Popsicle Toes

keith.rogers

keith.rogers

Well-known member
This was another "supposed to be" back porch kind of thing that a fiddler friend and I thought would be fun, but we never got past a couple scratch tracks. Anyway, I decided the weather called for it to be unearthed at least, even if left semi-frozen. I did run through the vocal again with my Miktek Mk300 and made some stabs at adding drums (old EZ loops) - learning something about this is a new years resolution I think.

Anywho, a Dropbox link since the fiddler might not come over again if I make it public on SoundCloud, IOW, you can say anything you like about any parts of the mix but leave the fiddle playing out of it ;)

Popsicle Toes (cover)

Now I'm off to an outdoor party in the low 30s. I don't have clothes for this stuff anymore!!!
 
Vocal seems maybe a little out front, seems to fit the style though. Might be kind of dry, too, I might up the reverb on it some, although that's a taste thing.

The clean guitar on the left sounds great, but it's either too far left, or the acoustic isn't far enough right to even it out. I'd leave the fiddle where it is (sounded a tad right), but I'd start with moving the acoustic a little further right. It sounded a little buried under the fiddle. I might even turn that acoustic up a little, seems like the clean guitar is louder.

Nice recording overall, great job. :thumbs up:
 
Wasn't until I read the comment above that I aimed my ears at the acoustic guitar on the right - totally buried, as are the drum loops. I'm not sure the vocal sounds too up-front, but I think the left side electric guitar and the bass are so muffled (no high end definition), that it makes the vocal and fiddle stick out more.
 
Thanks for the listens and comments. I probably can't do much with the electric guitar since I had the tone knob dialed pretty much to zero (trying for that jazzy sound :)), but I will play with the bass EQ and acoustic balance.

The acoustic was one of the scratch tracks and while done to a click, didn't align with the later added drum track, so was buried pretty much intentionally. Maybe when I let it come out a bit more I'll decide to make it fit or do it over.

Edit: made a couple minor tweaks and re-uploaded. The acoustic definitely sticks out more now that it's panned outside the fiddle, but I left it alone otherwise - keeps things loose feeling, which is what it is!
 
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Everything is too close. Lower the volume of your instruments. Pan things wider. Make a pocket for your vocal and put it there. Create a sense that there is a band playing in a space, with left, right, center, foreground, background, etc.
 
Robus said:
Everything is too close. Lower the volume of your instruments. Pan things wider. Make a pocket for your vocal and put it there. Create a sense that there is a band playing in a space, with left, right, center, foreground, background, etc.
Click to expand...
Hmm. Ok. You realize I'm getting a little bit of conflicting info here wrt vocal level, or at least it seems like it to me?

First, it's a really small group - me and one other person :), but I kind of get what you're coming from. I just want to keep it sounding more like it was a few folks in a smallish space and not spread across a 20' stage. And, I do toggle back and forth from mono to stereo and it feels like there's a fair spread (in cans anyway), but I'll give it a try. At the least i'll nudge guitars from 9-3 on the dials to maybe 8-4 and let the fiddle follow over some so its fills aren't as close to the vocal. The only thing else at center is the bass, and there's practically no overlap, freq-wise, there.

I might pull some of that reverb I added to the vocal back a smidge to see if that gives it a bit more presence, and maybe take the electric down a fractional dB. Maybe it's just a little overcompressed so I'll turn those knobs a little and see what happens.

Thanks for the input.
 
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