Blues Rock attempt

J

jjtcorsair

New member
I'm not so sure about pulling off this kind of tune since my voice leans to the mellower stuff but I thought I'd try. I want it to sound somewhat raw but I don't know... It's called "Give It Back". Click on the title and you can play it in your browser or download it.

http://www.esnips.com/web/jjtmusic

Thanks,
Jon
 
I'm listening right now. . .

Give it Back - Great song! Is this an original? I'm diggin it! Recording quality is fine to me. I like the panning for the intro. I'd turn the highs on the vocals down a little bit, and maybe add a slight bit of reverb to them. I don't know, maybe it's just me, but I think reverb makes things just a bit blues-ier :rolleyes: lol
 
Thanks for the review Ziplock. It is an original tune. I thought the drier vocal sounded more raw but I'll play around with some verbage.
 
Is there a bass guitar in there?
I listened on stereo speakers but nothing clearly bass guitar stands out.
If it's there give it a 3khz boost so it shows its nose.
Good work - esp like the panned intro.
 
rayc said:
Is there a bass guitar in there?
I listened on stereo speakers but nothing clearly bass guitar stands out.
If it's there give it a 3khz boost so it shows its nose.
Good work - esp like the panned intro.
Click to expand...


I agree with RayC, there needs to be a strong bass in the tune. I think the vocal is good, but it needs a bit of lo-fi overdrive to give it a bluesier feel-kind of a Shure green bullet sound that they mic harmonicas with.
There is probably some editing stuff that can do this for you-maybe a 'Howling Wolf' effect !! :D
Good tune and good job though~~~
 
you said you're striving for a raw sound. the drums are obviously a plugin and the guitars are a little too gainy. amp plugins? i think that's working against you for raw. i agree with the above comments about the bass. it's a cool song but i think the canned sounds aren't doing it any favors.
 
Yep, what they said about the bass.
Very nice recording and guitaring, vocals too!!.. Bluesy...well, yep, though it somehow sounded more like T-rex stuff to me... but thats blues-orientated too. :cool:
That's cool.
 
Thanks for the critiques everyone.

I posted a new version with a little verb on the intro vocal per Ziplocks request. I also made the pan a little less extreme. The bass has been attended to. It's funny, I had just forgotten about it as I tried to get the overall dynamics of the song in line. The bass was happy to be boosted. I'm putting the vocals through an amp plug in already, I might experiment with making it more extreme.

Travis-- my use of the word raw was probably not accurate. Midi drums and pod guitars don't sound raw, I totally agree. I think I was trying to make an excuse for my sloppy singing :)

The new version is at the same link if you care to check it out again.

Thanks again.
 
Sounds really good. If you haven't tried them yet you might have a look at the Antress plugins. They're really good for dirtying up tracks, which might benefit some of the parts on this. But a good bluesy feel to it already.

Good vocal intonation, but the high vocal bit at 1:23 and after stands out to me as flat. Given the style, some looseness is great, but I think it'd sound better nudged up a bit just on the very highest notes... just a little, not all the way. Apps like Reaper allow this to be done manually very easily with audio segment properties.
 
Problem with the guitar bit

The repeated part in the beginning sounds kind not bluesy... more like polka. Could just maybe use a harmonica or something throughout the mix. The vocals are nice but they really need to be rawer. Go get strep throat or something quick.

It's got some okay stuff, but it's a bit more rock styled than blues.
 
Timothy-- thanks for the input. I'll look into those plug ins, they sound cool. I cannot hit that high A for the life of me but I'll keep trying. I might have misrepresented my tune by using the word raw in my description. I guess I was trying for something a little like ZZ Top as opposed to John Hooker. I would sound like a tool trying to sing like him.
Zarathustra- I actually thought about the harmonica but never followed through, it's a good idea. As far as it sounding polka like in the beginning... hmmm could be the 1 and 5 bass line. Thanks for checking it out.
 
I completely understand about simple bass lines being a simple bass player (not capable of anything other..) BUT the 1/5 is too simple for your good song. I'd serioulsy rather the bass be just on the root than that "polka" line.
I know that blues rock works best where the guitar is doing the work & spitting out the bass runs but even George Thoroughgood called for more from his bassist.
the 1 - 5 sounds like thumb bass accompaniment on an old delta players guitar buuuut doesn't match the dynamics of the rest of the song - even a three note walk would fix the issue.
OTHERWISE REALLY good stuff.
 
jjtcorsair said:
I'm not so sure about pulling off this kind of tune since my voice leans to the mellower stuff but I thought I'd try. I want it to sound somewhat raw but I don't know... It's called "Give It Back". Click on the title and you can play it in your browser or download it.

http://www.esnips.com/web/jjtmusic

Thanks,
Jon
Click to expand...

I enjoyed my listen, I won't comment on the mix because my pc speakers don't tell the truth!

Koool tunage! :)
 
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