Alien Lard #3 of 5 - Get Lost

Bash This Recording
#1

Hey again. Song 3 of the five for my Alien Lard Project.
Normally I wouldn’t type out the lyrics or let people in on the meaning (as stated in the abstract lyrics thread) as I like people coming up with their own thoughts and interpretations, but I would like to make an exception on this occasion.

The song is actually about us folks here at IRD! Well, what we all probably relate to in trying to create something. Essentially it is a checklist of things we often think when making, recording and mixing a song, but can easily be applied to any creative process.

Any mix feedback will be greatly appreciated. I am hoping that I am getting on top of the harshness issue that was popping up in the previous two songs.

Oh, and there is a bunch of deliberate dissonance in this one. Just a heads up!

GET LOST
We’ve gotta make it great,
We gotta make it right,
We gotta make it fit,
We gotta make it tight,
It’s gotta make us proud,
It’s gotta hit the spot,
It’s gotta fill that void,
We gotta take that shot,

If it’s not just the way…
The way it ought to be…
The way we’d all prefer…
The way that we have dreamed…

It’s gotta tick the box
Of what you’re looking for,
It’s gotta do it’s job,
It’s gotta give you more,
It’s gotta make us proud,
It’s gotta hit the spot,
It’s gotta fill that void
With all it’s got,

It can’t be too bland,
It can’t be too raw,
It shouldn’t be too much,
It can’t be ignored,
It’s gotta make a point,
It’s gotta strike a nerve,
It can’t be forgot,
It can’t not be heard!

It can’t just get lost…

3 Likes
#2

I just drank some white wine and it’s the middle of the night here, so don’t take anything I say seriously. Then again, I bet there will be many people who listen to this style of music while under the influence of some drug…It’s rock’n’roll, man !!

You’ve got a punk, metal, hardcore vibe going on. I could really hear your British accent in this one and the lyrics are very easy to make out without the use of a lyric sheet. I kind of laughed a bit at the vocal styling, but not in a bad way. I appreciate the way you physically push the vocals. There are not many things that I dislike more than a weak vocal with no power, in an aggressive, heavy type of song.

There’s some very famous songs with a certain kind of vocal that makes me smile …or laugh…The Offspring have some songs like that, and they have some pretty cool tunes, such as Pretty Fly For A White Guy, Come Out And Play, Self-Esteem and many more. Faith No More also have some stylings like that, that make me smile or laugh. It’s entertaining, cool and laughable all at once.

Your sounds and mix, fall very much in line with the other songs that you recorded for this EP project. You’re on the right track.

I’ll give this another listen when I’m well rested and completely sober, haha.

2 Likes
#3

Cool - sounds great - Loving it! With the really Oz accent coming through, the song reminds me quite a bit of Mark of Cain (now there’s a blast from the past!). Cool track!

#4

I hear both too. I have decided to make sure I don’t add the artificial (for me!) US accent on these songs. I love Mark of Cain so that was a conscious thing to make sure that it is line with that (as with Helmet too).

Not British but I can hear the shape and tone of some phrases being similar to that punk, Sex Pistols delivery at times. Again, quite alright with that for this style.

It was a lot of fun and very easy to write a discordant song about trying to make songs perfect.

Yeah, this is my first venture into this style of vocals. After the first two songs, I started to get the hang of it and I did this song, the fourth and redid some of the second all in one hit, without straining my voice.
I do, however, use a more gentler voice in Giggons which is still heavy-ish, but far more melodic and comfortable for me.
Thanks for the listen.

1 Like
#5

I wasn’t sure if it was British or it was Aussie, so I took a wild guess. :laughing: If I was completely sober I might have heard the difference. I can distinguish the difference most of the time when hearing a person’s speaking voice (it seems a bit more difficult to distinguish when it’s singing though), but many of us North Americans (I’m Canadian) can confuse the two accents.

I did think of the Sex Pistols when I listened to this song, but I didn’t mention it because your style is different, sort of hardcore/ metal (I don’t know how to categorize it exactly). It does have a Punk element though.

1 Like
#6

Yeah cool song Dan! Love the bass and kick driving the song. Simple but effective. The dissonance is interesting and only just a bit unsettling for me :cold_sweat:
The vocals sound quite dry and could sit better in the mix. You could perhaps send both the vocals and the instruments through one room reverb and blend to taste?

1 Like
#7

The selection of a genre is often quite difficult and usually it is more accurate from other people’s ears, but the styles I think I’m doing would be a combo of Stoner rock with Noise Rock and probably grunge too. I tend to think of metal as lots of guitar solos and more tinny sounding overall (pun not intended). The noise rock element is the looser play style and performance glitches that I’ve left in, plus feedback and rawness. The Stoner rock is more the style of riffs and riff based music, with blues-esque riffs as break ups which is very common in that Stoner style.

It was unsettling for me at first too!! I knew that’s what i wanted it to be like, ironic given the words being sung!! I did an early version and it was terrible, but for some reason once I got the aggression style down for it, it seemed to work. Not sure why.

I’ll definitely fiddle with that. I have a small reverb, a medium reverb and a delay that I have been varying the balances of in this project to keep some consistency generally. But in this song, I did not use the delay at all, whereas it is very obvious in the other two songs. I found the delay made the mix confusing with the sharper deliver of words, the randomness of the drum fills (of which there are many) and the discordant guitar chords. But perhaps a touch more verb is needed…

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#8

Stoner and Punk (i.e. Sex Pistols) was what I got from it. Cool riffs, nice and staccato and prominent. Sounds pretty good to me, and yeah there’s an Aussie feel to the vocals for sure (as perceived by a Yank). I think it’s in the Key of D, but maybe D minor or a mode? Are the string instruments tuned down to D (?), because it has that Drop-D feel to it.

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#9

Yes, just drop D for this song. The other two I recorded in drop D, but then applied a pitch shifter (pre-effects) to drop them down a semi-tone or two further.

I was remarkably surprised to hear it turn out so well when I did that. Having the pitch shifter post effects sounded a bit wonky but before (straight after the DI guitar before any amp sims etc) seemed to work really well. I will be using for future songs on this project for sure.

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#10

Oh what fun. Love that bass. I’m fingers are tired already. Great guitar work. Dark thrash. Life is good. The playing is awesome. I could actually play this. Ha ha Nice punch and congrats.

1 Like
#11

Thanks mate.
I am not even sure what the discordant chord name is (I am not overly great with knowing things like that anyway, I just fiddle until I get what I am wanting). BUut yes, from memory this is a pretty straight forward song guitar wise. I did each of these songs in one sitting so I don’t really recall what I did after I hit the stop button.

#12

I’m liking it, Dan! The lyrics are nicely generic in the sense they do apply to many things in life, not just musician singing about his music. Now I want to relisten to the other songs, just to feel the progress, but I won’t today. After last week in freezing Texas with power and water outages and running out of propane to boot I feel as if my recent memory has taken a hit, but now I’m back and trying to get back in the proverbial saddle again.

I guess I didn’t realize you were English, dude. You have a pretty good American accent! This one is cool though with your Britishness shining through. Guitars, bass and drums are all strong, too. It feels like a good fit in the middle, full of energy and attitude over melody and just different enough from 1 and 2 to stand alone.

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#13

Not British, Steve, Aussie! :wink:
Thanks for the comments. Will get back to them in more detail soon.

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#14

I was going to chime in and mention this… and then I thought: " many Aussies are from a British background - what if Dan identifies as English?"… I know, I know, it’s a long shot but it could happen!.. Nevertheless I’ve heard you talk, so I was pretty sure what your answer would be!

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#15

I probably knew this from some older post, but I do forget things. I cannot do accents, and am amazed by how many actors surprise me when I hear their natural voice. I suppose singers do the same, but I can’t even think of any examples of that. Maybe some sound more American who are not than the other way around.

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#16

Yep, cool song, nice performance and recording.
I really like instrument tones, really spot on for this tune, everything seems balanced to me.
Lyrics are fun too, it would work for many other subjects I guess.

Really great job, I’ll rewind the tape and listen to it again!

1 Like
#17

Yeah Dan I am loving it. Brilliant.

1 Like