Surf Rock Tune - Recorded Live

  • Thread starter Thread starter ibleedburgundy
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ibleedburgundy

ibleedburgundy

The Anti-Lambo
Hey there. This a little song I wrote after being inspired by a bunch of surf rock. I was listening to the Mermen and Shark Quest and decided I wanted to mess around with that genre.

This was recorded live in my basement and then I added keys and acoustic guitar plus I had the other guy re-track his rhythm guitar. I am playing guitar and acoustic guitar. Other than that there is another guitarist, bass, drums, and keys.

This was all done in PT 6.9/digi 002. I use an RE20 on the guitars ---> FMR RNP ---> Digi 002. On bass it's an SM58. Not sure if anyone else uses a 58 on bass but for some reason I prefer it to the 57. Then I "mastered" it (loosely defined haha) in Logic. -Just a little EQ, stereo widening, exciting, and limiting.

On drums it's a D6 on bass drum, SM57s on the snare, tom1 and floor tom, and a pair of Naiant SDCs as overheads in a recorder man position. These all go into an Audient ASP800 for preamping and AD conversion.

Let me know what you think. Thanks!
 

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Cool tune - you definitely captured that surf vibe (although without boatloads of the customary tremolo). The playing is great and I like the '60s organ a lot. The drums sound "distant" to me. A little muffled and "lo fi". The stereo imaging could be wider - sounds almost mono. But maybe that gives it a live vintage sound too, eh?
 
The bass sounded pretty good to me. The drums are low but I actually liked that. Guitar tone was good. Don't know if you're interested in comments on the composition or not. Personally, I found some of the lead guitar lines could have been more melodic in their phrasing. There was a bit of noodling through the pentatonic scale, for example the solo beginning 1:48-2:13.
 
jm67 said:
Cool tune - you definitely captured that surf vibe (although without boatloads of the customary tremolo). The playing is great and I like the '60s organ a lot. The drums sound "distant" to me. A little muffled and "lo fi". The stereo imaging could be wider - sounds almost mono. But maybe that gives it a live vintage sound too, eh?
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Thanks for listening!

Funny you should say lo fi. I actually was consciously going for that (not that I know how to do anything else lol). I've also been listening to Hall and Oates and they have that dry lo fi thing going on in their recordings but I kind of like it. The gain on the drums was very low during the tracking phase. The drum set is a 22 year old Tama Rockstar that I've had forever. It's pretty bad but for some reason it isn't a disaster for recording purposes. Live, it would not wow you.

The keyboard is a Nord Electro set on the farfisa organ sound. Previously I had it too high in the mix but you can set it back pretty low and it sounds good. I don't know of a lot of surf rock that has keys. Mostly they seem to deploy guitars with copious amounts of reverb or delay and tremolo - not much sonic space left for keys. So this was a challenge.
 
Robus said:
The bass sounded pretty good to me. The drums are low but I actually liked that. Guitar tone was good. Don't know if you're interested in comments on the composition or not. Personally, I found some of the lead guitar lines could have been more melodic in their phrasing. There was a bit of noodling through the pentatonic scale, for example the solo beginning 1:48-2:13.
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Yeah, all types of comments welcome. It is a work in progress. To some extent this may be a demo and the final version will be tracked properly and independently (with a metronome!). I could certainly vary from the pentatonic a bit better. Any suggestions in that regard? Thanks!
 
There are better guitarists on the forum than me, so take this for what it's worth. Getting away from those pentatonic runs is something I've worked at in my playing. I try to find a solo line that is based on a melody that could be sung--well, if I could sing well! Often it is some variation of the main vocal melody of the song. I'm not sure how that would apply to an instrumental.
 
I was on-line this morning for a while but had to work today (for a livin'), so only got a short listen. Just finished work but now have to drive the granddaughter home so not much time to comment today...however, I really like the way you weave the instruments in. Only listened once this morning, but seems I recall thinking the organ was at a really good level in the mix and sort of on the left, then when he took a ride, you brought it more center which was cool to me. It's a nice Farfisa patch, sounds pretty realistic.

Good work on getting the acoustic strummed part in and good level on that. I thought the acoustic could use a little brightening during the strummed parts, think they call it "air"?

Any way, nice job. If you could find a way to let the instrumentation lay back just a bit and put a vocal on this, I think it would hold attention a little better. Also, when the instruments pop in and out, that would give it some variety.

Pretty surfy overall but I do dig the wheezy orgen.
 
it has the vintage 60s surf sound for sure. I listened on my car stereo on the way to work. On my car system it was clear but seemed to lack the high end sizzle and snap that a lot of the fender guitar surf rock has. It's not muddy but I think it could benift from a little boost somewhere in the 2 to 5K range.
good composition...I enjoyed the listen
 
jimistone said:
it has the vintage 60s surf sound for sure. I listened on my car stereo on the way to work. On my car system it was clear but seemed to lack the high end sizzle and snap that a lot of the fender guitar surf rock has. It's not muddy but I think it could benift from a little boost somewhere in the 2 to 5K range.
good composition...I enjoyed the listen
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I am playing a Rickenbacker 650 through an Orange Rockerverb 50 combo MKII. This Rick is an inherently dark guitar, which isn't really a great fit for this genre but I love that guitar. Maybe I should have used my American Strat instead, or better yet my friend's late 60's Yamaha Jaguar knock-off.

I will try boosting the upper frequencies but you can't really boost what isn't there. I may alos have a low pass filter on the reverb which might also be contributing. I'll try adjusting that too.
 
ibleedburgundy said:
I am playing a Rickenbacker 650 through an Orange Rockerverb 50 combo MKII. This Rick is an inherently dark guitar, which isn't really a great fit for this genre but I love that guitar. Maybe I should have used my American Strat instead, or better yet my friend's late 60's Yamaha Jaguar knock-off.

I will try boosting the upper frequencies but you can't really boost what isn't there. I may alos have a low pass filter on the reverb which might also be contributing. I'll try adjusting that too.
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it doesnt sound bad..just needs a tad more sizzle.

part of it is that most of the surf music was fender jags or str a ts going through fender twins or supers. There was a lot of snap and sizzle in that setup....You just kind of expect it when a surf tune kicks off. The classic treadling the Big E while muting it high on the neck and sliding down. It's a distinct sound....60s surf
 
I like it! Great tune. Good mix. Listening on cans, so I won't comment on the mix other than to say in my Pro380s everything sounds just a bit distant...like everything was miked a meter out instead of in the grills. I'll listen on monitors tomorrow to get a better picture. :)
 
This was cool. Sounded like something out of a Tarantino movie or the theme to Napoleon Dynamite.
I agree with Robus, though, that some of the phrasing is cliche and non-melodic. But whatever, that is being picky, and the fact I made it through the entire song says it was good.
 
Okay, listened on the M-Audios today. Veddy nice. What sounded distant in the cans, sounds proper reverb drenched on good monitors. Good healthy 60's. Is that a real Farfisa (you said it was live)? I had one of those red monstrosities when I was a wee lad. :) Can't imagine what it would be worth today...
 
I thought the drums sounded real good. I might turn up the snare a nudge or so. Bass sounds good too.

The guitars sound OK. But they all have a bit of a crispy/brittle feel. Overly clean.

Keys were OK, but could also come up a bit.

But all in all, it's pretty good.
 
BroKen_H said:
Okay, listened on the M-Audios today. Veddy nice. What sounded distant in the cans, sounds proper reverb drenched on good monitors. Good healthy 60's. Is that a real Farfisa (you said it was live)? I had one of those red monstrosities when I was a wee lad. :) Can't imagine what it would be worth today...
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Thanks. Nah it's just a Nord. They make good stuff though.
 
4tracker said:
This was cool. Sounded like something out of a Tarantino movie or the theme to Napoleon Dynamite.
I agree with Robus, though, that some of the phrasing is cliche and non-melodic. But whatever, that is being picky, and the fact I made it through the entire song says it was good.
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Thanks!

I will try to get a little more adventurous in the B section when I record this for the next album.
 
Hey, I have to admit that when I listened on the car stereo it was in my daughters car and she had the highs turned down and the bass cranked up...for that hip hop shit. Im relistening to it on my computer and monitors and the guitars sound great. Sorry I misread the mix...hope I didnt steer you wrong.
Really nice work IBB!
 
jimistone said:
Hey, I have to admit that when I listened on the car stereo it was in my daughters car and she had the highs turned down and the bass cranked up...for that hip hop shit. Im relistening to it on my computer and monitors and the guitars sound great. Sorry I misread the mix...hope I didnt steer you wrong.
Really nice work IBB!
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Thanks! I'm still going to try the strat though.
 
Love it. Sounds great on my system.

Melancholy and angst.

Conjures imagery of the river of live taking me to places I do not want to go, fear and heartbreak.

Very cool tune, thanks for sharing.
 
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