lengthy vocal-less metal piece

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bozmillar

bozmillar

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After all these years of recording, I've finally decided to try the band thing. This is our first song that will be going onto the demo CD. For the real thing, we're going to use real drums and have a singer, if singers actually exist.

I tracked the bass and did the drum programming to this. One of the guitarists tracked all the guitars.

I think what I need feedback on the most is the bass tone and the "realness" of the drums. I always have a really hard time getting the low end right, so I need a 40th set of ears to help me out.

Oh, and it's a long one. I haven't gotten around to fixing up the end yet, so if you actually make it that far, you'll see that I kind of gave up there. I'll do that part later.

 
hmm. listening to it now, the whole thing sounds a bit muffled and too bass heavy. I'll remix and repost.
 
I gave it a listen anyway because metal is more my thing. I like the composition and can't wait to hear it completed. First complaint is the guitars. They just don't have that big sound that I like in metal. I listened to Song 16 and it has a wider sound than this. I would do some wider panning to make those guitars bigger. Also, I wouldn't say its too bass heavy, actually to my ears it sounds as though the guitars are taking up to much residence in the bass guitars space. Id cut the guitars a bit in the low bass range and add a little more mid bass. Maybe a cut around 80-100hz and a boost around 250-300hz. Very light on the eq though. The bass needs to sit in the middle in its own frequency space. Also, the bass could use a little more definition. Maybe bring up the eq between 1 and 3mhz. The drums sound ok so far, though they could use a little more punch. Otherwise, Its a solid beginning for a nice epic thrasher. Cant wait to hear more.
 
Hey, thanks for the feedback. I think I pretty much agree with every point you made. Part of the difficulty I'm having with this is that the guitar is actually a real amp mic'd, not guitar rig, so it's a little different than I'm used to mixing. The guitars were actually really bright, so I tried to tone them down a bit, and I think I overdid it. And with the way the bass is right now, its serving more to fill in the bottom end than to actually be an instrument in the mix. I'll give it another pass this weekend and repost.

Thanks for the comments.
 
The intro's fine - a bit metallica & the bass notes on the guitar sound a little hollow - the drum prog is fine on the understanding that it's a fill in.
The bass isn'tt too bad - define it with a 3db peak at 3k and roll off the bottom a bit.
The guitars sound OK so far - not brilliant but you've mixed Brian may with Metallica so it's odd sounding at 1st.
Once the meat riff starts there is a bass brawl going on between guitars bass & bass drum. Just do some EQ carving so each has some space to its self.
Mic'd guitars are HARD to do well. But it really needs some minimization of the EQ overlap where possible.
I can hear you're aiming for your usual wonderful textures in this - it's just harder to do I suppose with mic'd stuff. - worth it but harder.
Of the whole piece - I like it EXCEPT for the little squeally guitar bits - they remind me of the Osmonds & Crazy Horses!
Good writing mate.
 
Great track Boz!
Seems a bit too long but that's because you don't have the vocals. It all sounds fine to me mix-wise. Nice purring bass sound, I think it blends pretty well with the guitars. Drums sound great too. Love to hear it with the voice.

Joey :):):):)
 
I like the way its mixed...and the balls in the bottom...the way I like it. And I like the guitar sound and playing.

The drums sound really good to me....but there's not a lot of time-keeping function on the hats and cymbals...the figures, w/o overt time, get a bit fatiguing.....like the plane sitting on the runway...never taking off. Always getting ready. I might try programming in a little sock-hats and/or bell ride and stuff like that, to let the figures recochet off from, when you want to get some momentum going.....
 
yeah, I agree that it's pretty long. i didn't think anybody would actually make it all the way through.

Rayc - yeah, mixing real guitars is just something I'm not used to doing. i think part of the separation issue is that he is playing all parts with the same guitar, through the same amp, so all the distortion sounds a little too much the same. That's something I'll have to just learn to live with for this song. This is just a demo version to hold us over until we do the real recording. As for the squealy guitars, that's my favorite part. His favorite guitarist is zakk wylde, so he has to squeal.

Joeym - Thanks for the compliment. It is prettly long, clocking in at over 12 min. Hopefully with vocals, it will feel less long. I think we might cut the intro a bit shorter too. I'm also planning on backing it with an orchestra, so hopefully that will keep the intro interesting enough.

jeffmaher - yeah, I didn't do the drum arrangement. I was handed a midi file with the basic drum layout, but it was all completely quantized in velocity, so my main goal was to try to get them to sound human. I'll probably have to let my ears rest from it for a while and take another pass at humanizing them.

thanks for listening. I'll repost when I update the mix a bit.
 
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