I wont load for me :(  But from the point of view of going from dark verse to bright chorus,the idea is good...it all depends on what story you are telling !!!

Your voice!!!  You are so lucky to have a voice like that.  As far as the mix goes it sounds a little murky, like everything is not clear sounding and a little muffled.  The best way to fix something like this is to take off all the reverb; see how it sounds then.  Then slowly add back little by little.  If you find it is till murky after the reverb is all taken off you will have to maybe take off everything and start rom scratch, effects wise.  But the song itself is amazing and I seriously love your voice, it is perfect for this music.  Also I would actually do another take or two on the vocals.  A couple parts just sound a tad out of tune.

sven450
Funny story:  You guys are all really awesome in your compliments about the singing.  I, on the other hand, was about to scrap the whole thing because I couldn't get it the way I wanted.  The vocal track on this song is actually the scratch track that I recorded with an sm58 sitting at my computer with the monitors blaring two feet away.
 
Afterwards, I kept trying to re-record the vox with my "real" mic and preamp, and I just couldn't get it.  I ended up just keeping the scratch track and doing a lot of slip editing to get rid of all the bleed from the monitors.  From there it was lots of eq and compression and all that jazz.  Just cracks me up that the BS take of me sitting there in my jammies with a beer in one hand belting in front of the cranked monitors actually is what works in the song.  Weird.
 
BTW, and took the totally disparate advice of everyone, and mainly went with the "if it works don't overthink it" idea.  I did make some little changes to the two choruses to "biggify" them a wee bit.  It is subtle, but just maybe it will help people find those pesky choruses (now easily located at 1:10 and 2:29!!)  
 
https://soundcloud.com/cy...arkness-falling-down-3
 
Thanks again everyone.
 
 

I find it real hard to do "real" takes anymore. Pretty much everything I've done in the last 10 years is scratch tracks. Well, at least from the original inspiration while I'm in the zone.
I blame it on, like you said, listening 100 times. And, time going by. At that point, you're just trying to replicate what is. So, why bother. I try to keep that in mind so to at least have clean tracks to work with.
 
Goes along with the feeling , to me, that once something is recorded, it's dead. It's not alive anymore. Before it's recorded it has vision and hope and possibilities. After, not so much. So, it's good to finish a tune before you hit record.

Get Nirvana vibes from this. Distinct chorus or not, who cares as long as the tune is good? And it is. As pointed out, your vocal is also great and expressive, great for this genre. Put on some vocal harmonies on the chorus parts if you want to put the spotlight on it. It's not too happy either. Funny, I had just the reciprocal problem with this song and still have with chorus dark and merky while the verses were too happy: https://app.box.com/s/sggt67fi7by0bv9mu5wj
 

There was some good useful feedback from the previous posters as well as consensus on the vocal talent. Great example of what a forum can do for you. I was inspired by the positive vibe to give the song a listen and had a slightly different take that may help round out the previous suggestions. 
 
1. There are no rules. Conventional song structures "work" for a reason, but I find my favorite songs (including Beatles) -don't- follow a convention. That  being said, you were looking for some ideas, always a great thing to do. 
 
2. My interpretation of your request was to find a way to create more "contrast" between the "verse" and "chorus". Typically this might be desirable if you are looking to make the song more "interesting" by providing a greater range of "emotional dynamics". (Don't mean to get too academic here, but we're stuck using words.) The "dynamics" can be achieved in the ways previously mentioned (such as make the verse more "versie") Another couple of arrangement options to think about are; 
- change up the instrumentation for verse or chorus to enhance the "contrast". I.e. perhaps some arpeggio guitar lines in a higher register to "lighten" it a bit. Might help to change the rhythm guitar sound, or mix in a cleaner tone track. 
- some shift in the percussion (repeating a good point made before on the high hat)
- consider widening the sonic stage with b/u vox panned wide left and right + delay, etc
 
3. Glad to hear you're finding that performance is trumping gear. Truly the essence of any good song, and a welcome relief from all the gear happy discussions elsewhere. I finally learned that -any- piece of gear is just a tool with a certain sound, and if it works, it works. Marketing can often get in the way of how something actually sounds. Does not matter how much it cost. 
 
It might be interesting to try another song with the same approach. You may be on to something. 
 
4. And then again, you're goal may be to maintain that driving grinding type of groove throughout, in which case you might want to think about working on some variations in the drum grooves. 
 
5. And yes, highlight the vocals. That's the "hook", if you care. 
 
keep at it. 
 

Again want to say thanks to all for commenting.  There is a wealth of info and food for thought in this one thread alone.  
The song in this thread was only the third one I've ever written, and it was the fastest as well.  I wrote the song over two days, then spent a week or so messing with it and recording, then mixed for a couple days (for me the hobbyist that is fast:  family, job, blahblahblah).  I think you can see that speed in the somewhat "thin" structure of the song.  I came up with it, liked it, and did it.  Like Tim said, I tried not to overthink it.  I have the luxury of not having to worry if its catchy, or structured right, or radio friendly or anything--its just for me.  
 
So I'll now try to balance the " who cares as long as it works" with a slightly more rigorous attention to what I'm actually trying to accomplish! Thanks again.
 
 
 
 
 

equality
Get Nirvana vibes from this. Distinct chorus or not, who cares as long as the tune is good? And it is. As pointed out, your vocal is also great and expressive, great for this genre. Put on some vocal harmonies on the chorus parts if you want to put the spotlight on it. It's not too happy either. Funny, I had just the reciprocal problem with this song and still have with chorus dark and merky while the verses were too happy: https://app.box.com/s/sggt67fi7by0bv9mu5wj
 

Cool song, and it is the perfect inverse of my problem!  But for you at least the vocal in the chorus is singing about dark stuff, so it sort of make sense to have the chorus darker, but yeah, big discrepancy there.  Nice solo!

sven450
Again want to say thanks to all for commenting.  There is a wealth of info and food for thought in this one thread alone.  
The song in this thread was only the third one I've ever written, and it was the fastest as well.  I wrote the song over two days, then spent a week or so messing with it and recording, then mixed for a couple days (for me the hobbyist that is fast:  family, job, blahblahblah).  I think you can see that speed in the somewhat "thin" structure of the song.  I came up with it, liked it, and did it.  Like Tim said, I tried not to overthink it.  I have the luxury of not having to worry if its catchy, or structured right, or radio friendly or anything--its just for me.  
 
So I'll now try to balance the " who cares as long as it works" with a slightly more rigorous attention to what I'm actually trying to accomplish! Thanks again.
 
 
 
 
 

that's right, I usually follow my instinct alone. But if I understood your thread title right, you wanted a chorus, an audible chorus for this song - therefore I preferred the advise from James to lower the verse level.That said,the song is just great as it is, I usually like "thin" structures, make it simple, make it three minutes, make it rocking, and I'm happy. And I am!

Yes!  It absolutely works.  No doubt.  This is the best tune I've heard all night (and I just got done fawning all over Batsbrew's Moonshine, you should check that one out if you haven't already). 
 
Man..this song has that off-thing going on in both the verses and chorus, it totally works.  At the last second that chorus has that commercial quality on that line "..what I'm gonna do" and "...falling down around me and you". 
 
Your voice fits very well, and I like the off melodies you're going for all throughout...damn good writing and singing.
 
And now I just listened to Happiness Is A Warm Gun...I'm a John Lennon / Beatles nutcase!  You just did that?  I can't believe I just heard one of my favs from the white album remade like that...wow...you kick ass man.  Totally got my respect. 

Link not working - my soundcloud page plays ok, so not sure what's up there.