Real Pretty spacey tune, guitar and voice work really well, lyric message comes through, and at 2:44 mini Frank Zappa shows up creating some great noise to accompany what was pretty much a folk song. And the recording is super clean, and I like the pauses, they seem organic and fit.

Yeah, I was waiting for the green chicks! I liked the wood wins!

Thanks!

If you haven't seen the newer Star Trek films with the young cast, there's a scene with James T. Kirk getting it on with a green girl who is a roomie of Uhuru. Those new films are pretty darned good.

Very cool that you picked up on that little synth sound that I stuck in there.

Thanks for checking this one out and for your appreciation.

Not sure if this belongs in 'songwriting' because it is an old Scottish ballad, a couple of centuries old, called 'The Wife of Usher's Well'...



It's a spooky tale, about three children who return from the dead to visit their grieving mother for one night. Really should be posting this at Halloween, but I recorded it the other week for a specific podcast that focuses on old folk ballads.

I gave it a quite discordant treatment, lots of deliberately jarring and discordant notes on the acoustic guitar. (For once I can honestly say that it's deliberate rather than just sloppy playing! )

Just vocals and guitar, quite a few long creaky silences too. Played the whole thing a bit too slow, so it's become a real funereal dirge! I'm reasonably happy with it though, it'll do for now. Hopefully sufficiently spooky with a 'Wicker Man'/'Blood on Satan's Claw' folk horror vibe

I made this song as a tribute to DMX. I tied to capture the same type of energy he would always deliver on the microphone. RIP Legends never die

https://www.instagram.com/p/CNihEC1Fu_j/

Any mix advice for this:

https://soundcloud.com/user-186908625/captain-slappy

Thanks

I think I would have approached how the parts were recorded differently. For the bass, because the guitar is already playing staccato parts, I would have tried playing whole notes on the bass for each bar and let them ring, rather than walking the bass. Then you don't have too many parts bouncing around trying to be busy at the same time.

I think you could maybe benefit from alternate guitar parts/doubles.
...and maybe even vocal doubles, during parts. Actually, the I think I would probably introduce the vocal as a double from the start. It just sounds like it could benefit from doubles, and sound good.

The intro to the song needs to be bigger than the verse, I think in this case. More guitars during the intro. ie: Maybe some fingerpicking also during the intro, with two guitars post intro/vocal, one playing the staccato part, the other playing ringing chords. The fingerpicking guitar falling away when the vocal comes in. The bass as mentioned above, playing whole notes as well...ringing out.

I think these parts might work with the vocal better, because the vocal is a busy/staccato part as well...

You don't want too many parts doing the same thing in an arrangement...imo.

For the mix, I think the drums needs more compression/punch and a bit brighter. I would find a way to buss my kick, snare and toms through an 1176 to beef/punch them up some more.

Thanks for listening mate. I pretty much disagree though on everything you mention regarding the parts.

I will look into the mix aspects you mention, sure.

Thank you

That's the fun of this - one man's deliberate choices are another man's errors!

It goes without saying doesn't it?

One man's dream could be another man's nightmare.

As long as we can decide for ourselves, I'm in.

For what it's worth I think the snare too hard. Could be it's just a little too loud? It makes uncomfortable listening, kind of stabs the song not in a good way... to my ears.

Just listening to your other stuff that followed on while I type and you obviously know what you're doing. Entertaining stuff.

Here’s a new song called « Bloodhound », which heavy atmosphere could be a good match for a movie soundtrack. Hope you enjoy !

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hwkq...channel=Philby

Yeah I hear you. I haven't mastered the dark art of mixing at all as yet...

I have, for example, 7 sets of headphones...all decent. The snare will behave differently in each of them. So will the high end and low end in general...and the mid range. Which about covers all areas, lol. In some headphones the snare sounds perfectly fine. In others it sounds like it's going to give me a headache.

As for my monitors...HS8's and Avantones...well everything, in my room, sounds basically good on those to me. So, they are pretty useless.

It's very hard to get it right across all manner of monitoring.

I'll see what I can do with the snare. Thanks, dude.

I listen fairly quietly on 5" monitors which can be quite cruel.
All your other numbers sound "right" to me, I think you do yourself a disservice. I really enjoyed Diamond Mine BTW, it's comfortable listening, it sneaks up on you and I sank right into it - excellent!

Nice track!

The entire drumkit seems to be in the center, which I’m guessing can’t be helped.

The vinyl/saturation/raised noise-floor sound is detrimental I think. Maybe just too loud, but also doesn’t sound evenly applied.

I’d probably prefer the dirty sounding rhythm guitar as an acoustic. It sounds out of tune or not setup currently.

Would like some more panning depth.

That’s all I got for now

You crushed it on this one bro

The composition is a knockout

Thanks for listening

Drums are more or less centre...I could pan them around in Addictive Drums but I like 'em centre. I did try more panned but it didn't seem right. The noise floor is just part of the Addictive Drum kit that I have. It appears more prominent on the quieter sections, that's all. You can turn the effect down somewhat, but can't eliminate it.

Electric rhythm turned out better than acoustic which was what I tried first. Much preferred the Strat. Panning...yeah...overall I liked the more mono vibe.

Thanks again, dude.

I just went back to listen again, and this must be a new version!

Sounds excellent. Either that or my ears are f***** now or were yesterday.

This is much more balanced and retaining the original vibe.

Great work, I like this song.

I've done about 3 or 4 different mixes since I posted it. Not completely new mixes but significant tweaks and changes to a lot of stuff. Pretty much trying to address everything everyone said.

Thanks again for the advice I think it's smoother now somewhat.

I was waiting for you to post up that you'd remixed it. Doh!

Vocals a bit quiet on headphones but it's often the case that the panned instruments sound louder in "headphone" stereo making the centre stuff sound quieter than it really is. Can't listen on speakers right now.

It slots in nicely with your other songs now, IMO.

I was just thinking about the lower Strat chord and how much of a problem I've had with that in the past on most strats.

On one hand, it could be tuning, intonation, or chord form/voicing, but now I'm also thinking about scale length and string gauge as factors too.

This isn't a criticism of the mix, just that this mix has triggered this question in myself cobined with some jam sessions I was listening to the other day from a few years ago where I was playing a friend's Strat and was having a similar sound even though I was in the same chord tones I was just playing higher up the neck which sounded great, but died as a lower chord.

I need to get a baritone strat at some point and explore the difference that scale lengh and string guage can bring.

It's probably the key to these types of situations.