This new song was created using several RealTracks styles individually and then importing all the tracks into Sonar Producer 8.5 via the BIAB DAW plugin. Then we cut and pasted the best parts of the tracks we liked to create a "composite" of steel and fiddle tracks from these styles:

_CBALAD1 Slow Ctry Bal w/ Pedal Steel SD#94
_George Ctry Bal w/ Fiddle SD#94
_ALLISF w/ Fiddle SD#94

Actually I think there were a couple more we imported in the same genre/style but you get the picture: "Pick the best and leave the rest..."

The vibrato Telecaster lead was recorded live in Sonar as well as the vocal. Final mix master track was run through Sonar's Linear Multi-Band 64 bit compressor using "Light Mastering" preset. The mix was exported to a 16 bit WAV file and topped, tailed, and mastered in Sony Sound Forge 9, using the Wave Hammer "Master for 16 bit" preset. Highs were boosted via Graphic EQ around 15khz to add some "sparkle" and lows rolled off below 80hz. Final step was normalizing to -16db.

This is probably not the final iteration of this song (is it ever?), but I want to live with it for a while before adding harmonies or remixing.

SONG LINK: What About Love (MP3)
LYRICS LINK: What About Love (RTF file)

Enjoy

Bob Buford, Producer
Summertown Studios
Fort Collins, Colorado

Bob,
Wow another very fine song. Great sound, I really like your voice. (once again, reminds me of Michael Martin Murphy)
A great job in cutting & pasting the RT parts out you want to keep... I know it's not that easy as I've been experimenting with that myself.
My only comment would be to maybe start out the first verse with no fiddle or steel fills and then bring them in gradually. To me they would be more effective if I didn't hear them all the way through from the beginning. Just my .02 cents
Still a great job!

Greg

Hi Bob,

I'm totally in awe of your musical talent. Your mixes and performances are first class all the way. This is a beautiful song and your voice fits it like a hand in a glove. Another great work from the Hawgly studios!

All the best,
Noel

Hey Greg...thanks for your nice comments. That cut and paste process is really cool for getting a unique performance out of BIAB; it's practically an unlimited source of original tracks. Actually it's not unlike what we do in the studio when we're tracking live performances. I make them record things over and over until they start to obviously hate me...then I back off. Then I have lots of material to choose from. Anyone who's ever worked with an analog studio, i.e. tape, can really appreciate the unlimited instantaneous options you have with digital. Nearly miraculous.

I just recorded the vocal last night around 10PM and I have a rule about not mixing until at least eight hours later. So this is a "kitchen sink" mix...i.e. everything is in there. I like the idea of "building" the mix, starting with sparse instrumentation and adding to a full, phat sound. In this case I'll probably keep the intro instruments, and pull back to basic accompaniment as the vocal begins. It's a proven technique. What do you think about a higher harmony or maybe three-part on the chorus? Sometimes a sensitive ballad, if the lyrics are strong, is more impactful if the vocal is a solo. Solitude and melancholy. Ya know? I think it would be cool if we could take a song and give our forum buddies a copy and let them mix it and see all the variety the would be created.

Man, this is just too much fun!

Bob

Hey Noel...how ya doing down there? Thanks for listening and your comments. I think I slept about three hours last night. Creating music is like giving birth: painfully laborious, lots of yelling and cursing, and then finally something to love unconditionally even if friends and family think your "baby" is ugly. Maybe there's a song there!

Bob

Bob.
Absolutely keep the intro instruments & then pull back at the start of the vocal.
I would try a harmony on the chorus for sure... maybe an airy female voice, (not to be confused with an airhead female voice)
I totally agree on the fun of having forum buddies do a mix of your song. Might be possible if your email server allowed a 200 to 300MB download of a .seq file... For me it wouldn't so much be the download, as it would be the upload since my upload speed is like 37KB's.

I can sympathize with your late nights too... I was up till 4:00am last night working on guitar parts & a new song idea, and that was after rehearsing with my band for 3 hrs earlier in the evening.
But your right, it is just too much fun!

Greg

Airy vs. Airhead....haha....tomAto, tomAHto. Careful. Seriously a female voice up a third might be nice. Now I just need to find a female. Hmmmm??

I was thinking of converting the 6 tracks of the song to individual MP3 files of around 3mb each. Make them downloadable from our studio site and then anyone could import them into RealBand, Sonar, whatever, and do a remix, output the remix to an MP3 and upload it somewhere that people could hear it. That would work, not sure who'd be interested though. Just a thought.

I was at another studio today. My friend there thought the vocal needed to be a bit more out-front, or up in the mix. Thoughts?

Thanks,
Bob

Hey that's a good idea to convert the tracks to mp3 & then import into RB, etc. I'd be up for trying that.

As far as the vocal level... I think people sometimes tend to put them TOO Much out front, so I guess that's something that didn't really occur to me. I thought the level was fine.

As for a female singer, I have a niece in Denver who's a very fine vocalist.
If your interested I'll give you some contact info later. (Although she is a bit of an airhead)

Later,
Greg

Well, another top drawer track there Bob. I loved the chord sequences and that tremolo arpeggio in the intro is one heckofa hook!
Yes, maybe leave some instrumentation out until 1:05 when the drums go from sidestick to snare. My head was hearing vocal harmonies coming in on the 'What about love, what about always" words, for the last two choruses.
Enjoy? Yes, totally.

John

That was a real pleasure, Bob. You're very comfortable in your skin - from the writing right through to the mixing. I haven't listened to your other postings yet - usually its the ideal activity for that first morning coffee before my ears get fried with my own musical activity.

I think the lyrics are superb, very strong hooks, overall strong marriage between all elements (except her own relationship ). I agree with Skyline on the harmony lines. In fact a woman harmonizing , or in fact singing the melody, would be a good idea on the three "question" lines of the chorus - I don't think the chorus needs more harmony than that. But on those three lines it would certainly bring the woman "closer" to the listener than only through the eyes of the narrator.
My 2.1 cents Canuck.
And thanks for posting the lyrics.
Ian

Hey John...thanks. I'm glad you enjoyed it. I heard harmonies in the same place you did. I wanted to really drive home the title with two or three part harmony on the "questions" as you said. I've never played with BIAB's harmonizing capabilities. But we do have a TC Helicon Voice Prism in the studio. Might be fun to experiment with some of that. What are you doing with harmonies on your songs? Software? Hardware? REAL people?

You know I really like that tremolo guitar sound but I think I'm starting to use it too much. (Hear my posting "Leaving Tonight" ala Duane Eddy) I especially like it with the Fender Subsonic Telecaster (Hear my post response to "retake" in the SUMMERTOWN post with the link to "Faithless Heart"). It's such a lush sound I love to use it. If I start to become musically "trite" feel free to point it out to me.

Thanks for listening,
Bob

Hi Ian...good point. I never thought of having a woman sing melody on it. That would put a whole new spin on it. Also, thanks for your nice comments. All great feedback. You're welcome on the lyrics posting link. Kudos to you for suggesting it. I love reading what other people write, and hearing how they came up with their story line and hooks. I think most songwriters are voyeurs of sorts when it comes to other songwriter's lyrics. To me the whys and wherefors are as interesting as the song itself. I'm a single man and dating a lot has given me a huge insight into what women on these dating sites are experiencing these days. My how times have changed. Anyway, that's pretty much where the song came from: A composite of other's experiences as they related them to me.

Thanks for listening,

Bob

Quote:

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...What are you doing with harmonies on your songs? Software? Hardware? REAL people?
Thanks for listening,
Bob

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I usually do them myself, or I sometimes use Melodyne plugin on a clone of the lead vocal and make some harmonies by just pulling the 'blobs' around. This works well with thirds, for example, but you can't go too far afield in terms of intervals or things sound strange, but kept low in the mix this is a good way to make harmonies.

John