returning with a couple of new tracks for your critique

moogyboy

moogyboy

New member
hello again folks

After committing the faux pas of flooding the forum with a pile of songs several months ago, I've decided to wait until I have reasonably complete and finely tuned mixes before submitting them for your perusal. And to be clear, I'm far more interested in your input than I am in racking up Soundcloud clicks, so direct mp3 uploads this time, and only two.

1) I did an impromptu cover of The Buggles' "Video Killed The Radio Star" that I thought turned out absolutely massive and epic. I experimented with cutting and pasting together a drum track out of a series of disjointed "drum riffs" that I played on a separate track. Also used my antique (over 100 years old!) open back banjo and my vintage Moog synth for color.

2) "Bald Spot" is a song I started last year before I moved and always had trouble mixing because everything seemed muddy and mid-treble heavy. Yesterday I added a lively acoustic drum track to replace the previous static drum-machine pattern and gave the whole track a brand new stereo mix which I think somehow opened everything up considerably. Also some subtle but effective edits over previous mixed I've done.

I played everything you hear here myself, and recorded in Reaper on an increasingly geriatric iMac, using a little M-Audio Fast Track USB interface. I'll be happy to fill in any other technical details you may wonder about.

And now I turn the mic over to you nice folks. Hope you enjoy listening to the songs as much as tearing them apart. :-D

cheers

Billy S.
 

Attachments

  • video killed experiment 3.mp3
    3.3 MB · Views: 9
  • bald spot rough4.mp3
    3.4 MB · Views: 11
it was nice to hear distorted drums in bald spot, it's a bit like Hendrix from 1967, found it quite amusing too, like the bold production and tape like sound overall, my main concern with it is the low end being too muddy and it feels like the extreme high end is cut off a bit and could be more open sounding, the lead vox is a bit buried in the mix too.
 
There are a ton of pops and clicks on Video (esp. on that banjo at the beginning)

Then the vocal parts drift from each other a few times.
 
Bald Spot - Reminiscent of MC5/Stooges/Iggy Pop era. Fun song. Bring up the harmonica solo. Distortion on tom fills
 
On Video Killed...

I'd keep the doubled main vocal tracks both down the center. Then keep the "oh uh oh's" panned wide. I thought the vocal sounded good otherwise. Can't you do the harmony vocals an octave higher (like on the record)? :).

The delay on the banjo (or whatever it was) was too long. It was distracting.

I liked the bass sound.

Drums for the most part were OK. A couple of spots were a bit machine-gunny. The tambourine level was quite high.

On Bald Spot...

Real cool vibe to this tune. Love the vocal and I love the bass part. Not sure I love the distorted toms like the other guys do. It's just weird having everything clean, but then all of a sudden things get distorted for two seconds or so.

The distorted guitar has too much gain. It's just way too mushy. It doesn't punch through the mix in a lot of spots.

I like the guitar and harmonica solos.

Double tracked vocals would work well.

But I really liked the tune.
 
TripleM said:
Forgot to say that. I noticed it too. But I got wrapped up in the other stuff I was writing. The delay on the banjo makes it worse. Literally twice as worse.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I don't know what happened with that. I noticed it while I was recording, it was weird.
 
TripleM said:
On Video Killed...

I'd keep the doubled main vocal tracks both down the center. Then keep the "oh uh oh's" panned wide. I thought the vocal sounded good otherwise. Can't you do the harmony vocals an octave higher (like on the record)? :).

The delay on the banjo (or whatever it was) was too long. It was distracting.

I liked the bass sound.

Drums for the most part were OK. A couple of spots were a bit machine-gunny. The tambourine level was quite high.

On Bald Spot...

Real cool vibe to this tune. Love the vocal and I love the bass part. Not sure I love the distorted toms like the other guys do. It's just weird having everything clean, but then all of a sudden things get distorted for two seconds or so.

The distorted guitar has too much gain. It's just way too mushy. It doesn't punch through the mix in a lot of spots.

I like the guitar and harmonica solos.

Double tracked vocals would work well.

But I really liked the tune.
Click to expand...

All good suggestions. I will definitely try putting a pitch/formant shift on the backing vocal and easing back on the tambourine.

That is a banjo, by the way--an over 100-year-old antique open-back instrument I inherited from a friend whose now-deceased father restored it. It kind of fits in poignantly with the "history of pop music styles" mashup theme I inadvertently set up in the track ('20s folk, '50s folk revival, '60s psychedelic echo and tambourine, '70s Ramones punk and disco synth-strings, '80s new wave, '90s grunge). Even those pops and clicks might suggest, if unintentionally, old vinyl if ya squint your ears. :-D

As for the drums on "Bald Spot" that was just poor recording I guess; I had one (one!) overhead mic on my kit because of my hardware limitations and I unfortunately set it too hot, or it just got blasted by the toms too much. I couldn't EQ it sufficiently without killing whatever it got of the kick drum. Oh well... I also agree about the rhythm guitar, I never liked the way it sounds and I may go back and rerecord it. I think half my problem with mixing this song may lie in that one track.

Anyway, as I say, good suggestions. I will head back to the shed and see what I can come up with. Thanks a bunch, my friend.

cheers

Billy S.
 
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