Critique on rough mix

[DeafEar]

New guy here trying to expand my knowledge from this small corner of the universe. I have a band in the studio right now that I threw up a few rough dry mixes to track vocals to. I thought this would be a good, slightly naked version of something I'm currently working on.

What I'm interested in knowing, is how I could organize and track better. In other words, from this rough starting point, what seems obvious that I should be doing that I'm not?

A couple notes real quick... The snare at the beginning needs some fixing on a hit or three, and don't bother listening past about three minutes, it goes on forever. This is to make room for a guitar solo and a huge harmony fading chorus thing that they want to do. It'll get faded out epic style.

[Mixerman]

New guy here trying to expand my knowledge from this small corner of the universe. I have a band in the studio right now that I threw up a few rough dry mixes to track vocals to. I thought this would be a good, slightly naked version of something I'm currently working on.

What I'm interested in knowing, is how I could organize and track better. In other words, from this rough starting point, what seems obvious that I should be doing that I'm not?

A couple notes real quick... The snare at the beginning needs some fixing on a hit or three, and don't bother listening past about three minutes, it goes on forever. This is to make room for a guitar solo and a huge harmony fading chorus thing that they want to do. It'll get faded out epic style.

The important thing as a producer, is to supply the singer with a track that he can get inspired by. You want the singer begging you to sing on the track.

As the singer, you've created your own track to sing to. If you feel you can give an inspirtaional performance on this track, then it's fine.

The problem with singing to a 2-track rough mix, is if there is something bothering you about the mix, you can't easily and quickly change it. I'm assuming your taking this home to do some private performances. If that's the ccase, you're better off making stems, which would be under 8 tracks depending on the instrumentation. Bass, stereo drums, guitars l, guitars r, stereo keys, BGs. Obviously, the last two don't apply here, and when I say BGs, I'm refering to the kind of background vocals that are not dependant on the lead, but rather the other way around.

By making stems (and your stems should optimally play back as a mix with the faders at unity), you allow yourself the latitude to make adjustments to the mix while you're recording.

For instance, there is a recurring guitar note that is considerably out of tune. This note, might prove problematic during the vocal tracking process. You should have the ability to pull out this note if it is causing you, as the singer, problems with your performance. This would not be an option when singing to a 2-track mix.

Good luck!

Mixerman

[DeafEar]

Mixerman, thanks for the reply. However, I don't think I was clear on what I was asking. This is just a rough mix I put together for the singer of a band that I'm recording to sing to (me being the engineer, and not the singer). My idea was that if I simply gave you guys a rough mix that I had not dramatically altered yet, that you could possibly pinpoint weaknesses in my tracking abilities as an AE. This is the area where I fall tremendously short every time I bring in another band.

[mousdrvr]

Ok I don't much about much but this one I have gotten through my skull. It sounds like the dudes D string is about 4 cents flat
and when he plays the G on it beats like crazy. If you record clean slowly arpeggiated shit like this. Obviously you have to check the tuning first, but don't just check the open strings check all the notes that are really going to ring in the positions in which they will be fretted. Put a scope on each one of those. Sometimes they will not agree with the open tuning, go with the fretted one as that's what you're putting to tape. I don't think it was the instrument in this case, meaning I think the open tuning was flat to begin with, but I have learned to always check the chord or voicing specific tuning.


-mous

[DeafEar]

You know, I've never thought about doing that. Thanks for the insight. I am very adamant about making the players tune after about every two takes, sometimes after every single one. I hear what you're talking about. Do you think it could be an intonation problem? I should get a better tuner and some knowledge about fixing intonations on a guitar.

I'll try tuning like you said, by the chord being played. How do you check it like this for an actual chord progression though?

[archtop]

It seems like it wants a room mic, it feels so close mic'ed,

the begining when there is no cymbals could use more overheads. (for more roominess)

[mousdrvr]

Hey DeafEar,

Ok there are way better axe guys up in here. But I'll continue a bit. Please take only what's useful

Do you think it could be an intonation problem?
Can't tell for sure but I am sure that's not the whole story. What I'm hearing is a major disagreement between the E string 3rd fret and the D string 5th fret. The E String sounds pretty close but I'd have to check. An intonation problem do to a bad set up would show up more evenly than that.


I'll try tuning like you said, by the chord being played. How do you check it like this for an actual chord progression though?

Well you're screwed basically, cause the Math is against you.
The Guitar is an equal tempered instrument and it can't be perfectly in tune ever. So you want the best compromise. Personally this shit breaks my balls, but real players seem to be able to deal with it no problem, I have no idea how. What I do is is get close and then listen through the whole progression, slowly sounding each string seprately. I pick whatever notes feel most important depending on what else is going on in the track and I tune them as close as I can relative to the tonic. In my case it's just tweaking, maybe some of the other cats have a better heuristic.


-mous

[G. Hoffman]

In general, tuning problems come from one of four places. In no particular order; tuning, technique, setup, and strings.

The first one is probably the most annoying, because there is no good answer to it. It also sounds like the problem here, where you are having a fairly specific problem on a particular string. Getting a guitar to really play in tune is a losing battle in most cases, but there are some things to keep in mind. First of all, the best tuner in the world is a well trained human ear. The reason is simple - the ear can listen for what sounds GOOD, instead of what sounds mathematically correct. The biggest problem is that intervals don't quite line up. For instance, if a G is the third in a chord, it needs to be a bit sharper than if it is the fifth in a chord. But of course, on a guitar that is not a simple thing to do. Different people have different solutions to this. Some people just learn to deal with even temperament, and damn the beating thirds. Personally, I like (particularly when recording, but really just in general) to tune to prominent chords in a song. If you have a lot of ringing chords in a song, it is probably best to make your root chord really sound really sweet, and then see if you need to make some adjustments from there. Do not, by the way, be fooled by the various "tuning systems" out there. They are all going to limit your guitars versatility by making some chord voicing sound good, while making other voicing sound decidedly bad. The other part of it is to have everyone in the band make the same adjustments. Basically, though, making things sound really in tune is a process of experimentation.

Technique is also problematic, and the one I (as a builder/repair person) always hate bringing up with people. It's hard to say to someone, "it's not your guitar, it's you." But sometimes, it's the truth. The most common problem is people pushing too hard on tall frets and bending strings out of tune. The RIGHT solution, of course, is to learn how to play with less pressure, but that can be hard to do when you are trying to play aggressive music. Smaller frets can help, but they can be tonally detrimental, and a refret is quite expensive. I like Slippy's idea on that one - use bigger strings. Like, REALLY big. I seem to recall him saying he gets his clients to go up to something like .014 gauge high e strings (presumably this is just for the drop tuned stuff, or at least I hope so - that's not good for the guitar!). While you may not need to go that high, going up a gauge or two can help a lot if you have a guitar player pushing too hard. Of course, this will require them getting the guitar into a shop for a setup.

Setup refers to all the various possible adjustments on the guitar. I've spoken to a lot of AE/producers who not only request, but to all intensive purposes REQUIRE their clients to bring their guitars to a good repair shop for a proper setup prior to any recording season. The number of issues here which can cause problems during a session are numerous, but include buzzing from the neck having too much or too little bow, fret wear, or from the action being too low; intonation problems stemming from a badly adjusted nut (first position notes will be sharp, usually), action too high or badly adjusted saddle placement (progressively sharper notes as you go up the fingerboard), or worn frets (usually this will lead to very specific notes being out of tune because the string is riding on the fret at the wrong point); damaged electronics; etc. All of these things should be taken care of by a good professional setup. After all, that's what we do.

Finally, strings can cause tuning problems out the you-know-what. From the rather unusual problems of bad strings (loose windings, uneven windings, etc., sometime they just are made badly), to very common problems (new strings which are still stretching out), there are a lot of things which can go wrong. The guitar player should use what they are used to, but when people ask me, I tell them that your best bets are to use strings from one of the major manufacturers (D'Addario, GHS, and Ernie Ball, with the first two companies making 90% of the other brands on the market), change them frequently (I have heard of people changing between each take in the studio, but that seems overly extreme to me for most people - every day makes sense to me though), and make sure to stretch them before you need them to be in tune. When I change strings I tune it up, and then I stretch the strings by pulling them a good inch and a half away from the fingerboard and wiggling it around for a few seconds. I repeat this until the guitar stays in tune (usually, I need to stretch them twice before the guitar stays in tune for me).

Obviously, without seeing the guitar I can't say for sure what the problem is, but either the guitar player needs to tune his guitar, or he needs to get it setup better. Or else he needs to get better as a player, but there is only so much you can do there.

Unless you want to hire Aardy to re-record and replace all the parts, of course.


Gabriel

[seagate]

In general, tuning problems come from one of four places. In no particular order; tuning, technique, setup, and strings.
snip


http://www.msc.id.au/private/tmp/AOK.gif

Great post!!!

http://www.msc.id.au/private/tmp/applaudit.gif


A good set up done regularly is so important. Nothing worse than doing the take of a lifetime only to have to dump it cause it's out of tune...

Then again, I'm really not sure why this made onto the track, it's one thing for it happen to us DIYselfers (we get lost in the moment sometimes, well at least I do) but it shouldn't happen with an AE doing the tracking...

[DeafEar]

Here's how that happened, honestly enough.

I looked at the guy and go, "does that sound funny to you?"

and he goes, "sounds like my guitar"

so I say, "check the tuning"

he checked the tuning and said, "see, it's just my guitar"

The visual of the tuner registering fine, and him thinking it sounded good made me think I was temporarily nuts or something...

Like I said, I'm still learning.

[dwoz]

On the topic of the tuning, I offer an anecdote from a carpentry project that I did, where I built a big, elaborate, fancy fireplace mantle/surround that had fluted columns, carved mantles, custom trim galore.

I built it in my shop, and when I got it set up in the room it was HORRIBLY crooked.

of course, it wasn't...the whole room didn't have a single plumb surface or true angle. So my "perfectly" square and accurate piece looked completely WRONG. I had to take it back and split the difference and make it crooked and twisted and skewed. Then it looked FINE.

The operating principle here, is that PERCEPTION IS RELATIVE. If the guitar seems out of tune, no matter what the scope says, it IS out of tune. You'll have to de-tune it to make it in tune.

now, on to the song.

As something to sing to, it gives plenty of pitch cues...its wide open and there's no trouble picking something to focus on and use for the pitch reference.

The issue I have with it is that, in arrangement, and in playing dynamics, there's very little here to give the singer clues about INTENSITY, particularly in the first half. I find, as a singer (yeah, RIGHT!), that if the guide track exagerates the dynamics a bit, (louder high parts and softer low parts), then I am pushed to throw a better treatment of vocal intensity.

I think you'll find with this guide, that the singer will tend to toss out a fairly pedestrian, "middle of the road" vocal performance.

then again, perhaps not!

One other thing I notice, is that most all of the beat subdivisions are "occupied" by something, leaving the singer no place to definitively call his/her own.

dwoz