'Rocket' vs garageband

[rharv]

We posted this mix on garageband and got some surprising comments, so I wanted to post it here and see if the same comments came out. It's a remix of one of simpletonguru's songs and is pretty much a straight ahead rock piece.
 We recorded this one at Barry's studio with live drums and all.
 Anyway- here it is and thanks in advance for any constructive criticisms..
Rocket

[elwoodblues1969]

Rharv,

A raw,tense & andrenaline-charged piece with nice  changes,strong power chords & sweet choruses....reminds me of early Rush tunes back in the day...a very fun song.

I give it two thumbs up & five stars.

Cheers,

Elwood

[kara]

+1
and a 5 stars + to your bassplayer
that guy is a walking metronome and realy knows what is expected from a bass player in a rock song.
you better make sure you don't loose him

k

Rharv,

A raw,tense & andrenaline-charged piece with nice  changes,strong power chords & sweet choruses....reminds me of early Rush tunes back in the day...a very fun song.

I give it two thumbs up & five stars.

Cheers,

Elwood

[Fred S]

A raw,tense & andrenaline-charged piece with nice  changes,strong power chords & sweet choruses. I give it two thumbs up & five stars.

Yeah....it's alright...I guess...if you like that sort of thing 

Actually, it works very well for me. Fits my musical tastes; well crafted and edgy. Love the transitions. Great live sound. Yeah, I'm envious.

Anyway, so what was surprising about the comments at garage band?? Inquiring minds need to know.

[rharv]

A couple examples- more than one person commented on the lead vocals needing tuning (?!?)

 A couple different people commented that the chorus seemed to have less energy than the verses..

Another that was said more than once was that the drums needed compression..(Some of the drum tracks have it, others don't)

  Just wondering if the vocal comment would come out here, or if the chorus was indeed too soft.  Maybe I should have held the verse back a little so the chorus jumped out at ya more.

Also looking for any other tips.

Kara, that bass player follows me around like a shadow. 

[Fred S]

  Just wondering if the vocal comment would come out here, or if the chorus was indeed too soft. 

IMO, the vocal comments are a little picky. The chorus seemed fine to me. Didn't give it a thought as I assumed it was part of the comp. The drums sound good to me.

Never spent any time at GB, so I've no idea re the apptitude of the commentors.

[rharv]

Since it's a 'review' site I think they try to find things to criticize. Not that we don't have things that need improvement, but  these few things didn't jump out at me and I wanted to make sure I wasn't missing them somehow..
 Barry is *usually* pretty in tune for rock lead vox.
Nothing here jumped out at me or I would have OBtuned it!

I have no idea of the aptitude of the reviewers either, but that's a good point to consider. Maybe they expected a different sound.
Thanks for taking the time, guys.

[Wyatt]

OK..I read the reviews.. someone makes a comment and then that can become suggestive to subsequent posters..not uncommon to get multiple instances.

..some people have a certain sound they are expecting and that isn't really objective...there can be a point of diminishing returns on critique from unknown sources.


Wyatt

[kara]

ok, i want to add a couple ideas
- I listened to that song as I listen to a live performance. And it is a great live performance, I actually would love to see it live. I would even love to see a complete concert like this. So, I think from that perspective it is a great track.
Now if you'd ask me this is our next track for a CD, yes I could make some remarks on the production, mixing,... remarks that I'm not sure I would dare to make because I know that you're way better in production then I am, and this is all very subjective.
- The vox... the guy sings and tells a story and believe in the story he tells, which is the most important. To be honnest, it IS a rock song, so who cares if it is 100% on pitch, ever went to a concert of Bruce Springsteen, to just name one example???
Azell here is a professional when it comes to singing and has perfect pitch, I asked here to comment the vox on the song. Conclusion, it is at least 95% on pitch which is above average of most singers. What could give the impression of been slightly out of tune, is the fact the singer has the ability to slide with his voice from one note to another, and this is a quality. Not all people have the ability or experience to do this. It is the difference between singing a B and a A and realy sliding from B to A with the voice.
- And finally some extra comments from me. It is a rock solid rock song. I allready mentioned it, but the drummer and bass are having a ball playing together, you can just hear how much fun they have and this is the base for a good rocksong, it puts the groove in place for the song and you can hear that all other members of the band feel this and are having fun.
This is what music is all about.

What I like about the KM forum here is that most of us listen to a song as listening to performance and appreciate the song as it is performed and don't start picking on details like 'could you compress the drums a bit more'
Just my opinion but I like to defend it 

Now, is this a review or not 
I would love to hear more songs like this here !

k

[Oren]

I suppose, if these people at Garageband are being asked to criticize so a group can improve their production or performance, then "it sounds good to me" might be an inappropriate answer.

The band and their producer are obviously competent. That's the way they wanted the song to sound - it was not an accident. So the Garagebanders have to resort to comments regarding style and taste.

[rharv]

Point taken.  And good points at that.
 I'd still be interested in hearing you comments on mix, etc. Kara.
What we're looking at doing is a promo CD.  Barry is really pushing the promotion side of the project, and investing a bit of money in packaging, etc., so I'm trying to help him put together a good three song promo. Rocket will be on there.  Since Kara said he'd like to hear more I'll put the other songs below. They are by far the most requested songs we have and the ones that have sold the most on iTunes and Napster.
I have Happy Melancholy uploaded already for Barry and Bryan to listen to & comment on, so I can post that one right now.  StoneSourSundayMother I'll post in a little while.  We think that one is really close to being done, but I'm wary of Happy Melancholy; it is such a strong song that I think it deserves rerecording. However the guys feel it will lose the sound and feel that ties it with the others. (I know there's some mic noise I need to cut at the beginning, this ones just 'close', not done)
HappyMelancholy

[kara]

Just a question Rharv
Is that a promo CD to get live gigs, or a promo CD for an upcomming CD ?

k

[rharv]

It's a promo CD for the recent CD ('Burn'). We've heard and read that it's better to send a three song promo package than to send a complete CD to record companies,radio stations, venues, etc. and these three songs, while being our best three also show a variety.
 Barry has done the 'take the DJ breakfast' thing, along with the original promo package that included the whole CD, and while it got us airplay they also suggested a smaller promo CD would compel them to listen to it better, rather than just skim through the first few seconds of each song and make a decision...
 Like I said; Barry has turned into the salesman, which is great, because that's what a lot of bands lack. He's also purchased nice parchment envelopes with artistic croppings on them and redone the artwork of the band and the flyers included in the package, etc.
 
Third song is here-
StoneSourSundayMother

[folderol]

Well this isn't of music isn't really my thing but I thought I'd comment from a 'casual lisetener' point of view.

Both of these tracks seem fine to me. I noticed a couple of 'slips' in the first track, but that was only after having had my attention drawn to the idea of possible faults by you! I would imagine your target audience would either not notice, or regard it as part of the work.

The second track you put up was spot on, and I really think that anyone criticising this would be doing so simply for the sake of having something to say.

I can't help thinking that you're falling into the trap of trying to make the music perfect - there is no such thing!

[Martin E]

Nice songs guys.

I understand that these are all live recordings. So obviously it would be very hard to get things perfect. The vocalist might be slightly off key in certain phrases. Well, who cares. Did you ever hear Mick Jagger sing live. Need I say more.

Rocket is a solid rock song. Only thing I'm not too crazy about is the snare in this one. It's too thin sounding. When the song needs a larger sounding snare IMHO.

Happy Melancholy is a very nice song. Really like this one. One thing bothers me in this one though and that seems to be the lack of any stereospread in the recording. If you can fix that it would really make the song shine.

Stone Sour Sunday Mother is another solid effort. Again the snare sound isn't really cracking it in this one. And I would eq the piano a bit. It has an obtrusive mid low sound.

Just some nitpicking on my side.

All in all three good songs.