first instrumental song, critique please -_-

T

teddyastuffed

New member
hello everybody. just for a background, ive been learning (or trying to) how to record and make it sound good for a while. this is one of my newer songs. i like to call it a screamo song even though theres no vocals just cuz it sounds like music to one of their songs. im just wondering whats wrong with it, cuz it sounds off to me. i recorded the 2 guitars with my pod xt, the bass through my ub1202 pre, and the drums r made with BFD. this is not pro shit by any means necessary so dont laugh -_-. but i do want a pretty good critique as i want to get better at this kinda stuff

heres the link...


and thanks in advance for any posts -_-. any help is greatly appreciated
 
Good sound and rhythm on the gtr. To my ear the mix is out of balance - too hot around 100 Hz. Maybe it's just the bass, or maybe the combination of bass, gtr low end, and kick, dunno. Drums are lacking a little in transients/attacks if that can be brought out more.

Tim
 
Yeah too much lo end man. Put a hi pass over guitar and bass tracks.
THe lo end is prob the trickiest one to get right.
Please try and use an amp (tube) when reocrding guitars as the guitars tone is noticealbe as a direct recording. Bass is ok just DI'd but a mic aswell as DI can give more realistic results.
Work on the drums, They need to be alot louder.
Keep at it.
 
Cool stuff but a few suggestions:

High pass the guitars definitely, maybe around 100 Hz
The tone is too sterile sounding, even just plain grating. Even though it's DI, you could make it alot less obvious for sure. Try a different amp model on the POD or a different cabinet setting. Experiment until you are getting more in line with a realistic tone. Maybe try a clearer, less saturated sound and layer it a couple of times. I agree that an amp is greatly prefered if possibly (may be impossible, I know how that can be)

Drums could be louder and with more attack/ transients as Tim said. Also in some parts they sound really sparse, as in they kind of fall out as the music carries on. I know that is a stylistic thing, but some more action on the drums during those parts would make the song alot more interesting for this style. Also maybe some more varied beats or accents here and there.

It's hard to tell, but the bass seems to be all muffled and low, kind of lacking any character. I would like to hear a fuller bass tone with less low-end mudd.

don't mean to sound like I'm picking you apart, just thought you might want these suggestions! :D
 
thanks for all the suggestions guys ! im a bit confused on the drum suggestions though. im not a drummer or know much about the terminology, so attack/ transients doesnt mean much to me. if someone could go more in depth with that, i would greatly appreciate it.

also, as for the guitars, it would be possible for me to cab the pod and mic that with different mic positions and what not. experiment pretty much. i dont really have a good amp, so i dont really want to use that for the actual recording, but i guess the cabing method could give me a more realistic sound (more like a flextone or something). im just wondering how much of a difference that really will make compared to the DI method. and as for the bass, im really no bassist so i just kinda wanted a low tone to add to the guitars. but i guess i could try to make that more prominant as well.

once agian thanks for the suggestions and advice, and please feel free to constructively criticize/comment on the track i created as harsh as possible. this is a learning process for me, so any advice aside from "ur music sucks, u fail at life, give up before u start" would be awesome ;).

i will try to fix up some parts u guys mentioned are lacking and release a redone track.

thanks again!
 
about the terminology, so attack/ transients doesnt mean much to me. if someone could go more in depth with that
Click to expand...
I'll give it a shot... At the start of a sound (the attack) there are brief things that happen that make up part of the character of the sound. Those things are the transients... meaning they pass by quickly. Transients are one of the toughest things for mic's to pick up accurately and without adding harshness. Compression with fast attack settings tends to remove transient detail. Since transients are often at a higher frequency than the fundamental pitch of a sound, EQ can easily pull transients out of phase - making them sound weird in various ways.

Tim
 
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Timothy Lawler said:
I'll give it a shot... At the start of a sound (the attack) there are brief things that happen that make up part of the character of the sound. Those things are the transients... meaning they pass by quickly. Transients are one of the toughest things for mic's to pick up accurately and without adding harshness. Compression with fast attack settings tends to remove transient detail. Since transients are often at a higher frequency than the fundamental pitch of a sound, EQ can easily pull transients out of phase - making them sound weird in various ways.

Tim
Click to expand...
Woah freaky stuff. So transients are the bits after the initial attack?
 
Woah freaky stuff. So transients are the bits after the initial attack?
Click to expand...
What I'm really referring to are the high frequency transients, not so much the swell of the fundamental pitch during the attack. With the sound of the guitar, I hear them from the very beginning of the attack. If you view a frequency analysis chart of the attack of a guitar string pluck, like you can in Wavelab and other software, you can sometimes see the high frequency transients, but they're subtle. To my ear when they're removed the music sounds artificial and lifeless.

Tim
 
wow thats in depth ! im still wondering what ur hearing though. to me it sounds like ur referring to something like a jazz kit where the snare sounds when the kick is hit (sorry for lack of better vocabulary). i dont know if this is possible with an artificial drum kit, but if anyone has like 2 tracks side by side, one with more attack/transient and one without? sorry if thats asking too much but i think that would help me along with anyone else reading this that doesnt know what that is to understand it better. or maybe just write it out (could be difficult considering i dont have a good idea what ur referring to).

thanks for the answer though ! and once again id like to thank all the people helping me out. this is my day off so ill get a chance to work on the song today.
 
I think that in stone simple terms the drums just sound somewhat lifeless because you don't hear the definition of the hits...or the "THWACK" of the heads. I think alot of the problem lies in the fact that the drums are way too quiet and alot of the quality of them may be masked by the other instruments. As far as the cabinet issue, I was referring more to a different "modeled" cabinet setting on the POD. The guitar now doesn't seem to have the characteristic tone of , say a 4x12 cab. Doesn't the POD have different cabinet emulations? I would try something different. Or if you wanted to mic a cabinet, perhaps you could mix the two together. The bass sounds almost like the tone is rolled off...hard to tell really. I think more midrange in the bass would sound better, but also make some room for it with eq on the guitar, either while tracking or when mixing.
 
for the guitar tone, what do u think would sound better? less fuzz and distortion? like a bit cleaner just so it has more definition, then just layer it with a few other tracks? i still want it to have that fast paced hardcore sound to it, but i do understand what u mean when u say it doesnt have character. i noticed that too. ill try to start working on this song a bit later today, as i have some errands to do. maybe i can post a new version of it sometime later today.


cuz right now on the pod i have the cab setting to kinda like a screaming guitar tone with a 421 dynamic mic as the mic its using. ill try to experiment.

1 last question, is it normal to track like layer multiple guitar tracks just for 1 guitar? (ie: 3-4 tracks just for the left side guitar?)
 
Yes, but you don't want to use as much distortion definitely. Also it will help to use a different tone for each take so they blend together better and have less phase problems. If you are gonna do it like that (which is what I would do) do the same thing on each side (don't cut and paste anything - play it again) and hard pan the tracks L and R. Put the bass right in the middle.
 
What is this BFD that you're using to make the drums? Is it a software drum machine?

Palm mutes are always a bitch when DI'd. A high pass around 80-100Hz is a must to get rid of that boomy sound. You might want to try putting the POD through the cab, it'll liven it up if you have a good mic and good technique.

I myself am looking for ways to be a solo artist and not be the traditional acoustic/vocals you hear everywhere. I'd like to be able to record music in a style similar to your song, but I don't know how to go about getting a good drum sound. Everything I've tried has sounded like crap, hence my interest in what you're using. By the time I figure out how to do all this by myself, I'll probably have a band anyways, haha. Just lettin' ya know I'm in a similar situation. Just keep up the good effort, and don't let yourself get discouraged.
 
BFD is a software drum machine. its pretty good but kinda restricting cuz of the fact that they dont let u go above 3 toms and 3 cymbals. so its just standard kits (no rush style music for me -_-). but other than that its probably one of the most realistic drum modelers out there. the only thing thats kinda difficult to make it sound good is the hi-hats and the cymbals, cuz those are so versatile in sound when its a live kit.
 
My $0.03 (Canadian Funds):

Song sounds good. I like. The recording sounds a little too dead in a few areas---but not so dead that they cannot be revived.

Guitar sounds very DI. I have the same problem with my POD. I would try using a little bit of reverb (so much that you barely notice it's there--and not the POD's reverb. Something post-tracking. It helps with the synth-ness of POD recordings.

And the snare sounds a little dead, too. If it could be brightened up a bit, that would be nice. It sounds more like a glorified tom than a snare--like a snare drum with a few broken strands (I played with a drummer who refused to fix his snare--NOT COOL!).

Other than that, sounds pretty good. I might even check out this BFD thing. . .
 
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