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I'm a HUGE fan of Tower of Power so after listening to some of their tracks I was inspired to write what I thought would be the type of song you would hear from them. I based the song off of the "Feel" (I'm a huge fan of capturing the "Feel" of a song) from the old soul track "Backfield in Motion". One of my favorites.

https://youtu.be/WG7BXgQZ6xQ

I really had to focus on the "Chord Push" feature in BIAB and the overlapping horn arrangements. Doing horn phrases of this type require a fair amount of manual manipulation. This is not MultiRiff stuff but listening, and cutting and pasting phrases in the DAW that I thought fit. That was the purpose of me creating the tutorial "How I create SOLOs) on my channel. Anyway I think the song came off pretty well. Back in the TOP heyday their lead singer was Lenny Williams (So Very Hard To Go). Hell I ain't no Lenny but I also thought the vocals came across OK. :-) This was just me playing around. It will not be released. It'll go in the can so no point suggesting I remix. I'm done with this one and on to the next. Still constructive comments always welcome.

Style: Monday.STY Slow Swing 8th Blues (of course speeded up almost double the time)

Bass: Electric Blues
Organ: B3
Guitar 1: Acoustic Rhythm
Guitar 2: Resonator Rhythm Blues Muddy
Horns 1: Rhythm Blues Shuffle
Horn 2: Background Blues Shuffle
Piano 1: Acoustic Piano
Drums: Nashville 128
Synth Pad 1: Pop Believe
Synth 2: Rhythm Pep Squad Horns

Equipment: Usual stuff, Shure PG-42, Sonar Producer, Focusrite USB
Vocal Stuff: Antares, iZotope Nectar, AVOX Suite, CLA Vocals

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Hi Henry,

This is a good song, well sung, mixed and produced.

Congratulations.

Best Regards
Nigel


Nigel Spiers
Christchurch, New Zealand
info@nzacoustics.com
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This is awesome!

Great job!


-rob

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Henry, I am another TOP fan and I think you did them justice with this piece. Your vocal is excellent and the horns were arranged perfectly.

This is your best to date IMHO

Loved it.


Today I bought a doughnut without the sprinkles. Diets are hard!

64 bit Win 10 Pro, the latest BiaB/RB, Roland Octa-Capture audio interface, a ton of software/hardware
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Henry...great tune...I love the arrangement...the vocals are top-notch...everything is so tight...I would love to hear the brass a little more on their emphasis points but still a very cool mix.


www.soundclick.com/firesong
BiaB 2024, Steinberg Cubase Pro 13, Wavelab 11.2, SpetraLayers Pro 10, Audacity, Steinberg UR44 Interface, Yamaha Genos, Roland FP60 and FP10, Windows 10

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I'm a huge Lenny Williams/TOP fan, also familiar with the Mel and Tim tune from Teen Club dances back in the day. This was closer to Backfield in Motion and had enough of that "Henry Clarke goodness" to satisfy any R&B fan. Great work, Henry.


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Fantastic! What a great mix. Your vocals blend in so well with the music. Well written too. The band hums along nicely too. Top notch production.


My music can be heard at: The Cracks
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Hello Henry
Great song
As always excellent sung
great melody and song structure
If you want to know what you can get out of BiaB you just have to listen to your songs ;-)
It was really fun to listen
Many greetings
Andi ;-)

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Great horn arrangements!

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Smoooooooooooooooth ear candy. Yummy! laugh

Bouncy, catchy, and fun to listen to.

Love it.


-- David Cuny
My virtual singer development blog

Vocal control, you say. Never heard of it. Is that some kind of ProTools thing?
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I like Tower of Power and I've seen them alive too. You have really captured their sound and their soulful mood is present. Nice and catchy melody, very good arrangement, horns sound good. Excellent vocals.

Janne


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Cool mix.... Listening on my buds this sounds really sweet.

Love the "feel" to this song.

Everything is in it's place and tasty.

The vox sound like they have the slightest touch of AT on them.... while I'm not a fan of blatant AT, this, if that's what I'm hearing, is interesting. Kind of like a teaser. Of course, it could also be artifacts from the streaming or MP3 conversion ..... IDK....

I liked it.


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I love this Henry.. I am hearing what I think Guitarhacker mentioned in the previous comment about "AT Artifacts"
The track still sounds great to me... Feel good music.


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Originally Posted By: bloc-head
I love this Henry.. I am hearing what I think Guitarhacker mentioned in the previous comment about "AT Artifacts"
The track still sounds great to me... Feel good music.


Thanks. You may hear a slight touch of AT since I absolutely hate any flat notes and it does provide a lift but I think it could also sound this way because I usually cut anything around 200 Hz for my vocals to eliminate and floor noise and any booming sounds coming through on the vocal. I could probably have cut a bit of highs in the 13k range. It was a bit difficult competing with the horns :-) Either way I'm not opposed to having a tinge of AT on my vocal to give it a more modern sound. Just my personal preference. Thanks for the kind comments about the track. Cheers folks.

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Cool song and love your voice. Backfield is one of my all time favs so I dig the inspiration. I'm just not into the robotic modern stacks or any of what they used to call the Cher/TP autotune vox fx. Don't get me wrong you did a great job on them - I'm just old school. I can't help it. Great job.
Josie

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Never heard of Tower of Power (and why should I look them up when I can listen to you instead?).
Your productions never disappoint which is probably a testament of your attention to detail. Keep up the good work!

Ghostgum


My music may not set the world on fire but if it causes a glow in just one person's heart, it has all been worthwhile smile
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Originally Posted By: Sundance
Cool song and love your voice. Backfield is one of my all time favs so I dig the inspiration. I'm just not into the robotic modern stacks or any of what they used to call the Cher/TP autotune vox fx. Don't get me wrong you did a great job on them - I'm just old school. I can't help it. Great job.
Josie


Thanks for the comment. I'm also old school but enjoy all forms of creativity. I think you're in the camp that all autotune is the Cher/TP effect when essence it is not. AT is on almost every recording being released from major studios today. It's just another tool and doesn't have to sound robotic. That's the main misconception. It appears you think my vocal stack is AT when in essence it is not. There's only slight AT on the lead vocal. Nothing else. Here's my opinion on the use of AT or Melodyne https://youtu.be/Hd16ie1gQAw

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Man, did that work on the horns ever pay off. They sound great.
And speaking of great you can apply that to your vocals, arrangement and mix.

You really grabbed that TOP vibe ... their early 70's releases were everywhere.
Back when you could hear R&B, blues, soul and country on the same station smile

Well done and enjoyable indeed.

J&B

PS This is the first song we've listened to on the forum with our new monitors. Great way to break em in!


Our albums and singles are on Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, YouTube Music, Pandora and more.
If interested search on Janice Merritt. Thanks!
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Is that TOP (Tower Of Power) or POC (Power Of Clark)?
Nice job.
Horns rock and vocals come off beautifully.

Smooth as a velvet hammer!

Moto

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I've heard this song many times since the day you posted it, Henry, so now have a chance to come here and tell you I love it, man. Such a great feel and so well sung and mastered. I've already told you how impressive those horns sound. the whole thing "feels so good to me."


Enjoy whatever happens!
marty

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@babumusic51
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