Recent recordings (me just engineering) - couldnt be more different

[MDV]

I thought some of you lot may be interested to hear these (and mercilessly pick them apart :lol:)

This is a local band and mates of mine I just recorded the first track of the demo for. There are no BKs involved, alas. The gear is James' LTD with the 81 bridge into my powerball, ubercab and swamp thang, through an MD421 and my trusty fireface800s front end. Drums are sup 2. Bass is Ross on my schecter DId. Original track, hardcorey type stuff.

http://www.myspace.com/horizonshardcoreband

This is something that I recorded for a young fella whos a scary good guitarist and my mum on vox as a birthday present for the guitarists mum, who has also been my mums friend since school - >90% of the guitars were done in one take, and this guy is 16 - hes the same age as me when I started playing. Makes ya sick! (in a sort of good, gudgingly impressed way) Its a cover/interpretation on joan baez Diamonds and Rust.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3702469/Diamonds%20and%20Rust.mp3

Edit - DL of the hadleys hope to avoid myspaces player. http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3702469/Hadleys%27%20Hope.mp3

[Plexi Ken]

Second track sounds great, you mum's voice is really good and suits the song well. The guitar sounds excellent (lively, not dull) and I agree, that's fantastic playing for a 16 year old  :)

[MDV]

Cheers Ken :) (and thanks on behalf of the others too).

[tomjackson]

I would like them both if your mum sang on them both!

The first track is pretty big sounding, I'm not a fan of the brootalz, I like the guitar but just hate that type of vocal.  But from an engineering point of view I think it sounds pretty accomplished, on my ear-bud headphones at least.

Second track is really nice, it has a nice warm sound but a fair amount of background noise, which I guess adds to the vibe in a way.  Is there a fair amount of compression on this track?

[MDV]

Than' yer vury mush

/elvis voice

I tried to go for an organic and intimate sort of feel on the Diamonds and Rust, like it was being played and sung right there in the room for her, hence reverb, compression, delay, eqing, seperate signals for phase cancellation to enhance the stereo image, and a few other things I've forgotten were used, but all to just bring the song and performances out and take out the 'raw take' sound - I left in  background sounds, rustling of clothes, the occasional fumbled note, fret noise, that sort of thing in the interests of giving it a natural and live feel.  

[dheim]

ok, you want us to be merciless? i'll be.  :twisted:
just because i heard some awesome recording from you and i know what you can do...  :P

1st track: good guitar production, but the overall sound could be thicker, and drums could sound more natural OR more synthetic... maybe, more than sound, the effect is related to programming. they're definitely robot-like, and should sound more... robotic. but this is just a personal idea, the slightly thin sound is less arguable.

2nd track: on this one i'm heavily biased by blackmore's night version (that's perfect in every aspect), and i was about to say that it sounds too raw and "poor". then i read your comment about the intentional rawness, so i'll shut up. i like to hear 85 layers of acoustic guitars, didjeridoos, cellos and such in this kind of tracks but it's really me...
anyway every comparison with MY playing when i was 16 (i too started playing at that age) is too embarassing to be even considered...

the interesting thing is that my skills on acoustic guitar have not improved much since that time...

[dheim]

uh, please take my comment as a constructive criticism, i'm not playing the smartass... i wouldn't even if i were able to do better, which i'm not by the way!

[MDV]

:lol: You swine, you, dheim!

Oh, heres a dropbox of the hadleys hope to a mid-bitrate LAME mp3. Sounds better.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3702469/Hadleys%27%20Hope.mp3

[dheim]

i got it. what sounds wrong in the deathcore song, i mean. i can't hear the bass (and i'm using quite expensive senheiser earphones)!
but i confirm, guitar sound kicks ass!

[MDV]

Hmmm....the bass is there loud (well, not that loud, but;) clear on my Adam A7/sub8 monitor setup, B&W DM602 lounge stereo, senneheiser HD25s, ultrasone pro750s and senn RS140s.

Its blended with the guitars low end, and its in drop A#, so we're talking low here. Theres actually a lot of a system that can get under ~50hz to chew on in the mix;its got a LOW low end. Cranking it on my monitor setup rattles your guts. But the bass is extending the low end of the guitars and filling out the low mids; listen out for it in the deep recesses of the mix.

On the guitar sound; thanks :)