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HybridZ

New song. Give it a listen.


Mauisnow13

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Gotta wonder why you're asking car guys about your song... You can't really say everything is you, cause the electronic drumbeat isn't really you. Unless that's a real kit, it would sound funny, and I'd have to remove my foot from my mouth. Honest opnion: It's boring. Also, you really need to be stronger with your voice. don't whisper it, you'll get such better clarity and power if you sing louder, then just mix it down how you want. It just sounded weak to me, I imagine it does a pretty good job of wooing girls though. I just play drums and do a little bit of vocals, so if you disagree with me just don't take to heart what I said.

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... 21 shells?!?!?! I thought it sounded ovation ish. The whole round plastic back thing has a pretty unique sound. How old is the yamaha? And do you know what kind it is? I'm not trying to be mean to you, you're way more talented than I am for sure, I was just trying to give constructive criticism.

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I understand. I get the voice thing a lot. I haven't been singing for long, and my mics don't pick up my sound very well either.

 

It has 21 pieces total. including cymbals. As for shells, I have 8 toms, two bass drums, two snares (only use one) then a bunch of cymbals and accessories.

 

 

The Yamaha is a CB-700. The snare off that set is the real prize though. It's an OLD Ludwig. From back when they used to only make snares. It's about to fall apart. I swear I'll pick it up and it'll turn to dust one of these days.......

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Cool man. WHen you count pieces of your drumset you count main snare, toms and i guess if you have 2 bass drums that's cool too. But your second snare is a breakable along with all your chinas and splash cymbals and cowbells and whatnot. I'll have my guitarist listen to it now, and then he can bash you too :-P

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my guitarist/vocalist says: song is slurred too much together with vocal melodies and changes. Maybe spice up the chorus with some more flashy vocals or guitar riffs to give the audience something to remember.

What do you mean going out nationally?

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As a musician, I'd be looking for honest but helpful critisism, so here I go.

 

Too short, even for radio. The intro is long for the length of the song, could probably due without at least 2 bars of the intro.

 

Dynamics are too flat. Some well done strings in the background could really help elevate the crescendo a bit.

 

The Drums fading in seems weak. I'd try to main a definitive POINT that the drums enter, and it might require a fill of some sort. It might help to use some light cymbol work earlier on in the song.

 

The song fading out is another weak point imo. Though 80% of the time I don't choose a fade out for a song. Fade outs are over used this day in age, and a bit teenybopish to me. I usually just avoid them. To me they show lack of creativity. I'm sure you can come up with a good way to end the song.

 

The vocals. I'm not gonna say you did anything wrong here. I actually understand what you're going for and thought you did quite well. But the vocals are DEFINATELY too quite in the mix. You might need to record a few more vocal tracks and play with stereo fielding so they don't dominate too much as you increase their presence.

 

You're going to need some compression on those vocals too. Sounds like you used a dynamic mic on the vocals and you're getting some proximity effect breathe pops. Either get a better screen and stay farther away from the mic (a consistant 3 inches with a good screen is good for a shure SM58 in my experience), or you can get a good condenser mic.

 

Song could use some more variety. Either a better defined chorus, or a bridge.

 

 

Now, with all that said.

 

 

I like it.

 

I think you have something to work on, but you can't just lay a foundation and call it a song. You have a good idea that can really go somewhere, but it's just a skeleton right now. You need to add some meat and flesh before calling it done. The midi drums are... well... midi. Get some real drums recorded if you can. Let the song breathe a little bit, get the mix a bit tighter and you can have something that actualy has a shot at some good radio play.

 

It's definately pop enough of a sound that it could make radio, but the quality really is gonna need to be stepped up if you want it to stay there.

 

Hope this helps ya.

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I totally agree with Gollum(?). The average intro is supposed to be like 17-20 seconds max, so I've heard from some studio guys... But I wouldn't say it's too short, it was like 3:30 right? That's about the norm (not that that's good or bad), but it's easier for radio play that way.

I really hope you're not just feeling beat down, I know I'm just trying to help out and that's what Gollum(?) said too.

Seriously though, what do you mean going nationally? Are you gonna slap it on your myspace and call that national? I'm really confused.

Gollum(?), what do you do as a musician?

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The song started fading out at 2:40, that's on par with an MXPX punk song.

 

A slower, low key song needs time to breathe and develop. I agree though, 3:30 is fine for a radio song.

 

But like I said before, don't feel bad, I had good things to say too. I'm just being brutally honest hoping you can take it. If you can learn to take critisism and learn the difference between help and opinion, then you can truly grow from what others say.

 

Another good note I forgot to mention...

 

I love that you've actually got GOOD stereo imaging. Your stereo work is much better than most of what you hear from individual's projects online these days.

 

 

As to the question about myself:

 

I grew up in a very musical family, and even in my extended family I have about 40+ cousins and I'd say 90% of them played some instrument for at least 3+ years, some of them becomming pretty dedicated musicians.

 

Example:

http://www.myspace.com/shobeemusic

 

 

I first picked up a guitar when I was probably around 10, and learned a D chord... I learned a few chords here and there from my brother, but never really thought "hey, I can do this, this is fun". It was more like "hmm, this doesn't seem hard, I should try to remember these chords". I played flute for a good solid 7 years during grade school and became pretty decent, as far as grade school bands went. I'd met a couple flautists who thought I really had a chance in the future of the instrument, but sadly when I started homeschooling I dropped the instrument completely. My female flute counterpart when on to get a full musical scholorship for her flute playing, and our competition with each other was probably what drove both of us to exceptional hights for our age (who wants to be bested by a girl in grade school?!).

 

But at age 16 I picked up the guitar for real. I learned stairway to heaven (i know... typical) in one day. It was about 8 in the morning and I'd printed up the tabs to the song I'd found online. I was playing it on my brother's ibanez RG and as he left for work he said "what's that" and I said "stairway to heaven" and he kinda chucked and said "good luck, needs some work though, couldn't even tell". When he got home I played through the whole song (minus solo) and he was pretty emotional (mad, upset, ready to tear my head off...)

 

How I finished homeschooling high school while keeping up this guitar addiction is a mystery unto itself, but I did, and did well. Decided I didn't really want to go to college yet, and I've kinda been floating since.

 

I've been part of a couple band projects, and play every sunday at church. I've played for probably around 20-25 churches here in the bay area and can never find enough time to play with the various worship leaders I've met along the years.

 

One of my good friends is a graduate of Expressions school of the media arts in emeryville, ca. He has a bachalor's degree in sound engineering so I tend to pick his brain for all sorts of stuff. I'd been dabbling in sound engineering since before I even started playing guitar, so I've had quite a bit of time to work on those skills and learn what I could from my friend.

 

I'd link you to some stuff, but most of it is either old, or very poorly done. I guess I can link a youtube vid. It's nothing serious, it's something I put together for a guitar recital some time ago now (probably about 2 years ago). I recorded it for youtube just to test out the waters and see what it took in the realm of video editing to put something on youtube that looked good and didn't get out of sync.

 

http://youtube.com/watch?v=CzeEKjmq0zc

 

Man my hair looked nasty... glad I stopped using gel/mousse. Blaa.

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Ya, Definitely need to add some stuff. Like I said, it's a work in progress. I have my stuff published on compilation CD's that are sent to stores, musicians, and put online. I try to get at least decent stuff. My last one wasn't that great in my opinion. But, they said they wanted it so I was like ok......

 

I have some condenser mics, but they have been picking up a very bass like tone throughout the entire song. They aren't very high end. I'm kinda lacking on money.......If I had more, I'd get everything professionally done and it'd be a bit better.

 

Thanks for all of the input. I can post another that I think you guys might like more. More of a chorus, and a bit better singing on my part I think.

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I can post another that I think you guys might like more. More of a chorus, and a bit better singing on my part I think.

 

I'll be looking forward to it. Hopefully I don't miss it as I tend to not check the non-tech section on a daily basis, and stuff gets by me. If you start a new thread and I don't respond PM me if you remember.

 

 

YOU ROCK GOLLUM!!! That is a teriffic talent you have.

Amazing the allure of the Z into so many generations and attrabutes!

 

I have a sickness called passion. I'm overly passionate about pretty much anything I do. It's a good quality about myself, but it means that things that aren't important many times get left in the dust. I'm not the more organized person, and it takes much dedication to even appear half organized.

 

(sorry for the off topic discussion)

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