Musician Forum - Band Discussion Board - BandMix

Remixed a little this afternoon after listening to the first mix in my usual listening environment (my truck) this morning. Haven't burned to disc to listen in the truck yet for this mix (worked on the drums and boosted the bass, played with the guitars a little more). 'Doubling' of the lead vocal is actually 3 separate tracks, with a little automation. Single vocal track sounded weak (like my voice IS!)

The 60's are alive !!! lol

Vocals seem a little soft, s/b a tad more forward in the mix.

And your bridge I wasn't too terribly happy with, but all in all, not too bad.

A lot of work has gone into this and it is appreciated believe me! Production, musicianship, songwriting are all top notch.

But we need to talk about dynamics and arranging. You have complex music here and that's good but you need to let it breath. That's done with phrasing and level control. If you are in a noisy bar you have to maintain control with a strong level but in the recording world we like dynamics! Vary the instruments (it's all guitar?) and vocal and play with the level to let it tell a story!

Other than that. I believe you will believe me.

I like your vocal and the overall sound of the song.

It's a good groove... but it's a bit long w/o much change throughout it. I would revisit it to try and consolidate somewhere if possible.
Could you post the lyrics maybe on the next tune?

Jahva wrote:I like your vocal and the overall sound of the song.

It's a good groove... but it's a bit long w/o much change throughout it. I would revisit it to try and consolidate somewhere if possible.
Could you post the lyrics maybe on the next tune?

I'll post the lyrics tonight.

When I sat my wife down to listen to it, her first reaction was 'over 6 minutes?!' It's only 3 verses plus leads and bridge lead, not sure how I could shorten it up.
Whats different for this song from my usual writing is the repeating open A-C-D chord pattern (intros to each verse PLUS the chorus) - that's the way the song wrote itself this time. Been listening to too much new 'indie' stuff where its not unusual for 9/10 of a song to be the same chord pattern.

"Too much guitar"? Well, yeah, I'm a guitarist! In the song there are 2 acoustics (one is low and panned way to the left and may be indistiguishable from the main one), and two different electrics panned to the right (1 on verse, 1 on the chorus-intro pattern), plus the open A accent guitar plus the lead guitar.

So to change things up ... hmm .... take down the verse guitars and add piano for the 1st two lines of each verse? I figured the lead guitar woven into the repeating A-C-D pattern helped break up that repetition a little.

Dynamics - first part of the verses a little lower in volume, maybe, and the first part of the bridge lead louder? I was surprised when I looked at the overall waveform to see the lack of dynamics I normally see in my songs, could be from the multiple guitars.
Does the lead guitar sit ok all the time? My wife thought it was a little loud, but her ears are over-sensititve to that frequency range.

Thanks for listening and the suggestions. I'm waiting for GT to come along and say 'get a singer' and Paul for some vocal tips!

Mike I immediately thought Moody Blues when you played the first guitar lick.

I like it, little out of my comfort zone, but it sticks in my head. Its a bit long but sometimes songs do write themselves long. Vocally, I dont have any real problems with it.

I like the seperation of the instruments, cause you can clearly pick out the different things going on.

Good Song, Good Job!

Thanks for sharing

Sometimes I write guitar songs. Sometimes I write piano songs. Sometimes I write guitar + piano songs - this is not one of them! I tracked a Rhodes piano part, simple enough to play, but sounded all wrong with the song.

Remix now on my player with some dynamics added.

Lyrics, per Jahva's request:

Believe © 2013 Michael J Birch

When I was young I believed in truth, family and love
What I saw and what I did, no help from any powers above
As my world expanded
I found it easy to deceive
My own sense of what is right
Of what I believed

CHORUS
If you believe in me, I will believe in you
There's nothing that together we can't do
If I believe in you, will you believe in me
There's nothing to keep us from being free

As I grew into adulthood I forgot what I had relied on
Pressures from every side, no time for beliefs that were gone
Life got too busy
I forgot to be strong
No time for thinking
Forgetting what's right or wrong

CHORUS

Now that I'm older I've discovered I've got to believe in myself
Can't constantly do things for others, put my own life on a shelf
I've got to be strong
Strong as I can be
I've got to believe
Believe in me

Chorus

If you believe in me, I will believe in you
If I believe in you, will you believe in me

Mike the lyrics helped point out a few things to me.
Some of the phrasing is a bit off... some words sound late others rushed to catch up. The rhythm could use some work in the phrasing.
With the voc. tracks doubled (or more) at times it feels too busy or clumsy like one track gets in the way of another because they're not right on top of one another. But I do the same thing at times to thicken up the sound. If that makes sense.
If I were producing this I would still consider either cutting some of the solos out between chorus/verse especially after the first round...
I do like the idea. As Capt. had pointed out it does have a 60's feel/theme about it.

Took a lot of remixing (and many tweaks), recording vocals ...

Final mix on this video: http://youtu.be/M6iTLGKsA9Q

Ah I knew you were a bitch keys player down deep. LOL

Nice vid . . . thanks for the music

Sounds better from what I remember Mike. The vocal tracks are tighter throughout almost the entire song now.
Good groove... nice job!

MIke It definately has that 60s feel... Vocals are improving...keep on it. (Bring the main vocal track forward a little)

As composition goes, I thought the song ran a little too long, given the the main verse form of three chords... Also your intro used keys , which I thought were quite catchy, but you could have used them more aggressively through out the song. (Just my own opinion)

Any way good work, keep on keeping on!

Starfish Scott wrote:Ah I knew you were a bitch keys player down deep. LOL

The keys sound is from the Kawai synth, preset called 'Fairlight'. Just sold the synth on ebay, supposed to be local pickup only, but some guy bid out of Arizona and is willing to pay the shipping charges.

I tweaked the mix up-and-down a lot on this one. Youtube may have screwed with the sound when it compressed, too, of course.

Got all 15 songs mixed where I was fairly happy with them on first rounds of listening. Now, I'll go back and listen to them all in order first in my truck, then on the big old stereo speakers in my living room, make notes on changes, and do it again, but close to sending them out for mastering!

Mike great video, IM impressed big time!

Just curious were you lip syncing the singing and playing?

I like the song in general, only too long, sorry, but you could have edited a lot out of it in my opinion. I know this is hard, I was working on this instrumental song Ive been toying with and when I played it all the way thru this weekend it clocked in at almost 7 minutes. Plus Im really struggling with it, it has various tempo changes, I tryed programming a click and then when I played it out I never hit right, so I said what the hell just count it off and do it freewheel, of course when I listened back I realize the tempos are way to inconsistent to build on, so I will trash what I did, and try programing and cutting the heck out of the length again.

Sorry Im rambling.

I like the mix on the song, your vocals sit nice in the pocket to me, if you boosted them much more Im afraid they would sit way out front of the music, love that one riff, it still reminds me of Moody Blues.

Good Luck and Thanks For Sharing, Im jealous cause lately I cant seem to finish a song and get it up to snuff, while you and some others here are really setting the bar high!