first tune with Sonar (and other new gear)!

  • Thread starter Thread starter maryslittlesecret
  • Start date Start date
MLS,

I was really impressed with this tune... I was thrashin' around a bit. I basically loved it.

The vocals didn't sound too bad to me -- did you remix since you started this thread? Although, I'm using headphones cuz my kidz are sleeping.

I'll comment on the one thing that I don't think my ears dug too much... and it's already been talked about in the thread... but... the stuttering vocal thing jarred my shyte so bad that I think my right eye popped out of it's socket... Okay, not that bad, but something about it didn't sit well with my ears... Possibly it was too loud during the stutter... maybe it was off-time... (remember, I was banging my head, so as you can imagine, heavy-thrashing of the head running into something off-time is like a train-wreck - pah!)

This song rocked... In fact, I'm going to listen to it again...

Great job!

Teddie
http://mp3.com/smartapple
 
Just so you know.....

The NT1 is a very good mic, but it's not nearly as awesome as the NTK.

If you really want that pro~quality sound, get the NTK.

The sound of the NT1 will make you smile.

The sound of the NTK will make your jaw hit the floor as you piss in your pants.

A wise man once said...."spend your money once!"
 
I agree. NT1's are too inconsistent. I've used 4 different ones, and they ranged from "prettydamn good" to "pretty damn weird" in sound quality. If you're stuck in that price range, you'd be a lot better off with a C1.

Yeh, I could do a house or dnb remix, but that's not a big stretch for your music, it's already very rich in techno elements. I was thinking more of a rethinking of it, just a little surgical messaround to see what happens. Mostly, replacing the drums, adding some synths/gtrs/fx, maybe changing the arrangement some... more for kicks than as an official "remix." If you're interested, PM me.
 
brokenwindow

Actually, if I had to compare this song's sound to that of a band, I'd have to go with Prong, at least instrumentally. There is, however, a bit of a "Mustaine-esque" quality to the vocals.

For a more current instrumental parallel, I'd go with A Perfect Circle.
 
PRONG!

HAHA! a Prong reference. That would be later Prong. Earlier Prong (a la Beg to Differ) is really unique. The combination of that really heavy, tight guitar sound and the ultra-gated drums still rocks my world. Later, they got more into looping, technoish sounds, started working with people like Charlie Clouser...
 
Teddie -- you've got me laughing outloud with that visual of you jammin on the headphones... :D Thanks for the comments on the tune. It's the same mix I started the thread with, so all the comments are still valid. And as you can probably tell, the stutter has been a big topic, which is cool to me. I listened to the tune again today and am still digging it, but I can see where you're coming from, in terms of being dangerous to those who are thrashing along... ;)

Charger -- thanks for the mic input. Since they seem to be pretty inexpensive (and getting rave reviews), I'll probably try a C1 when I take the plunge into new gear... And a rethinking of the tune would probably be even more fun and interesting for us to hear than a straight remix. Any thoughts on which tune float your boat?

BrokenWindow -- Prong is a new one for us, in terms of a 'sounds like', which is cool to hear. Quite honestly, I don't think I've ever heard anything from them other than 'Prove You Wrong"(?) years ago, bu you've peaked my curiosity now. Vocally, I'm trying to break through my Mustaine-isms -- give me another song or two and I hope to be a little less 'Davey'. And A Perfect Circle -- now there's a comparison that makes me :D

J
http://www.30SoS.com
 
BrokenWindow -- Prong is a new one for us, in terms of a 'sounds like', which is cool to hear. Quite honestly, I don't think I've ever heard anything from them other than 'Prove You Wrong"(?) years ago, bu you've peaked my curiosity now. Vocally, I'm trying to break through my Mustaine-isms -- give me another song or two and I hope to be a little less 'Davey'. And A Perfect Circle -- now there's a comparison that makes me :D
Click to expand...

Um, Not to pick nits... but that was me :p.

I thought you might appreciate the Perfect Circle reference. And don't worry about the "Mustaine-esque" vocals... sing the way you sing, and the end result will be much better than if you try to "force" a style.

As for the Prong comparison, it's less about the electronica than the guitar/bass/drum sound. I think the sound is along the lines of "Prove you Wrong", "Unconditional" and "Snap Your Fingers...". Emphasis on Bass and Treble, with greatly reduced mids. Check out their material if you can find it - they're a great band.
 
My bad, homerec. And yeah, I suppose I need to embrace my 'inner Mustaine' (as wrong as that sounds -- in so many different ways). I really am fairly new to trying to sing 'seriously', so I believe my style (if I can call it that) is still developing. Perhaps I'll check out the vocalist for Prong... ;)

Thanks again to everyone for the comments -- this thread has rocked! Is there anyone left that we haven't heard from?

J
http://www.30SoS.com
 
I have a new listening style, I listen to the whole song in lo-fi, then I listen to the 1st 20-30 seconds in hi-fi to get an idea of the true sound (this saves TONS of time). :)
In that stuttering part everyone is talking about, I might have a suggestion. Did you set up the stutter from the bus or the track itself with envelopes? It seems like whatever sounds are behind the vocals are stuttering too, which is what might be killing it. If you did it from the buss, try setting an envelope from the track itself instead. I'm assuming you used an envelope to develop that. You might also want to check into a tremelo plug in that will perform that same task and plug it into that track alone, not the whole mix.
Pretty cool song! Wow, I just started on the actual hi-fi listen... huge difference, wow. I was fully prepared to start bitching about the guitar sound... it was the lo-fi I was hearing after all. Made it sound far away and roomish. Good tracking, good work. Its hard to critique a song not knowing exactly what you used. If you have $5000 worth of mics and a few $3000 preamps I could find some things to work on, but if its all prosumer gear, its quite good, probably about as close as it'll let you get. :) I do like a little more thump in addition to the kick drum click.
I didn't see you list all the stuff you used for this one. I like seeing gear lists and stuff and what was done.
 
I hear the Prong reference now, starting mainly at 2:08. My favorite part, actually, sounds a tad more modern than the other parts of the song. I'm not a big fan of solo's anymore though, but to each his own :) The solo was very Cantrell-ish, though, nice and not overly flashy.
That stutter effect is definately over the whole mix ( I've ended up listening to the whole thing in hi-fi anyway, now... some time saver huh?) Get it off the mix and put it on the vocal track only and it'll sound way better.
Peace.
 
Hey, tubedude. thanks for the comments. in terms of the stutter effect, we actually ended up doing that in post-production (if I can call it that) with Sound Forge and its stutter plug-in. We tried the stutter on just the vocal track originally, but we ended up opting for the whole mix because we were going for a bigger impact and felt it was much more dramatic -- personal taste, I guess. :) I am going to look into a tremolo plug-in that can be set by tempo as opposed to by milliseconds -- anyone have any suggestions on if and where I can find a plug-in like that?

And in terms of gear, I think I posted a full list on one of my old threads, but here's a basic run down of the key elements -- my studio is probably closer to a total of $5,000, as opposed to that much in mics... :(

Guitar -- Jackson PS4 through a POD 2.0
Vocal -- AKG C3000 into a dbx 286A with an ART DR-X for effetcs
Drums -- Boss DR660
Bass -- Ibanez SG 5-string, also through the POD
Keys -- I have a couple sound modules, but everything in "Relativity" was from my Roland RS-5
Loops -- assorted Sonic Foundry CDs
Soundcard -- WaMi Rack 24
Software -- Sonar 1.02/Sound Forge 5
PC -- Homemade 600MHz PIII w/ 512K RAM

If there's anything else you're wondering about gear-wise, let me know -- that's most everything I use.

Thanks again for the input -- any other suggestions, advice, opinions, etc.?

J
http://www.30SoS.com
 
It indeed sounds very good. Maybe even too good for that kind of music.. It sorta reminds me of a band called Haji's Kitchen.

Gotta love that ps-4... That's a sweet guitar to play on. I'll have my EMG S-81 put in it ASAP. (have Bartolinis right now. They're lovely, but too "nice" for metal.)
 
Howdy, I know this is very newbie of me, but how would I be able to do the "stutter" in Home Studio 2002. I assume it is possible in it also because it is very similar to sonar. Thanks
 
Wow! Strange to see this post back from the grave -- this was a couple songs ago (though I suppose the technique in question is unique to this song). Anyway...

Dudleys100 -- I had to ask the same question to figure out how to do this, so don't worry about being a 'newbie' -- I'm still there in more ways than I'd care to admit.

There are actually two stutters in the song -- I'll cover both to be safe. The guitar stutter in the bridge (2:25) is pure digital editing. I did it in Sound Forge 5 by copying a little piece of the guitar (a fraction of a second) and pasting it into the space I had left there. If you have SF5, you can do a 'paste as special/replicate' in the edit menu where you can highlight an area of the song and it will paste as many copies of your clip as will fit into the space you determined, then we just did a fade in on the stutter to soften it up. Let me know if that makes sense. If you don't have Sound Forge, I'm not sure what to tell you -- I don't know if theres a way to do it in Cakewalk...

The vocal 'stutter' at 3:00 (which is more of a rhythmic cut out) is much easier, but requires a special plug-in from Sonic Foundry called "Stutter" (though I think their Amplitude Modulation effect may also work). It takes some effort to time it to the song since its goes by Hz and not tempo, but after that its smooth. The plug-in can be used in CW or Sound Forge (which is where we used it in order to effect the whole track (a decision that was in dispute with this thread ;) )

Anyway, I hope that helps. I'm sure there are probably other ways to accomplish the same effect, but this is how we went about it. Hopefullly, you have a version of Sound Forge, the plug-in, or a budget for either. Let me know if there's anything else ( can try and help with. Also, if anyone else knows a different/better way to do this, specifically in regard to a plug-in that will create this effect with tempo settings, please share -- I'd like to get this technique down a little more effectively. Thanks!

J
http://www.mp3.com/30SoS
 
Thanks a heap Marys little secret (sp). I don't have sound forge but am seriously looking into getting it. I actually don't have CW 2002 either, that is just what I am planning on (maybe) I am still going through a bunch of demos before I commit to a specific software. Anyway, whichever I get I can pull the stutter off in SF it sounds like, and I will remember that. Thanks again for the help, and keep up the good work.
 
THAT KICKED SOME SERIOUS ASS !

I say A+, I liked it all. The stutter stuff was cool and unexpected, and I personally liked the sound of the vocal. Hurrah, I hope to put together something that sounds that good. Peace and Rock, Silver
 
hey, dudleys100...

I just found a free tool that will make the 'rhythmic cutting out' effect we discussed much easier (assuming you can get the plug in). It also works for timing delays, etc. It's called "Time Cruncher" and it's available at the following link:

http://www.prorec.com/prorec/downloads.nsf/filename/9A58F14838E5EDE0862568EE0073D92F

Essentially, you plug in the tempo and how many beats/repeats you want per beat (ie: 4 = 16th note) and this will tell you the number of ms you need to set your delay to -- or in terms of the Stutter plug in, it will tell you how to set the Hz to match the tempo!

I personally am quite excited about this since I spend a fair amount of time going by ear in terms of matching delay and other rhythmic fx to the tempo of the song, so I wanted to make sure and share with those interested. Hope this helps.

J
http://www.mp3.com/30SoS
 
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