Light 'em up! With easlern and ibleedburgundy

  • Thread starter Thread starter Robus
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Robus

Well-known member
New song. Dave (ibleedburgundy) on drums, Nick (easlern) on lead and harmony vocals. This was a difficult song for us, getting our timing together. It took a few tries until we were all in agreement on that eighth note swing, but I think we have it nailed.

Mix is very preliminary [Closer to finished now]. I'll work first on balancing levels of lead and harmony vox and sorting out a few 'esses. I wrote this song in April and have been messing with it ever since, so it's getting hard to be objective. Should I add keyboards? At the moment it's all guitars and bass. Any and all comments welcome!

Latest Mix:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BzqJIqBR8uJeUEJqMWJLcU9Kb2c/view?usp=sharing

Light 'em up
Words and music by Ray Taylor, 2016

Fifteen minutes till the break of dawn
All your boys have come and gone
In the highlights, low lights
Street lights, cop lights
Stains and pains and false alarms
I saw your tail lights leaving town
Another lesson I have found

You turn round and you walk again
Ruins of the Northside and Southside pain
And your thoughts go back to the last night’s gain
And price you fetched and the price you paid
Old rings and such
They don’t count for very much

Light ‘em up, close ‘em round
Light a fire in this town
You don’t me to bring you down
Ride ‘em in, sight ‘em in
Let the signs of life kick in
I’ll bet your singing in the wind

They say old hookers and soldiers
We just fade to yesterday
A rough trade in the balance
For the promises we made
May you always find a harbor
And a wood to park your still
To dwell on your reflections
As we all most surely will

Light ‘em up, close ‘em round
Light a fire in this town
You don’t me to bring you down
Ride ‘em in, sight ‘em in
Let the signs of life kick in
I’ll bet you’re singing in the wind
 
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Hi Robus. First thoughts, nice performances and nice first mix. The drums sound pretty good to me. I'm not completely sold on the tone of the left-hand guitar - it seems a little middly and a bit thin, especially when the right-hand guitar comes in a little later with a much nicer tone.

My main feeling is that the mix needs a tiny bit of reverb "glue" to pull the thing together. At the moment the mix sounds a little as if the individual parts are too isolated. I'm not talking about a lot of reverb, either - just a hint of space, not too bright and of a medium length. Put it on everything. :D That might sound over the top, but you don't even need to hear the reverb strongly for it to help the tones and glue the thing together.

The song is really good, the singing perfect for it and the guitar tones are generally very good.
 
Thanks Bubba, just what I needed to hear. I had a lot more ambiance on the previous mix, then made a last-minute decision to go dry just prior to posting this. Yeah, that telecaster on the left has a thin, cutting tone that may need to sit a bit farther back. I'll be giving the guitars a second look, as I think some of the transition fills are too loud and others too soft.
 
I love that barely-breaking-up-guitar sound. Sounded very nice. The bass sounds very nice.

Honestly, everything sounds very nice.

Only a couple of quibbles...

The snare is a bit loud, at least in spots. And it's dry.

The vocal is a bit up front. And it's dry too. Both the vocal and snare are noticeably dryer than the guitar tracks.

But only minor things. It was real good.
 
you need to do something with those vocals maybe? some kinda effect or double on parts of the vocals would make it more interesting
 
Very nice sound, and you guys did nail the groove. I'm jealous that you have each other to play with. For me it can be really hard to pull a groove together by myself, especially a swing groove at 69 bpm. I agree that it needs some ambience, but the overall sound is great.

As far as adding another instrument, two things come to mind when you mention keyboards. A piano would be the natural, conventional choice, or maybe some type of organ. My other thought is, and this might not be at all what you want, but if it were my song I might try adding some kind of synth line. Kind of a Cars type of thing. Might sound good, might not. And you might not want that kind of quirkiness on this song. But that's what I'd experiment with if it were me.
 
Thanks, that's an idea. I can hear the kind of Cars synth line you mean. I'm a fan. Still, I might go with the organ under the chorus, just a pad.
 
Good groove going on here.

Drums seem to be cutting through the mix an awful lot, particularly the ride and hats. Feels like it needs a bit of 'room' to me, or if you want to keep them pretty dry, maybe some other way to back off the transients a bit so that they lay back a little.

Really well done vocals. Lots of subtleties in the performance. Great timbre and really nice intonation. Bang on performance for the tune. All the performances are really great actually.

The guitar panning is a little too wide for me, although I like where the guitars are sitting front to back. Subjective.

The overall production sounds like it would benefit from some gluey moves with verb or compression.

Strong track. Nice job to all!
 
Lip smack at 0:32

I might pull that left-most guitar a little closer to center. When that's the only guitar going, the right side seems very bare, and it sticks out a little on its own on the left.

Your delivery of "light 'em up" has a very bro-country vibe to it. None of the rest of the song really; just that one line.

They say old hookers and soldiers
We fade to yesterday
Click to expand...
Wait, which are you? :D

Good tones. Catchy tune. Nice work.
 
New mix in the OP. I'll leave the old one up for a time. Changes:

1. Lots of work editing and balancing lead and backing vocals.
2. Drums remixed, snare and overheads lower.
3. Guitars remixed--still some work to do there. Tele on the left is lower in the mix.
4. Organ pad under the chorus and a couple of other places.
5. Slight reverb on the mix bus. Slightly more compression on same.

Let me know what you think. I'm of mixed feelings about the organ pad. What I recorded last night was stupid simple--just held chords. Something was needed to fill out the chorus. I'm starting to think the whole song might need a more serious keyboard part.

The reverb on the mix bus is a new thing for me. I've never done it before in my life. I wanted to try this first, before I tried adding reverb to the individual instruments. Does it help?
 
Checked out the new mix. I'm thinking that anything on my mind right now is very subjective, so please just take it as a personal aesthetic thing. In other words, if this was my mix, I might do 'x' sort of thing.

Pads are pretty low. Personally, I'm not much of a fan of having really subtle mix elements. If it is there, it should be an important part of the song. To me, this sounds 'shy' right now.

The guitar doing the lead bits is a little 'attacky'. Might be sitting (subjectively) to the front of the mix too much.

Finding that the kick, snare and cymbals are low. Ride a tiny bit too, but to a lesser extent. Maybe not. Depends on the contrast with the other elements if you decide to bring those up a little. Not the toms. Even though they are low, drum elements like the snare, hats and ride seem a little 'attacky' too though.

Other than the front to back positioning, I think the sense of space is sounding good. Verb and compression is working for me anyway.
 
The mix is much improved with No.6. I think the drums are a little too crisp in the upper mids, centred around 8kHz with a wide Q. The vocal suffers a little with the same. Perhaps the overheads on the kit need to be dropped a couple of dB? That left-hand guitar is still bugging me a little; is it hi-passed? It could do with a bit of beefing up in the low end, IMO, and bringing a touch closer in.

The ambience is working, but the crispness of the drums and vocals are masking it a bit.

You know who this song reminds me of? It didn't hit me straight away, but it's very reminiscent of Ocean Colour Scene. I don't know if you're aware of them?

Good stuff, and getting closer.
 
kindafishy said:
The guitar doing the lead bits is a little 'attacky'. Might be sitting (subjectively) to the front of the mix too much.

Finding that the kick, snare and cymbals are low. Ride a tiny bit too, but to a lesser extent. Maybe not. Depends on the contrast with the other elements if you decide to bring those up a little. Not the toms. Even though they are low, drum elements like the snare, hats and ride seem a little 'attacky' too though.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I hear what you mean about the attack of that Strat on the right. WTF? Sounds like clipping, but there was no clipping on the raw track. Something's overloading--reverb, compressor? I'll track it down tonight. I agree about the drums. Kick needs to come up. I might have overdone it when I lowered the snare.

Bubba po said:
The mix is much improved with No.6. I think the drums are a little too crisp in the upper mids, centred around 8kHz with a wide Q. The vocal suffers a little with the same. Perhaps the overheads on the kit need to be dropped a couple of dB? That left-hand guitar is still bugging me a little; is it hi-passed? It could do with a bit of beefing up in the low end, IMO, and bringing a touch closer in.

The ambience is working, but the crispness of the drums and vocals are masking it a bit.

You know who this song reminds me of? It didn't hit me straight away, but it's very reminiscent of Ocean Colour Scene. I don't know if you're aware of them?

Good stuff, and getting closer.
Click to expand...

Thanks again Bubba. I think you're hearing the same thing as kindafishy when he mentioned the attack on the drums. I agree, there are some raw midrange frequencies to be tamed in the drums, lead vocal, and now it seems lead guitar.

The Tele is high passed at 100Hz, but I doubt that's the issue. There's just not a lot of low end in that track. It's the quintessential thin, cutting Tele tone, in this case through a Trace Elliot Velocette 15 watt 1x10 combo. I'll try moving it in. I'm beginning to think I need to reconsider the arrangement, starting with the guitars. I've heard of Ocean Colour Scene but haven't heard their music, that I'm aware. I'll check them out now.
 
Newest mix sounds awesome - great work everyone! Some of the final chorus harmonies are throwing me off the groove, not sure if it's their timing or pitch. Listening again, it's both. Around 2:35. Otherwise, great stuff all around. Nick changed the delivery of the first verse a little, and I really like it. "come and gone" is a bit more emotive. Nicely done.

I like the verb on the mix bus. Nice glue to the track. I might experiment with it on my tracks. Anyway, best mix of this track yet. A little background touchups and it's sounding really top notch, to me. FYI, listened on HD280's. Car is a little better for low end, but these don't lack bass by any means. The Fusion just has some extra low end in its system.
 
Bubba po said:
Do you see the similarities? "The Day We Caught the Train" and "The Circle" are very redolent of your style.
Click to expand...

They remind me of bands like Supergrass--sharp songwriting, tight playing, imaginative changes, and always a pop song at the core of each tune. I aspire to that. The singer has a bit of Jagger going on.
 
Mix #6 is a better mix. I thought #5 was pretty good - but #6 is a bit better.

Everything sounds excellent. Except maybe the guitar on the right side. I'd give it a small notch around 2400hz. It has a bit too much bite.

But that's it. I'd keep the rest of the mix where it is.
 
Sounds good man. May be a touch too much bottom snare mic vs top snare mic. Sounds a touch flappy at times. At other times it fits perfect. I'm on the fence about that.

Vocals sound great IMO. Very clear and good tones.

I really like the pads. Tastefully done. I wonder if the song could actually handle a little more.
 
New mix in the OP:

1. Guitars tightened up.
2. Kick louder, snare balanced.

I worked mostly on guitars for this mix. That annoying attack on the lead should be less now. I brought in that Tele on the left. The song is moving more to a vocal arrangement. I do think lowering the guitars had made the chorus sound thin. It needs something to drive it--maybe a piano? I'll track something in the next few days and upload.
 
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