Many thanks for the helpful ideas on this one! Absolutely great forum!
 
Lower voice lowered so the vocal is less weird.  Snare lowered, drums panned, sparkly bits brought out more. All good suggestions!
 
Any comments are very welcome, particularly if you help me mix it better!
    it's the first one in the player on the right side . . .
http://www.songsbytom.com  
 
thanks,
-Tom

Different sort of material – very original (Bruce Hornsby meets David Byrne?).
Nice groove – bass and drums establish a relaxed yet bubbly pace. Piano sounds are really clean and clear – no over-playing, very tasteful. The strings drive the rhythm as well. The chord changes are what make this so good to listen to.
There is one instrument that comes in around :51 – not sure what it is but I like it – the little melody works really well.
Vocal treatment is unusual – melodyne? Simple, direct lyrics - almost childlike in a way. It works, whatever it is.
It’s not Hey Jude, but I like it.

I cannot help mix it better it was fine as is. Or perhaps the bass was too loud. Probably not. The song was very nice IMO. Just about perfect pop song.

Very nice Tom! I really like the instrumentation you chose for this. My only crit would be that the vocals sound like they are coming from a tunnel. I'd like to hear them more up front (not louder, if you know what I mean). The bass is right in my head, along with the strings and the horn (duduk?), so the vocals just sound too separated from everything else. I'd say this song is well worth investing more time in...
 
Regards,
Dan

Really like this. I also think the vocals are sitting a little strange in the mix. Everything else seems great.

thanks a bunch for the ideas and comments!
 
Manny - thanks much! That instrument at :51 is a sampled Kontakt version of an Armenian Duduk! It's one of my favorites, from Ilya Efimov. Thanks for the nice comments on the piano - if you want to hear some overplaying, just listen to any of my other tunes! :) and speaking of that, thanks for the "not Hey Jude" reference! Much obliged!
 
Kakku - thanks, and the bass being loud is something I'm getting more paranoid about, because bass is probably my favorite tone in the pallette, and I apparently like it louder than most people. I'm going to go back and re-mix some of my posted songs specifically to bring the bass down to a level more people can appreciate. Thanks for the thoughts!
 
Dan - thanks, and yes the vocals! As the vocals are the experiment here (for me) I'll say I was replicating a trick (or TRYING to replicate) the Steve Miller thing where he sings the line an octave apart and then blends it together. I'll try to bring it out of the tunnel before it collapses in on me! I very much respect your ears, so thanks for the heads up . . .
 
Slumbermachine - thanks, I'll keep chipping away to make it even better!
 
 
cheers,
-Tom
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Excellent Tom - I really like this - it is really free flowing and is totally unpredictable. Love the voice and ll of the ear candy.
Mix-wise, my only crit would be that the main drums start off very narrow which is great to build tension but it would be great if they were set free around the middle of the song and opened up in the stereo field.
Going back for another listen - great stuff.

Hi Tom.  Very nice song indeed!  It has a very laid back groove but has a tempo that really keeps it moving along.  I don't have much to add to the above comments.  Actually, you must have improved the bass I because I don't notice it as being intrusive.  It is probably the cheap system that I listen on but to me the bass foot pedal (drums) sounded a bit strong compared to the rest of the percussion.  However, as I said that is probably an artifact of my system.
 
Excellent number and well done!

Daryl1968 - great idea on the drums, I'll open them up a bit. That's actually something I fail to attend to, it's easy to focus on melodic things and just have the drums kind of be there. Thanks for the idea.
 
Freddy - many thanks, glad it's workin' for ya!
 
cheers,
-Tom
 
 

Very sweet sounding track Tom. Not my cuppa musical tea (a bit too Coldplay for me), but I appreciate the work that has gone into mixing and arranging this. Piano sounds beautiful, and reminded me of the 'Hill St Blues' theme towards the end