Home Recording Newb - 1st Attempt + new band

Okay, I had some time to run this through some plugs tonight. Here's the file.

http://www.markszabo.net/music/Rain09_Master.mp3

Here's what I did to it.

1. I put a de-esser on it. I was about to get a tiny bit of the sibiliance out, maybe 2dB. Any more than that and the track started to pump. If I had access to the main vocal track I could remove the sibilance from that alone.

2. I put a Neve 33609 compressor plug on the track, gently compressing at 1.5:1 ratio, with the meters coming down around 4dB. The meters aren't real accurate though - I think it was only compressing the peaks.

3. I put a Neve 1081 EQ plug on the track. I cut everything below 40Hz (rumble), boosted a peak at 100Hz (the bass of the kick drum), cut about 8dB at 270Hz (mud), and boosted about 4dB at 15k (for air).

4. I added a UAD Precision Limiter and boosted gain until I got a tiny bit of gain reduction on the track - meaning I made it as loud as I could without seriously dipping into the dynamics of the track.

5. I added an Apogee UV22HR plug on the master buss to smooth out the dithering from 24 to 16 bits.

Finally, I mixed it down to a 320K MP3.

I think it sounds a bit different. I recommend listening to the first 15 seconds of your original, then start this mastered version.
 
Just listened to your "Rain" song, since I'm familiar with it.

Bass tone is much improved, but could still be even better....like a little more "bite" at around 4.5kHz, maybe.

I think you went a little overboard with the "click" on the kick...it overwhelms the "thud".

Vocal tone turned out great, but you might want to push the gang vocal back in the mix on the choruses, and pan them a bit more. Put a little more delay or reverb on them and turn 'em down.

I also think you need to look at panning....the song seems kind of flat and 2-dimensional with everything right up the middle. You need to keep the kick, the bass, and the lead vocal centered, and pan everything else somewhere else.

Now, some comments on the arrangement....

Intro
Verse 1
Chorus 1
Verse 2
Chorus 2
Bridge
Solo
Chorus 3, x2

I think the song is kinda too long. I think you should cut the 2nd verse in half, and cut the solo section in half (or lose it altogether). I know soloing is fun, but there's nothing there that really carries the song forward. This tune needs to be like 2:30 at most.

What I'm getting out of the arrangement is basically intro/verse/chorus, then repeat. The repeat of those things needs to be slightly different than the first time through...either in dynamic, or different chord inversions, or just *something* to connect the listener with "hey, this song is going somewhere".

Sorry, I had some coffee. :)
 
My opinion of the Rain song is that it just needs a bit more polish, maybe cut the solo down to like 30 seconds, and whatever that is at 1:50 mark seemed "odd" to me.

The voices though, I think have some originality to them, not just some mediocre heard it before sound.

Thats my opinion as a music listener not any expert.
 
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