Here we go ladies and gents, my very first hello.cover version 1. From Greg Johnsons world through my fingers and vocal chords it makes its debut to the internets. I am likeing how this is turning out so far.. Going for that jovial, almost I’m From Barcelona type sound, which I think i’m hitting? Keep in mind I havent done any proper mixing yet, but here it is in it’s unfinished glory. Now with backing female vocals by Sue Burrington!
Let me know…
This is a great start.. I think you could build in the middle a bit into something orchestrally large w\ some bells\xylophone\synth strings. Also build some drums louder make and make it more of a singalong in the middle so it really does recall that I’m From Barcelona\Polyphonic Spree happy happy way too many people in the band choral feel. Is your midi controller really dead?
Vocals sound good, but could also build into something more from your throat and stomach…dont sing so restrained at the end of the chorus because this is obviously the peak. And well done SUE!
All good suggestions.. I plan on adding more too it .. MORE MORE!!
I wasn’t trying to be harsh… just hoping to help shape it and make it complete sounding. I think the more I listen to this, you should consider adding more voices at the end choruses each time it goes around for another pass with “all my friends”… start doing some new tracks.. try doubling up parts but putting in different levels of each channel… one thing your mix could need is better separation in the channels. Also try doubling or tripling up your handclaps and adding a bit of echo on it to make them sound less flat.
Like I said, good start but youre almost there!
Oh I didnt take your comment as being harsh.. I agree with you .. this is still in mid stages, and I plan on adding some more vocals (harmonies) ..
Good Idea on the hand claps, I was also going to experiment with some snare hits but I couldnt get a sound out that I liked last night but I plan on trying again this weekend.
I was considering getting a few other friends over here to sing on it .. no wait.. would you be able to do a track (or two) of the chorus at the end? I think the more different voices I have the better it will get that sound I am going for.
Maybe even greg would be able to sing me up a chorus as well? I think if I start asking outside friend to sing it will just take a long time to get out of them what I want where as using seasoned singers (like yourself) it could be done in no time flat!
How long did it take to get a solid take with Sue? Was it more getting over her singing flat or timing or finding the right harmony line for her to sing? Or simply just coercing her into doing it in the first place? How many ruffies did it take? Or more likely, how many dishes did you promise to wash in exchange for roughly 32 measures of singing? What is the exchange rate of notes to dishes?
I will definitely sing a few lines on it if you like. Ill go off the mp3 you sent and send you a few tracks.
Great.. It actually was pretty easy to get her to sing.. I let her listen to the song, and told her what line to try and follow, then I left the room for about 15mins and she laid it down. I’ll probably get her to do more this weekend.
It will be nice to have in house female vocals on call.
Do you know how many takes she did? Did she like singing?
Not sure on exact take count ( as I was in the other room, and showed her how to record, delete rewind etc) but I think the whole process took about 20 mins to get that take.
I think she enjoyed it.. although a bit nervous hearing singing on tape at first ( who isnt? ) I know I am just now getting over that fear of hearing myself sing.
its hard to find your voice i think. harder to have the confidence to sing and breathe from your lungs and stomach and not just short breaths in your mouth…we all sound a bit hesitant in our recording voices but id imagine if we were all in the car our voices would so very different.
more interesting is that you so easily taught her to record, rewind, delete etc…
did you record directly into Live or into Garageband and then dump into Live? What sort of mastering presets or effects are you adding (if at all) to your voice?
Directly to live, I set her up with a track to record on , added the Reverb effect, and showed her how to highlight and delete what she recorded.
I sometimes use the “Male Vocal” or “Backing Vocal’ preset in Live.. just play around with it until I am happy with the sound.
I find that recording directly into live …esp. with vocals is sometimes pretty quiet and hard to hear in my headphones…I wonder if its my other tracks being to loud or my interface. Then when I export tracks are noticeably quieter than cd quality (probably b\c I’m pulling the volumes down) Have you noticed something similar?
Hmm, not really.. I feel like my vocals sound much better through Live than through Gband..
You might not have the input set high enough, or your rocking instrument tracks are too hot.
I feel like my inputs are high enough, I’m just not sure why tracks seem quiet…I might be normalizing too low…do you know if you can set your peaks for normalization? Didn’t you say that your tracks sound quiet when you export from Live?
I thought past ones did.. but this one seems ok.
Excellent forum with fantastic references and reading…. well done indeed…
Congratulations!