Edit: I took some of the advice below and reworked the song, the video is of the reworked version. Thank you very much for the feedback! Of course any more feedback would be very appreciated.
This is my second attempt at a song in Band in a Box. I'm still getting the hand of the whole mixing side of things and still working on my vocals as well. As always, any feedback would be great! I used BIAB to generate the track and then Studio One to record vocals and to provide virtual instruments for midi tracks.
RealTracks in style: ** N/A ** 628:Bass, Electric, Funk James FingerSlap Ev 100 RealTracks in style: ** N/A ** 2197:Piano, Electric, Rhythm JazzRockHeld Ev16 100 RealTracks in style: ** N/A ** 2158:Guitar, Electric, Rhythm FunkyGroove60s Ev 100 RealTracks in style: ** N/A ** ~1436:Guitar, Electric, Rhythm JazzFunkGroovinMute Ev16 110 RealDrums [in style:JazzFunkUrban^1-a:Picolo Snare, Ride , b:Picolo Snare, HiHat
Hi Richard. Great work on this. The sax is a nice touch Your vocal needs to be more upfront and the vocal effects isn't helping. Try a little reverb and delay. Over all nicely done. Looking forward to hearing more. Rob
Catchy song with a nice chorus! It's got a very 80s feel.
I enjoyed this listen.
OK, now for the critical bits.
My first thought is the same as Rob4580 - the vocal is too far back.
The vocal doesn't sound like it's in the same "space" as the instruments, and the vocal effect doesn't make things better - it sounds like a cheap reverb.
Instead of using a vocal effect, doubling (or tripling) your vocal might be a better idea.
The last few notes of the guitar solo sound off.
Here's the elephant I'm not very good at tip-toeing around: you've got pitch problems. There's nothing wrong with that - I'd never suggest that it prevent you from singing, or that your singing is bad.
But with pitch correction tools, it's fairly easy to find and fix pitch problems before anyone else hears them.
I've personally had more than a few sessions where I was sure I was singing on pitch, only to have the software show me I somehow drifted into the wrong key.
Anyway, I hope this hasn't discouraged you in any way. Keep up the good work!
Thank you both very much for your feedback. I really appreciate it. At this stage I really need as much criticism as possible because I pretty much know nothing! I'm going to go back in and rework some of the song and use a bit of pitch correction in melodyne. The key is c and melodyne picked the vocals up as f# major... So I definitely went wrong somewhere!
You're doing pretty well Richard... It may be hard to get your head around all the technical issues all at once... But you seem to be getting there... Keep at it & have fun!
You're doing pretty well Richard... It may be hard to get your head around all the technical issues all at once... But you seem to be getting there... Keep at it & have fun!
Thanks Jim. I know, I thought the writing and singing part was hard enough... then you add mixing, arranging, etc! I am enjoying it though and hopefully getting my songs closer to how I imagine them being before I record them.
Catchy song with a nice chorus! It's got a very 80s feel.
I enjoyed this listen.
OK, now for the critical bits.
My first thought is the same as Rob4580 - the vocal is too far back.
The vocal doesn't sound like it's in the same "space" as the instruments, and the vocal effect doesn't make things better - it sounds like a cheap reverb.
Instead of using a vocal effect, doubling (or tripling) your vocal might be a better idea.
The last few notes of the guitar solo sound off.
Here's the elephant I'm not very good at tip-toeing around: you've got pitch problems. There's nothing wrong with that - I'd never suggest that it prevent you from singing, or that your singing is bad.
But with pitch correction tools, it's fairly easy to find and fix pitch problems before anyone else hears them.
I've personally had more than a few sessions where I was sure I was singing on pitch, only to have the software show me I somehow drifted into the wrong key.
Anyway, I hope this hasn't discouraged you in any way. Keep up the good work!
I think David is pretty much spot on. Your mixing and use of the program really seem to be coming along! Doing some work on the vocals will bring this song a long ways! Nice work!! Take care. Greg
Nicely done - I found the tune to be really catchy, and someone else said already but the sax was a nice touch. I think you did a wonderful job here, and that it's an improvement on the last version.
The song has potential but you do need to work on the pitchiness as well as a way to get the vocal sit in the mix as, at present, it seems like it's in another room as the instruments. To help with that I suggest you turn the reverb off on the instruments before you export them to whereever you record your vocals and do your mixing. That way you'll be able to use various doses of the same reverb so the vocal and instruments seem more together.
Cheers rayc "What's so funny about peace, love & understanding?" - N.Lowe
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Whether you're exploring new features, checking out the latest RealTracks or Style PAKs, this is your go-to guide for Band-in-a-Box® 2026.
Band-in-a-Box® 2026 for Mac is here and it is packed with major new features! There’s a new modern look, a GUI redesign to all areas of the program including toolbars, windows, workflow and more. There’s a Multi-view layout for organizing multiple windows. A standout addition is the powerful AI-Notes feature, which uses AI neural-net technology to transcribe polyphonic audio into MIDI—entire mixes or individual instruments—making it easy to study, view, and play parts from any song. And that’s just the beginning—there are over 100 new features in this exciting release.
Along with version 2026, we've released an incredible lineup of new content! There's 202 new RealTracks, brand-new RealStyles, MIDI SuperTracks, Instrumental Studies, “Songs with Vocals” Artist Performance Sets, Playable RealTracks Set 5, two new RealDrums Stems sets, XPro Styles PAK 10, Xtra Styles PAK 21, and much more!
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