Work in Progress, Comments appreciated

    Here we have a song i am working on from time to time since the end of 2010, i replaced the drums now for the umpteenth time and still not happy yet!
    Any comments? Which of the three parts do you like the most?



    Freeway Song (work in progress)

    My occupation: showing teenagers the many hidden secrets of the A-minor chord on the guitar.

    Hi Geraldo , thx for sharing ! the main vintage classic rock riff sounds great to me.


    Allow me some hints : this is a personal point of view you may not agree at all since I'm not sure about your intentions here.



    The snare is too bright for me ( it's a matter of taste I know !) I would have chosen a mellower one and a different verb.


    The bassline is too much in the background.


    You should redo the double track with different guitar or tone in order to get the left one more clean & brilliant ( a strat or tele with a crunch tone). Or better Double track the main riff on both L/R sides and add some cleaner chords fills ( center or extreme L/R )


    You should add some background fills ( Hammond or organic bass synth line ). I did several tracks with a 35€ monotron that sounds very rich regarding the sound textures. This is great addition to ambiance and chordal/melodic foundation. Vst synths are OK for this purpose.


    Add a solo with a more beefier tone and some FXs like delay to make a fresh sounding part somewhere in you track.


    Keep it up with recording this is a great experience !


    Renaud.

    Thank you , Waraba. This one of the best comments i have ever received! Since i am german und you are french and in order to get the structure of the song right:



    It begins with 4 times a riff with Quart chords, let us call this Part A. I think you call this the classic rock riff?
    The middle section with this kind of funk riff is Part B. It is played three (!) times.
    Then we have the spanish chord structure, in half time. This can be called Part C. It is played two times and then Part D is added, an arpeggio of the chords. No solo yet!


    • I have checked literally 16 snares and this is the one i like best, but i will try again some less prominent snares.
    • The bass is a problem. While i think it is okay in Parts A and C, it is NOT audible in Part B. This is strange. I even doubled the track, to no avail. But it is MIDI still, once i have
      changed to a wave i can boost in the mix, i hope with 500 Hz.
    • I have recorded two guitars with the exception of Part D, where there are 3 gits. I mixed the guitars extreme left and extreme right. The sounds are the same. I am not sure whether
      i understand you here. I could (I have recorded wet and dry tracks) reamp the left guitar with a profile, probably a fender from andi44, with less gain. Okay?
    • When you say double track, you mean reamping the same track or playing it twice with a slightly different touch, as i have done??? Only better?
    • I have two guitars. In the midlle of the mix would be the singer. I know it is always difficult to imagine, plus my singer has left Munich for Cologne. I do not know whether this will have to
      stay an instrumental and for how long.
    • About the fills: This is all still pre-pe-production. Once i have this thing in good shape, i will bring it to my keyboarder, who is an arranging genius. Serious! A difficult character, but
      nice nevertheless. He has a virus and this and that and he is going to add fills and organ and so much, i do not want to overdo things here.
    • There is no solo yet. I will definitely use a much pumped up tone like my trademark solo tone, you can hear here .


    Thanks again, this is really of help. I hope i understand you correctly. Could you please comment again on the guitars? Shall i add a third guitar or do what exactly? See points 3 and 4.



    Merci beaucoup encore une fois!

    My occupation: showing teenagers the many hidden secrets of the A-minor chord on the guitar.

    Well, difficult to tell what YOU want here and what to say.
    So, please don't take my comments personal. ;)


    As you asked for impressions as to which part we like best:
    That's the problem, this is not a song yet but 4 parts played in succession without the cohesive element where my gut feeling tells me "YES, now this next part HAS TO come!"
    And it seems to me you don't know either which part you want to feature, around which part the song could be centered.


    Part A could be the intro of a song, but if heavily featured it could also be the centre of a riff rocker.
    Part B complements A pretty well so personally I would concentrate on working with A/B.


    Part C has nothing to do with A and B, seems like a stranger in a strange land. Make a different song from it.
    Part D is also a stranger as is doesn't complement any of the other parts. Also it sounds like a bad rip off of 'Verdamp lang her ' by BAP, sorry. :)
    At this stage, IMO, you need to work with somebody like a singer who brings in the melodic, 'hookline' elements and helps to make a song out of different elements, in this case make a song out of A/B and write a good chorus for it.


    As you mentioned the drums: they sound static and awkward.
    If you programmed them, well, you should get better at programming.
    If you used loops you definitely need more variation.
    If you used Jamstix, ... no you didn't as it would sound miles better then.


    Actually I feel that any discussion about sound or drums is a bit premature at this point as the song is not ready yet.

    Hi Geraldo, I've to listen again to the guitar parts to help you but anyway here are some more hints :


    You should give up with the midi bass and grab a single coil guitar ,as a guitarist you can easily play this instrument that has 2 strings less , the opposite is not true :D . I'm not a bassist but I often add very simple bassline played on my strat or tele with a fender profile. I can send you a bass rig if needed. Here is my method : dial up a clean profile set the harmonizer to -12 or -1 octave ( harmonizers tracks better than the transpose for me ) EQ the highs down and actually play those bass parts and feel like Jaco Pastorius ( I play those parts without pick, try to play fewer notes than on guitar and give some groove ).


    Lsiten to these bassline examples , much more musical & fun to play to me than a midi bass and took like 5 minutes to record ( https://soundcloud.com/waraba/jazzbox-vs-drz & https://soundcloud.com/waraba/sitar-hero-v2 )


    Regarding the double tracking I prefer playing another track instead of simply pasting & reamping a single track , it sounds more musical to me. About the sound it's better if the 2 tracks have really different tones ( Les Paul + strat , Jazzbox + tele ) It's mainly a matter of 'contrast' , pan & EQ , the objective is to hear like 2 different guitarists like you can hear them on a stage. Rigs can be the same or not, the guitar will make the differences.


    You should wait for your keyboardist , he will arrange the whole song and new ideas will show up as the track gets more elaborate since you'll have more harmonies to stand on.


    Remember to leave some room for the singer and you solos.


    I agree with Jamstix , it will feel and sound more realistic if you use it on your track.

    Make sure there is a crash hit on the following beat after each drum fill. Also make the crash louder, it's very quiet compared to your hihat and every time you do play the crash it sounds like a hihat hit is missing. I know that's more mixing advice but it'll also add to the feel and the fullness of the song.


    What you call the c-part, instead of the crash playing the off notes, change it to a ride bell that plays quarters and add a shaker or a tambourine that plays 8ths. just make sure the shaker/tambourine i's mixed in very subtly. imagine that you can rather "feel" it than hear it.
    At the 1:09 mark try to let both rhythm guitars ring out together with the lead. sounds more like a unity then.


    From the 1:21 mark no off hihat ;) choose a straight hihat beat to give it more drive. try 8ths an also add palm muted rhythm guitars that also play 8ths. but all in all I'm not to sure about the speed up thing.


    This is some stuff I'd change. But to be honest when you say you have that song idead since 2010 I'd let it go and try something else. If you ever finish this tune it'll be probably okayish and that's it. I'd start from the scratch with something new.


    Oh yeah, and no midi bass anymore. just doesnt fit with the genre you're into. If you dont have a bass do what waraba already told you. You can get some cool bass like sounds out of the KPA with your guitar. A proper bassguitar woul be of course better but anything will be better than midi bass in this genre ;)

    Thanx waraba,


    this time i have understood. :)

    I actually have played bass in a couple of bands, before i decided to sell my equipment and to go back fully to the guitar, around 2006. It is a good idea to try
    this kind of bass rig. While i like quantizing the bass it will feel more natural. // I checked your bass again, it seems to lack the punch of a true bass a bit. But it
    is worth a try anyway. If you could provide some kind of bass rig, très bien.
    The guitars, two different ones, maybe with the different sound, very easy to achieve. Merci.
    With Jamstix i do not understand the high value it has for especially Ingolf. Maybe the Demo is a wreck? I can use all styles, all drummers and it still does not sound
    as good as you say it should. And the fills are nowhere near interesting. But my keyboarder has a better feeling for drums anyway. My turf is the guitar and the bass.



    I will post the result, but it will take a while, because my friend works as a children's book illustrator and has a lot to do. If a singer can be added the whole thing will
    change shape again considerably. Thanks for all the hints.

    My occupation: showing teenagers the many hidden secrets of the A-minor chord on the guitar.

    Oh, while i was writing, KoMa posted his hints. Well, yeah, maybe the whole thing is for the trash can.
    But your suggestions for the bass and drums are very helpful indeed. THX :thumbup:


    By further checking i see that we do not call the parts identically, so here is the structure precisely:


    • Part A, played 4 times = 16 bars | from 0:00 to 0:24
    • Part B, played 3 times = 12 bars | from 0:25 to 0:43 (half time)
    • Part C played 2 times = 08 bars | from 0:44 to 1:08 (half time)
    • Part D played 2 times = 08 bars | from 1:09 to the return of the intro which will ofcourse be deleted and Part A will follow

    My occupation: showing teenagers the many hidden secrets of the A-minor chord on the guitar.

    Edited 2 times, last by Geraldo7 ().

    Yeah 'paper ' bass is still better than a midi bass , I plan to buy a real precision bass like a squier for this purpose and also for Jams when friends come at home. I will check my bass rigs tonite and send them to you.


    I also agree with moving to another song if this process is too long : while you're spending lots of time to make it sound good you'll probably have written another song from scratch.


    I have not tried Jamstix for now, but the demo sound very realistic on their website. I have a similar system on my computer, it's great for jamming / writing demos.


    See you & enjoy . I see recording music as a big fun and creative activity , if it gets boring I often give up and start a new track.


    R

    Geraldo, Jamstix is a bit different and for sure it has a learning curve.
    But when you are into creativity, making up songs and inventing grooves fitting to the songs, there's nothing better on the market.


    Go to their forum and get help learning Jamstix.
    This is the best advice I can give you. ;)

    gianfranco : I aimed for the warmest rig of my personal collection cause I like warm round basses with soft attack. I also must admit that my monitoring system is not good/large enough to render good basses , so as I know my boogie to have very good and buzzless basses it was a foolproof solution for me.


    I would be cool if someone interested and equipped with a real FR studio system would be king enough to make some bass rigs suited for being played on Single Coil guitars ...


    Any volunteer ?

    thx for all of the comments and the bass rig, had to postpone this till friday, but will try all of this ASAP. :thumbup:

    My occupation: showing teenagers the many hidden secrets of the A-minor chord on the guitar.

    Kick and tom toms are waayy too quiet for this style imo. But I'm used to those huge Bon Jovi drums. :D


    Bass guitar could use some harder compression. Maybe add a multiband comp for the lows on the master bus to keep the low end more constant/even.


    Something like 50-125Hz, fast attack, slow release, 3:1 ratio, 3-4dB attenuation, gain to taste.

    Quote from waraba

    gianfranco : I aimed for the warmest rig of my personal collection cause I like warm round basses with soft attack. I also must admit that my monitoring system is not good/large enough to render good basses , so as I know my boogie to have very good and buzzless basses it was a foolproof solution for me.

    Have you ever tried with a bass profile anyway? It would cost nothing after all... Just changing the amp in your rig I mean :)

    I am planning to do a lot of recording today and/or tomorrow.

    Quote from nakedzen


    Kick and tom toms are waayy too quiet for this style imo. But I'm used to those huge Bon Jovi drums.


    Bass guitar could use some harder compression. Maybe add a multiband comp for the lows on the master bus to keep the low end more constant/even.


    Something like 50-125Hz, fast attack, slow release, 3:1 ratio, 3-4dB attenuation, gain to taste.

    The compression, and all this stuff, is it possible in the KPA? I dont know much about compressors. "A multiband comp", i have never even heard of this.
    Can i use the comp from the KPA and boost the wave in Cubase, would that be okay? thx

    My occupation: showing teenagers the many hidden secrets of the A-minor chord on the guitar.

    Quote from Geraldo7

    I am planning to do a lot of recording today and/or tomorrow.

    The compression, and all this stuff, is it possible in the KPA? I dont know much about compressors. "A multiband comp", i have never even heard of this.
    Can i use the comp from the KPA and boost the wave in Cubase, would that be okay? thx


    It's better to do the compression in post processing so you don't accidentally kill all dynamics on the way in. A good free vst compressor is Variety of Sound's Density MkIII, just slap that on the bass track, load a preset and tweak the Drive so that you get around 3-4dB of attenuation on peaks, then tweak the makeup gain so that the track is the same volume with the compressor on and off.


    http://varietyofsound.wordpress.com/downloads/


    Here's a good tutorial on multiband compressor used for low end:


    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yj1JWZmfWWM

    So many good ideas here from my colleagues, almost too many to mention! :thumbup: So, here we go.


    • This is "FREEWAY" Version 2.01
      Improvements include playing a superdooper bass rig from fellow forumite waraba.
      Using the exact method nakedzen mentioned to compress the bass waves.
      Not two guitars yet, but took warabas advice to heart and separated the two guitars with EQing in Cubase.
    • This is "FREEWAY" Version 2.02
      I used the Jamstix drummer here. Tried about 30 presets, sorry, it does not improve and the reason is not the sound itself which is very limited in the
      demo, but - well - either i do not know yet how to use it or it just is not my cup of tea.


    Anyway, it has improved a lot, i think. I haven't played bass for 7 years, and the first 10 takes were throw-aways, but slowly i get the feeling again. comments?



    and thank you to everyone involved again, you know who you are. :thumbup:

    My occupation: showing teenagers the many hidden secrets of the A-minor chord on the guitar.