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#314237 10/13/15 12:42 AM
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Note: I copied this over from the Recording section. I was thinking maybe too many folks don't get over there!

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I think I am pretty close to done to finishing this CD I have been working on (on and off) for a couple of years. I have uploaded the songs to a playlist at soundcloud: Crows Say What?

If you can spare the time, I would appreciate it if you would just go through the first 30 seconds of each tune (or a verse and chorus if you are so inclined!) and just make sure nothing is glaringly wrong.

I have listened to it so much that all I hear now are the mistakes, stumbles, mush mouth singing and that sort of stuff (ha, ha). Overall I have gotten the volume up to where it is almost on par with most analog recordings from back in the day -- but I can't get to the current music loudness without squashing it too much (the CD as a collection has a dynamic range rating of DR10). Quality-wise I think I am doing pretty decent for a typical home recordist.

Thanks!


Now at bandcamp: Crows Say Vee-Eh @ bandcamp or soundcloud: Kevin @ soundcloud
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I listened to some tracks. My first impression is that the guitar/banjo is too loud compared to the rest. The voice hides in the mix for most of the time.

For most of the time banjo and guitar dominate the rest of the band including the singer.

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My background: I'm a square dancer and a square dance caller. As a square dancer I need to hear and comprehend the command to be able to dance it. Listening to square dance records reveals two different schools. One has the dancer in mind and the voice is clearly audible in the mix. The other has the person inside who wants to listen to songs with some unconventional and sometimes dadaistic lyrics.
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Back to your songs: If I'm a guitar student I could easily figure out what is played on the stringed instruments. The rest just offers an impression about the overall song, so when I practise I have the correct context.

The song that made the best overall impression: That is Her Weekend
The song that I would delete from my playlist on the computer: Bear Picture Song (it is just a noisy mess for my ears)
The song that I have the impression that I had heard it before: Thunderbird Motel (Eagles/Dylan/???)


While writing this post, I listened to the entire playlist in the background. I had to write it twice, because I accidentaly hit the "back" button and deleted all my writing.


Desktop; i7-2600k, 8 GB mem., Win 10 Pro, BIAB 2017; RB 2017 - latest build
Laptop: i5-2410M, 4 GB mem, Win 10 Pro, BIAB 2017; RB 2017 - latest build
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Excellent Stuff! Right now I am listening to all the songs on super, super low volume where I should just be able to hear the lead vox. If I hear any competing instruments I am going to turn them down (like the banjo in shout it out).


Now at bandcamp: Crows Say Vee-Eh @ bandcamp or soundcloud: Kevin @ soundcloud
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I think I am done. Thanks to all who listened and commented (and the pm's). I took every suggestion to heart and tweaked what I thought I could tweak without ruining what I had (ha, ha). Perfect -- not by a long shot, but probably as good as I can do!


Now at bandcamp: Crows Say Vee-Eh @ bandcamp or soundcloud: Kevin @ soundcloud
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Got the first free review CD back from kunaki -- looked good and played fine. Kunaki said they didn't use CD-TEXT, but when I popped it in, windows media player recognized the album name and the names of the 14-tracks, pretty cool. Kunaki wants 300dpi artwork, but all I had were images in Paint (96dpi). It still look passable.

Of course, I have slightly edited four songs already (ha, ha) -- I ended up playing the CD really loud in the car and I heard a few things that I didn't hear at the lower volumes that I was mixing at -- oh well. So I will be resubmitting a new cd image. Nothing gets changed at kunaki, you have to start all over again as if it was a new project -- but that is no big deal.

Kunaki only offers one free review CD (still nice), so I will order 5 and when I get the next set I can fire up iTunes and submit the album name and track names to gracenotes and be in that big music database in the sky!


Now at bandcamp: Crows Say Vee-Eh @ bandcamp or soundcloud: Kevin @ soundcloud
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Kevin,

Don't settle for 96 dpi images. What do you need done? Plenty of free image editors, paint.net for example, that can be put to service.

-Scott

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I might have to try out paint.net, but the images I am using are just screen captures or save image as from the internet (I got permission), so the resolution isn't that high probably.

Next one I'll try and do better graphics. Attached are the front, inside and back:

Cover:


Inside:


Back:


Now at bandcamp: Crows Say Vee-Eh @ bandcamp or soundcloud: Kevin @ soundcloud
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Kevin, if you got permission from the original owners of the photos, ask if you can get 300 dpi versions from them.

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rockstar_not: Thanks for the suggestion -- but I think for this one, I am happy enough as is. I am getting tired of it (ha, ha).


Now at bandcamp: Crows Say Vee-Eh @ bandcamp or soundcloud: Kevin @ soundcloud
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