Old Friends

[JD01]

OK, despite the title, this is another new one.
Seems pretty tidy to me, although I haven't listened on the downstairs stereo, while going for a walk or in the car yet

Old Friends Mix 1.mp3

OK, new vocal mix here. Mainly based on what @Greg_L said about a fattie wearing baggie clothes and what I learned from doing the latest mix of Road Crew.
So, I've changed:
The reverb impulse for a much shorter one to try and avoid the sea-shell sound
Reduced the "vocal fattener" delay effect so that its only just noticeable when I turn it off.
Reduced the overall level of reverb.
Made the lead vocal a little louder.
Made the double tracking quieter so you can only just about tell its there when you flick it on and off.

10 - Old Friends.mp3

[TripleM]

It's sounding really good to me. Love the guitar sounds, and the drum programming. Tight and dry snare sound is nice. Guitar part on the right is nice.

The only thing I might consider is brightening up the vocal a little. It's a bit dark. Words here and there are getting covered by the guitars.

Overall, really nice.

[rayc]

Sounds good but the guitars sound a little meat free to me...I like what they're doing though.
Vocal performance wise: "black hole... con troll" seems a little forced but other wise fine. Could use some "sparkle" though.

[JD01]

Cheers guys, I might have gone too far with the low pass on the vocal,

[CrowsofFritz]

Been having a bout of creativity recently, huh? I think this is my favorite one yet.

[JD01]

Been having a bout of creativity recently, huh? I think this is my favorite one yet.

Kind of... a lot of these were already in the works, some of them are re-workings and re-mixes of older tunes.
I'm trying to get a group together of similar recording/mixing quality. I've decided that a few of my older songs are also basically crap so they'll probably be transferred to archive purgatory.

[Tadpui]

I like this one JD. I really like the vocal on this one as well. I know you're always bagging on your own vocals, but I think they're solid.

You've gotten really good at programming drums. Nice guitar playing as well. Tones sound good to me on everything. I'm not sure if I'm listening to an updated version compared to previous comments, but the vocals don't sound dark on my systems. They're definitely not hyped in the high end, but they sound good to me.

I could use more bass guitar, at least more low frequency from it.

This has almost an 80s post-punk kind of feel to it, I like it.

[JD01]

I like this one JD. I really like the vocal on this one as well. I know you're always bagging on your own vocals, but I think they're solid.

You've gotten really good at programming drums. Nice guitar playing as well. Tones sound good to me on everything. I'm not sure if I'm listening to an updated version compared to previous comments, but the vocals don't sound dark on my systems. They're definitely not hyped in the high end, but they sound good to me.

I could use more bass guitar, at least more low frequency from it.

This has almost an 80s post-punk kind of feel to it, I like it.

Cheers tad, I've not revisited this one yet. So you're listening to mix 1

[WhiskeyJack]

I like the guitars and their tones on this one. the leads tell me it is you. you have a flavor.

the vocals are sitting under the guitars a bit. (i'm on cans though) the leads and vocals aren't balanced level wise to my ears. lead work is speaking louder then your voice i would set about fixing that.

I'd like a little more meat in your vocals to. so I will echo that. Cool song bud.

[Greg_L]

I think you should develop this more as a song. To me it's 30 seconds of song and two and a half minutes of guitar wankery. I don't like leaving songwriting critiques because it's your song and it is how it is, but this one struck me a certain way because I think you usually do better at crafting complete songs. That's just my 2 cents though. The plus side of all that guitar noodling is that the guitars do sound good. I like the single-coily cleaner sound in the verses. Nice clarity there. Your guitar sound is morphing into Mesa territory. Maybe it always was but you're getting that kind of crunch pretty noticeably now. Not the Mesa high gain, but the Mesa crunch sound is there, and to me that's the best part of the Mesa sound.

I think the mix is overall pretty decent. I want more clarity from your vocals, less of whatever room effects you're using. It's kind of like a fat person wearing baggy clothes to hide their fat. That just makes their fatness more noticeable. They're not fooling anyone. We know you're fat under there and we don't care but you're actually drawing attention to it by trying to hide it. Proper fitting clothes look way better and more flattering. Same with your vocals. If all the rest of your mix is clean and clear and right up front, burying your vocals in a sea shell just makes them stick out even more, but not in the right kind of way. It's like a reverb imbalance. Maybe you just don't hear it that way, maybe you want it that way, but it is always that way and to me it's one of the little things keeping you from going up a notch in mixing..

I think the snare is too splatty. Maybe too much bottom mic track. It sounds loose and not as defined as I think it should be in a rock song. I think that would be an easy fix if you wanted to address it so no big deal.

The rest sounds good. Good kick and bass. All the endless guitaring sounds good. Not too bad.

[JD01]

Cheers Greg. You think it needs a chorus?
I'm on the fence regarding the vocal processing at the moment. I finally have vocals in place where I feel like they sit right and don't make me cringe. I'll gradually ease off the "vocal fattener" delay and over drive and see if I can keep not hating them.

Love the baggy clothes analogy.

[Greg_L]

Cheers Greg. You think it needs a chorus?

I don't know if it needs a chorus. I'm not saying it needs the typical verse/chorus/verse/bridge/solo/whatever pattern. But it needs changes. It needs something to break the monotony IMO. To me it's a short song that seems really long because it doesn't really go anywhere. So you know, do what you think will work if you want to. Add a chorus or a key change or a timing change or a bridge or something. Or just leave it. It's your song.

I'm on the fence regarding the vocal processing at the moment. I finally have vocals in place where I feel like they sit right and don't make me cringe.

They don't make me cringe either, but I don't think they sit right. I know you're really working hard at the vocal sitting thing, but you're seemingly in this mix rut that won't allow you to break out of your old norms. Maybe you don't like the sound of your voice or whatever so you bury it in stuff. Get over that! Think about the casual listener, right? What do they wanna hear? Vocals. Good or bad, regular shmoes want to hear the fucking words. They don't care about the midrange character of your bridge pickup. They care about the vocals. Now for me, I couldn't care less about singing or lyrics. But I do care about how the vocal track, it being it's own instrument, works in a mix. You wouldn't bury your lead guitar track under a bunch of stuff to hide it because you like it and want it to be heard. Get into that mindset for vocals. Think of Dr Greg Graffin. He doesn't have this beautiful operatic golden voice. He talk sings. But you can clearly hear every single word he says because he wants you to.

[JD01]

I need to do more work on this. I've had a whole week of singing and mixing . I've actually barely picked up a guitar since Tuesday. Just been mixing... a lot

[JD01]

Just listened to this again now and I agree that the vocals need more presence (not in the up treble sense) they need to be more at the front of the mix.

I actually like the song structure though to be honest and I really like the ending. I actually think the last 30 or 40s of the song is some of the best music I've ever written... as Sonic Youth as I can sound without breaking things.

[JD01]

OK, new vocal mix in the OP based on Greg's suggestions. I've added a list of what I've done.

[Alison]

I really like your guitar work on this. Personally, I like the song as it is. The music speaks for itself. Great job!

[vomitHatSteve]

The vocal on the new one sounds just a little bit darker. Any way to brighten that up?

The FX chain on it otherwise sounds good.

[Lt. Bob]

Nice tunage ...... I like the song and your vocals continue to get better and better but:

I could use more bass guitar, at least more low frequency from it.

^^^^^^^^^^
Is there even a bass on it?

[JD01]

Cheers guys. Brightening the vocal up should be easy... it has a low pass on it. More bass. No problem.

[JD01]

OK @Lt. Bob and @vomitHatSteve
Brighter vocals and more bass!

10 - Old Friends.mp3