2024 Do Something Challenge- Season One- Week Three

[FuzzyAce]

*****BANDMATE CHALLENGE ENTRY

@megametal7 - pretty guitars
@Iron1 - ugliness, weird things, pain and bass
Morpheus - words of wisdom

Great way to start the morning -- with a bowl of Mega-Iron!

Nicely done!

 

[megametal7]

Been in a weirder mood lately, playing more Blues and whatnot. Even broke out the harmonicas and hacked my way through.

sounds good geez….

 

[Whizzinby]

This is week I honestly wanted to pass. Nothing inspiring happening, but for the sake participation...

This one pissed me off because I didn't realize that the Axe didn't save block libraries so my block settings got lost and I didn't realize it until halfway through tracking. Tempo settings got jacked too. I only stuck with this because I had fun playing the bass on the middle section. I can't play bass, but I tried. lol I added the distorted parts at the end while on a call at work an hour ago lol, totally jacked but I'm not bothering to bounce again.



Here is the other riff I was doing until I realized it's basically "A 40yo buys a 7 string" and bailed. Im much more comfortable in slow depressing music.

 

[FuzzyAce]

This is week I honestly wanted to pass. Nothing inspiring happening, but for the sake participation...

This one pissed me off because I didn't realize that the Axe didn't save block libraries so my block settings got lost and I didn't realize it until halfway through tracking. Tempo settings got jacked too. I only stuck with this because I had fun playing the bass on the middle section. I can't play bass, but I tried. lol I added the distorted parts at the end while on a call at work an hour ago lol, totally jacked but I'm not bothering to bounce again.



Here is the other riff I was doing until I realized it's basically "A 40yo buys a 7 string" and bailed. Im much more comfortable in slow depressing music.

Love the first one. Did the second one cut off early?

 

[PLX]

This is week I honestly wanted to pass. Nothing inspiring happening, but for the sake participation...

This one pissed me off because I didn't realize that the Axe didn't save block libraries so my block settings got lost and I didn't realize it until halfway through tracking. Tempo settings got jacked too. I only stuck with this because I had fun playing the bass on the middle section. I can't play bass, but I tried. lol I added the distorted parts at the end while on a call at work an hour ago lol, totally jacked but I'm not bothering to bounce again.



Here is the other riff I was doing until I realized it's basically "A 40yo buys a 7 string" and bailed. Im much more comfortable in slow depressing music.

What mastering software are you using to get your audio levels up that high ?

 

[Whizzinby]

Love the first one. Did the second one cut off early?

Thanks man.

No that’s the point I bailed on the second one. I was actually going to compile a “Wk3 Medley” of all the riffs and aborted ideas, but given my lack of enthusiasm for anything this week I bailed on that idea too.lol

What mastering software are you using to get your audio levels up that high ?

Ozone 11

 

[DrewJD82]

Friday night I couldn't handle hearing that song from last week one more time, that's the song I learned about demo-itis on originally. I was anxious to start something from scratch, I figure that's the best way to see how well my ears have adjusted to the speakers. But I really wanted to start from scratch, like no presets for any drums or mixing stuff. So I grabbed a chorus idea from the ideas folder and wrote a song around it Fri/Sat and have been fucking with it since.

I set up the Logic session with all the raw drums routed to their own tracks and did up the EQ/compression/reverb in Logic, just using the SSLChannel/CLA/DBX compressors, no presets within the plug-ins, I wanted to treat it as close as I could to being in a studio with a console and a few pieces of outboard gear. This isn't so much an exercise in "Can I make this sound good, but can I make this sound how I want it to sound?"
Same thing with the master bus, just EQ, compression and a limiter without using any presets. Eventually I want to own the hardware versions of this stuff.

There's a lot of scratch guitars on this, I've slowly been tweaking the tones and re-recording parts ot the song to see how the changes I'm making turn out while keeping a 'control' in place.



Question for you all; where does this land on your muffled/bright scale? Not just the guitars, but the mix overall.

I don't want to say which way I'm leaning on it, but I will not find any answers offensive.

That's all the Orville, probably 90% of it is the Jose 6CA7 I made in the AxefX, with a Friedman BE in a few spots.

 

[Whizzinby]

Friday night I couldn't handle hearing that song from last week one more time, that's the song I learned about demo-itis on originally. I was anxious to start something from scratch, I figure that's the best way to see how well my ears have adjusted to the speakers. But I really wanted to start from scratch, like no presets for any drums or mixing stuff. So I grabbed a chorus idea from the ideas folder and wrote a song around it Fri/Sat and have been fucking with it since.

I set up the Logic session with all the raw drums routed to their own tracks and did up the EQ/compression/reverb in Logic, just using the SSLChannel/CLA/DBX compressors, no presets within the plug-ins, I wanted to treat it as close as I could to being in a studio with a console and a few pieces of outboard gear. This isn't so much an exercise in "Can I make this sound good, but can I make this sound how I want it to sound?"
Same thing with the master bus, just EQ, compression and a limiter without using any presets. Eventually I want to own the hardware versions of this stuff.

There's a lot of scratch guitars on this, I've slowly been tweaking the tones and re-recording parts ot the song to see how the changes I'm making turn out while keeping a 'control' in place.



Question for you all; where does this land on your muffled/bright scale? Not just the guitars, but the mix overall.

I don't want to say which way I'm leaning on it, but I will not find any answers offensive.

That's all the Orville, probably 90% of it is the Jose 6CA7 I made in the AxefX, with a Friedman BE in a few spots.

I love your use of the acoustic in the track. Its adds a lot of dimension layered with the grit. Are you actually recording with an acoustic or using a sim?

Killed it dude.

(Never go bright gang checking in lol)

 

[PLX]

Question for you all; where does this land on your muffled/bright scale? Not just the guitars, but the mix overall.

I'd say it falls right in the sweet spot between bright/dark.

Wouldn't change anything.

 

[DrewJD82]

I love your use of the acoustic in the track. Its adds a lot of dimension layered with the grit. Are you actually recording with an acoustic or using a sim?

Killed it dude.

(Never go bright gang checking in lol)

Real life acoustic!

I spent a few minutes finding the best spot I could, pointing a 57 at an angle towards the neck/soundhole, then compressed and EQ'd the shit out of it. It's double tracked in the choruses, with a lightly distorted LP on the in-between position playing the same part also doubled.

I'm also trying to use as little EQ as possible, or as little aggressive EQ moves as I can, by getting the source right before I record them, that definitely does give plug-in amp sims the edge when you've got an instance of them for each track you can tweak on the fly!

 

[T Gobbs]

 

[Iron1]

Here's a new studio track called "Through The Wood". A modern take on synth pop with some heavy guitars.


Gear used in production;
Relish Mary One LTD, PRS CE-24, Gibson Les Paul Standard, Taylor T5z, Fractal Audio FM9, Boss GM-800, Boss SY-1000, Chase Bliss Mood MKII, Meris LVX, Korg MiniKorg 700FS, ExpressiveE Osmose, Waldorf Quantum MKII, Roland JP-8080, Studio Electronics SE-3X, Arturia PolyBrute, UDO Super 6, Arturia EFX Motions, Arturia LX-24, Valhalla Supermassive, Valhalla Delay, Valhalla FreqEcho, Valhalla Shimmer, Minimal Audio Cluster Delay, Logic Pro X Drummer.

Made me wanna go back to MD and run around in the woods like I did when I was a kid. Good stuff!

Awesome as always, but...

This is week I honestly wanted to pass. Nothing inspiring happening, but for the sake participation...

This one pissed me off because I didn't realize that the Axe didn't save block libraries so my block settings got lost and I didn't realize it until halfway through tracking. Tempo settings got jacked too. I only stuck with this because I had fun playing the bass on the middle section. I can't play bass, but I tried. lol I added the distorted parts at the end while on a call at work an hour ago lol, totally jacked but I'm not bothering to bounce again.



Here is the other riff I was doing until I realized it's basically "A 40yo buys a 7 string" and bailed. Im much more comfortable in slow depressing music.

Didn't hear anything wrong with the first one. The second one is all kinds of wrong cause it ends too soon...

Friday night I couldn't handle hearing that song from last week one more time, that's the song I learned about demo-itis on originally. I was anxious to start something from scratch, I figure that's the best way to see how well my ears have adjusted to the speakers. But I really wanted to start from scratch, like no presets for any drums or mixing stuff. So I grabbed a chorus idea from the ideas folder and wrote a song around it Fri/Sat and have been fucking with it since.

I set up the Logic session with all the raw drums routed to their own tracks and did up the EQ/compression/reverb in Logic, just using the SSLChannel/CLA/DBX compressors, no presets within the plug-ins, I wanted to treat it as close as I could to being in a studio with a console and a few pieces of outboard gear. This isn't so much an exercise in "Can I make this sound good, but can I make this sound how I want it to sound?"
Same thing with the master bus, just EQ, compression and a limiter without using any presets. Eventually I want to own the hardware versions of this stuff.

There's a lot of scratch guitars on this, I've slowly been tweaking the tones and re-recording parts ot the song to see how the changes I'm making turn out while keeping a 'control' in place.


Question for you all; where does this land on your muffled/bright scale? Not just the guitars, but the mix overall.

I don't want to say which way I'm leaning on it, but I will not find any answers offensive.

That's all the Orville, probably 90% of it is the Jose 6CA7 I made in the AxefX, with a Friedman BE in a few spots.

Love that odd/aggressive riff around the 75% mark. As to your question, it didn't strike me as muffled or overly bright. It did seem like a noticeable volume drop after just listening to @Whizzinby's tracks, but that's nothing on you.

Man... you just keep knocking it outta the park. This immediately gave me Ahab vibes, then it felt very Mammoth Storm influenced and since those are two of my favorite bands currently, I lamented the inability to "Much Love" this track more than once. Please do more like this again, and again, and again, lather.rinse.repeat.

 

[Whizzinby]

Real life acoustic!

I spent a few minutes finding the best spot I could, pointing a 57 at an angle towards the neck/soundhole, then compressed and EQ'd the shit out of it. It's double tracked in the choruses, with a lightly distorted LP on the in-between position playing the same part also doubled.

I'm also trying to use as little EQ as possible, or as little aggressive EQ moves as I can, by getting the source right before I record them, that definitely does give plug-in amp sims the edge when you've got an instance of them for each track you can tweak on the fly!

You ever use an electric acoustic? I’ve thought about nabbing one so I wouldn’t have to mic anything.

 

[Iron1]

Speaking of electric acoustics, I broke mine out for this:

 

[Iron1]

Since the spirit of this is to push yourself to do something more than your normal, I got struck with the inspiration this morning to do a song from scratch in under 30 minutes. Barely made it - and it shows…

 

[mbenigni]

Since the spirit of this is to push yourself to do something more than your normal, I got struck with the inspiration this morning to do a song from scratch in under 30 minutes. Barely made it - and it shows…

I could probably throw something like this together in 30 hours or so.

 

[Iron1]

I could probably throw something like this together in 30 hours or so.

Well, that means you need to do it 29 hours. Chop Chop!

 

[mbenigni]

Well, that means you need to do it 29 hours. Chop Chop!

Calling my bluff. I'll check back in 30 months LOL.

 

[DrewJD82]

You ever use an electric acoustic? I’ve thought about nabbing one so I wouldn’t have to mic anything.

Yep, my Breedlove has a pickup/Fishman preamp in it. I’ve tried several combinations; just the pickup, both the pickup and mic’d and while the pickup doesn’t sound bad, it has a plastic-y sound to it I’m not a fan of. I DID get some good results using some Tone Matches in the Fractal of some nice acoustics, but it wasn’t enough to keep me going back to them.

I keep a mic on a stand ready to go o it’s just a matter of pulling it down and pointing it at the guitar, maybe spending a couple minutes dicking with the mic placement.

Eventually, I need to get a really nice acoustic. This Breedlove is great for a $550 acoustic, but it’s exactly in recording situations where another $500 would have gone a long way.

 

[JiveTurkey]

This is week I honestly wanted to pass. Nothing inspiring happening, but for the sake participation...

This one pissed me off because I didn't realize that the Axe didn't save block libraries so my block settings got lost and I didn't realize it until halfway through tracking. Tempo settings got jacked too. I only stuck with this because I had fun playing the bass on the middle section. I can't play bass, but I tried. lol I added the distorted parts at the end while on a call at work an hour ago lol, totally jacked but I'm not bothering to bounce again.



Here is the other riff I was doing until I realized it's basically "A 40yo buys a 7 string" and bailed. Im much more comfortable in slow depressing music.

I hope you get the Sade gig Also; some of the best riffs come out right before bedtime

Friday night I couldn't handle hearing that song from last week one more time, that's the song I learned about demo-itis on originally. I was anxious to start something from scratch, I figure that's the best way to see how well my ears have adjusted to the speakers. But I really wanted to start from scratch, like no presets for any drums or mixing stuff. So I grabbed a chorus idea from the ideas folder and wrote a song around it Fri/Sat and have been fucking with it since.

I set up the Logic session with all the raw drums routed to their own tracks and did up the EQ/compression/reverb in Logic, just using the SSLChannel/CLA/DBX compressors, no presets within the plug-ins, I wanted to treat it as close as I could to being in a studio with a console and a few pieces of outboard gear. This isn't so much an exercise in "Can I make this sound good, but can I make this sound how I want it to sound?"
Same thing with the master bus, just EQ, compression and a limiter without using any presets. Eventually I want to own the hardware versions of this stuff.

There's a lot of scratch guitars on this, I've slowly been tweaking the tones and re-recording parts ot the song to see how the changes I'm making turn out while keeping a 'control' in place.



Question for you all; where does this land on your muffled/bright scale? Not just the guitars, but the mix overall.

I don't want to say which way I'm leaning on it, but I will not find any answers offensive.

That's all the Orville, probably 90% of it is the Jose 6CA7 I made in the AxefX, with a Friedman BE in a few spots.

This production is great. I can hear the difference in your change up in monitors!