Dedicated Hardware

Hey guys, just finished my latest track after a brief hiatus... looking for feedback on structure, EQ, balance, etc. I think it's my best work yet.... but I'll let you be the judge.

 

http://soundcloud.com/lienan82/dedicated-hardware

 

Drew

listened, not my cup of tea at all i'm afraid but it's got that Utah Saints kind of vibe which i guess is appealing to a lot of people. the composition is certainly nothing groundbreaking but the track ticks along well and has a good amount of breaks and changes to keep the interest, so i think overall it works well. i could envisage this track (and others like it) being used in commercial applications - sounds like this could be used on a TV show, maybe even a TV show theme tune - perhaps something like junkyard challege - honestly not taking the piss here! i'd happily make some music for a TV show, advert, corporate video, whatever if somebody asked me. just think this tune sounds like it should be played at the start of something about machines, or engineering, that kind of thing....

Edited July 11, 2012 by BCM

I prefer your processed guitars over the unprocessed ones. Especially at the breakdown coming in at around 2:30, it sounds to me they aren't really needed at that spot. Mixing-wise, I think your bass is struggling sometimes; I can tell there's a synth line in there at some points, but I'm having trouble hearing it clearly (maybe it's just my bad monitoring).

 

 

On a side note, Pretty Hate Machine is one of my all time favourites; your drum sounds (especially snare and tambourine) have that very distinct early NIN/Ministry vibe. I don't know if that's a good or bad thing for you.

  On 7/10/2012 at 8:32 PM, BCM said:

listened, not my cup of tea at all i'm afraid but it's got that Utah Saints kind of vibe which i guess is appealing to a lot of people. the composition is certainly nothing groundbreaking but the track ticks along well and has a good amount of breaks and changes to keep the interest, so i think overall it works well. i could envisage this track (and others like it) being used in commercial applications - sounds like this could be used on a TV show, maybe even a TV show theme tune - perhaps something like junkyard challege - honestly not taking the piss here! i'd happily make some music for a TV show, advert, corporate video, whatever if somebody asked me. just think this tune sounds like it should be played at the start of something about machines, or enginnering, that kind of thing....

 

 

Hey, totally fair comments! Honestly I have no idea what I would do with a song like this... I'm not a singer (at least I don't think I am but I have never tried) so really I just make the kind of music I think I would want to listen to but I don't have any vocals in them. I would like to find other musicians to collaborate with someday. Thanks for listening!

  On 7/10/2012 at 8:58 PM, kokeboka said:

I prefer your processed guitars over the unprocessed ones. Especially at the breakdown coming in at around 2:30, it sounds to me they aren't really needed at that spot. Mixing-wise, I think your bass is struggling sometimes; I can tell there's a synth line in there at some points, but I'm having trouble hearing it clearly (maybe it's just my bad monitoring).

 

 

On a side note, Pretty Hate Machine is one of my all time favourites; your drum sounds (especially snare and tambourine) have that very distinct early NIN/Ministry vibe. I don't know if that's a good or bad thing for you.

 

Definitely my biggest influences are 90's industrial like KMFDM, Godflesh, Ministry (Land of Rape and Honey, Pslam 69), Skinny Puppy, NIN, etc. But also more electronic stuff like Aphex, and Porter Robinson. And yes that snare I built up is a mix of two different samples and some processing... and the whole time it was banging along it gave me the same thoughts of Ministry! So that's a good thing, to me.

 

I actually didn't have a bass line, per se - just other sounds that sometimes get into that range. Maybe I should look closer at that and try to fit an actual bass in. Good advice.

 

For guitar, I'm just using PODFarm even thought I have a half-stack (no mics yet). My biggest challenge with guitar is getting that "big" metal/heavy sound. On this song I took two takes, panned each slight left or right, and used different amp and cab settings. I would like to get something more like Fear Factory or PIG if I can learn more about guitar mixing. I should get a bass guitar to at least follow the roots for depth.

 

Appreciate the candor!

I liked the drums. I thought the overall production sounded reasonable to me. Obviously there's more room to max out the bottom end and boost the mids with some mastering I can hear. I guess musically it wasn't totally my bag but it sounds like a decent sort of tune aside from that. I like the heavy guitars oh and yeah props to the drums again. :-)

  On 7/10/2012 at 9:47 PM, 82DMC12 said:

I would like to get something more like Fear Factory or PIG if I can learn more about guitar mixing.

 

Getting a big open guitar sound

comes down mostly to unissons and natural chorusing. Humbucker pickups + mesa boogie distortion (or a good emulation, the POD does this well) + at least 2 different amp settings (one setting focused on the low mids, the other on high mids to help cut through the mix). Cab-wise a 4x10 packs a big punch, though a 1x12 can be surprisingly beefy sometimes. Some 2 to 4 takes of each setting stacked in unisson is usually enough, then you can pan the unissons hard left and right to get that stereo chorusing feeling (it sounds more spatial in comparison to panning out different sounding tones). Quantize the attacks and stops so everything sounds like one huge guitar, and there's your FF sound

Awesome tips! I did quantize all the attacks! Ableton Live makes that easy with warping. Sounds like I'm on the right track but I have to maybe quadruple my efforts! I'll give it a try tonight. Props!

the first time the guitar comes in, and afterwards halfway through, the panning left to right was very distracting to me. the track moves though, and the chugging guitars work well. if anything i'd beef up the 'main' drums a little bit, mix-wise.

Thanks guys, here is the same track with a few more tweaks -

 

http://soundcloud.com/lienan82/dedicated-hardware

 

AND... as a bonus I did a remix of it this week - Desoldered Mix

 

http://soundcloud.com/lienan82/dedicated-hardware-de-soldered

 

Can't decide which one I like better right now.