Taking the 910 out for a spin.. It's been about a year since I posted a new tune...

Anyway, took me about a month messing with the setting.. Noticed the 910 came with a lot of bass and setting messed up.. Well, I don't have it right yet but still working on it..

Rock tunes are the most difficult to do on these boards, I thought I'd start from their.. Probably could have done a Latin type tune and pulled it off...

Take a listen if you have the time and if you have any setting suggestions let me know

Tune is Bitter Sea (Just click the play button on the bottom right) http://chipos.com

Thanks for the listen as I begin another CD journey...

BTW/ All 910 on this



[This message has been edited by beachbum (edited 02-20-2010).]

Great job on this one. Good balance between vocals and keyboard. The 910 sounds great, however, you may want to change the EQ of the drums a bit, which would make them a bit hotter and more upfront.

Congratulations,

Gary

Another good tune, Larry.

I agree with the drum EQ comments. You've got to shelve off some of the highs, it's pushing those cymbals WAY to the front. Recording drums to tape is still the gold standard for getting a good recorded drum sound, and one of the consequences of doing this is a slight loss of highs. It warms the drums up, and prevents the highs from the hihats and cymbals masking the highs from your vocals, and other instruments. If you feel that this takes too much highs off the snare (that's pretty crispy, too, but in a nice snappy kind of way), you'll have to make two passes at recording the drums, one for the drums, another one for the cymbals, and just EQ the cymbals a bit softer...

Did you add the cymbal splashes as an overdub, or were they part of the style? If you can dial them back, so much the better.

In my opinion, most of the time, when recording, it's better to turn off any on board EQ and compression in the arranger, and then do it in the computer with higher quality plug-in EQ's and comps. It's a lot to expect as good a sound in a mid-level keyboard. Or even a high end one, to be honest.

The thing about doing rock on an arranger is, if you can, get rid of any lead guitar sounds, and use the real thing. The rhythm patches can be adequate, depending on style, but even they can be helped by doubling with a real guitar, but leads HAVE to be real, IMO.

And I STILL think you get a bit drum fill happy. Let the bass player add some variety and edit the drum fill down to something subtler from time to time, especially in the middle of sections. The problem with arrangers is that the fills are always REAL fills, and often at other than entire section boundaries, a drummer would play more of a pick-up rather than a full fill. That's where a little bass flourish or a little extra on the guitar line can make things interesting, without getting TOO interesting!

Nice to hear more of your stuff, though.... keep on keeping on!

Thanks for the listen..

This is kind of a test.. I had all the levels just right on the 900 so I need to get the 910 the same..

I'll keep tweaking till I get it right, Yes their is to much high end on this..

BTW/ I wanted to keep everything 910, on the final product I'll have one of my gutair buddies lay down a real Guitar track



[This message has been edited by beachbum (edited 02-20-2010).]

It's quite a task to come up with a PERFECT mix inside the arranger, IMO. A lot more convenient, perhaps, but there are SO many things that are difficult to balance against each other. For instance, can you EQ each drum differently inside a kit, or do you have to make a blanket change? Are the frequencies variable enough to dial in each sound correctly?

My workflow with what I record tends to be to get the basic style part as good as it can go, but then I save as an SMF, and then start to play it from my DAW. At which point, I can solo different sounds, even certain drums, and record them as separate track as audio. This allows me MUCH more flexibility with effects, EQ and compression (if it needs it) for each sound individually (not to mention, this is where you can start to vary the fills a bit, make bassline corrections to lead up to chords, etc.). Is it a lot more work? Sure. Is it worth it? IMO, yes...

It's obvious that you heard the cymbals issue already, yourself. But, because of your workflow it must have been more work to correct it than you wanted, and you posted the demo that way anyway. But you never know who's going to listen, and putting your best foot forward, even if it takes longer to produce, is always a good thing...

Arrangers are already a big shortcut to making a decent track. Having been given all that extra time, perhaps you could use some of it to correct what can't be done entirely inside the arranger?

As an additional thought if you wish to proceed along these lines is; EQ the individual drum sounds or sections (Snares, cymbals etc.) and save as a new drum kit or style. (That way you will not need to make multiple passes)
I am not familiar with the capabilities of the key board you mention, (These features may not be available) but it may be worth looking in the edit settings to see if the above can be done.
Apart from that carry on, and follow Diki’s advice.

Bill