Give Me A Chance

New Song. Here is some of the background on it. 

It is written for a local pregnancy center that helps young girls who find themselves in difficult situations.

The lyrics are by Pat Bishop and Herb Hartley.

The band is the upper room studio band.

There are a  few firsts on this song.

1. I upgraded from MC4 to X1 and this is the first song that rolled off the new DAW. Tracking started on MC4 and was finished on X1.

2. I bought a mandolin recently, and I am playing it pretty much straight through on this song. (one take)

3. I recorded a singer other than me. The singer is Cassie Helms (16) who is a friend of my daughter. I was told she could sing, and asked her to sing this before I ever heard her actually sing.

4. I recorded a child singing for the first time. The child is my niece, (7) whose mom graciously allowed her daughter, Sydney Bradbury to come and sing in my studio. We actually did her parts in one session of about 30 minutes in length.

Here is the song>  Give Me A Chance

Have a listen and comments are welcome.

Wow, This is great! I love the message and the delivery. The child singing was a very nice touch. The mandolin was perfect as well. Excellent clarity on the mix. Great song.

:-) You'll enjoy that mandolin :-D I LOVE playing the mando! Such a cool instrument... A mandolin is a violin with frets you know? Try it without the frets... You won't be able to understand how someone like Scott Campbell can do what he does? 

That little girlie can sing... She will be quite a singer one day soon. I would mix her up just a bit higher/maybe compress her a little more?

I didn't care so much for that little kid singing? But I understand where you were going with the song. Good job overall.

Any song with a good ol' Helms singer can't be bad! 


Tell cuz i like her voice.

Nice song Herb, very touching.

O dis agree with the Child vocal comments. It is not important that she is not a polished singer, but that the vocal from the 7 year old was touching, and powerful in the way of sensibility.

Thanks for all the good comments all .... the child is singing slightly different lyrics in her version of the chorus. That changes the perspective from the mom's POV to the unborn child's POV.

That's nice Herb, Cassie will be a good singer in time. She's obviously new to recording, but puts in a good performance here. Music backing is excellent, love the fiddle.

The child's voice - I think I get what you're going for, but to be honest, it sounds a little weird to me in context of the subject matter.

Well, to me, and if you want an opinion. Drums are too loud a bit that is all. I think you need a different mic on the singer (or equalization for upper sibilance ) and well, the niece, ah, perhaps, ah, well, either too young or needs a bit improvement for that, or needs to get more experience by doing it over a few times and pointing out how to sing in the song.

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Let the sound patches do it (or the computer in the synth)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKQc_9JdcvE
now on to timing. Warning given with video.
Hey standard about warning given in computer games, just changed to video.

First off, congratz on writing a really great song.  I felt it just had everything going for it.

The performances were excellent (well, maybe a little VVocal on the 7 YO ).  Given that it was written and recorded toward a specific purpose, it makes it's point very dramatically.  And, honestly, I thought the drums were pretty good, and there were some nice fills in there too.

You upgraded to X1???? Sadly, this has too much digital sound in the song, and there is no bottom end on the sound. Just my opinion. I'm talking about "DEPTH IN THE SOUND". Not Crispness. You've always been a great player Herb. And honestly I love the tune, it's great. But you would have been better off to have recorded this using MC4, instead of trying to go for all this clarity stuff. If I wanted to hear a saw I would go out and use one wide open. There's too much brightness in this tune's mixdown, plain and simple that's my opinion. The vocals are pretty good, but because of the clarity you can hear the excess NOISE. Sorry if this upsets you, I"m not out on a mission to GO AFTER HERBS POST. I actually like your music, and what I am saying is while everyone else is kissing your butt to be nice, I'm going to tell ya what I hear. There's too much sharpness in the tone plain and simple. You've got to have a balance in the sound. Sorry to upset you if I do. THe thing is, nobody ever got a chance to hear what my mixes sounded like for the most part, so there's nothing to compare them to. Either way. That is my opinion. I wish you well with your post and enjoyed hearing it, but I'm not gonna lie and say everything's perfect like most everyone else, I am honest. Good Luck!

@SN.... yeah I upgraded to X1.... but the interesting thing is.... I was back & forth between X1 and MC4 during the whole process here. I started in it 4 with a bunch of tracks..... and then loaded X1 and opened it there. I recorded in X1 several of the tracks. Here's the interesting thing.... they are both digital. They both have the same frequency response and they both run the same VST's and FX.  Opening and playing this song in either... everything loads and they both sound identical.  

 I'm OK with the comments from anyone about anything.  I understand there are personal likes and dislikes. I'm good with everything you said up to and including this> Sorry if this upsets you.  What followed that was, shall we say, uncalled for? Attacking the opinions of others who enjoyed the song for what it is. 




@James.... I really like the quality Cassie has in her voice. Working with her was a pleasure. She came in with a willing attitude, did the course corrections I pointed out and we got the tracks.  Like any teen, she focuses on lots of "teen things" but if she really worked on her voice..... she would be freaking amazing. I think, maybe, this song showed her that.  

I bought that mandolin a few months back and had been looking for the song to play it on..... this one seemed to be the right one.... so, since it's not electric, I used the NT-2A on it about 12" out. It sounded pretty good if I do say so myself.  Violin is Real Band.

I think the song does what we wrote it for.  

Nice mando! The violin is 'almost' real sounding. Vocals are well performed. I can tell the little one is related to you...she sings just like you.  The mix is very bright and hissy though.