So we've been madly working on our first tune, but something was missing. Everything sounds good, good tune, good lyrics, good solo, etc, but it just didn't feel like a "hit". I started a new clean project and John recorded the rhythm track at 90 BPM. It now feels like it's got a chance. The lyrics are about a young woman leaving town and her abusive husband with her 3 girls, and at 80 BPM it seemed a little plodding and there was more time to reflect on the sadness of her situation. At 90 BPM, we are telling a story, sad tho it is, it moves along with the "urgency" of her desire to get as far away as fast as she can.
 
I am new enough at this to think this a real breakthrough for us. Or am I just in noob honeymoon?
 
Sadly the only thing I can move over is the EZD2 drum loop. At least according to my "research".
But, should I open the slow one(project), delete the data from the tracks, rename the project, save as, to be able to keep all the sims, etc.?

When I'm in doubt about tempo or key, I put Pitchwheel on my master bus and play with the pitch and tempo until I find the groove.
Once I find it, I rerecord accordingly or start the project over again in the new tempo or key.

My brother is also a great indicator of tempo, when I send him something to listen to, he always suggests that I speed it up and it usually ends up becoming 10% faster.
Now when I start recording something new, I automatically add 10% to the tempo.

Yeah, we've added the step of starting at whatever bpm John has been playing the tune, and then go up and down 10. Then we tried 5, and that's where we ended up setting the click, 10bpm faster than the original. Not a big deal, but no sense in wasting takes on the wrong bpm!

Would This be of any assistance to you, I have used it, and it works rather well

Truth be told, I was hoping the discussion would be more about how the tempo increase changed the song..........

Charlyg,
 
It's all down to human physiology. Our average heartrate is 60 bpm, so any multiple of (60 or 30) is mentally 'acceptable' and enjoyable. Disco at 120, rave at 180 etc. Just by taking your 80 bpm up to 90 takes it into the realms of a 'multiple' of 60.
 
If a song doesn't have it's groove, try taking the tempo to the closest multiple of 30.

That's weird, because I like tempos like 89, 106 or 114. In fact I deliberately stay away from nice round numbers, and never 120, or fractions/multiples thereof.
 
Actually, thinking about it, that explains a lot LOL!

Since we are clueless, we tried 120. Too fast, didn't even start the recording. At 110, we still couldn't get it. Then 100, and we could at least follow along. We took a time out to change metronome to wood block high and low and a huge bump on vol for beat 1. Then 95, and it still seemed a tad rushed. Set it to 90 and BOOM, everything clicked. We didn't try 85 as 90 felt right. 
 
So what you are saying is, we stumbled into the sweet spot! Coolio....

As I write I always record throwaway riff tracks, arrange them, usually record full or almost full versions (again throwaways) then once the structure is down create single comped clips of the final structure.
 
Once that is all written then I convert all the audio tracks to Groove Clips (rhythm guit parts, bass, maybe some rough lead parts... drums are midi but if I were tracking live drums I'd convert those too). Then play with the tempo to get it right at the speed it needs to be.
 
Then those are the bed tracks and I record the pre-finals/finals around them (of course writing all the fancy froo crap like solos, bass runs, drum freakouts, etc around the new structure/tempo).
 
Things always end up getting bump up a few notches tempo-wise (like maybe 10-15) from the original takes. I am however addicted to speed (the musical kind... not amphetimines... I'm spazzy enough by nature without that crap).
 
;-)