CD Finished and Mastered!!..Check it out...

  • Thread starter Thread starter NickHall
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NickHall

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w00t.

After 4 hours in the studio this afternoon, the tracks are finally mastered, and I'm not touching them ANYMORE!!!...lol....

I tell you what, best £100 I ever spent (well apart from the £100 that went towards my Selmer S80....and my Martin, and my erm erm erm...) its amazing how much difference mastering can make.....all of a sudden my songs have 'life' (no pun intended....)

SO please take a listen.... as these are now complete, I've finally updated my webpage so you can download em from there...

http://www.nick-hall.com

Enter the site, then click on the 'Clips' plectrum.....all four songs are now there.....

Thanks for all your help guys, the engineer said he was 'very impressed' for a home mix...(although he did slate the acoustic recording...lllolll...)

Comments as usual, appreciated, but this time please bare in mind that theres nothing more I'm gonna do to the tracks now....(cus I'm sick of em.....)

Onwards to new stuff.....
 
Excellent!

Listening to "Better Day" as I type this. The acoustic guitar is ringing nicely, the fretless bass (or was it done on keyboard?) has a very melodic, smooth quality that adds a lot of depth. Fill guitar is nicely back in the mix, but not lost.
Writing, playing, singing, and mastering of high quality.
Job well done!

Mark
 
OMG what did the mastering engineer do to your voice?. The lead voice sounds weird.

Everything else sounds good.

The songs are pretty good too.

funk on!
 
having trouble gettting your clips, nick.

"400 Bad Request" from the server. Right clicking and trying to save doesn't work either. :(

Ah... here we go. "Life" is downloading. But "Better Day" and "Wherever You Go" don't work using Netscape 4.7


Chad
 
Downloaded the whole thing (Life), and only the first three seconds play... but it sounds like someone holding down the skip button on a CD player :( Bits of voices and instruments fly around for a few seconds, then it stops.

Maybe something's wrong with the server?:confused:


Chad
 
Sounds great Nick!You did a good job on this project.I really dig the other tunes on your site also.

Participant,
Get rid of Netscrape and you'll be able to download these songs with ease!:D
 
Oh yeah! I love the way this sounds (Better Day). Nice clarity, warmth and separation--yet the whole thing gels together very well. Good song, production and vocal performance.

Mastering IS great! Now, I gotta figure out how to do it right!
 
Nick..."Life" just sounds fantastic now. Excellent mastered version. The drums...I don't know what you did, but they sound better too in the beginning...and when the solo hits....I hear the "whamo" effect, like you are thrown into the solo. It all just came together great on this song. You've done good, mate.:)
 
I'm having to listen to the others now too (for the first time, admittedly). You've got some really nice stuff. Just came out great. Pat yourself on the back. "wherever you go"...the balances are "just there".
 
"better day" .....must be one for you leaving the mastering suite. ... whoa!! this one and the acoustic are [3rd and 4th] favs...so your song order is good. Your vocals sound great.

Here it is...proof that quality mastering is the best money spent...even more than the pizza:p
 
just as a heads-up

Yo, nick

Didnt mean for that earlier post to sound like a dis, but your site doesn't work with Netscape. I had to open it in I.E. to get the clips to download... we ornery types like to stick with those loser, outsider browsers :D ;)

Here goes --> Better Day:

Wow! Good singing! Interesting guitar sound, kinda harpsichord-like... maybe a tiny bit of those (cerca) 8 kHz frequencies peeking thru too much.... a bit piercing on certain guitar strums (maybe it's harmonic distortion in these crappy speakers tho :()

Very nice composition and arrangement. Great singing and control! Kind of a jazzy, adult-contemporary song. Very clean production...

Wherever you go:

Jazzy arrangement, synths... more peppy. Nice background singers. Nice and full sounding... good balance. Another top notch effort. :)


Chad
 
some of us call it "Nutscrape"

Kramer said:
Participant,
Get rid of Netscrape and you'll be able to download these songs with ease!:D
Click to expand...

Go ahead and say it, Kramer. It sort of rollllllss off the tongue ;)


PS: (Did it :))

Chad
 
Just what I wanted to hear guys..thank you.... (good to know the money and time was worth it....)

mkg: Wicked mate thanks...Better Day is one of my fave's, and always go's down well live. The bass is synth (JV-1000 Keyboard) but is one fo the closest-to-real bass sounds I've got....I tried real hard to get this one to sound like the live version, and 'simplicity' seemed to be the key here..

CyanGuitar: Erm....not sure what you mean. The engineer did 'bring' the vocals forward in the mix. He did the following: Converted from digital to analog, then put the tracks through some nice valves, a sonic enhancer, and then multi band compressor (very nice bit of kit it was too) before normalizing and smacking everything up against 0db (the CD is now louder than some of my commercial cd's) The vocals now sound 'earthier' and warmer to me than the original recording, and in general the tracks seem 'smoother'.......

Participant: erm not sure why netscape doesnt work, probably not aided by the fact that my site is in 'frames'. You could try clicking on the link at the top of the first page which says 'For resolutions less than 1024...' as this disables the frames (you just lose some of the pretty piccies ;)
Glad you finally got there though :D. We had a few problems losing the sharp stuff in better day. A lot of this was caused by the cymbols, which were a little too high in the mix. The engineer tried to lose some of this. Also caused as this track was recorded a long time ago, and the guitar was DI'd, and i didnt really have a clue about recording back then....I couldnt be bothered redoing this one though, so told the engineer to do the best he could....
Wherever you go: nice backing singers?...why thank you (its all me ;) lol...), dont ask me how I hit the high notes though, its a trade secret...:P

Kramer: Thanks bud...

Crawdad: Cheers bud x 2. Totally agree. Ive totally come to the conclusion that I cant master my own stuff. I just cant hear what it needs. The engineer picked out some frequencies I had problems with and flattened em, I hadnt even noticed.

Mixmkr: You're comments as ever, are appreciated hugely. I honestly dont know what he did to the drums in Life, but as this was the first one he mastered, he spent a good hour trying to get the bottom end sound right. Somehow (and I guess this is why they are worth the money) he managed to give all the songs a 'fat' yet 'tight' bottom end. He said he masters a lot of peoples home made dance stuff, so I guess he knows how to get the frequencies fat in the right places...As I said up there ^ he didnt actually do that much, but each small thing he did took the songs a step further.
It was your advice specifically that created the 'Whamo' as you so elequantally put it. I dropped the whole mix just before the solo, and bought it all back up instantly the first solo note hit. I also automated the volume on the vocals all the way through to match the volume of the backing. Proof clear that you guys here have improved my mix..... Thank You...

Overall you guys hear have been an invaluable 'sounding board' for my music. Its given me that extra bit of confidence that what I'm doing is going in the right direction. All I can say is thanks.

Keep the faith

Peace.
 
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I can't believe the fuc*** difference!

I have both versions, since i downloaded the pre-mastered version to have a listen, and just a few minutes ago i downloaded the Mastered Version.
Man, what a difference!

Whoever did the Mastering, tell him he did a damn good job.

I only know Life, and although this is not my style of music at all, i really enjoy listening to it.

Some good qualitity music.

Congratulations is all i can say!

Best regards from Vienna,
datune

Ps: The only thing i am not too fond of are the spoken parts, they remind me too much about them stupid Boygroups as in BSB etc.. :P
 
rofl Datune.

Thanks....It seriously amazed me too. and bare in mind the guy only spent 3 hours. 1 hour on Life, and then 2 hours tweaking the settings for the other songs.

Made me wanna go to recording school, I tell ya that much...lol.

Im keeping tally on the people who do vs the people who dont like the spoken bits....its around 50/50 at the moment...lol.....
The song was written as an up-beat pop song, and they kinda 'fell' into the song when i recorded it....never had the heart to take em out.... dude, if your' comparing the songs to BSB, i'll take it as a compliment (even though i hate the BSB), those guys got paid over $10M for their last album.........

Sell out?...who called me a sell out?...erm.....ok, I'm a sell out.....($10M though........)
 
ROFL

Your Voice, my friend, sounds IMHO a thousand times better then crap BSB Boys.

Though, not all of there Songs are bad, and yes i admit, some of them can actually sing, but i just hate it if they milk the cow until there is no more milk to milk left (read that real fast :) ), if you know what i mean!

In NO WAY am i comparing you to BSB, if i was you i would not consider being compared to BSB a compliment. :D
No matter the $10 mill.

You have produced something that you can REALLY be proud of, and you know what you have done for it, all the work and effort etc... and if you want to be compared to the BSB, your Song Life sounds easily as good as there Songs if it comes down to Sound Quality.

And believe you me, being a DJ for the last 7 years (yes as my main proffession) NOBODY is going to notice if there is a little bottom end missing here or if this or that could be better etc...


Trust me! Actually, if you are making Songs which you want to be played in Clubs you should go out and ask the DJ's for a play, you would be AMAZED just how different your Song sounds in each Club!!!!!!

And though your Song is what we would consider commercial over here in Austria, it would for sure get plays in the Clubs, cause it's ....commercial....music for the masses if you get me....if i was you i would send it to all A&R's you can get a hold off....

Regards,
datune
 
I'm listening to 'Life' right now and I would say it sounds almost perfect.. nice tune.. I can't think of anything to complain about sound wise.. great job! Ready for the radio IMOP.. I'll check out some more a bit later..

late
samicide :D


BTW Great thread about conversion.. You changed the way I do things from now on.. thanks a lot! :D
 
I listened through "Life" twice. I cant really comment on the mix as any comment I make would be for the sake of it. It sounds as good as it needs to to show off the material. The playing is fluent and relaxed. The real strength here is the material, and thats what sells it. I've not tried to record my own material for some years now, but is was never as good as this.
I would be pleased to hear this music be it live or recorded.
Best of luck with it
 
Thanks datune, compliment taken (hey if you feel like playing the songs in your clubs...feel free ;) ;)) The CD will be winging its way to some A&R chappies, but then I dont hold out much hope from that......(its never got me anywhere in the past.....)...

SAM: Thanks bud....and thanks for your input into the final product....hugely appreciated..... (welcome to the world of VBR aswell ;).....the new version of 'GoodNightmare' is much clearer.......have it in my car allready for the drive home from work when im stressed!)

Thanks Matt: (had to add this one in, cus you were obviously typing it at the same time as me..lol - 3 minutes difference) The CD is really only a demo, to do exactly as you said - show off the songs. However some of my earlier stuff lost its impact as the mixing / recording really didnt do it justice...I really wanted this demo to 'sound good' which, I hope it does thanks to the people here. Huge Ta for the compliment..

Peace...

Out.
 
hey "life" sounds good.

good luck.

I listened the other tracks too and they are very solid stuff. "Where ever you go" is may personnal favorite. Keep on rocking.´

Riku
 
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