought a brand new desktop PC to run it all. Also have SoundForge Pro 10 installed. Those who are familiar with my past recordings know I was using a Tascam2488neo, and an old Boss DR-770 drum machine.

Anyway, I can't believe I waited so long. I'm blown away.

I've had it all for about a week now, and after a few days of figuring things out, I wanted to start with a simple song that I had written a few months ago, but never recorded. Vocals will be added soon, but this is just the instrumental version. It's an extremely rough mix, just want to see if anything stands out to anyone. Hardly no effects, just a hint of reverb and EQ here and there.

Pretty basic mix- two clean rhythm guitars panned hard right and hard left; two soft acoustic tracks (one a 12-string) panned soft right and soft left; bass dead center; a lead guitar solo dead center; some random clean fills very softly panned; a soft underlying keyboard; and of course, the drums. The drums will still need some work with the velocity settings, but I think they sound nice (remember, I'm used to my DR-770!) I do have a hint of compression on the bass guitar to even out notes, but I'm still learning how to do that. It sounded pretty good dry, actually.

All I did to the mixdown file was open it in SoundForge and used the preset "Smooth Compression" to add some overall volume for listening. Any input or feedback would be greatly appreciated!

Blue Sky Man | Johnny Amato
 
Just some evening out of the drum hits would be nice. That snare is cracking the same every time. Get in there and manually edit the velocities and timing. Even the "humanize" feature in SD doesn't do it enough. Guitars are very clear and clear, nice work. Looking forward to the vocalized version. :guitar:
 
Sounds very good to me. I'd boost the bass a bit, it seems like there is more room for it to fill and groove. Also maybe a bit more cymbal work :)
 
agree with andrushkiwt, the way the snare is programmed makes it sound very robotic....
but the whole is really nice

bass is a bit muddy, and could use some high mid in it to balance.

it doesn't really work for me as an instrumental, it's just too simple...
but as a backing track for a vocal,
i think this works well.

solid basic tracks.
 
I think the bass and kick are dialed in just right.
Snare tone sounds bit too compressed.
Nice variation on the cymbals but I expected to hear a more apparent ride cymbal during the turns.
Very sweet guitar playing.
Overall mix seems very well balanced.
 
Guitars and drums sound nice and clear to me, bass sounds a bit indistinct.

I really love the little 16th note repetitive run that's happening beneath the guitar solo that starts around 1:51. I can't tell exactly what it is, but it adds a nice dimension. Almost sounds like another instrument emulating a banjo run or something, but it sounds cool on its own, whatever it is.

The only thing I didn't really care for was the continued use of the main guitar hook throughout most of the song. It got old to me fairly quickly, and IMHO, it wore out its welcome. :) Maybe with vocals it won't be so taxing.

Thanks for sharing.
 
Thanks guys! Appreciate all the feedback. This is my first attempt with PT and SD, and I'm loving every minute of it. Only had it about a week, so I wanted to start with something somewhat simple to learn as I go.

The main melody/riff does seem repetitive, hopefully the vocals will take care of that somewhat. It's full of harmonies and such, so I'm excited to get that started soon.

The drums I will get to soon also, haven't really tweaked the velocities much at all yet. Might change a few cymbal choices too, I feel a few of them don't sit right. Might add a few more guitar fills after the vocals are in and taking shape. The "banjo" sound Beagle mentioned is just some light chicken-pickin' type lick underneath the solo to add more dimension and spark to the solo part, it also comes back during the last chorus, both parts also with some tamborine I did live with an SM-58.

My main worry is the bass, I feel there's a little mud and rumble in the extreme lows. I haven't used a shelf or any EQ on it whatsoever yet, that's basically the dry sound of the bass itself through an amp sim (I forget which sim setting) I'm going to mess around a bit with the shelf as I've never really used one before. So any tips on that would be awesome.

I won't be able to get back to the song until this weekend, I have a pretty big show Friday night, so I have to spend the next two nights getting ready for that.

Thanks!
 
First off, well done man. :)

Yeah, weak point would be the consistency of the snare. Work that.

No issue with the low end of the bass on my system. I have a subwoofer as well. In fact, I feel it could have more low end in the mix. And I am careful about that...

I like the way the bass sits in the mix now, but this would be one of the times I duplicate the bass track, cut out the upper frequencies, and compress the hell out of the low end and adjust EQ till the smooth low end fills the bottom end.

Again, props to ya man.
 
Overall I'd say this is pretty good. I think the comments you received were good ones.

I think you could probably de-mud the bass with a small cut in the 300hz-400hz range.

The kick is also a little boomy.

I think your tunes in general call out for some more dirty guitars. Gain them a bit. The sound is too tame.
 
Thanks Jimmy! Good to hear the bass sits well on your end, I'm still quite new to this whole compression and high-pass filter thing, learning as I go. The bass was tracked through my Digitech GNX3000, with a bass amp sim called "Showbass" through a Blond 2x12 speaker setting. No effects, just a tad of compression. I'll probably try a different setting next recording. It's a beautiful black 2006 USA P-Bass with a maple fingerboard.

I will spend a night with the drums this weekend, spend a little time with the bass compression and EQ, and hopefully get started on the vocals sometime next week.

Thanks!
 
Thanks again TripleM, I was wondering about that kick as well. No one commented on it yet, so I wasn't sure, but it seems a tad boomy to me as well. I will try to address that. I'll also mess a little with cutting the bass a hair in the 300hz-400hz range.

The left rhythm guitar is pretty clean, but the right side has a little dirt. I'll try to mess with them a little without having to re-track. I can add some gain/dirt with Pro Tools?
 
JohnnyAmato said:
Thanks again TripleM, I was wondering about that kick as well. No one commented on it yet, so I wasn't sure, but it seems a tad boomy to me as well. I will try to address that. I'll also mess a little with cutting the bass a hair in the 300hz-400hz range.

The left rhythm guitar is pretty clean, but the right side has a little dirt. I'll try to mess with them a little without having to re-track. I can add some gain/dirt with Pro Tools?
Click to expand...

You can add anything to anything with Pro Tools (as well as just about any other DAW). :)
 
I just spent a few hours on the song, even though I should have been practicing for Friday's gig, but couldn't resist. I addressed most of the issues mentioned above, or at least got a start on them.

I boosted 1.5db of 350hz on the bass, liked the results. Seemed a bit hotter though, so lowered the output gain from the compressor 1db. Hopefully I didn't screw it up. Still haven't used a high-pass filter on it.

Spent some time on the velocity of the drums, and added a few more crashes. Also lowered the kick 1db, seemed a little boomy. Not sure if I lowered it enough though. Tried to raise the ride cymbal during the choruses, but couldn't isolate it enough from the overheads without messing with the other crashes.

Gave a little dirt to the left clean rhythm guitar, but just a hair.

Turned up both acoustic guitars, as they were barely audible. They're still quite soft, only put them there to warm the overall mix a bit. Not sure I like them higher, but the strumming is a little more present now. Soft right is an Ovation 6-string (Custom Legend); soft left is a Taylor 12-string.

Turned down the underlying keys (strings) just a hair, feel it's clashing with the acoustics.

If anyone can give any more feedback, it would be awesome. I'm going to give it a break for a few days, and come back with fresh ears (or however long it takes for my ears to heal after Friday's gig :)

Thanks!

Blue Sky Man (Demo) | Johnny Amato
 
Just gave another listen with fresh ears after a two day break. The bass sounds even worse to me than it two days ago. It's driving me nuts, just want to get it somewhat in shape before I start tracking vocals, without having to re-track it. Any suggestions?
 
My go to plug for bass guitar is the PSP Vintage Warmer. But that is only a compressor with some saturation. You could do that yourself.

If it just killing your whole thing, send me a PM and I can play with it for ya.
 
JohnnyAmato said:
Just gave another listen with fresh ears after a two day break. The bass sounds even worse to me than it two days ago. It's driving me nuts, just want to get it somewhat in shape before I start tracking vocals, without having to re-track it. Any suggestions?
Click to expand...

What's wrong with it? I'm not hearing anything bad from it. HD-280's. Sounds good to me here dude
 
Good to hear, thanks. It sounds good on my monitors (M-Audio BX-8s) but sounds muddy and boomy on my phones (Beyer Dynamic DT-770 Pros) I don't fully trust my monitors since I mix in a room with cement walls, but never really had any problems with consistency from the monitors to the phones. I boosted 350hz 1db, and added a tiny bit of compression, that was it, other than that it's just the straight sound of the P-bass.

I'll probably just tame it down a hair, lay the vocals down, then see how it all fits in the mix later. Thanks for the input!
 
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