I decided to go full on 90’s melodic punk on this one. I love heavy tunes with sentimental lyrics. So if that’s not your thing…
Quick demo, wrote and recorded in a few hours the other evening. I’d love to make a less sloppy full version of this. What do you think…a soft break after the solo then one more chorus? That’s where I’m leaning. Thoughts? Thanks for enduring the noise!
Lyrics:
A Story to Tell
Am I not ‘posed do this?
But it’s the only way I know
Swing and hit but we miss
I don’t really know so I’ll just keep on like this
Remember when it started
(The journey was ours)
And it was all uncharted
(We’ve all come so far)
Keep the course and don’t abandon
I don’t really know but I can fathom
Chorus
A story to tell…
An enemy we know too well
And times to erase…
And others that were perfect and I’d never trade
From and old man…me likes. I like the melody notes that you used in the verses. I liked the lyrics.
Now you know by just working with me I can’t contribute to much. haha
I found it interesting that the verses really moved along quickly. I expected the chorus to explode. It didn’t, but that is cool on it’s own…I think.
Keep it goin and hope others chirp.
Your guitar playing on Jim’s was awesome.
Thanks for commenting @feaker !
I’d love some advice on making the chorus bigger/explode.
That mix has the following in an attempt to sound bigger and stand out:
-Doubled main vocal
-More background harmonies than the verse/pre chorus
-Increased the rhythm guitars and dirty bass channel by 1-2dB to match the increase in vocal volume
-Change in Beat and slight change in tempo to juxtapose the rest of the song
-Pause in busy drums right before it starts (4 on the floor kick)
Other ideas? Softer less distorted guitars in the verse? Lead in with a bigger drum hit or fill? I used hot rods instead of regular sticks to be a little quieter since I was recording in the evening, and it’s hard to open up the toms with those, so I stuck to snare fills. The 16” floor tom might help add energy when I re-record everything.
The second chorus that I would add later should be a little bigger than the first so I’d probably add a lead guitar over the top and/or an extra vocal on top.
Sir fly There are many on this forum that have tons of more talent in the mixing category. I am a slam bam how’s that mam kinda guy.
Here is how I came up with the chorus lacking a bit. My wife was 8 feet from me working a 1,000 piece jigsaw puzzle. (72 year old) She was head banging to your song until it got to the chorus and then quit. I didn’t preface it with anything. So there is that.
I wish I was good at this, because I am retired and could help folks all day???
I don’t want to say the ones that you hope listen and comment. ha ha
Nice! I was thinking about one of my favorite Rise Against songs “Paper Wings” that does the opposite…the final chorus goes into 1/2 time (or not cut time, or common time…or whatever it’s called) and it’s awesome. Check it out. The key is probably contrast. Definitely need a break in there somewhere too. Thanks!
Help me out with tightness and warmth. I recorded two tracks at the same time through an Orange Bass Butler, one clean and one a little dirty. I blended the two, with much more clean than dirty. Only compression and EQ on those. Do you think it’s more a matter of EQ to take some of the edge off, then boost volume a little? I’m definitely trying to dial in my bass tone. Thanks!
EQ is definitely part of it yes. Cut some unwanted, unclean bass from some other tracks and to make room for your bass guitar and the kick and the works.
However, a trick I learned from working with Marcella Araica (mixer for Pink and Wiz Khalifa).
She collapses the bass tracks to mono, dead center.
Then she pretty much “flat irons” (heavy compression threshold) out anything that is within fighting range of the bass. For example if you have Rhythm guitar playing some notes in the same octave as the bass guitar, you want to compress or duck those notes with a quick attack so the bass guitar can play those notes cleaner.
Then its about compression attack and release times on your bass guitar track. You want a slower attack on those and a slightly longer release (to add spread, which translates to warmth).
You might have good results simply collapsing your bass to mono and duplicating it. Then compress or clip one track heavily so you can control the volume of your bass easier. I am not an expert at mixing bass, specially in rock songs. You may get better advice somewhere else, but I understand the basics of it nevertheless.
Both bass tracks are mono and panned dead center, so might not be able to much there…If I’m understanding that correctly. I think my compression is probably set for too fast of compression and release, I’ll try that. I’ll try parallel compression too, because I think my 1176 style compressor is running at 100% wet. Great advice!
I did cut a lot of the low end (and high end) from the guitars to make more room for everything else. I’ll have to look into maybe multiband compression on the overlapping frequencies of the guitars to open some room for the bass too. Awesome, thanks!
Haha! Would definitely be fun in a live setting (minus the hair…always short for me!). When I was in bands in high school and college my favorite part was writing new songs, teaching them to my band mates during the week, and trying them out on the crowd on the weekends. I write for me and a few friends these days (my creative outlet and non work related challenge). Ah the glory days, lol!
And I did have fun with that solo. I double tracked it but it’s was pretty close so it matched up nicely. Lots of small slides that might not be noticed by the listener but really ripped up my callouses, haha!
The song sounds great. Since I live in a world where anything over a minute is a long song, I think it is just the right length as it is. The guitar and drum sounds were great, I’d bring the vocals a bit more forward in the mix, and hmmm - how to put it - the bass guitar sound did not vary much - I think the bass guitar sound could have been more expressive / varied. I might have shaved off a few seconds by writing an ending rather than the fade. Great song. Thanks for posting.
This is really good, and nicely walks the line between full-on pop-punk and something a whole lot grittier, even getting some subtle Sublime vibes in places.
Wasn’t hearing too much out of place first run through although the guitars felt a little thin in the mid-range and lacking presence.
Here’s an A-B of a short snip of your track with a 2db gentle bump at 1600Hz. Obviously just focusing on the rhythm guitars, and how much more they stick out in the mix.
1 - 3 - 6 - original
2 - 4 - 5 - 1600Hz EQ Bump
that is likely the issue. ol 76 is a very fast compressor and not the best on bass when running 100% wet. It will squash the initial hit too quick and the bass may disappear. You want a slow attack compressor on bass or on anything you want standing out in the mix. Or no compression at all if loudness isnt the goal.
Other thing you could try is a quick hack I have seen some pros use. Layer the finished mix in post processing with a separate, crushed and normalized, mono bass track. Treat the rest of the mix like a karaoke track for the bass and re-mix. This approach works to get the bass noticeable, but the rest of the mix can suffer. Ideally you want the compression dialed in right.
nice work