First Complete Home Recorded Song

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Formyson

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For your pleasure. Please listen, review and comment. It's our first home recorded attempt.

https://soundcloud.com/bigredants/im-tryin

Updated Mix after taking in your suggestions.

https://soundcloud.com/bigredants/im-trying-exp02-6a-mas/s-q3ubD

(Raised bass volume, spread the drum mix, lowered the kick compression ratio, lowered the drum overhead volume, worked on snare tone, flexed the vocal spots on the first verse.)

Guitars, Drums and Vocals recorded in the living room.
Bass was DI
Mixed and mastered using Logic Pro X
We used a couple of our studio cut demos as reference tracks
 
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The recording quality is pretty good in my opinion. For a first try its definitely a home run.
 
It misses some low end in most instruments, but otherwise it's a clean recording.
 
Vocals are a tad loud, you have them sitting right, just bring them down slightly closer to the music. I bit more bottom (150-300) would help translate the energy of the song.

I think you guys really did a nice job for the first outing. The time and effort you put into the song and the mix really shows here. My compliments!
 
Agreed on low end. Not hearing much bass. Drums/cymbals don't seem to have much width, seems to be pretty centered. I like the vocals, guitars sound good too. Good job
 
I thought it was well performed. Very tight band. I thought the vocal sounded good. Singer kind of struggles on those drawn out notes in the middle.

The drums were very narrow - like mono. Crash cymbals were kind of hissy and phasey. Hats sounded OK. Snare could use a little more upper end - it was a little thuddy. Kick was a bit too loud and had too much low midrange, making it a little woofy.

Having trouble hearing the bass. It comes through in small spots here and there.

Guitars need some upper midrange. They sound very muffled. Lots of low and low midrange.

Doubled vocal would sound good on this song.
 
I loved the vibe...really, really cool, man.

Although I'm not an expert at the subject, I thought that the drums are the only thing that needs some polish. The cymbals are too damn loud. But it is cool anyway...

Keep on recording those cool tunes, dude.
 
Thank you all for all the feedback. We did tweak the low end and vocals just a tad as was suggested. (You guys are way better at catching this stuff than we are at this point.) This is a labor of love for us and I find it very interesting that you could tell that we have put some time into this mix. We had almost 30 bounces before we got here.

Here's the link for the new (final) bounce.
https://soundcloud.com/bigredants/im-tryin/s-H2J10
 
Yeah. This is much better than my first recordings.

+1 for the cymbals being too loud and too centered. The panning sounds better on the second mix, but it's still all drums down the center.
+1 for the bass being inaudible.
I think the guitar tone is alright actually.
Some of the vocals get a little buried (especially the "been trying"s)
Not a huge fan of the snare tone. It's kind of mid-rangey and lacks punch.

It might not hurt to put in a few more tracks in as accents. e.g. some harmonies; some lead fills; etc.
 
Dude, I love lo-fi drums...absolutely love. Your song reminds me of Guided by Voices...I think it has a lot of personality, even though it doesnt sounds perfect.

There is a background hiss, how do you recorded this?

Oh, I could hear this song all day long BTW.
 
Nice job. The 2nd posted mix sounds even better than the first. These guys really know what they're talking about.
 
I am pretty sure that the background hiss is do to a lack of headroom when we recorded. I had to keep turning tracks down when compressing and I think that caught up with me. The hiss was not present on the original recorded tracks.

The artist (my son and his band) would not let me spread out the drums. Which I disagreed with. I also wanted the whole mix a little more wet. He disagreed. When it came down to it I had to let the artist have his way since no one is thinking about me when they are listening to it.

I did not achieve the drum mix sound that I wanted. The drums you hear are as close as I could get. I just don't know all my tools in the DAW yet. Our drum mic set was not the most expensive and we are still fine tuning our mic placement. YouTube is great for learning basics but a little hard to get it to respond to questions. Logic Pro X seems great but I don't know if I will ever be able to learn all the native plugins. I see why Waves does so well because under the hood of their plugins, there is a whole lot of things going on and the beginner like me can just hit a preset setting.

We bought two waves plugins while mixing this song but in the end did not use either of them because we could not fine tune them enough for sound the artist was going for.

Last item is the vocals. The boys in the band are all young including my son who is 16. He is a very talented musician but never really planned on singing. He only started fronting his band when they could not find a singer. He has come a long way with his vocals but he is still has a way to go and that is why he is a little buried in the chorus. They are wonderful live and as a result are starting to get regular gigs at some of the local clubs but getting behind the mic when recording vocals really stresses him out. It took three takes to get the two guitar tracks down but 4 days to get the vocal track down. ( he was not really happy with it.).

I really want to think all of you for your kind words and knowledgeable input. I am not a musician but music is the bond between my son and I. Learning how to record at home is becoming a true hobby for me. it allows my son and I spend time together and that is my true goal. I never expected to find myself being driven at midnight to get in the office and try new tweaks that I thought of or found on the internet but I'm doing it. Guess I'm hooked.
 
Some of the vocals need automating a bit, you're losing volume in places, it's also sitting on top a bit uncomfortably. The vocals are a bit off pitch at times, if you're using Logic Pro X and you can't get him to re-record it, AND you don't feel like it's heresy, the Flex Pitch tool will fix that nicely. Google it, but don't go overboard with it or you'll make him sound like Cher.

The guitars sound decent, nice tone.

Nice song.
 
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Wow.......well done!! I like the song and the production........for the most part. Your pounding hi hat is too piercing. Not terrible and maybe you like the sound but it distracts for sure. Was your vocalist playing and singing at the same time? It seems like he was. His proximity to the mic wanders around and he seems distracted at times.........throwing his timing and pitch off a bit. I also think the vocal track is not helped by the room or environment. Try a closer mic approach and see how it sounds to begin with. Really though........nice job!! Thanks for letting me hear it.
 
Formyson said:
I am pretty sure that the background hiss is do to a lack of headroom when we recorded. I had to keep turning tracks down when compressing and I think that caught up with me. The hiss was not present on the original recorded tracks.

The artist (my son and his band) would not let me spread out the drums. Which I disagreed with. I also wanted the whole mix a little more wet. He disagreed. When it came down to it I had to let the artist have his way since no one is thinking about me when they are listening to it.

I did not achieve the drum mix sound that I wanted. The drums you hear are as close as I could get. I just don't know all my tools in the DAW yet. Our drum mic set was not the most expensive and we are still fine tuning our mic placement. YouTube is great for learning basics but a little hard to get it to respond to questions. Logic Pro X seems great but I don't know if I will ever be able to learn all the native plugins. I see why Waves does so well because under the hood of their plugins, there is a whole lot of things going on and the beginner like me can just hit a preset setting.

We bought two waves plugins while mixing this song but in the end did not use either of them because we could not fine tune them enough for sound the artist was going for.

Last item is the vocals. The boys in the band are all young including my son who is 16. He is a very talented musician but never really planned on singing. He only started fronting his band when they could not find a singer. He has come a long way with his vocals but he is still has a way to go and that is why he is a little buried in the chorus. They are wonderful live and as a result are starting to get regular gigs at some of the local clubs but getting behind the mic when recording vocals really stresses him out. It took three takes to get the two guitar tracks down but 4 days to get the vocal track down. ( he was not really happy with it.).

I really want to think all of you for your kind words and knowledgeable input. I am not a musician but music is the bond between my son and I. Learning how to record at home is becoming a true hobby for me. it allows my son and I spend time together and that is my true goal. I never expected to find myself being driven at midnight to get in the office and try new tweaks that I thought of or found on the internet but I'm doing it. Guess I'm hooked.
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Dont worry...it takes time to really learn how to do basic recording stuff. But honestly, the soul of all of this is to make a documentation of a moment, a feel, an impression in the form of music. And there is no perfect form of that, as you may know.

I think that you did a good job with the tools you have and bear in mind that you'll keep on getting better, everyday, man.

Keep on making great tunes with your son!
 
Very good job for your first home recording job! It sounds as though you really did your homework. It's funny that you mentioned compression with regards to the hiss, because that's the first thing that struck me is that the drums (in particular) sounded over-compressed. The guitars sounded pretty dang good, but in general the song has a bit of squashed sound to me. I guess it's actually mainly the drums and bass now that I listen again.

Anyway, keep up the good work!

Edit: By the way, these comments were regarding the first mix. I just saw that you put up another one.
 
Great first mix, tell your son he has a great "modern" voice and not to worry about it. :D
 
Do a mix like you want (just don't tell them what you did) - spread the drums and put a reverb buss on it, the vocal is very dry, as is it all - noticeable during the break.
 
I listened to the 2nd mix.
it sounds really good.. I think the vocals are a tad inconsistent in levels and a bit dry. Maybe some compression to level them out and a bit of ambiance to help glue them to the mix.
 
cakewalkgg said:
I listened to the 2nd mix.
it sounds really good.. I think the vocals are a tad inconsistent in levels and a bit dry. Maybe some compression to level them out and a bit of ambiance to help glue them to the mix.
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Yep - much better but the vocals are a little forward. Try parallel compressing the vocals then adjust to the mix. (PM me if you want suggestions). The reverb is a tough call - this type of music doesn't need a washy reverb - just a touch of something to color it a bit. I'll let you decide how you like it to sit. Everything else is pretty good as is.....:D:D:D:D
 
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