The Best Sound I've Got Yet

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BJW

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The best sound I've got yet - which might not be saying much. . .

Tell me what you think of my latest recording: "Something Better"

It's right in the middle of the page under "Feels Like Friday - 13 Miles" on this site: http://www.feelslikefridaymusic.com/The Music.htm. Play the song "Something Better". If that page doesn't work try my soundclick page: http://www.soundclick.com/bands/2/feelslikefridaymusic.htm. It's the first song on the page.

Rip it up - tell me what sounds good and what sounds bad. I just got a firepod, so this is my first song recorded with it, and I LOVE it over my old delta 44. I've got the same song recorded through the delta and it sounds terrible compared.

Recording Notes:
Electric guitars: SRV custom strat->original POD->firepod
Vocals: Studio Projects C1->firepod - and I'm not so sure about the reverb/delay I've got on them, sounds a little off.
Acoustic guitar: Takamine fd-360sc->pair of mxl 603s's->firepod
Bass: plugged direct into the firepod.
Drums are loops by Drums on Demand.
Recorded in Cubase.

Have at it! (By the way, hope you like the song - I think it's a pretty good one, in a poppy rocky kind of way).
 
Any thoughts?

After listening to it a few days in the car I've come up with these opinions which I will work on.

1. The bass is a bit weak, but not too bad.

2. The lead needs to be panned straight up in the middle. (until the last chorus - see below)

3. The vocals in the 2nd chorus sound really good and up front in the mix, but in the 3rd (last) chorus, they sit a little too much in the middle. I think the lead guitar is fighting with them - the lead needs to be doubled and panned hard left and hard right to bring the vox back to the front like in the 2nd chorus

4. The delay effect on the vocals is kinda cool, but maybe a little too wierd. It might work, though.

Any opinions? Anybody I play this for is just like "You wrote this all by yourself and played everything? Wow" or "It sounds good" and that's it - no good constructive criticism. I don't really know anybody who records to give me some good recording advice so I'm kind of all on my own, which is why these boards are valuable to me.

Thanks for listening!
 
solid mix,

What i like the most:
The electric guitar sounds perfect to me, great tone, no mess-ups, panned nicely.
The acoustic guitar stands out less but fits every well in the mix. I can hear the odd botched chord in the intrumental parts.

What i think you could try changing:
The echo/reverb on the voice is a bit too strong i think. I thought that before i read your second post so we are in agreement.
Maybe you could do a bit more with the drums too? I would say bring them up just a touch and pan some of the crashes, that would sound cool.

Post a revised version of the song if you ever do one. i like this song a lot and it would be cool to see how it develops.
 
Thanks, Dar,

Yea, I'm definately going to work on the vocal effect - it's almost cool enought, but just wierd enough to want to change.

The drums are loops, but they are stereo so I can extract the right and left into separate mono channels and pan them more.

I was hoping to hide that botched chord in the bridge, but I should really re-record just that part.

Thanks for listening. I'll let you know when I make the changes.

I'm glad to hear somebody say the guitar tones are good, too. I use an original POD for the tones - sometimes I like it, sometimes I don't, but the more I listen, the more I like them.
 
Overall it sounds pretty good man! I like the groove of the song. If you ever re-record the electric part, just see how it sounds with the gain backed off a bit to clean up the detail in the sound and make it sound a little less like a POD ;)

Ahh...a fellow FD-360 player! What year is yours? Mine is a '98, and is not the SC model (it's a full dreadnaught body). My first guitar ever :D
 
Sounds great!!...atleast at a low volume (because the wife was watchin tv)..ill listen again later when i can crank it up!!
 
Hey thanks for the compliments, guys!

Sile - my 360 is a 2001, I think - but don't hold me to it, haha. I could check when I get back home. I graduated from high school in '98, and bought that sweet sweet guitar when I was a junior in college I think, so it might be an '01 or '02 - probably '01.

Mark - crank it up, man!

Thanks again for listening!
 
Nice! A lot better! Vocals most certainly stand out better, but don't seem TOO upfront.
 
sile2001 said:
Nice! A lot better! Vocals most certainly stand out better, but don't seem TOO upfront.
Click to expand...

Thanks - I agree. They are just barely not too loud, haha. Thanks for listening!
 
Sounds pretty good. One thing I find myself noticing is that I want to hear a little bit more snare... kick could maybe even come up too, it's pretty clear.

Maybe some of the leadey type guitar stuff could be pushed a little farther into the background with some light room reverb or delay or something.

Overall sounds pretty good (listening to it on phones right now)
 
I am planning to get the Firepod. I am very happy with your results, awesome. I enjoyed the song very much. Did you update the song at feelslikefridaymusic.com also?
 
pkmusic said:
I am planning to get the Firepod. I am very happy with your results, awesome. I enjoyed the song very much. Did you update the song at feelslikefridaymusic.com also?
Click to expand...

Yeah, the song at www.feelslikefridaymusic.com is updated as well.

Thanks for the compliments! What are you currently using as an interface? I'm sure you'll love the firepod. The thing is idiot-proof and works awesome. I had it up and running in about 5 minutes flat. Plus the sound (at least to my ears) is a HUGE upgrade from my old M-Audio delta 44 with an M-Audio DMP3 for pre-amps. Personally, the pre's in the firepod sound way better than the DMP3 pre's did - especially on vocals. The difference could have been in the converters rather than the pre-amps, though. I'm very, very pleased. Plus now I can record drums! (once I meet somebody who actually plays them)
 
Hey great sounding recording. I just got a firepod this week, but havent had the chance to really record anything yet. I was wondering how your drums on demand loops work with cubase. Are you using cubase le? How do you change the tempo?
 
BJW said:
What are you currently using as an interface?
Click to expand...

I am using the Roland VM3100Pro with the RPC card, VTB1 preamp. I was debating on whether to get better converters or keep what I have and get a better preamp. I am going with the Firepod. Thanks!
 
Bigsnake,

I use Cubase SX 2, but you can do the tempo thing with the loops in LE just like in SX. What you do is go to your pointer button, and there should be a little drop-down menu. Click the drop-down part and choose "Sizing applies timing stretch" (it's either that or something that sounds just like that). From then on, whenever you stretch an audio clip, it will change the tempo to fit what you've stretched it to. Basically, if the loop is at a faster tempo than the song, you just stretch it to the next measure mark, and if the loop tempo is slower, you time stretch it to the measure mark that it just passes. Make sense?

If you have any more questions about it, feel free to email me at brianwahl@hotmail.com.
 
I'm listening to the song right now...

From a songwriting aspect, it's a really good song. It kind of reminds me of something by Guster, especially your vocal. Very nice! :)

I think all the guitar parts sound just great. I wouldn't change anything there. The thing I would change is the drum track, though. Instead of doing a double hit each time on the kick through the verse parts, I'd alternate between a single and double hit.... bump....*snare* bump bump... *snare* bump... *snare* bump bump... *snare* Know what I mean?

One other thing you could try is to clone the vocal track, pan it out a bit, delay it, and EQ it slighly different with a bit more bottom. The vocal track was sung really well, and it could add some depth and make it silkier, ala that Duncan Sheik type of vocal sound. I'm not saying that you *need* to do this, but it could make it interesting and sweeter.

Really nice job on this one. Sounds like you're having no trouble at all dialing in that POD.

Keep up the good work!!! :)
 
Buck62 said:
I'm listening to the song right now...

From a songwriting aspect, it's a really good song. It kind of reminds me of something by Guster, especially your vocal. Very nice! :)

I think all the guitar parts sound just great. I wouldn't change anything there. The thing I would change is the drum track, though. Instead of doing a double hit each time on the kick through the verse parts, I'd alternate between a single and double hit.... bump....*snare* bump bump... *snare* bump... *snare* bump bump... *snare* Know what I mean?

One other thing you could try is to clone the vocal track, pan it out a bit, delay it, and EQ it slighly different with a bit more bottom. The vocal track was sung really well, and it could add some depth and make it silkier, ala that Duncan Sheik type of vocal sound. I'm not saying that you *need* to do this, but it could make it interesting and sweeter.

Really nice job on this one. Sounds like you're having no trouble at all dialing in that POD.

Keep up the good work!!! :)
Click to expand...

Hey thanks a lot! You're right - that POD is treating me well so far. I'm having a blast using it to record. Thanks again! I'm gonna try that vocal thing for sure - if not on this song then on something else in the future.
 
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