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Very cool music!! Love the groove and the instrument selection. Really well put together. Much enjoyed!! Take care. Greg

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Thanks, Herb! I'm stoked you think this ditty's cool.

To some of your points:
60-ish Psychedelic Solo
Yeah, and now a few others have commented similarly on the psychedelic solo. The consensus so far seems to be that it captures the overall mood/theme. I'm very pleased with it and am glad others agree. I am seldom very pleased with anything I create, but there are the occasional exceptions.

Mix too dark: I agree. See below where I had mentioned "mud removal".

Vocal track hard to hear: I'm not sure about that one; I'll be considering it, though, thank you. Where I'm at now is that I like where the vocals sit in the mix and I think the issue is probably more that since the vocals are sung very quickly (as needed to fit the time) my enunciation gets a bit "approximated" in the crunch, if you know what I mean.

Info about the making of the tracks: (in the initial post I had written what follows this comment; I'm not sure if you caught this stuff yet, but it seems you may not have so I've taken the liberty of reposting it here.)

All performances are by yours truly, but for the drum track which was taken from my Yamaha DD55 drum machine.

Vocals were recorded with the much maligned AKG c3000 condensor mic

the Fender Jazz Bass was sent Direct In (DI=no amp) through a Korg AX1G using a factory stereo phase-shifter/amp sim effect.

The super simple keyboard coloration was through a Yamaha DGX portable Grand. (addendum:) also DI.

The lead solo passage and additional coloration was provided by a Korean-made Fender Squire II Strat, sent direct in using a factory pitch shift/amp sim effect.

recorded with Focusrite Saffire Pro 24 DSP and Reaper. I think it could use a little "mud remover" EQ, but I'm not about to change the Soundcloud file just to upgrade it to that extent, I'll wait until there a more finished version. As I finish it I'll probably change the arrangement to have only one chorus after the first verse and then two after the lead passage, and then come in again at the end but with a modulation (key change).

Thanks for the well wishes and encouragment, much appreciated! -Eric


FredM #284827 02/18/15 12:09 PM
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Hi, Fred!
Quote:
Your first post made some waves

How right you are, I made some waves! Also, some Mp3s! wink

Quote:
I liked the funky mantra like style of your song.


That's an astute comment! The creative process is a wonderful thing, full of happy accidents. That "mildy chanty" back and forth between the E and the A note in the melody of the chorus was one such. When I was first fiddling around with the song, I just couldn't think of how to sing it, so I tried that "out of the blue" and stuck with it even though it didn't gel immediately, and I'm glad I did. I agree with you that it works in this song.

Thanks for your kind words of welcome, I appreciate them! -Eric

Last edited by DIOECHOOTO; 02/18/15 12:43 PM.

tommyad #284836 02/18/15 12:38 PM
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Thanks, Tommy. I do love me some laughs!
Fairly recently my vocal ability was the pits. Then I realized I had been laboring under a delusion that is not all that uncommon, I've come to understand: that singing gets better just by practicing singing, and not even that much of that. Once I realized how silly such a notion is, and that warm-ups and solid training techniques are definitely needed, I was able to move out of the pits. This song was something of a fluke. I had not been practicing, and if history is any guide, the performance should have been the aforementioned pits. For some reason, the initial couple of takes that I was intending just be a trial and placeholder turned out not that bad, and so I moved on and got this far so I guess I'm keeping 'em.

People do seem to like the bass part, but I hear you about there being perhaps an excess of stereo panning; this is from the stereo phaser effect aforementioned. The sucky part is, I can't fiddle with the effect because it isn't being applied to a raw signal in a DAW, it was recorded going in. IOW I would have to play the bass line all over again. BUT, I have a possible workaround, to play with getting a more centered sound out of the existing recorded tracks. Maybe you know if this could work as I think it might: (I'm not sure about all the proper terminology but) what if I somehow made a ping-to-pong mirror image of the track, and added it. Such that, when there is now panning left, there would be a symmetrical panning right, and vice versa. For every ping, a pong, so to speak. There would still be panning movement in a stereo field, but the overall effect should be centralizing to the ear, is my theory.

Quote:
The lead is a killer sounding sitar 60's style George Harrison thing and captured the essence of the whole song.
Thanks for saying this, it makes my day. I have thought so too and it's really good to get that strong of a validation.

The tag line came to me the other day. I took my 11 yo daughter to a coffee shop, and we were sitting there so I started looking around on the walls. There was a framed picture of that old saying, and it just came to me to quip to her what is now my tagline. She looked at me calmly and not even a faint glimmer of a smile and said "I get it".

Thanks for your warm welcome, Tommy...'preciate it, man!


Last edited by DIOECHOOTO; 02/18/15 12:41 PM.

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Nice song and nice arrangement and performance. I enjoyed the listen and the resulting banter in the comments as well.

One suggestion regarding your bass stereo work-a-round: The mirror image work-a-round may result in phasing issues and not work well for you.

I suggest you make a mono copy of the track and then mix/blend the mono and stereo tracks with the stereo channel remaining dominant in volume.

At any point, looking forward to you next post.

Charlie


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Hi Charlie. Thanks for giving the tune a listen, I appreciate your comments. I think you are right that I would be inviting a phase issue doing as I suggested; I forgot about that phenomenon, thanks! Your suggestion is a good one, surely. 'preciate it!
ciao!


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