CSW

Hi,

Longtime user of Cakewalk..... I think the prochannel could really use a large VU Meter plugin. 

The console emulation has some smaller ones but it would be nice to have a dedicated large as possible VU meter to the already great prochannel.

Regards

Craig

Hi Group,

Is it possible thru a key press or section technique to resize waveforms of multi selected tracks.... simultaneously ? 

Also how do you reset all waveform sizes to the default scale "The scale size that will snap lock into place when resizing just one track"

Please see pics.

Regards

Craig

Thanks so much for the suggestion.

I purchased this tonight and so far it's working very well.   

Regards

Very Creative!   So many elements coming together.

Super dynamic playing.   The guitar sounds and the delay on the guitar put it in a perfect spot in the mix.

Premium performance and mix. 

Haunting guitar sound.  This composition keeps you interested and leads you.

Nice work.

How did you process the main guitar here?

Craig

I've finally figured out what memory this triggered in my brain......

Remember that early 70's French full length animation called "Fantastic Planet"

That's it.....but in hi fi .

It's Really something.

Craig 

On 10/10/2021 at 4:36 PM, freddy j said:

I don't know if you recall the Allman Joys (precursors to the Allman Brothers).  In their early days they played the J-Ville, Daytona Beach and N E of Florida.  This song just reminded me a bit of some of their early stuff.  I agree with you on "not too far" north.  Being on the west coast of FL I find that Brooksville is too far north in the winter.  Anyway great song, I enjoyed it!

Freddy,

 I recently went down a youtube rabbit hole and watched several documentaries on the Allman Brothers and also Lynyrd Skynyrd. 

My God there was enough talent between them to fill the musical universe.

It's a stark but wonderful reminder to let you know where you stand in the pecking order of musical talent....that's for sure.

On 10/10/2021 at 2:01 PM, Paul Bush said:

great song , ! really well recorded and the instuments and vocals are all just so spot on  great harmonies 

Thanks Paul!

On 10/9/2021 at 8:01 AM, DeeringAmps said:

My only crit there, and you worked them to “fit” brilliantly, is the harp is too wet, puts it too far back in the mix (for me).

Other than that “high marks” overall !

👍’s

t

Hi Tom....  I took most all of the reverb off of the harp as a test and it does make it more refined.  Cleans the mix up a little. 

I was concerned about the tonal artifacts because I had to change the pitch of the harp runs to get them to match the song so I tried to  hide them in some reverb....  

you busted me. Good ears!

As I listen back to my early mixes I cringe at my overuse of reverb.  I can be a serious clarity killer of a mix. 

Two elements I've found will neutralize this by alleviating the need to hide something in reverb......

A good performance and good source sound and those are the hardest things to come by!

Craig

15 hours ago, Wookiee said:

I missed this somewhere along the way, which considering things here is not surprising, it sounds very accomplished here and the mix is nicely balanced on the Adams.

Appreciate it Wookie!

Aren't the  Adams a high quality set of studio monitors?

I sure as heck lucked out then.... I mixed this with ATH M50x headphones and a set of cheapy tiny Presonus desktop monitors.

I have some decent Yamahas but I ran out of space on the desk area. I need to pull those out of storage and reconnect them.  

I still feel like every mix is pretty much a stab in the dark but I think I'm stabbing in a smaller area these days. 

Regards

Craig

On 10/4/2021 at 3:20 PM, freddy j said:

Excellent song!  Being a FL guy I can appreciate that Northeast FL (Jacksonville) sound.  Excellent song and excellent work!

Thanks Freddy,

I'm down here in West Palm Beach...... How I would love to move more north... but not too north!

This is a really good song! 

Good song.  Good vocals. Nice lead guitar work.

Regards

Craig

This has  grit!  I like the slide work!

Love it! 

Hi Group,

Is it possible thru a key press or section technique to resize waveforms of multi selected tracks.... simultaneously ? 

Also how do you reset all waveform sizes to the default scale "The scale size that will snap lock into place when resizing just one track"

Please see pics.

Thanks

Craig

1 hour ago, jwnicholson78 said:

Very impressive production.

Thanks!

Sounds really good! A very good song! 

 The power chord guitar tones drive really hard with just the right amount of crunch and the bass guitar is placed perfectly in the mix.

Drums sound very good.... not overpowering but very exciting.

The lead vocal textures and timbre are really excellent.  The voices are eq'd perfectly and they are out front where they should be. A really pro sounding recording.

American Rejects,The Darkness and Rick Springfield come to mind.

Craig 

What a great mix and composition.

Is the entire production made from VST's?  

The horns sound amazing!

Tom....... your channel is blowing me away.  Seriously .....you are unique in the universe!

I'm not sure how to critique your stuff. It's very advanced and stands on it's own for originality.

Sonically speaking I think maybe the song should be cradled in a little more low end.  Maybe coming from the bass and kick.Nothing overwhelming but cradling as a larger presence. I'm listening on some ATH m50x. It's late and I'm in church mouse mode.

Are you playing all that I hear?

Regards

Craig

12 hours ago, PhonoBrainer said:

Great mix and production - I especially liked the bgv's which brought Styx of all things to mind! Super cool!

 

cheers,

-Tom

Thanks Tom,

Dude....... your channel is blowing me away.  Seriously .....you are unique in the universe!

On 10/2/2021 at 9:50 PM, KurtS said:

I just listened again and am even more impressed with your song. It must have been a lot of work with all those changes.  It may be more the sound of the kit, I think I like an old school natural sound.  Not a fan of clicky kick drums and percussive compressed snare. This a very popular sound now. That is totally a personal preference thing, don't pay any attention to me you did a great job.

Thanks Kurt.

You bring up a great point about the clicky  kick drums and compressed snare. 

        I'm totally blown away by the really excellent drum sounds we were hearing in the 70's to be honest with you.  An example like Elton John's "Captain Fantastic" album comes to mind.... the tom sounds were legendary and the balance of the drum kit in the music was perfect. Of course the songwriting was absolutely sick!

       One of my absolute favorite drum kit sounds of all time in a Rock song is the studio recording of Rick Deringer's "Rock and Roll Hoochie Koo".....(especially the toms!) The groove between the bass guitar and the drums still blows my mind today..... and let's not forget the lead guitar work..... it was Derringer's finest performance. He captured magic in that guitar solo.  There are better players out there but sometimes a person will capture that intangible magic..... be lucky enough to record it.... and it lives on forever. 

Another great 70's rock drum sound was mixed in "Frankenstein" Of course these are just a few of thousands across many genre's of the 70s.

       My  problem is I don't know how to get those drum sounds at this point. They are dry and powerful and have great presence in a song but don't overpower. The key I believe there is in the  compression and the source sound.  The dry thud of the 70's toms eq'd properly and placed is something to behold.

Craig

5 hours ago, jwnicholson78 said:

I really enjoyed that. Sounds ready for the radio to me!

Thanks Jeff!

3 hours ago, David Sprouse said:

The first singer reminded me of Denny Laine a little.  Such great voices all around.  This is one of the most original and polished songs I've heard here.  Did you really use Cakewalk software?

Hi David,

Thanks for the encouragement and kind words  I did actually use Cakewalk to mix this. I also gave the SoundCloud mastering service a go and it seemed to work pretty well. 

     I recorded the instruments with Studio One because at the time I had given up on Cakewalk after the Gibson fiasco.  Sonar Platinum was my first DAW and I really enjoy the workflow and the workspaces.

    I could have easily tracked this in the latest Cakewalk as Bandlab has made great strides in eliminating bugs and adding new features and minimizing audio engine dropouts. The comping is easy and intuitive as well. I hope someday there will be zero drop outs but I very rarely get them. I have used the "mask engine dropouts" set to true setting and that has really helped.

   I can't say enough about the arranger tracks and the new export feature is out of this world! So far I'm finding it better than the Studio One arranger track tool.   One of the main reason's I stuck with Studio One is because of the arraigner tracks functionality...it's a super tool for song writing and quickly hashing out ideas. Also the Studio One audio engine is very very fast and stable which I hope someday Cakewalk can be optimized to that level. I had my doubts about anyone being able to resurrect and improve the Cakewalk audio engine but we're seeing that happen right before our eyes. How far they can take it remains to be seen.

     While I haven't created a song from scratch with the new Cakewalk yet, I will be doing this with my Robin over the next several weeks and I will put the Cakewalk's arranger track feature to the test. So far what little testing I've done with it has left me very impressed.... super easy to use.

My favorite feature in Cakewalk is the Mix Recall utility. Back when it was first released (Sonar) I had glitchy issues with it and gave up on it.  After running it thru it's paces recently I can't stump it..... it's literally bullet proof so far and coupled with the new export features it's really something special...  I don't know if there's any other DAW with that kind of combination that works so incredibly well. 

I've always loved the pro channel and let's not forget the track templates... another feature that blows my mind and works incredibly well for me.

Since I returned to Cakewalk it's been like a little Christmas to me. I've always loved the interface..... it's feels like home.

They still have work to do but so far I'm very impressed with what I'm seeing happen with Cakewalk.

Regards

Craig

On 10/2/2021 at 6:40 PM, antler said:

Hi Craig

Make sure that when you edit a clip, the edits end up on a zero crossing - when audio clips play through, they won't click if they end and start on zero crossings. If that's not possible, try to introduce a crossfade (or increase the crossfade time) between the two clips.

If the click is recorded into your audio, you'll need an audio editor to cut out that section - Audacity is a good free one:

https://www.audacityteam.org/

If you're serious about removing clicks that are recorded into your audio (and you're prepared to pay), check out something like iZotope RX (there are usually some deals around Black Friday/end of year)

https://www.izotope.com/en/products/rx/features.html

On 10/2/2021 at 10:00 PM, bitflipper said:

Editing them by hand will drive you crazy. Fortunately, there is good software out there that can intelligently clean them up with little effort.

For many years my go-to tool was Adobe Audition, but I now use iZotope RX8. I'm not sure, but I think even the $29 Elements version has the feature. I use the standard version, which adds a whole bunch of cool stuff. And of course if you're made outa money there's the Advanced version. Here's a comparison of features from each edition.

Now, you didn't hear it from me, but if you only need it for one project you can try RX8 for free for 30 days. Just sayin'.

Thank you for the solution. I downloaded the iZotope RX8 trail and it's really something. I was able to transparently eliminate the clicks pops and crackles. It's really amazing and simple to use. 

Thanks so much for the suggestion!

Regards

Craig