Originally Posted By: Guitarhacker
I love real tracks and once I compose the song in BB I work almost exclusively with the Real Band real tracks along with live musicians tracking their instruments. The real tracks are totally amazing in many respects and I love how they sound.

I liked parts of your song creation pretty well and others not so much. Let me explain.

I like the progression at the very beginning of the song, but without the piano lead. I'd go back and replace that piano part with a piano soloist real track player. It will have more compatibility than the part that's there now. Use envelopes to bring the parts in and out as needed.

OK, the fiddle part starts off absolutely fine and where the fiddle comes in is superb. I love the sound of the RT fiddles. BUT, at 48 thru 56, the song jumps out of it's key and goes off into something that totally doesn't fit or work. Drop those 2 chords out. Just because you can put those chords in there and the soloists will follow them, doesn't mean it's a good idea to do so. There are ways to drop unusual chords into songs, I've done that, and others have done that as well. You need to try to find a way make it work better. Perhaps using one chord that is close kin to the key you're in to start with.

Same thing with the stops at 2:20. I was totally puzzled by them. What? Why? Stops are great tools to break or add tension to a song, but indiscriminate use does nothing. In an instrumental it's harder to use them because there is no vocalist to add that third dimension to the music that calls for a pause. Perhaps you should try a partial stop..... let everything stop except maybe drums and bass.... that give the music a pause but there is continuity maintained.

Note: In BB if you input the chord as C.bd , it will stop all the other instruments except the bass and drums. I'm working on a tune right now where I'm using that in the intro to keep it sparse.

OK I know that you are experimenting, and sometimes we gotta try something to see how it works. Kudo's on what you did....

Like MarioD, I do think you have some really sweet stuff in this tune. He used the phrase "diamond that needs polishing". I agree. All you have to do is refine it, fix a few things and waa laa, a tune that flows smoothly and doesn't grate the proverbial fingernails across the chalkboard of our listening experience....



None of this is meant to be "mean spirited, snarky" criticism. It's intended to be constructive and help you understand what we.... no....what I, hear in this tune.


+1 on most of that. Saved me a lot of typing (lol) except that I quite liked the chord change at 0.48-0.56 and also the chord introduced around 3.18 - that sounded nice.
The three "stops" - Nope!!
cheers
ian

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