Instrument variety on a CD.

[homeuser]

Quick question, when making a cd with 12-14 songs, do you think all of the songs should sound as if they came from the same collection of instruments or do you think it's ok to experiment and use different instruments/sound on each track? Thanks.

 

[The Green Hornet]

Yo User@home:

I'd just say creativity is the key. If you're doing a CD of mood music, I guess you define "mood music" and keep your songs within your definition.

If you're doing Jazz to fill a CD, then I guess you use your best jazz chops and jazz musicians.

If it's ROCK -- you just rock as you define it.

You can review all the other terms of today's music and choose. I think what you're driving at is "continuity" within a CD.

It would seem incongruous for a Country Western vocalist to stick in a couple of "Jazz Scat" songs in the middle of the CD.

But, in today's world of music and creativity, who knows what will satisfy the whims of a given audience? Rock on.

The Green Hornet

 

[sjjohnston]

Quick question, when making a cd with 12-14 songs, do you think all of the songs should sound as if they came from the same collection of instruments or do you think it's ok to experiment and use different instruments/sound on each track? Thanks.

I think it's ok to experiment and use different instruments/sounds on each track. Hey, it worked for Sgt. Pepper.

But, it really depends on why you're asking. As an artistic matter, I'd say do whatever you think is best. As a commercial matter, I suspect there's a reason why most major label CDs do sound like "one band" is playing all the songs (with relatively minor exceptions).

 

[homeuser]

"As a commercial matter, I suspect there's a reason why most major label CDs do sound like "one band" is playing all the songs (with relatively minor exceptions)."

Interesting, I do agree that most commercial efforts seem to centralize around a "sound" for that particular cd.

My problem is, I love to rock out, but a good tekno tune is also within my capabilities. I'm leaning towards a mix of rock and tekno music.

Thanks for the feedback people!

 

[Cyrokk]

I think what's more important is the song itself. If the guitar begs for a strat sound, then use a strat sound. If you simply must have gated reverb on song three even though the rest are more traditional, then do it anyway. (Drums should be tuned in the key of the track, and due to temperature differences and the constantly morphing nature of the snare, live drums will never sound the same from track to track anyway).

Unless you are going to track in different studios or use different rooms, you are going to use the same recording equipment and processes, which will help define consistency.

Also, there are many tricks you can use to make your cd's sound consistent. Song order is a good example. If you had a punk song with a classic fuzz tone or strat sound play just after a warm Les Paul boogie, the ear might have trouble reconciling the two sounds and the punk sound will appear sonically inferior. However, if you reverse the song order, with the strat sound first, the ear does not notice the difference so easily.

Also you can do all those nifty segues that many bands do. Those come in handy when you have two songs in different key signatures that when played back to back are too taxing on the ear.

Cy

 

[HapiCmpur]

Quick question, when making a cd with 12-14 songs, do you think all of the songs should sound as if they came from the same collection of instruments or do you think it's ok to experiment and use different instruments/sound on each track? Thanks.

This is a great question and one that I've been thinking about for several months. I believe you're going to have to decide what you intend to do with your CD before you assemble it. If it's just for you and your friends, then have fun with variety. If you intend to try market it, however, you're probably better off sticking to one genre--or at least one genre per CD.

Record companies are just like other corporations. They trade on their brand names. And for a brand to have any meaning, the product MUST be predictable and consistent--painfully consistent. A McDonald's hamburger, for instance, must taste the same whether you eat it in Baltimore or Guatemala City. (And, oddly enough, they do.)

So if you want a record company to take an interest in your CD, you should make it very easy for the execs to be able to immediately identify its genre, know to which audience they will market it, and decide which category it will occupy on the rack at the CD store. Those things are much more important to the company than the aesthetic quality of the music.

Yes, there are exceptions. There are some very creative bands out there. But usually they get their start as genre bands, build a reliable audience, and then start to expand their repertoire after that. SJJohnston (above) mentioned Sgt. Pepper as a good example. Look how much predictable upbeat pop the Beatles put out before taking a chance on sitars, sound effects, and (gasp!) a thematic concept. And that was back in the '60s. It's even harder to break the corporate stranglehold today.

I guess if I were you (and I am in a very similar situation), I'd record all the songs, assemble them on a CD the way I like them, but keep them stored separately, too, just in case your stuff catches the interest of a record company. Then you can easily re-assemble a CD with tunes of all one genre if that's the requirement of getting the deal.

 

[homeuser]

Cy,

Thanks for your tips, but they went straight over my head. Sorry...

HapiCmpur,

Thanks for the comments. Yes, that does make sense. I would like to send my finished cd out to a few places, and would just add confusion if it sounded like 14 different artists.