This one is brand new territory for me, so I know it’s not a great track. But there are elements I’m proud of, and I have learned a lot! I think at the end of my detour into electronic music I’ll have some new skills that I can apply to all of my tracks, whether they are electronic or not. These songs are so much quicker to work on too, mostly because I don’t have to record a god damned acoustic guitar haha.
I’d love to hear your feedback, but like I said it’s more of a learning experience than anything and I already know it’s not going to be a great track. I mostly just wanted to share my journey into electronic music. These remix contests are fun by the way, and I got to use Ellie Goulding’s vocals. How cool is that! If you’re looking for something new to try, there are a bunch out there.
I like this, Cristina. Listening on my MacBook Air and all parts are clear and well-balanced. Only thoughts I’d have are three: one of the synths (e.g. at 1:46+) are a tad loud. I don’t know how to describe which one, but it’s kind of a pulsing synth toward the middle. Two is bring the drums up. Too soft. Three (this is probably just personal preference), less reverb (or maybe that’s a slapback delay? Can’t tell on my laptop) on the vocals.
Thanks for your feedback! I layered a bunch of synths for the drops, but I wonder if you’re talking about the strings. Or, actually, I think you might actually be talking about the vocal chops now that I listen back to that spot. Yeah those do stick out too much. Good catch. I’ll play around with the drums a bit more too.
The stems all come with the processing applied, so there’s already reverb and whatnot on the vocals, but yeah I added more. It may be too much. I didn’t change that much in the mix after I was done producing it, but I could go back over the vocals. It’s really weird working on songs with someone else’s vocals. I didn’t realize how much care I give to my own, I guess because it’s me! But when it’s someone else I just see it as another part of the song, haha. And especially with these remixes where they are already processed, they basically already sound good. It’s just a matter of fitting them into the remix.
Interesting song. I’m just learning about this type of genre myself too, so I don’t know how much I can comment on mix/style. One thing that stood out to me though was between about 2:00-2:30 the pads and synths do a tremolo or volume modulation where they go from loud to almost silent and back again. Kind of like compressor pumping but more extreme and slower. I think I heard it on the vocals at some point too. I don’t know if that’s baked into the tracks but I found it auditorially uncomfortable and perplexing.
One other thing that came to me while listening is the old rule of thumb - only have 3 instruments at a time as a focus, and only one as the main focus. At times it feels like multiple things are competing for attention. I think the low end is working pretty good though, and that can be a challenge to get right.
I would second the too much reverb on the vocals. For me the low end is playing well together but i feel like it needs to be a little more present through out the track to anchor the song so to speak.
Oh man, that’s my favorite part and why I got into the genre in the first place; must be a preference thing! Or I might be doing it completely wrong, lol. But yeah that’s the main thing I had in mind to do when I started the track. I was listening to this playlist and I loved the way that volume automation (or side-chain compression perhaps) felt with the music.
In this case I used SoundToys Tremolator to create the swells. Definitely something I’m still experimenting with and learning about.
Wild sound. When it breaks out, it’s almost too much, if that makes any sense? My granddaughters would love this. In fact I have to run this by them. I love when I see you post a song, but hate that I can’t help with specifics. I think the vocal is way too far back in so many places and the strings get a bit aggressive at times. Tweaking here and there is going to make this very interesting as far as salability ?? Best of luck to you
The “compressor pumping” sound has been popular in dance music for along time IIRC. It has to do with the attack/release settings used with the tempo of the music. It’s usually something that goes with the beat but creates short swells. That seems to be what I’m hearing in that Illenium reference track. With all these new genres though I probably don’t know heads from tails on all the techniques they are using. Interesting that you used Tremolator. I think as an effect if you used it for shorter swells and maybe not the same swells for very long it might work well. In other words … “less is more”. Just my opinion. In the Illenium track about 9:00 they’re doing something similar to what you did (or vice-versa) so I guess it’s a ‘thing’ in that genre.
That’s my favorite track in that mix, and my favorite part of that track no less! (I didn’t listen to all of the songs though.) So I’m actually really happy to hear that, haha. It’s totally what I was going for. I understand it’s not for everybody… I just think it’s so cool.
I admire your taking on an electronic song, @Cristina. You did a great job transitioning through so many sounds and effects while maintaining a healthy continuity. There was a lot of power in this mix, which is extra good on the dance floor. No doubt you will be able to use some of these tools in any type song you make. Plus you sounded like you were having a blast doing it!
I just posted a version 2. The contest deadline is in a few hours so I’ll just submit what I have.
I took a lot of the reverb off the main vocal, and made the drums a little louder/punchier, added SoundToys Crystalizer to the main synth in the drop to add some sparkly high-end which I think makes it sound more like future bass, and I used Driftmaker (thanks again to @miked!) to print an vocal fx track which I then just used bits and pieces of to add more interest to the song. And a few other tweaks here and there.
I think it sounds a bit better than before. I’m already working on my next one, which is an original song this time. Things gonna get crazy up in here.
These remix contests are fun by the way, and I got to use Ellie Goulding’s vocals. How cool is that! If you’re looking for something new to try, there are a bunch out there.