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Post by liquidscreamer on May 24, 2005 21:26:07 GMT
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Post by Dubsounds on May 25, 2005 13:17:04 GMT
Ah loops and lots of them Some of the samples were a bit naughty, but I won't tell. I liked the bass and at first I thought you had a bit of an early 80's Jah Wobble thing going on which i quite enjoyed, (probably before your time, I'm 5 years older than you! ). The drum loop isn't properly tuned so it has a warped record sort of effect which is quite clever, (I assume it's deliberate) in a drunken drummer sort of way but it does get a bit too much after five minutes I like the switching between "movements". You do that a lot in your music and It always reminds me off that razor splice method pioneered in the late 60's where they would cut several radically different versions of a song and chop them all together. My only criticism is that when you do it, sometimes it jars a little and the blending could be more subtle. Try leaving a little more breathing space betwen the sections or try the old "heavy handed" sustained reverb/echo crossfading from the first section to the second trick. Overall, it still sounds a little unfinished, possibly even disjointed in places but production tricks could sort that out and I say that to you a lot anyway so apologies for the repetition. My best advice to you at the moment Martin, is to really get to grips with EQ and compression. Particularly EQ, as its the colours on your palette. Right now your colours are a bit blurry. Make the bass red, the vocals blue, the drums green etc (if you follow my analogy) and they will all stand out from each other and send psychological cues to the listener which will help them untangle the sound a bit and make it easier to follow. You do this by placing unique frequency boosts and cuts for each of your sounds, taking care to ensure that no two sounds occupy the same frequency (wherever possible - obviously difficult to achieve on very broad-band sounds like synth pads). For instance, if you add a 4dB lift to the bass sound at say 80Hz, when you get to the kick drum, subtract 4dB at 80Hz and boost 6dB at 60Hz. Boost the vocal at 5.5kHz and drop some of that 5.5 out of the snare or synth (or whatever occupies the same space as the vocal)... you getting my drift? What you're doing is carving little notches in the frequency spectrum which you allocate to various sounds. Now THAT is the Engineers black art number one. Master that technique so that you can do it on the fly and completely subconsciously and you're well on your way. Black art number two concerns the use of space through reverb, panning (and more EQ) but we'll leave that for another day as I gotta get back to work Hope there's something you can use out of that lot.
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Post by liquidscreamer on May 25, 2005 14:50:19 GMT
You know i can make use of anyones advice I do understand the importance of EQ but unless i get actual figures like you,ve just provided i feel like im pissing in the dark,so i get bored,call it finished and start a new track. And i know what you mean about the clarity,your stuff sounds like a fish pond with crystal clear water and different spieces of fish slithering around whereas mine sounds like tar I will get there though
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Post by Dubsounds on May 25, 2005 15:05:32 GMT
Martin you can't do it with figures mate. The ones I gave are just examples. It has to be done by ear. Familiarise yourself with parametric EQ. Grab the frequency pot, (after hitting say 10db of boost) and literaly sweep it up and down the frequency range over the sound you want to EQ. You will hear two things. First off you'll hear a sweet spot (your ears will tell you when) that's where you apply boost. Now back off the gain on the parametric until it sounds right. The other thing you'll hear is a vile resonant booming sound... that's the opposite... back that off with cut and you're effectively removing summat nasty. Again your ears are EVERYTHING. Make a note of the frequencies you boosted. Then move onto another sound. If that sound is running at the same time as the previous one, try and remove a little of the frequency you previously boosted first. Then find a sweet spot for this sound (which should be different)... make a note of the two boosted frequencies. Move to the third, remove a bit of the TWO boosted frequencies and find the third one's sweet spot... You must be following me now right? It has to become instinctive (like knowing when to change gear by the tone of a car engine). It's all in your ears and only they can tell you what's right or not.
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Post by Minimoog on May 25, 2005 15:50:24 GMT
I tried like buggery to do this on the ol' engineers track (must do something new soon - referring to that all the time is getting embarassing!). It still all ended up like porridge on the bottom end and sounded a bit 'honky' overall.
Ah well, practice I guess...
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Post by liquidscreamer on May 25, 2005 16:06:21 GMT
I suppose i was thinking along the lines of paint by numbers by working to a template but i get what you mean now.
Are loops already eq,d or do you still need to alter those,i suppose the answer to that is yes cos they need to work with all the other sounds?
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Post by tmwd on May 25, 2005 16:20:19 GMT
jesus christ on a bike, that is feckin ace, no techy review from me here, i love this, best screamer song for me so far. the jah wobble thing rings very true, very "take me to god". the bass seems to dissapear towards the end, put it back in there for speaker shakin finish. love it!
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Post by Dubsounds on May 25, 2005 16:39:37 GMT
I suppose i was thinking along the lines of paint by numbers by working to a template but i get what you mean now. Are loops already eq,d or do you still need to alter those,i suppose the answer to that is yes cos they need to work with all the other sounds? You should tailor everything to fit in a track. There are no templates in music production mate. Go get band-in-a-box or one a'dem auto acompaniment home casio jobies if you want it with fries
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Post by Dubsounds on May 25, 2005 16:41:25 GMT
I tried like buggery to do this on the ol' engineers track (must do something new soon - referring to that all the time is getting embarassing!). It still all ended up like porridge on the bottom end and sounded a bit 'honky' overall. Ah well, practice I guess... Actually Jordan you're talking out yer arse. That mix sounds pretty passable here at dubsounds inc. Now that's either a fluke, or you need new monitors but it's fine.
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Post by Dubsounds on May 25, 2005 16:43:39 GMT
...the bass seems to dissapear towards the end, put it back in there for speaker shakin finish. love it! I agree. I also think the intro is full of good ideas and promise but it looks like Martin rushed to the finish a bit and didn't keep up the momentum on the ear candy. Helps having heard it a few times now of course
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Post by liquidscreamer on May 25, 2005 17:29:51 GMT
Cool rick I actually had most of a song with lyrics ready to work on when i read one of shauns posts regarding using loops,so i looked into it found a drum loop messed it up a bit created the intro then plonked the original song in the middle,put part of the intro towards the end then played the piano to finish. Who says i,m not technically minded
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Post by prettyhatemachine on May 25, 2005 21:25:42 GMT
Nice track Liquid mate. I really like it. I don't tend to be too good with "scientific" reviews but I do try to be constructive in my critisism. I like the drum loop and the piano - not sure about the vocals though. An odd effect on them combined with the speed of some of them make them a little bit un-decipherable (which may have been the intention). Good bassline and I quite like the little bits of synth sounds in there. Parts of the mix are a bit muddy (but i'm no expert) but the track itself is a good 'un. A nice "industrial" feel with dark electronic flourishes. Good job mate
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Post by prettyhatemachine on May 25, 2005 21:29:45 GMT
Shaun - Thanks for those little mixing tid-bits up there. They've given me a bit of advice to go on too.
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Post by liquidscreamer on May 25, 2005 22:15:24 GMT
not sure about the vocals though. An odd effect on them combined with the speed of some of them make them a little bit un-decipherable (which may have been the intention).
Johnathan,when i first got to work on the vocals there was loads of pops and peaks on them,so even though through compression etc. i seem to of sorted that out it has lost the clarity of the original,plus,when i put the vocals back into the mix,i think iam a few hundredth of a second to late,especially the first verse.
When you record vocals,if it peaks originally,can it be salvaged or should it be re-recorded?
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Post by prettyhatemachine on May 25, 2005 22:33:39 GMT
Someone else may be able to advise you better but from what I know it should be perfectly salvageable.
I don't have a pop shield so just try to be careful and avoid and pop's or clicks and just try to maintain the level of my voice to avoid clipping or peaks.
I record my vocals through Audition or sometimes Sound Forge and use their Normalize and Limiting options to correct unwanted peaks. Sometime's compression can help too.
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Post by Dubsounds on May 26, 2005 0:20:27 GMT
...When you record vocals,if it peaks originally,can it be salvaged or should it be re-recorded? I think you already know the answer to this guys. You should be recording your source as carefully and accurately as possible. If you have to fix it later, the following age-old engineering phrases come to mind: 1. You can't polish a turd. 2. Shit in - shit out! Now that's a bit harsh possibly, but I was taught those "watchwords" a long time ago and they are so true. Technically you CAN fix peaks with compression, that's what it's there for, but ...(now this bit's important)... as long as the original signal hasn't clipped! With digital recording this is absolutely imperative, as once you reach 0dB there's no where else to go! Totally the opposite in fact to analogue recording to tape where it actually sounded nice sometimes to record into the red. Unlike digital, analogue just soaks up the extra level at moderate distortion and adds warmth and colouration. If you have clipped audio in a digital signal you introduce digital distortion which is an extremely unpleasant crackling sound which is practically imposible to get rid of without spending hours with digital audio restoration tools and even then you only get poor results and believe me, a re-take is much easier. Post compressing, limiting or normalising a CLIPPED signal will not remove the distortion. Getting it right first take is the only way it can be avoided. Not wishing to be rude, but the vocals on your tracks Martin and the one I heard recently from you too Jonathan have quite a bit of clipping present and it's just so unecessary when a quick "mic check one two (make a loud noise - boo!" kind of thing would enable you to set your levels to cope in advance with the loudest sound you can get from your source. In this instance we're considering vocals so that will be plosives like PUH, BUH, DUH and TUH and sibilants like THH, FFF and SHH). A minute of preparation will allow you to compensate for any extreme levels and you won't have to re-record unless the performance itself is shit if you get my drift. A decent pop shield will remove the plosives and sibilants to an extent but they do still seem to make it through and are best removed by a de-esser (a compresor that hunts down sssss frequencies and pushes them down when it finds them but leaves the rest of the sound alone) and conversely you can make a similar type of compressor to operate on low frequency pops with a "frequency conscious" sidechain. When you consider the cost of a pop shield against what you spent on your microphone, you really have no excuse not to buy one and use it. My best advice to anyone is... when you recording, don't stare out of the window - watch those meters like a bloody hawk. That's what they're there for and yeah, I fuck it up too 'cos I get too cocky and think it won't happen to me, so it bites me on the arse just to remind me. Try fixing a drum track where one of the mics on the kit has been quietly distorting without you noticing... emabarassing AND frustrating to say the least!
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Post by scream2sleep on May 26, 2005 11:51:38 GMT
1. You can't polish a turd. Thanks Shaun for calling me a turd!!
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Post by scream2sleep on May 26, 2005 11:55:59 GMT
Just kiddin as you know i cant keep my eye on flashin lights or look out of the window when Martin has me bent down on my knees under a duvet! But not to take the piss, thank you for your help it makes a huge difference to our confidence. Great site mate.
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Post by Dubsounds on May 26, 2005 13:08:14 GMT
LOL. They're just "phrases" Lou and weren't directled at your song or Jonathan's but you guys know that Anyway, if singing on your knees helps...
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Post by prettyhatemachine on May 26, 2005 20:48:22 GMT
Cheers Shaun, didn't mean to hijack Liquid's thread and get comments for myself From the sounds of it I am a lot like ScreamToSleep - have to be alone and make sure no-one's hearing me when I record any vocals as I get embarrased. My vocals on the Telekon track were done in just a few takes and put through distortion which probably resulted in their poor sound. Plus my mic is just a cheap thing. Still, thanks for the advice mate. I'll try to present less shitier turds in future
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