Some More Songs

**Brett** · 03.27.07, 01:59 AM

I've posted some of these before, but here are some tunes my band has been working on for a CD forever. We recorded 10 songs. Our drummer is a recording engineer and the dickhead quit the band and left us with the recordings. So I've been trying to mix them (because it's too much to get it done at a studio for us right now) and I'm no fucking engineer, so I've kinda been learning on the job here. So if they suck really bad, you know why, I have no idea what I'm really doing. If anyone knows how to mix and has some good advice, let me know. I've been doing lots of reading but the fact is I'm just a beginner at it. I barely know how to EQ and I never compress anything right. I just play guitar man.

Oh another caveat, yes we know we sound old and dated, some of these songs are like 10 years old now. And yes our singer/other guitarist can't sing, he's just always been the singer by necessity, so you don't know anything we don't already know. And yes we have dumb lyrics. It's just about having fun for us anyway, we're not trying to get famous. But I'd love to get this thing mixed right at least, we did put a lot of work in on these songs.

Ok enough blabbing, here's a couple of them.

Left For Dead

Why?

Sticky Buns

Deaf & Blind

**TheMightyCopenHalenII** · 03.27.07, 03:37 AM

As far as how everything was captured, I thought the bass was phenomenal throughout (that's always the hardest thing for me to get a good captured tone on - even though it's a cheap ass Yamaha) and the vocals weren't bad either. I'm curious as to how the recording process went from beginning to end...some of the guitar tones seem to have that cold/dry amp mod feel to them. I was surprised the bass was so phenomenal and the drums are so puny.

Songwise, some of the guitar playing on sticky buns and especially the vocals reminded me of Skid Row (in a good way) except with Sebastian Bach's balls dropped. Deaf and blind was my favorite track. Some fluid playing there.

AT · 03.27.07, 03:50 AM

Listening now...

Brett, what format was this recorded on? What are you using to mix?

**Brett** · 03.27.07, 08:43 AM

To try to answer the questions.

We tracked the drums in a studio, it was all recorded digitally, that's about all I know. To try to save money, we did the guitars and bass at our drummer's house and the guitars were all done on my Pod XT, not our amps. So that's why they sound the way they do I'm sure. Bass was recorded direct I'm pretty sure. We did the vocals actually in a very nice post-production studio for free because our drummer was friends with the owner. Real expensive mics and a nice vocal booth.

He started to mix eveything on Pro Tools before he left, but I don't have Pro Tools, nor am I buying it for this. I don't have the money or the need for it, so I'm just mixing it on Acid Pro because that's what I have. It seems to have enough plugins to make this work. When he left he gave us a DVD with all the songs and every track in WAV format. The drums I just can't seem to get the way I want, they just seem small and washed out I know. What's funny is I've taken most of the EQ's off of them, just basically have them compressed, maybe too much I don't know.

**Wolfgang_'99** · 03.27.07, 12:40 PM

Cool with a K.

**jonmcg93** · 03.28.07, 01:08 AM

Being my opinion and all, this is my critique of the one song I had the chance to listen to a few times.

Guitar, bass and even vocals aren't bad at all.

The drumming on Deaf and Blind (only one I listened to so far) especially in the first chorus, dude was overplaying a bit much. He needed more pocket playing and less attempts at being a show off. He does "ok" the rest of the song but that first bit kinda killed me LOL. The old adage of less is more is appropriate here. Not everyone is AVH or Mike Portnoy; where a simple floor tom hit or something would have been fine he wanted to get fancy and jumble things up a bit (from my ear that is)

Other wise I dig the rest of it... If I had a drum kit handy I'd redo it for you

Adobe Audition (Cool Edit Pro) is real handy and not in the Pro-tools range of money either, I've used it in writing and recording and it's great. Drop me a PM for more info on it if your curious.

/edit #1 : Adding the fact I've been playing drums for 16 years and have learned the fine difference in what fits a song and whats wanking off in a song.

**lil'devil** · 03.28.07, 01:29 AM

this is fun. nice work.

**Brett** · 03.28.07, 01:36 AM

We actually did about 5 different drum takes of every song, but I know the roll you're talking about in "Deaf & Blind," in the first chorus. I don't like it either, but the timing of that particular take was better than the others so we all agreed to go with that one. He didn't particularly like what he did there either, and he rarely overplays (overplayed now that he's gone)...in fact he never did, in his defense. When you hear our other stuff, it's all in the pocket 4/4 stuff. That roll is a bit sloppy however and is a bit off time, but it's barely noticeable...and to the average listener, they don't even notice. Dude was a pretty solid drummer, I have to give him that much. He turned out to be flakey douchebag, but that's a whole other story.

**homeunit** · 03.28.07, 02:29 AM

Originally Posted by Brett

He turned out to be flakey douchebag, but that's a whole other story.

Drummers, go figure?

Sounds pretty good boss. I'd suggest letting the drums breath as much as possible without weirdo bleed from the other mics. When mixing them pan them like a real kit is setup if you haven't already.

If you've put a lot of work into the project this far, it would be HUGELY worth you scraping a rhythm track and adding one with your 5150 cranked. Even if you have to rent a stand alone hard disc recorder, track in your basement then import the track into whatever program you're using to edit/mix. IMHO that would up the sound quality 10 fold. If that's not going to work, I'd go out a rent an Avalon or Focusrite mic and pump the guitar tracks through that.

As far as EQ goes, the flatter the more true representation of what you recorded will show through. If it was tracked well, it shouldn't need much eq.

AT · 03.28.07, 04:15 AM

Originally Posted by homeunit

As far as EQ goes, the flatter the more true representation of what you recorded will show through. If it was tracked well, it shouldn't need much eq.

That's the X-factor now, isn't it? A kick drum is a hard thing to record; if you know what you're doing the EQing is easy to do. Otherwise, it's gonna feel like getting kicked in the nuts with long waves that can resemble basketballs in tone.

I track with full EQ and compression. I'm not one to leave a lot to the mix. If the player is good, plays consistently, and keeps up his/her instrument (like knows how to tune drums), the recording job is easy. I've still found I need to work with mostly higher frequencies when mixing, as that is territory where it's easy to have things bumping into one another.

I agree that a real amp would be the way to go, Brett. You guys did okay with the POD, and if you're happy with the tracks then leave it. I don't think you should ever do anything differently than how you play as a band, though. And if you like your rig and are used to it, then go with that for recording.