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Starlight - a soft, electronic song


K. M. Joshi

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8 hours ago, garybrun said:

Very nice...
I listened on Spotify.
Which samples are you using for the ethereal vocals?
Very nice composition.

Hi, I used a free sf2 called Irina with Sforzando as the engine. Then a ton of multi-band compression until it was smooth. Haha. And thank you very much!

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1 hour ago, emeraldsoul said:

Way good. Brought back some memories of "Barcelona Tribe of Soulsters" or B-Tribe as they were known. Before your time! Super clear mix, with things out front when they should be. Well done!

cheers,

-Tom

 

Thanks, Tom! I'll check out B-Tribe when I get the chance. Cheers!

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I didn't expect a vocal track on an ambient electronic song, but it works very well. Really like the spacey background vocal.
I think I would add a bit more reverb or delay on the main vocal track to make it bigger and grander.

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On 4/4/2019 at 10:16 AM, bjornpdx said:

I didn't expect a vocal track on an ambient electronic song, but it works very well. Really like the spacey background vocal.
I think I would add a bit more reverb or delay on the main vocal track to make it bigger and grander.

Hi, yeah, I suppose it would make the vocals bigger. 😃 I'll surely think about it!

Edited by Kaustub M. Joshi
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  • 2 months later...

Lovely indeed. I really like the guitar.

This is my first commentary in the Songs subforum, so I don't know how welcome mix suggestions are.

If they are not welcome, I apologize. If they are, I concur with the earlier comment about the ambience processing on your lead vocal. The music and backing vocals and the higher vocal that comes in later all sound like they exist in the same ambient mystical "space," but your voice doesn't quite, if you get what I mean. On my own mixes, I either use a reverb send or use similar settings on the individual track reverbs so that it all sounds like it's in the same space, glued together.

I can still make individual elements come to the front by varying the amount of reverb or using compression, but they sound like they are in the same space.

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4 hours ago, Starship Krupa said:

Lovely indeed. I really like the guitar.

This is my first commentary in the Songs subforum, so I don't know how welcome mix suggestions are.

If they are not welcome, I apologize. If they are, I concur with the earlier comment about the ambience processing on your lead vocal. The music and backing vocals and the higher vocal that comes in later all sound like they exist in the same ambient mystical "space," but your voice doesn't quite, if you get what I mean. On my own mixes, I either use a reverb send or use similar settings on the individual track reverbs so that it all sounds like it's in the same space, glued together.

I can still make individual elements come to the front by varying the amount of reverb or using compression, but they sound like they are in the same space.

Hey, man! Any kind of suggestions are most definitely welcome and received with thanks! I was intending to make the story telling up close and personal, but it appears that wasn't a great idea. 😃 I'm working on some similar songs though where I'll be keeping all the comments you guys have given in mind!

Cheers!

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2 hours ago, Kaustub M. Joshi said:

I was intending to make the story telling up close and personal, but it appears that wasn't a great idea.

No, I got exactly what you were trying to do! That came across, and it is a clever idea and works for the piece. I really liked the idea. Just if you try it next time, I wanted to suggest taking more care to put the "narrator" or lead vocal voice in a similar sonic landscape as everything else.

It's why mentioned the bit about being able to making individual elements move to the front. You can still do what you were trying to do while making your voice sound as if it's in that lush magic mystical space.

Maybe I'm not describing what I mean well enough. With a rock band or a folk ensemble or an orchestra it's easier, because their music also exists outside the studio and we can say the band should sound like they're in the same room (or coffee house or concert hall) playing even though we're recording them an instrument or section at a time in a studio or even more than one studio. But we do tricks to make it sound like the singer, drummer, guitarist, bassist, and keyboard player were all there in one room playing at the same time.

This is even more so for people like me who are one man indie rock bands. I have to make it sound like I am 4 or 5 people all plugged in and mic'd up on an idealized stage in an idealized fantasy nightclub, and not call attention to the fact that every single note, drum hit, word sung, everything on the recording is all me overdubbed.

In the case of ambient/EDM/electronica, it goes off script, but since humans live in a reverberant world, humans still want to hear reverberations and ambiance in our recordings, and our ears still like it when we hear reverb even as an exaggerated effect. As a matter of fact, our ears are so good at it, because they have to be in order for us to survive, that we are also good at detecting when reverberant spaces, even artificial ones, aren't quite "right."

So as we find out, even completely synthesized music wants all of its sonic elements to sit in a comfortable sonic space. They're still instruments at the end of the day.

You ever go into a dorm room or new home before your family or friends move in? They just sound and feel too "live" and it maybe feels a little uncomfortable? There are too many surfaces causing too many reflections to hit your ears at slightly different times because there's no furniture and carpeting in the place to deaden it. It actually drives me kinda nuts. I feel on edge in places with nothing up on the walls.

The same thing can happen with a mix if you put on competing plug-ins, where one has its reflections set to one set of time constants and others have theirs set to others. They clash, and the sense of a coherent space is lost.

Of course, to the extent that this is a rule, it can be deliberately broken to interesting effect. Benny Benassi likes to make his "Macintosh System voices" dry so that they really pop out, and it works.

In the case of your piece, maybe you used a different plug-in, different settings, or just too little reverb or delay for my taste, but that's just my taste, and it's also one sonic element on a great sounding track. I change my mind all over the place with my mixes.

Anyway, I did want to get across my idea of "painting a picture," where I close my eyes and I "see" your musical tracks kind of going out in all directions with a certain soft gauzy texture, and any elements that come to the forefront should pop to the forefront, but they should still have that same soft texture. I listen to mixes with my eyes closed a lot to "see" what pictures come to mind, if it "looks" coherent. I see them with my mind's eye as well as listen with my ears. Try it?

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5 hours ago, Starship Krupa said:

No, I got exactly what you were trying to do! That came across, and it is a clever idea and works for the piece. I really liked the idea. Just if you try it next time, I wanted to suggest taking more care to put the "narrator" or lead vocal voice in a similar sonic landscape as everything else.

It's why mentioned the bit about being able to making individual elements move to the front. You can still do what you were trying to do while making your voice sound as if it's in that lush magic mystical space.

Maybe I'm not describing what I mean well enough. With a rock band or a folk ensemble or an orchestra it's easier, because their music also exists outside the studio and we can say the band should sound like they're in the same room (or coffee house or concert hall) playing even though we're recording them an instrument or section at a time in a studio or even more than one studio. But we do tricks to make it sound like the singer, drummer, guitarist, bassist, and keyboard player were all there in one room playing at the same time.

This is even more so for people like me who are one man indie rock bands. I have to make it sound like I am 4 or 5 people all plugged in and mic'd up on an idealized stage in an idealized fantasy nightclub, and not call attention to the fact that every single note, drum hit, word sung, everything on the recording is all me overdubbed.

In the case of ambient/EDM/electronica, it goes off script, but since humans live in a reverberant world, humans still want to hear reverberations and ambiance in our recordings, and our ears still like it when we hear reverb even as an exaggerated effect. As a matter of fact, our ears are so good at it, because they have to be in order for us to survive, that we are also good at detecting when reverberant spaces, even artificial ones, aren't quite "right."

So as we find out, even completely synthesized music wants all of its sonic elements to sit in a comfortable sonic space. They're still instruments at the end of the day.

You ever go into a dorm room or new home before your family or friends move in? They just sound and feel too "live" and it maybe feels a little uncomfortable? There are too many surfaces causing too many reflections to hit your ears at slightly different times because there's no furniture and carpeting in the place to deaden it. It actually drives me kinda nuts. I feel on edge in places with nothing up on the walls.

The same thing can happen with a mix if you put on competing plug-ins, where one has its reflections set to one set of time constants and others have theirs set to others. They clash, and the sense of a coherent space is lost.

Of course, to the extent that this is a rule, it can be deliberately broken to interesting effect. Benny Benassi likes to make his "Macintosh System voices" dry so that they really pop out, and it works.

In the case of your piece, maybe you used a different plug-in, different settings, or just too little reverb or delay for my taste, but that's just my taste, and it's also one sonic element on a great sounding track. I change my mind all over the place with my mixes.

Anyway, I did want to get across my idea of "painting a picture," where I close my eyes and I "see" your musical tracks kind of going out in all directions with a certain soft gauzy texture, and any elements that come to the forefront should pop to the forefront, but they should still have that same soft texture. I listen to mixes with my eyes closed a lot to "see" what pictures come to mind, if it "looks" coherent. I see them with my mind's eye as well as listen with my ears. Try it?

I think I do get it! It's certainly very necessary to keep each instrument in the same ambient space. The reason why I kept the reverb for the vocals at minimum was to make sure the words were easily understood. However, yes, it could've sounded much better with a softer but longer reverb to match the rest of the sounds. As of now, it sounds like it was recorded in a smaller room! I'll definitely endeavor to use your suggestions on my next work. Thank you very much for the detailed explanation!

 

Also, my friend, I'd love to hear your criticisms on this song too, if you wouldn't mind spending a few minutes on it!

soundcloud.com/kmjoshi/celestia

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