My First Posted Tune

I'm a performing songwriter, currently working on my 7th album of original tunes, all recorded by me at my home studio. I write mostly alt.country, folk, Celtic flavored story songs. I've never had any formal training in the recording field, as evidenced by my first three albums, all of which will be remixed/mastered when I need to get more copies.

During the past 18 months, I've been making a real effort to spend a good deal of time learning how to improve my techniques, and move toward a big-studio quality. Thanks to forums, both here and elsewhere, along with some books, I think I'm making some headway.

Considering that most of you are likely miles beyond my capabilities, I would appreciate any/all critique you can throw my way. Too much of this..Too little of that....  Thanks in advance for your help:)

This song, "The Fenix" was written last year at the time of the Chilean mine collapse.
The Fenix

Nice song Rob.

I appreciate the positive responses!!! From a sound quality aspect, do you think the tune is  approaching studio quality? This is really a concern to me. I know I put out less-than-adequate quality in the first few albums, but I'm hoping I making some progress..
Thanks again!!!!

@ Max.. Thanks for that. Exactly my point. I, as the artist, mixoligist, and masterer thought I did a decent job, but I know that a mixer should never master a song. What I don't know is, where is the song deficient? What would a mastering engineer hear that I didn't? What would he tweak that I didn't? I need to get into a masterer's head:)

woodenmusic,

Very nice.  Well written lyrics and story being told.

My only suggestions here are to apply a bit of reverb to vocals (lead and backing).  Not a lot, just give it a bit more depth as it felt a bit too close.  Additionally, consider dialing in a bit more volume to the bass guitar. It is there, but gets lost at times in the mix.  Clarity and separation of the mix are good.

As for the huge studio stuff, I say don't sweat it.  Make music that YOU are happy with.  If you feel like you want to push your skills, go for it, but in the end it doesn't matter where it was recorded as much as the material/performance itself.

As for the "what would a mastering engineer hear", that is a great question.  We had our latest CD mastered by someone rather than doing it ourselves.  We took the material in and he listened to it and made suggestions on where the material could be tweaked before he got it (adding a touch less reverb on the lead vocal, aligning the snare WAVs to the overhead WAVs for better mono mixes, etc...).  He gave us recommendations on where to set our buss compression and limiting as well.  I'd recommend you work with a good mastering engineer locally (if one is available) and see if he/she would consult at first.  That way you get a feel for what they hear.  In the end, we'll probably go this route for anything we do in the future and it gives fresh ears a crack at the material.  I think it turned out well for our latest CD.

Hope this helps,
Tom

Great writing and a great song.  You've got a great voice, too.  It sounds well-mixed to me, but I'm no expert.  I know I like what I hear though.  :)

OK great song, really great.  You as the mixer know what you want so don't listen too much to the advice about more verb, somtimes dry works and somtimes it doesn't.  Trust yourself, your work is at a quality where you can do that.

As for the master, without putting it through a couple of analysers, I can't give you a precise evaluation but the master is fine for this sort of music.  When it comes to real folk type music less is more but here is a couple of tips.  Use the spectrum analyser and see what is happening with the frequency, if you have too much sub 20-80hz so if there is too much energy and you will see this on the analyser, if the bars in the sub range are constantly hitting the peak, roll of at 40hz using a hi-pass filter but becareful with this type of music it doesn't have too much bass as it is.  Next use a hi-shelf filter and at around 8k boost by about 3db, this should give you some sparkle. 

If you want to get really techy look at the analyser again and see what the predominant frequency is and then keep adding that number with its self so say the tracks predominant (and this is after the 100hz range) is 320hz add that to itself so we end up with 640, we do that again and we end up with 1280, we do that again and we end up with 2560 finally we add 2560 with itself and we end up with 5120.  Any of those points  in terms of frequency and if you use a just a normal bell eq and boost by no more than 3db will give the track it's own life.  What we are doing is looking for the harmonics of the track, so 320hz is harmonic 2, 640 is harmonic 3.  I think you get the picture.

Finally to get the levels right for mastering, use the RMS meters in Sonar, they are suppose to be a couple of DB out but dont worry.  For this kind of music I want to keep the dynamics, so just a bit of light compression, you want the average of this sort of track at around -15db and the average peak to be no more than -12db.  Finally just use a brickwall limiter (set it to .03db) the boost 11 will do just so you have that average I have mentioned perfect.  Then once all this is done go back, use your ear to adjust your EQ settings.

Any questions?  fell free to ask

Peace Ben  

Good job , very interesting tune !

this is very cool!  great song, great writing, great arrangement, mix is really good for this style.  my only suggestion would be to add just a very very small amount of verb to the lead vox - not much, leave it very close up front, but just a little to take off the sharp edge.  love the harmonies - sounds like you did them yourself, tho, so if you're wanting "recording quality" I'd suggest getting someone else to at least add on top of what you have and not do all of it yourself.

I also don't think this needs a "HUGE" sound.  for the genre it's perfect. 

Well, you've already received some great advice here, so I'll just add that I thought it was a great song and story line with a very traditional feel.  The vocals seemd heartfelt, which is (IMO) the most important thing on this type of song.  I personally could have heard the mandolin less prominent in the mix, but that could just be a matter of personal taste.
BTW- Welcome to the Songs Forum