Well folks, after a hiatus of only nine years or so, I’ve gotten back into the writing and recording of music. Or pop music rather – I composed some classical music in the intervening time, but that’s not nearly as much fun. So, here are my two new tunes: Sidewalk Chalk and Quicksand. Be kind.
DISCLAIMERS: These are rough recordings. I’m still getting the hang of my new recording software, and I’m only aware of about 10% of its capabilities. There are some obvious mixing glitches – backup harmonies too far forward, guitar too tinny, overdone vocal effects, etc. Also, I decided that I really don’t like the fake drums on my 12-year-old keyboard, so the arrangements are not exactly the rock epics I hear in my head. Plus, I was lazy and didn’t feel like recording multiple takes, so I biff a number of notes, including the high note at the climax of Sidewalk Chalk. Ah well. This should at least give you an idea of what I’m up to. That’s a large enough disclaimer I think.
Dig it, man, groovy
Sidewalk chalk: dig it. It’s well done, compelling lyrics and imagery. “Quicksand” didn’t grab me so much. My only complaints about Sidewalk would be technical, and you already got it figured out: the hand drum is too hot, and the delay on the vocals is distracting.
Hey, so you have to spill it: what are you using for your home studio? Hardware, software, all of it 🙂 If you’re using Cakewalk Sonar, I’d love to pitch in on some mastering. Heck, even if you aren’t, you can really brighten and broaden a tune from a single stereo .wav file…
The guitar tinny-ness is totally fixable, but may require some adjustment of your technique. It sounds as if you did a single dynamic mic over the soundhole, about 18″ away. Is that about right?
The setup I used to lay down the guitar track for I Said A Prayer was two condenser mics, each about 2 feet away from the guitar. You need some room for the bass waves to develop and not “boom”. Anyway, one is over the 12th fret, the other is over the nut. I could go for more bass on the sound by positioning the 12th fret mic a bit more toward the soundhole, but generally, I want the guitar to stay in its sonic area when I add bass, so I don’t want too much emphasis on the fundamental of the lower notes.
Ultimately, I’d like to modify my setup. One over the nut (to get the fretting noises, you need those!), one over the twelfth fret as usual, but then a stereo microphone immediately behind the 12th fret mic so that I have another track to play with when balancing the sound. I’ve heard the addition of that stereo mic really helps the depth of the sound; I’m eager to try it out. Besides, I really need to spend more money on recording when I don’t release albums anyway!
So anyway, I decided to take a brief break this morning, flagrantly violate your copyright without permission, and demonstrate what some trivial mastering can do for a recording 🙂 Here’s what I did: * First, noise-reduced it. You had some minor background hiss. But you left that silent chunk at the start and end that I could use to get a reference on it and yank most of it out. * Put in a 30Hz low-pass shelf. The bass was booming. * Cut the frequency response right around 100Hz, because the bass was still booming 🙂 * I tweaked some other ranges to optimize the frequency response curve. In my GUI, this actually “flattens” it into a straight, sloped line, but in a non-logarithmic frequency response scale, it looks like a pretty massive dropoff at the high frequencies. I love parametric EQ. Arbitrary shelves mixed with traditional EQ knobs is the way my brain thinks. I also hunted down the booming of your guitar on G, and reduced that just a touch, but not enough to make a difference, really. I went hunting for the fundamental of the hand drum, too, but reducing it also squashed your voice pretty badly, so I left it alone. * Added a touch of reverb. Nothing big, just enough to fill out the sound in the midrange. Though I may have slightly overdone it. * Compressed it about 6dB with a soft knee. For the initial compression, brickwall compression sounded a bit too cold for what your sound sounded like. * Used a mild exciter above 5KHz. This probably made the biggest difference in the “sparkle” of the sound; it was pretty dead before. * Ran it through a smaller brickwall compressor to quash some transients a bit and boost the level by about 3 dB, and thought it was roughly CD-master level at that point.
Tell me what you think of my “mastering” attempt on your tune. It’s fairly subtle for non-musicians, but for me, this kind of stuff makes a big difference when I’m listening.
Sidewalk Chalk – Remix
I mixed it on a crappy pair of headphones, though, so I think there may be some clipping, and I’m certain the levels are off. I usually burn a CD of a tune, then go listen to it on several sound systems to figure out where the problems are on various rigs. It’s amazing the sonic difference between various speakers. For instance, on my laptop, about all I can hear is the hand toms from its speakers.
Oh, and since mp3 cuts off everything above 15KHz, the “air” of the tune gets lost, and re-encoding to MP3 doesn’t help the quality any 😉
—
Matthew P. Barnson
remixes and funk
Wow, that’s a big response. I’ll respond to as much as I can. 🙂
Yeah, I’m not entirely convinced by Quicksand yet either. I like the main idea and some of the thematic elements, but it doesn’t gel yet. I need a new bridge to tie it together or something. Plus adding a full band will make a big difference, I think.
Adobe Audition. I need to sit down for a weekend with the instruction manual and just figure out how the damn thing works. I know that there’s a lot more functionality that I’m not using, and I was either too lazy or too eager to take the time to figure out the software before jumping in.
Everything else is crap. A cheap-ass unidirectional mic from Radio Shack until I can afford something nicer, my long-suffering Seagull acoustic, a djembe I’ve stolen from my mom and don’t intend to give back, and the reliable old Korg 01-W for the bass until I can afford the Washburn 4-string from the Musician’s Friend catalog.
Actually it was about 5-6 inches from the soundhole. I think the mistakes I made were in the EQ and the balance rather than the recording. I used the same technique in Quicksand and I think the guitar came out sounding much fuller.
Good to know. I’ll try it with the mic farther away next time.
It sounds fantastic! I don’t understand any of what you said, but whatever you did, it worked. 🙂
Thanks for the feedback!
— Ben
Make you a deal…
Make you a deal… you send me high-quality .wav files of the stuff you do, and I’ll do the magic on it for free and send it back to you with levels appropriately adjusted for burning to a CD and sounding “semi-professional”. Just include me on the mastering credit! The files will be big, so email and such won’t work to send it, but I can tell you how to get them to me easily via the Internet.
Or heck, you can just snail-mail me a proposed CD, and I can get it back to you sounding better 🙂
The usual mastering caveats apply: aim for about -6dB on your master mix so that I have about 6dB to work with. Make sure all your effects are finalized and your levels are right, because I can’t “mix” anything, I can only emphasize or de-emphasize certain frequencies. Be sparing on the reverb, as I’ll add a touch of mastering reverb on some frequencies to round the sound.
Glad you liked my changes 🙂 MP3’s are a pain to work with, because you lose all the sonic data above 15KHz, but you can still do some fun stuff with it.
As far as big responses? I wrote a long missive because I lacked the time to shorten it 🙂
—
Matthew P. Barnson
Thanks
I appreciate it Matt, but really, these are just rough recordings. When I get more familiar with the software itself, I’ll probably go back and re-record them from the ground up, and THEN you can master them.
— Ben
It Was Cool And All, But–
Where was the slap bass solo?
🙂
Yeah…
And the rap interlude?
W
Umm..
HEY!!
Rap interludes are MINE!
http://www.timpane.com/starbucks.mp3
Okay
I see you apply the term “rap interlude” loosely 😉
My $.02 Weed
Naw..
I’m all bout dat.
My MC skillz iz da shiznit
Bassmasters
I’m waiting for you to come back to DC and record it, homeslice.
— Ben
Nice..
I’ve always been a fan.. and its nice to hear some of that sound I liked so much in the past.
Of particular interest to me is the imagery and the strength of the chorus. Very very nice.
Oh, and good remix DJMat (our project begins soon enough.. can’t wait)
Lessons for Caleb
You do realize that heavily qualified, rough cut, “man this sucks guys” song is far beyond any of my musical capabilities. Are you & Sam and everyone else on the site available to give my 2 boys music lessons? Instead of being like their dad who love music but has no ability and wishes he did, at least they’ll have the chance to get into it young and rock out.
Except for “Megan”. I did do the lyrics for that 😉 Oh, to be a minstrel but stuck as a poet…
My $.02 Weed
Lessons Would Be A Mistake
Don’t let your kids grow up to be musicians.
I agree
Friends don’t let friends play gigs sober.
—
Matthew P. Barnson
Aces. Happiness is.
Aces. Happiness is.