“The Strip” – song in progress
http://www.lightningmp3.com/live/77586-theStrip.mp3
a new mix, new arrangment, new tracks.
i’m thinking of changing the middle (2nd) verse, with a whole new verse, since the only verse gets repeated 3 times now.
also thinking of dropping ‘gambling card game and party noise’ during the drum/guitar boogie break in the middle.
don’t know, might be too cheesy.
inspired from true events on my last trip to The Strip.
equip: taylor 414 acoustic, congas, shakers, hand claps, custom strat, mesa boogie mark2b, avatar vintage cab, ibanez mikro bass, ezd rock kit, ADK Hamburg (vox, claps, shaker), AT4033 (acoustic), A Designs Audio MP-1, ART DPS, DBX MC-6 compressor.
guitar/bass rig used:
alternate streaming from Myspace:
http://www.myspace.com/batsbrew
1st song on the player
waterboy
thanks for checking this out….!
you know, i never played any 80’s metal, so i don’t know what that ‘formula’ entails, but i’ve listened to it for sure, i don’t konw, i’m just tryin’ to boogie!
LOL
thanks scott
mojque
thank you.
i’ll tell you, i did a bunch of stuff to this this weekend, including dialing back the vox delay (it’s just a slapback, but no verb was there.)
did a LOT of tweaking and changing this weekend.
as per a lot of good advice from reviewers, i changed some things, starting with losing the conga at the beginning of the opening of the tune, it was cluttering the beginning.
i left the hand claps, and let the conga come back in when the vox starts, that cleaned up the clutter quite a bit.
some other tweaks:
changed the snare this weekend. went to a 14″ rogers, from a slingerland.
sounds much more meaty. tweaked the main ride cymbal as well.
i edited the entire drum track, for subtle changes all over.
tweaked ALL the drum eq’s, and took out the reverb on the snare, and left on the room mic for drum effects. added a compressor on the top snare head. usually, all the drums are dry, and go to a drum bus, that i put a special channel effect on, that uses 2 compressors in series, along with 2 eq’s in series. it’s a great channel plugin.
i added a NEW 2nd verse with 2-part harmony, and added lyrics to the funky bridge breakdown….
remixed the whole thing, made the guitars LOUDER, put a limiter across the drum buss which allowed me to make the entire send to the master buss hotter without changing the peaks (no higher than -6db EVER).
rolled off the bass guitar starting at 55hz, gentle Q, and that really cleaned it up, and left it fat.
the whole thing sounds much better now!
“The Strip” – an updated version (posted june 22 2010)
http://www.lightningmp3.com/live/42116-6-21-10_THESTRIP.mp3
i got great feedback on this tune, from many places, and i appreciate that.
spent the weekend updating this mix, with new tracks and lots of edits.
ok, a few mix tweak notes for us geeks:
vox: dialed back the vox delay (it’s just a slapback, but no verb was there.)
i added a NEW 2nd verse with 2-part harmony, and added lyrics to the funky bridge breakdown…. 2 part harmony there as well. i used a ADK Hamburg condenser to capture vocals, ran it into a ART DPS mic pre, out of that into a DBX MC-6 compressor, and into the soundcard VIA the digital out of the ART.
percussion: mixed out the conga at the beginning of the opening of the tune, it was cluttering the beginning.
i left the hand claps, and let the conga come back in when the vox starts, that cleaned up the clutter quite a bit.
total EQ tweaks on the shaker, also added LIMITING.
bass: rolled off the bass guitar starting at 55hz, gentle Q, and thatcleaned up some of the low end issues.
Drums: changed the snare- went to a 14″ rogers, from a slingerland.
sounds much more meaty. tweaked the main ride cymbal as well.
i edited the entire drum track, for subtle changes all over.
tweaked ALL the drum eq’s, and took out the reverb on the snare, and left on the room mic for drum effects. added a compressor on the top snare head. usually, all the drums are dry, and go to a drum bus, that i put a special channel effect on, that uses 2 compressors in series, along with 2 eq’s in series. it’s a great channel plugin.
MIX:
remixed the whole thing, made the guitars LOUDER, put a limiter across the drum buss which allowed me to make the entire send to the master buss hotter without changing the peaks (no higher than -6db EVER).
yeah, i’ve been polishing this turd for a while.
but it’s a great learning experience for me.
(2) questions:
i’m really on the fence about the panning scheme of the rock rhythm guitar part.
i like it as is, but it definitely is NOT following the more modern method of balancing tracks.
it’s mixed more like a classic rock track, early-mid 70’s style.
also, i’m trying to stick to a L-C-R mixing scheme these days, but most of my songs have arrangments with multiple tracks evenly spread left and right, this is a single rock rhythm track, more like an old beatles track, or van halen track.
i used 2 classic rock tracks as a touchstone for the way i mixed this.
some zeppelin, and some VHalen.
(i.e.- rhythm guitar hard panned to the left.)
on the hard panning:
i DO have the acoustic to the right, playing along with the rock rhythm on the left, for some balance with the guitars.
and, i have a short hall reverb send on the rock rhythm, reverb only, hard panned to the right, opposite the rhythm track, to fill the sound out, tho it’s pretty low in the mix.
does the hard panning of the rock rhythm bug you?
would it be more effective closer to center?
or leave it the way it is, and bring the reverb up?
or possibly change the reverb to a 8ms delay, and bring it up even in the mix —to balance out the rhythm track?
my general feeling about it is, i like it hard panned, i like the clarity it brings to the mix, it’s really only an issue when listening in headphones, i’d prefer folks listening to it thru big stereo speakers anyway.
on the arrangement:
i used 2 songs as a touchstone for arrangement
(i.e.- acoustic intro length, relevent to when the whole band kicks in, and relevent to the overall length of the song)
zep’s “over the hills and far away”, and VH’s “ice cream man”.
some folks have said the acoustic intro is too long, tho i think it’s perfect ( i would….! )
LOL
my feelings on THIS issue is, i really like how the longer acoustic intro is almost like a song unto itself. it sets the mood of the song perfectly, just like when i landed in vegas…
it was kinda upbeat, a little fast, but a bit laid back, because it was day light. as soon as it got dark, the whole mood changed, and it got very intense, and the song is a living breathing version of what i actually experienced there.
whew
i need a producer.
heheh
jgro002
hey, thanks for re- listening!
yep, deciding on this panning thing is a pain….
some folks, are just dead-set on hearing things like ‘everything else’
they want evenly panned, multitracked rhythm guitars, which to me, homogeonizes the sound.
i listen to older classic rock recordings, and hear distinctly different things all over the place, and only rarely doubled, that’s more common with lead vox than anything else.
still, if the arrangment is such, that it throws a listener off, then maybe it’s wrong.
but hell, listen to the 1st van halen record!!
LOL
all the guitar is in the left speaker, with nothing but pre-delayed reverb in the right!
back then, if you played that album in your buddie’s camaro, and the left speaker was out, you had zero guitar!! heheheh
so, i don’t know, i’ll keep experimenting with it, but trying to ride the fence between being creative with mixes, knowing that a lot of folks are stuck with ear buds in their heads, listening to ‘headphone’ mixes, and knowing my best mix sounds best thru a big cranked home system, is chafing my ass!
LOL
thanks jeremy
Dimaension X
thanks man.
hm, music recording history.
i know the beatles experimented a lot, and did multi tracks and all that…
but i’d have to say it was Les Paul.
guy was a genius.
Please log in to read and reply to this topic.
