TGF Do Something Weekly Challenge Week 1 Thread

[SeeD]

Alright I’m dropping my submission for my own sanity. (I CANT HANDLE THE PRESSURE) Straight up overwhelming trying to record something for the first time. Sometimes you remember to tune, sometimes you check levels, sometimes the DAW cooperates. In retrospect I could have spent more time writing but I was a bit hurried to get anything down so I could fight with the DAW, so lots of teenager garage rock and bad play in here. lol Overlook the sh*tty cut-ins riddled throughout the track and my decision to try to do a lead, as a chug-head.




Guitar: Les Paul
Clean: Archtype Plini
Lead: SLO
Rhythm: Fortin Cali
Drums: One Kit Wonder (Metal)
Bass: Big Stack in Logic (Done with my guitar )
Mix: Neutron 4
Master: Ozone 10 Standard


Drew thanks for doing this. I bailed on trying to record anything a couple years ago after cussing the first go round with Logic. Nice to put some of the gear to use.

Cool riff`s, I like the slow mody stuff. Keep up the good work, and thing will get even better!

 

[TSJMajesty]

I'm hoping to demo all the songs I've written using GarageBand on my iPad to limit my ability to get lost tweaking things :)
Plan to add real drums after I finish all the songs and tighten up parts and performances

iPad, GarageBand
AxeFx III Teeerbo
Fender Telecaster & Strat & PRS S2 singlecut all w/ Zexcoils
Fender Jazz Bass w/ Zexcoils
SM7 direct into my AxeFx for vocals - no preamp

Very well-written! I like that. Still tapping my foot. And bobbing my head. And playing the melody on a loop in my mind.

 

[DrewJD82]

I'm hoping to demo all the songs I've written using GarageBand on my iPad to limit my ability to get lost tweaking things :)
Plan to add real drums after I finish all the songs and tighten up parts and performances

iPad, GarageBand
AxeFx III Teeerbo
Fender Telecaster & Strat & PRS S2 singlecut all w/ Zexcoils
Fender Jazz Bass w/ Zexcoils
SM7 direct into my AxeFx for vocals - no preamp

Tight work, man!!! It started off reminding me of Tom Petty’s “Refugee” and went somewhere different, nice! Great tones and that might be the first time I’ve heard of someone using their AxeFX for a mic interface, nice!! Man, with a few production tricks, this could easily be a song on the radio. Chorus is already stuck in my head!

 

[TheTrueZoltan!]

[…]

GZ, that was totally cool! The mix is flawless and I really dig the vibe. Does anyone remember that scene in The Crow where Brandon stands on the roof of a building at night, plays guitar and the sound floats and echoes over the sleeping city (and then he smashes the guitar in despair)? That‘s what came to my mind.

 

[TheTrueZoltan!]

[…]



[…]

You‘re a Whizzard and this was beautiful! Do I hear some Anathema (back when they were still good) and Katatonia influences in there?

 

[TheTrueZoltan!]

[…]

That‘s a very catchy song, Travis! :-) Had to go back a couple of seconds when you sang „any direction“ because my stupid brain understood „I need erection“ at first listen.

 

[Stone]

Alright I’m dropping my submission for my own sanity. (I CANT HANDLE THE PRESSURE) Straight up overwhelming trying to record something for the first time. Sometimes you remember to tune, sometimes you check levels, sometimes the DAW cooperates. In retrospect I could have spent more time writing but I was a bit hurried to get anything down so I could fight with the DAW, so lots of teenager garage rock and bad play in here. lol Overlook the sh*tty cut-ins riddled throughout the track and my decision to try to do a lead, as a chug-head.




Guitar: Les Paul
Clean: Archtype Plini
Lead: SLO
Rhythm: Fortin Cali
Drums: One Kit Wonder (Metal)
Bass: Big Stack in Logic (Done with my guitar )
Mix: Neutron 4
Master: Ozone 10 Standard


Drew thanks for doing this. I bailed on trying to record anything a couple years ago after cussing the first go round with Logic. Nice to put some of the gear to use.

Hot Damn Whizz that was really great
Wow that Neutron 4 suite looks amazing is there anything similar for Windoze ?

 

[Whizzinby]

You‘re a Whizzard and this was beautiful! Do I hear some Anathema (back when they were still good) and Katatonia influences in there?

Thanks dude.
Never heard of those guys, need to check them out.

 

[Whizzinby]

Hot Damn Whizz that was really great
Wow that Neutron 4 suite looks amazing is there anything similar for Windoze ?

Dude Neutron is awesome. I thought the mix would be barely fit for human consumption until I started running Neutron to mix the individual parts, and all I did was let the AI assistant do it. Definitely getting this once the trial ends.

Ozone, I have mixed feelings. I actually think “mastering” it took something away from the mix, but by the point I used it my computer was about to melt from the sheer amount of plugins I had running. (Poor routing) Seems highly thought of, so I’m sure that’s just user error.

Both can run on Windows, or at least I’m pretty sure I saw an option to download for PC.

 

[JiveTurkey]

Dude that is exactly what happened to me on my first mega reply... something like 1000 character limit ffs...

STUPID WEBSITE oh

 

[DrewJD82]

Ozone, I have mixed feelings. I actually think “mastering” it took something away from the mix, but by the point I used it my computer was about to melt from the sheer amount of plugins I had running. (Poor routing) Seems highly thought of, so I’m sure that’s just user error.

This is exactly why I’m not a big fan of mastering plug-ins. They definitely do a quick master really well, but without really learning how to use them and know exactly what they’re doing, they can take a lot away from a mix and even when you do start finding the areas to add the missing stuff back, the overall master starts changing and you’re in a tweak fest.

It’s a pain in the dick when you spent way more time than you should have dialing in a guitar tone, then add the mastering plug-in and it chops off exactly what got you stoked about the guitar tone, but the rest of the master sounds f*cking awesome.

 

[SeeD]

Dude Neutron is awesome. I thought the mix would be barely fit for human consumption until I started running Neutron to mix the individual parts, and all I did was let the AI assistant do it. Definitely getting this once the trial ends.

Ozone, I have mixed feelings. I actually think “mastering” it took something away from the mix, but by the point I used it my computer was about to melt from the sheer amount of plugins I had running. (Poor routing) Seems highly thought of, so I’m sure that’s just user error.

Both can run on Windows, or at least I’m pretty sure I saw an option to download for PC.

Do you use Group tracks?
With this I mean I have 10 ( could have 20 also) Guitar tracks, and the `output of these` go to a Group track I named Guitar Bus, and there I load Neutron 4. So I only use 1 plugin for all the guitar tracks, and I do the same with Bass and Drums

There is a MIX slider ( on the right side, of the modules) on the Ozone ..EQ, COMP, Structure, if you feel like some of them do to much, you can turn these down a bit

 

[JiveTurkey]

I need to check out Neutron apparently. I have Ozone and I like it; but I definitely found using generic mastering presets on my guitars and then NOT having a bass track made my submission thin af. Checking out Neutron won't fix this, obviously; but it's the potential of buying stuff that puts it on my to do list

 

[SeeD]

I have Ozone and I like it

 

[JiveTurkey]

It was free iirc so I couldn't pass it up!

 

[SeeD]

It was free iirc so I couldn't pass it up!

Free? or "free"

 

[JiveTurkey]

Free? or "free"

Free from Sweetwater.

 

[Whizzinby]

This is exactly why I’m not a big fan of mastering plug-ins. They definitely do a quick master really well, but without really learning how to use them and know exactly what they’re doing, they can take a lot away from a mix and even when you do start finding the areas to add the missing stuff back, the overall master starts changing and you’re in a tweak fest.

It’s a pain in the dick when you spent way more time than you should have dialing in a guitar tone, then add the mastering plug-in and it chops off exactly what got you stoked about the guitar tone, but the rest of the master sounds f*cking awesome.

Yeah it definitely made it more cohesive but I think took about 5-10% of the dynamics out, particularly in the riffy parts, but I think the problem was I couldn’t tweak it while demoing the track because my computer was telling me “BACK OFF SPECIAL OLYMPICS BOB ROCK”

What I do like is you can let the AI do it, but then there is an advanced page that shows you the exact modules and signal chain going through them that they are using, so you can go back and either re-tweak each module, or in my case learn the approach being taken, and eventually use that as a launching point to do it yourself. For a klutz like me it’s cool to see the process at least.

 

[Whizzinby]

Do you use Group tracks?
With this I mean I have 10 ( could have 20 also) Guitar tracks, and the `output of these` go to a Group track I named Guitar Bus, and there I load Neutron 4. So I only use 1 plugin for all the guitar tracks, and I do the same with Bass and Drums

There is a MIX slider ( on the right side, of the modules) on the Ozone ..EQ, COMP, Structure, if you feel like some of them do to much, you can turn these down a bit

So I did figure out buses, which is how I used Neutron, but I think a big fail was still using individual guitar plugs on each track, and not using the bus like I did for Neutron. I was probably running 4-5 more plugs than I needed. I actually think I’m going to try reconfiguring it to have the plugs run on the bus too, which will allow me to move the individual parts into more stand alone tracks, so I can do some more level fine tuning. I had to do some really blunt leveling because I was collapsing different sections together to keep the computer running. lol

I think that will also let Ozone run capably, so I can put a little more thought into the mastering.

All part of the process I guess.

 

[SeeD]

It`s using AI, and it can teach you how to do things. If you don`t like it you can tweak it. Super fun to use