Getting it going

spantini

spantini

COO of me, inc.
I've started a new Reaper project for my next song and right now all I've done is put in a scratch drum track to use as a metronome. I'm making a lot of practice runs with my Strat. I'm using closed headphones as I sing along (not mic'd), so I'm mostly hearing my vocal inside my head. It's working ok.

Funny thing is.. the drum track is very similar to a lot of AC/DC stuff and as soon as I make one run-through on my song, which is nothing like AC/DC, I'm inspired to go into a little AC/DC-like guitar rhythm and it locks in beautifully with the drums. I may get one or two new songs out of this if I don't watch myself.

Now, instead of being focused on just the one song, I've got three tunes fighting for attention.
 
Sounds like my MO. I usually start out with drum tracks, put in my initial guitar tracks, maybe a bass part, re-record guitars, throw in scratch vocals, keyboards etc. Wash rinse repeat. I personally write that way Spantini. If I get one idea down, then great. But if it inspires 2 or 3 more "offshoots" then I go with it. Because I never know where any one of the nuggets might go. Keep us posted on how this all progresses, I am interested in where you go next.
 
I'm building my voice back from lack of use and it's still breaking mid-phrase in a couple spots. I should be able to get a complete a scratch vocal soon, then get on with the rest.
 
I know what you mean - in my case, I try to sing a bit every day to keep vocal cords limber and pitch control. I do scales because my vocal teacher always had me warm up with those, plus she was listening and watching my throat, face, etc. I found that to be a good way for me anyway to keep practicing. I don't always sing every day, but most days. Good luck Spantini with your songs, it sounds like you are on a roll. :thumbs up:
 
Sounds good. They could go together imo. If this is in the key of A (not near my instruments to check), the A/ C#m/G/Bm part could be your verse and the D/A/E a chorus possibly. Nice tempo too.
 
spantini said:
Funny thing is.. the drum track is very similar to a lot of AC/DC stuff and as soon as I make one run-through on my song, which is nothing like AC/DC, I'm inspired to go into a little AC/DC-like guitar rhythm and it locks in beautifully with the drums. I may get one or two new songs out of this if I don't watch myself.
Now, instead of being focused on just the one song, I've got three tunes fighting for attention.
Click to expand...
Because I'm in different countries to my friends that play drums, I find that I can use drum tracks from already recorded songs to make new ones. So, quite a few of my songs over the last couple of years have involved drum tracks that draw from more than one previously recorded song. I find that I have to really think about how the song is going to go in each of its sections to make sure none of them sound like the songs from which the drum tracks may be culled.
 
I was looking for some good reverb for my drums. VSTs of various sorts (including those within amp sims) weren't working well at all.

Without first watching Kenny's video, I played around with Reaper's ReaVerb a few times and without knowing WTF I was doing I got nowhere. So much for winging it.. I finally watched the video and.. B A N G ! .. I got the reverb I was looking for and was going at it ten minutes later. That'll teach me :laughings:

Here's the first mp3 without reverb, then the second with ReaVerb. It's on the whole drum kit - right now it's a single MIDI track so the verb is applied to the kit. Since the snare is prominent it works ok.
 

Attachments

  • HHH.mp3
    689 KB
  • HHHVerb.mp3
    335.1 KB
grimtraveller said:
Because I'm in different countries to my friends that play drums, I find that I can use drum tracks from already recorded songs to make new ones. So, quite a few of my songs over the last couple of years have involved drum tracks that draw from more than one previously recorded song. I find that I have to really think about how the song is going to go in each of its sections to make sure none of them sound like the songs from which the drum tracks may be culled.
Click to expand...
I know what you mean. When my head gets going on a drum part my mind wanders and weaves all kinds of melodies and guitar parts around it. Sometimes I think it's easier to write a song from scratch beginning with a drum groove, but then I have problems coming up with good lyrics. I find if I start with lyrics and melody first I get better material, though not as solid sounding.
 
I set that one aside for now because I recently purchased a GK bass amp sim to add to my AmpliTube 5 setup - and it's magical.. for me, anyway. Almost exactly the sound I've been looking for. That relit a flame under my butt and I moved over to a song I've been trying to give priority to for years but had left me flat as I didn't have the right amp sim sound.

I've made more progress on this song in the last 3 days than in the last 12 years. The first 2 days, I put down a click track (a snare rimshot.. sounds more like a wood block to me), 3 guitar tracks, 2 bass tracks and a partial drum track. Then I took a day off to rest my ears (and brain). Today I built out the drums to where I have the intro, first verse, chorus, second verse, second chorus and the first beat of the lead break (verse/chorus) - kick, snare, a few fills, some crash cymbal, but that's about it. Then I deleted 1 bass track.

I step-entered all the drum notes up to where I can now just copy/paste everything from there to the end. I'm on that tomorrow. Then I'll get on adding some hi-hat and ride, and then focus on fine tuning the drum track - nudging and tweaking here and there, you know..

No vocal(s) yet, but I have reached a point where I can sing along (sans mic) with my headphones on and it's coming together nicely.

I don't know yet how this is going to sound on monitors or laptop speakers, but it's sounding real good in my headphones... so far. It's kinda watered down through my laptop speakers, but I played Led Zep I & II YouTube recordings through my laptop speakers and they also sounded watered down - can't hear Jones-ey's bass 99% of the time. But plugging headphones in brings it all to life in full force.
 
Last edited:
Man...:guitar: I've got the instruments 90% done - they could fly as is but I need to play around with the drums a bit more.

I saved the vocal(s) for last, though I have been singing along for two reasons: to make sure the timing and accents are right, and to work my vocal chords.. get my singing up to 75% at least.

Worked on drums all day today. Plan to rehearse some miked vocals tomorrow - might get lucky and have a useful take.
 
Well, that last song is 99% done and has been over in the mp3 Mixing Clinic for a while now.

Started on recording a new song several days ago. I couldn't make up my mind which one to use this time. I've been sitting and walking, running them all through my brain's playback machine, trying to imagine different amp sounds. Different arrangements. I haven't touched a guitar for over a month now and I'm looking for the right sound to kick this thing off.

Pulled my Strat out and... out of tune [ugh], so give it a tune and run it through the interface with no sims or processing. It still sounds like crap. So the search for the "right" sound begins again. I play for 20 minutes, flitting about all the amp sims looking for the basic sound so I can pick one and have a go. Several days of this before my guitar and amp choice begins to gel and sound at least acceptable.

Then I get to work on the BPM. That took all day today because I couldn't make up my mind until I relaxed and loosened up from steady playing and settled into a groove. That gave me 100 BPM. Next, I added a (Reaper) MIDI item track and looped a rimshot (sounds like wood block) for a metronome. Played through it a half dozen times without singing, just to make sure, then another 3 times while singing to make sure all that worked.

Then I saved the project and put it away for the day.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top