Please Critique

  • Thread starter Thread starter dewhitt
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So you're telling me it needs more guitar?

Ha ha, just kidding of course :) I'm sitting here cracking myself up thinking about delivering that line like Jim Carrey in Dumb and Dumber when his character LLoyd asks Mary "what are the chances of a guy like you and a girl like me...?" and she says "one out of a million", and he pauses and then says, "so you're telling me there's a chance!". Classic, classic line. :laughings:

Yeah, I definitely like to hear the guitars. That was one of the main questions I had about this mix - whether the guitars were a little over the top. I might mix it down again with the rhythm guits pulled down about 1dB per track (x4 tracks) and see if that helps them sit a little better.

It's great hearing this with real drums man, I can't tell you how much I appreciate you taking the time to record them and send them over.

Best Regards,

Dave DeWhitt
 
It's much better than your earlier mixes. I agree with PI that the drums need more presence. This is a rock song. As a guitarist your natural tendency is to put the guitars out front. You need to fight your instincts as a guitarist and think of the mix more. Listen to any modern rock CD or radio station and you'll hear the kick and snare at all times throughout the song. I don't think your new mix is too far off though. The drum sub-mix seems good - as in - the toms, snare, and kick are all generally at the same level. So, if the drums are on a group track, just bump it up a little. Maybe a .5db and see what happens.
 
Hey Greg,

Thanks for the feedback, that's good advice and I'm going to take it to heart. I think it's interesting too that you recommend just a .5 dB change. That's pretty cool because lately I've been starting to realize how it's just little things like that in a mix that add up to overall better sounds. I've been guilty of being way too heavy handed with pretty much everything - EQ, levels, effects, compression - because I'm looking to make things sound better and I think that's the way to do it. Lately I've been realizing that if you have a good sound to begin with, it's just very minor changes, and sometimes none at all, that are needed to just maybe make things sit a little better, or have their own space. Cranking up the EQ by 8dB or moving levels around by huge amounts is usually way too much, so it's cool to see that suggestion for a small change from you, and hopefully it means I'm on the right track.

By the way, I listened to a bunch of your tracks the other day and thought they were really outstanding. Signed up for your mailing list and I'll be waiting for the album.

Best Regards,

Dave DeWhitt
 
Thanks dude.

Yeah, if the mix is close, small changes usually make a better difference than big ones. .5db might not seem like much, but it's the difference in say, a vocal track neatly sitting in the mix and one jumping all over the top of a mix.

For me personally, moving the snare or kick or bass as little as .2 or .3 db can make the difference that I want to hear.

If you're having to do hardcore EQ cuts and boosts, you need to re-examine your source sounds, mic choice, or mic placements. The only heavy EQing I do are on the kick and sometimes vocals. My kick mic is a cheap POS, and my vocal mic is a bright POS.
 
dewhitt said:
It's great hearing this with real drums man, I can't tell you how much I appreciate you taking the time to record them and send them over.
Click to expand...

My pleasure, man. Great song ya got there.
 
Everything is great, except guitars. Sorry, but it sounds like not-real guitars. It's too digital sound (for me). But anyway it's a really good job, 7/10
 
Thanks Jacob, I just have to ask though, did you listen to the latest version, or the original? The guitars in the original were pretty bad, but I think they are a lot better in the latest: http://soundclick.com/share?songid=9197122

Just curious :)

Dave DeWhitt
 
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No shit, dewhitt...I get chills when you sweep up into your soaring choruses with the vocals slammin'.

PI did a GREAT job on the tune....and with the Les Paul the blend and natural compression are really getting you a powerful wave of energy.

Like the tune even better than before...which was a lot.

The only thing I can pick at is that some of the earlier guitar features, standing-in for the lead vox, seem like they could be brought up a tad...somewhere approaching the strength and saturation of the lead vox...which is, again, stupedous, BTW

Oh yeah: how did you handle the stereo drum track to get it sounding that good?
 
Wow! Superb job - Great songwriting, playing & vocals... What a difference a few extra sets of ears can make to an already well constructed tune... I'd still like to hear the drums punch a bit more... I always find, when I've reached the limit with what standard compression can accomplish, its time to turn to parallel comp to save the day. Great stuff.
 
Thanks All,

Hey Jeff, Jason Jones was kind enough to send me the individual tracks for the drums, so I didn't have to resort to the methods we were discussing previously, like cloning and then crazy EQ to try to separate (thank goodness). The tracks were well recorded, so there wasn't much for me to do, but I did blend in some kick and snare samples with the original sounds to give them more punch in the mix. I was originally scratching my head with what to do with the overheads, since I've never mixed real drums before, but after reading a couple of threads, including Greg's excellent post on recording and mixing drums, I opted to do nothing to them other than spread them left and right. The only interesting thing with that was that I found them to sound better when only panned to about 45L and 45R as opposed to all the way wide, which I would have assumed was right. Not sure why, but there seemed to be some weird phasing stuff going on with the wide pan and it sounded better closer in.

I'm taking down the new mix and updating my original link with the new track on soundclick, so if anyone else wants to give it a listen, just check out my soundclick page below.

Best Regards,

Dave DeWhitt

www.soundclick.com/davedewhitt
 
Yeah, dude... Just wanted to let ya know I've been showing this song to friends and family - nothing but good response. Gave me chills last time I listened to it. Keep it up.
 
Hey, just listened to Signs..., great song, lyrics are worth listening to....

I think it's almost radio ready and it will fit in nicely with other songs in rotation. Love what PI did for this song. Good job, man. I'd like to hear a little more snap from the snare. I think the mix still needs some tweaking, little things I can't put my finger on, but it's close.

I don't like the psuedo morse code thing at the end.

Cool.
 
Hey, thanks Chili. Yeah, I'm going to remix again to try to make the drums a little more prominent, and also maybe get the lead guitar work out in front a little more. I haven't played with it yet, but I'm hoping that just dropping the rhythm guits just a tad will maybe help everything else pop a little more, but I might also bump the kick and snare a tad.

No love for the morse code, huh? Ha ha...well, I was working on the lyrics for this tune (which is always like torture for me) and it struck me that the whole rhythm of the song is like an SOS, which really worked with the direction I was taking with the lyrics. The rhythm guitar riff right at the beginning has a dot dot dot dash dash dash dot dot dot feel to it, so I thought I'd be clever and try to slip a morse code SOS somewhere in the song to kind of call it out. Unfortunately, I couldn't seem to get that to work in the context of the song structure itself, so I stuck it on the end. It isn't quite what I was hoping for, but I do like it, and I really dig the connotation now with the finished lyrics.

Anyway, thanks for checking it out!

Best Regards,

Dave DeWhitt
www.soundclick.com/davedewhitt
 
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