PhonoBrainer

Snappy little swing number! Very good chops with the guitars! A lot of quality jazz ideas here, and the parts are structured well to make a composition that doesn't get boring. Timing wise, one idea is to look at the 2:20's region. The hi-hat is clearly a swing pattern, but the guitar rhythm chords are played more or less straight. I think those rhythm guitar chords would be very difficult to play in a swing pattern at this tempo, if you were going to make them match. A more nitpicky timing thing would be the stops, check out :40, the snare and bass aren't in sync. If you want a more natural live feel, than that should pass so no problem. Most important is the "fun" of the tune and that's all there. I'd be interested to hear how you develop this one, some good suggestions can be found here - welcome to the forum!!! cheers, -Tom

This will put the psalt in your zither. Very very cool to transcribe and reimagine this! Nice job indeed. I've not heard the original but I dig the composition and I can tell you have lovingly brought a new life to it. Nice! A mix idea maybe, the string plucks that sound a bit like an autoharp? have a very percussive attack, and that attack is very up front in the mix. Overall the reverb is trying to sit all things in the cathedral setting, but the guy playing lead strings is picking them right next to you and the bright attack doesn't mesh with the cathedral reverb. ? Is that even a problem? Maybe not! I have no idea what you could do about that, if anything. You wouldn't want to dull it up. As it is, it's like you've got one mic up close on the altar, and another 100 ft away in the last pew of the nave. I don't think many people are going to care at all, it's a great piece and well brought to life. see you in church! cheers, -Tom

Boy what a great song! Love the lyrics and the vocals are perfect. For the mix, I'd agree with Antler's comments. Get the nuclear weapons off of the master bus and you'll be fine. You got this. Did you gain stage the tracks so that before any processing they don't have an average level above like 16 - 12db? When my mixes sound like this, I see I have pre-plugin average levels around 10 or higher. Then my processing down the line gets things pretty baked. I wouldn't change a thing about that vocal performance. cheers, -Tom

https://www.acousticsamples.net/vhorns 169 euro. Interesting, not perfect, but very interesting. I'm hearing a lot of realism solo, some cool potential for use in a section, and maybe a bit of pitchiness in just a few notes here and there. Celemony could assist. ?

Firth I've heard of it.

My 7.1 setup

Larry, if you think you can just waltz back in here and pick up where you left off, you're right. Welcome back and many thanks for all you do for us! You rock.

All set for some intensive editing, I see the scrubbing tool.

I see a cunga line of Shrouds of Turins.

How can it be "it's not what you think" if I don't even know what the hell it is ?!? Annoying!

Ibtl! Dear Mr. Wavesample, Is that you? It's me, God. If I exist, as a human you can't really understand me. If I don't exist, then your question is time not very well spent. You might consider writing another love song in 4/4 time at 120bpm with a duration of 3:30, with a nice lift in the chorus. 😊 Have a nice day! Sincerely, God P.S - I liked your song, you might boost the vocal a tad.

yess! genre confusion indeed! so glad you found it entertaining and worth 8 minutes that you can't get back. I really am trying to put things in different reverbed spaces and have them still fit together. It doesn't always work. The electric guitar solo you can read about in an earlier post in this thread, spoiler alert it's keyboard. I very much appreciate and am humbled by your comments. The videos are always a lot of fun to make, constrained by the limit of hey, it's just a bunch of disparate video clips from stock this and that, trying to be a story, kind of! cheers mate, -Tom

yup, agreed, and glad you liked it, thanks!

Hi Bjorn! Thanks for the comment and I'm glad you liked the video voyage. You make some cool travel vids that I've always liked as well. cheers, -Tom thanks Wookster for the listen, and the enigmatic comments! Hi Larry! Thanks so much - the opera lady is from Fluffy Audio's Kontakt instrument "Spaghetti Western" - that library has a lot of different niches covered.

A pleasure to groove to! Very pleasant mix, I'd agree enough bass is present . . . maybe the drum fills drop a bit of timing in a few spots - did you solo just bass guit and drums together, to check the timing? Great guitar dips and tone, as usual! cheers, -Tom

Absolutely killer video, love the editing, the overlays, the effects. Great match for the song. cheers, -Tom

Greenday meets Rush meets Plimsouls. In a pro mix. Any q's? awesome! cheers, -Tom

Jeeze that was fun. I appreciate the drums, super clear in the mix. Don't fix your vocal mic for this one, it works. Love the originality, which is becoming too weak a word to use for your songs. cheers, -Tom

Pretty wonderful. Very subjective as to what a person would do to this mix. Your tastes are not horrible. I would make the lead tremolo guitar "brighter" in the mix. There is a bit of rumbly muddiness that could maybe be thinned up, in your bass guitar I think. I assume you have eq's away everything under like 50hz from your bass guitar? Is it a bass synth with a really delayed attack? Maybe cut a notch out of 300hz or so as an experiment. I hear the boomy bloom of mud gloom pop in @2:49, that might tell you how the bass is overfilling. ? Probably the constant tremolo effect on the guitar might be adding to some over thick bass moments? Did you eq away the lower guitar frequencies you don';t need, say below 300 - 400 hz? Just checking. I like the arrangement, the theme, and the mellow! Another personal taste for me would be to eliminate that buzzy synth that wanders in. For me it all has a 70's vibe like a cool Joe Walsh instrumental. Some real piano would solidify its left coast rock cred! keep this going, it's cool. cheers, -Tom

Hi Jack! Awesome how you don't have to bend the rules because there are none. That's creativity! The vocals totally work, the processing is nice. If you are using reverb on them, you might as an experiment pull the reverb off and replace it with a tight slapback delay. ? Might be worth the time to explore. The only other mix comment would be, in the first (and last) section - listen to your chipsynth thing panned left - it's probably louder than your excellent vocal. If this were my mix I'd get the vocal more prominent and the lefty chipsynth down a db or so. Again might be worth trying, or not. In this song you are going for extremely minimalist robo-drums? Works for me, but all I can remember hearing was a cymbal, and the kick thunks were kind of competing for the bassline. Hard to avoid that one. Lyrics I catch in most cases but sometimes intelligibility gets tough because maybe they need to be boosted and more dominant in the mix, and reverb can slurrrr things so sometimes simple delays thicken better than reverbs in a mix. Your bgv's that are actually lower in pitch than your falsetto lead - that's a great choice right there. Thanks for the 80's! cheers, -Tom

Every song should be a bass solo. Nothing below the 12 fret.

Lilt for days. I agree mixwise the fiddle might tuck back just a bit, but it has a good tone generally. I liked the reverb settings you chose, especially for the steel stringed guitar or whatever came in that sounded like a harp. Bjorn, or Bairn? Nice tune! cheers, Tom

Were they sisters??? 🤔 Now that's a cool blues car wreck story song! I liked how tightly your bgv sticks to your lead vocal, and good bluesy guitars, well timed and in rhythm. Good groove! cheers, Tom

Man o man, good choice having no bass guitar in there. Love the tones, so clean. I get the early Cockburn reference, and can only add Michael Hedges. This composition has an energetic purity to it. A wondrous listen. cheers, -Tom

Here's some lesser Larrys to tide us over while the real one is away.