Seven Monkeys: feedback appreciated.

  • Thread starter Thread starter ahcvankampen
  • Start date Start date
A

ahcvankampen

New member
Hi all,

I just finished a new composition: Seven Monkeys.

I have put this together in Cubase using several softsynths but also real instruments (Nord Stage, Guitar, Tenor Sax), which I recorded myself. More details can be found : HERE.

This was actually the first time that I recorded a real sax (just in my room, with an SM57 and Rode NT5. Probably the recording is suboptimal, and the sound in the mix was the best I could do. Any suggestions on how to improve the sax sound are therefore appreciated.

I can provide more details and all the tracks if someone wants to have a go at this.

All other comments are also welcome

SoundCloud:
https://soundcloud.com/skippystudio/my-composition-seven-monkeys-remixed-now-with-real-sax

Antoine
 

Attachments

Last edited:
You're not far off ... but for backing off the compression on the main bus. The sheen is pressed glass ... everything up against the brick wall ... sucking all the "air out of the band". Compression is best applied to the point where it isn't noticeable, and it is very noticeable here.

The result is the ear can't discern individual elements through the brick wall of sound. I started on the second tune that followed, and sure enough ... the same thing was there, evident immediately.

I've learned over the years that a light touch on the main bus is best until I can let the M.E. work their magic.
 
This was weird. Everything sounded really far back besides the sax which was really far up.
The overall mix had a weird throbbing. Might be compression like K-dub said.

The performances all sounded great. This kind of music needs a lot of dynamics but at the moment it's a pancake sausage.
 
K-dub said:
You're not far off ... but for backing off the compression on the main bus. The sheen is pressed glass ... everything up against the brick wall ... sucking all the "air out of the band". Compression is best applied to the point where it isn't noticeable, and it is very noticeable here.

The result is the ear can't discern individual elements through the brick wall of sound. I started on the second tune that followed, and sure enough ... the same thing was there, evident immediately.

I've learned over the years that a light touch on the main bus is best until I can let the M.E. work their magic.
Click to expand...

Thanks, I will reevaluate....... But indeed, I did quite some compression there. So your probably right...
a
 
New version

Hi again,
Listening back, i must agree that the compression was way toooooo much. What worsened matters was the use of a stereo enhancer that also washed out the sound. I have uploaded a new version too sound cloud (and in the attachment). This has a tiny bit of compression left. Also to me this sounds better. In addition, given responses in a composers form i turned up the piano and added little more reverb.

Antoine
 

Attachments

I'm listening to it on other speakers now.
It sounds pretty good.
The playing is really great on all the instruments.
 
Sounds good to me! Never recorded Sax before. So what were the positions of the 2 mics?

cheers
 
Hi Hugo,

Recall that I recorded the sax just in my untreated room.

We did two attempts.

During the first attempt I had the microphones about 30-50 cm from the sax. The SM57 pointing towards to the bell, and the condensor NT5 pointing to the body. This turned out to work very poorly. The sound was very 'soft' and smooth (in a bad sense) and lacked high freqs. I cannot imagine that this is entirely due to the microphones (and their placement) but maybe also cause by room effects.

In a second attempt I actually recorded with three mic's: i also used a clip microphone which was put on the bell. This time also the other mics were put much closers (10-15cm).

This resulted in a better sound. The clip and SM57 sounded similar, but the sm57 had more body. All mics also had more high in particular the sm57.

In the end i ended up with mixing in nt5 with sm57 (for the high freqs) but it was only after putting in tape saturation on the sax bus that it started to sound acceptable. I didn't do a lot of eq.

However, compared to some recordings that I find on youtube (or my music collection) i'm still far far far way of a great tenor sax sound. But I have no idea how to improve.

I will try to make the wav files available this week so that you can hear how the individual mics sounded like. May you can combine it to a better sound........


a
 
An SM57 works pretty well on the sax, actually. I've also used a CAD e200 with good results.
 
I think the playing of all the instruments is incredible. I think the backing instruments may be over effected with reverb and compression and whatever else you may be using. There is a muddiness happening that is preventing all the instruments to heard to their potential. However on your first version I think the Sax stood about better and had more space.
 
I have uploaded a new version to soundcloud.

Actually, i didn't use a lot of compression on the individual tracks are almost completely removed the compression on the bus. W.r.t. reverb, to me it didn't sound too much but I will listen to it again after a while to re-evaluate.

Nevertheless, I agree that there is a certain level of muddiness (lack of clarity). I tried EQ'en the low-mid range of several tracks but without much success......
I made all raw tracks available for those who want to give it a try..
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top