Pop/Soul/RNB "TheyNeverCouldBelieve"
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This definitely has potential!
There are things that still need work, though. Everything below is my humble opinion, so it may not necessarily be right.
Good: the vibe/groove, the vocal itself. Reminds me of Gorillaz and Lonely London Lad
Work needed: the vocal rhythm and energy remains exactly the same throughout the whole piece, which makes the structure obscure and unmemorable, and the musical arrangement can do little to compensate for this. Try altering the rhythm/energy/pressure in the vocals on the chorus ("never will believe" is the chorus, I assume) to make it stand out more. This will have the biggest impact, I think.
Best of luck, man!
There are things that still need work, though. Everything below is my humble opinion, so it may not necessarily be right.
Good: the vibe/groove, the vocal itself. Reminds me of Gorillaz and Lonely London Lad
Work needed: the vocal rhythm and energy remains exactly the same throughout the whole piece, which makes the structure obscure and unmemorable, and the musical arrangement can do little to compensate for this. Try altering the rhythm/energy/pressure in the vocals on the chorus ("never will believe" is the chorus, I assume) to make it stand out more. This will have the biggest impact, I think.
Best of luck, man!
I do agree this could be improved in a few areas, but there’s a ton of good stuff in here! the music is really well done, and the vocal melody sits well on top of it. nice work!
the first thing that stood out to me was that the mix sounds very bright to my ears. or maybe a better way to put it is, it seems lacking in lows and low-mids, which makes the track a bit less punchy.
I also agree that the vocal delivery could be improved. it seems pretty good overall, but it does sound like the performance could be a bit more dynamic. just kind of push yourself and really get into the performance a little more. I’m not sure if you’re just starting out singing, but I was in exactly the same boat when I first started, and the best “feedback” I ever got (it came in the form of derision) was that my singing lacked confidence—it did—because I was so self conscious it was hard to get past myself and really get into it. I wonder if that might be the case here too—of course, only you can answer that. also, the pitch seems a bit wavery here and there. another thing I’ve found helpful with that has been to use the pitch edit to correct some of that stuff, but more importantly, seeing a visual representation of where the pitch is at as you listen back actually helps you understand where your weaknesses are, and you can improve your ability to sing to pitch as a result, over time. not that I’ve got great pitch now—I don’t—but it’s a lot better than it used to be.
the only other suggestion I’d make is to be aware of the song’s flow and pacing. I found myself toward the end feeling like it had gone on a little too long. that could be down to the arrangement, or it may be a side effect of the vocal stuff I mentioned above, or some combination of the two. to say it another way, a more dynamic vocal performance might make the existing structure work well, but then again, it could be the structure itself that’s making it feel that way. that’s the part about recording music that sucks the most (IMO); getting something REALLY close, and then realizing you might need to change something as fundamental as the song structure. and it’s probably small comfort to know that this particular fun hurdle can crop up no matter how long you’ve been writing music. still happens to me at least once every few songs. and it’s worse for those of us who record physical instruments, because it often means needing to rerecord instruments. no quick MIDI fixes for us, I’m afraid.
but as I said, there’s a ton of good stuff here. I think this definitely has a lot of potential. great job!
the first thing that stood out to me was that the mix sounds very bright to my ears. or maybe a better way to put it is, it seems lacking in lows and low-mids, which makes the track a bit less punchy.
I also agree that the vocal delivery could be improved. it seems pretty good overall, but it does sound like the performance could be a bit more dynamic. just kind of push yourself and really get into the performance a little more. I’m not sure if you’re just starting out singing, but I was in exactly the same boat when I first started, and the best “feedback” I ever got (it came in the form of derision) was that my singing lacked confidence—it did—because I was so self conscious it was hard to get past myself and really get into it. I wonder if that might be the case here too—of course, only you can answer that. also, the pitch seems a bit wavery here and there. another thing I’ve found helpful with that has been to use the pitch edit to correct some of that stuff, but more importantly, seeing a visual representation of where the pitch is at as you listen back actually helps you understand where your weaknesses are, and you can improve your ability to sing to pitch as a result, over time. not that I’ve got great pitch now—I don’t—but it’s a lot better than it used to be.
the only other suggestion I’d make is to be aware of the song’s flow and pacing. I found myself toward the end feeling like it had gone on a little too long. that could be down to the arrangement, or it may be a side effect of the vocal stuff I mentioned above, or some combination of the two. to say it another way, a more dynamic vocal performance might make the existing structure work well, but then again, it could be the structure itself that’s making it feel that way. that’s the part about recording music that sucks the most (IMO); getting something REALLY close, and then realizing you might need to change something as fundamental as the song structure. and it’s probably small comfort to know that this particular fun hurdle can crop up no matter how long you’ve been writing music. still happens to me at least once every few songs. and it’s worse for those of us who record physical instruments, because it often means needing to rerecord instruments. no quick MIDI fixes for us, I’m afraid.
but as I said, there’s a ton of good stuff here. I think this definitely has a lot of potential. great job!
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The_Real_DeanC2000
- Posts: 49
- Joined: 04 Mar 2017
Thanks for the constructive criticism guys. I made a couple changes, sped it up a little bit, took out an unneeded percussion part, tried to tone down the reverb, and also tried to back off on the compression and the limiting. Now I think it sounds better, but it's not perfect.
I'm still learning how to EQ, but mainly right now as you have noticed, it's mainly applying a lot of high pass filtering. I want to learn how to eq better, so that it sounds clear, has the lows and mids, but doesn't sound muffled too, like a blanket is over the speaker.
Does anyone have any recommendations of EQ tutorials that have helped? Thanks.
I'm still learning how to EQ, but mainly right now as you have noticed, it's mainly applying a lot of high pass filtering. I want to learn how to eq better, so that it sounds clear, has the lows and mids, but doesn't sound muffled too, like a blanket is over the speaker.
Does anyone have any recommendations of EQ tutorials that have helped? Thanks.
I recommend just searching on youtube for Produce Like a Pro EQ. he’s got a number of videos on the topic and he’ll never steer you wrong. he’s entertaining to listen to as well.
fwiw, here are some tips that might help...
for me, I’ve found the most important EQ range to be aware of for ensuring there’s clarity (avoiding that muffled sound) is actually going on in the low-mids, from around 200-500 hz or so. that’s always been super tricky for me. I can often get away with carving out a few db (2-6) from several instruments in that range, in busy sections of a song, which usually helps clear things up. as with any corrective EQ, it’s a good idea to start with a fairly tight Q, and sweep through the frequency range with a substantial boost until you find the frequencies that make it sound the most wrong/muffled, then pull those down a couple of db—you may have to adjust your Q at this point.
high passing is a very good idea, but as with anything in mixing, a little goes a long way. here are my rules of thumb for high passing:
- for the most crucial parts of the song (vocals and any primary instruments like drums, bass and guitar), set the high pass all the way down and pull it up while listening to it soloed (this goes against what most people say about EQing, but I’ll explain why in a second). as soon as you hear an audible difference in the sound, stop. move the filter back down to a little bit before that. the reason I do this while soloed is, in this case you’re not trying to change the sound of the instrument at all. you’re just trying to remove unneeded information at the very bottom. if you’re doing that while listening to it in context with the whole mix, odds are you won’t hear the sound change until you’ve got the filter set much higher than if you were listening in solo. that’s because all of the other instruments will be confusing your ability to hear what’s going on with just that instrument.
- for secondary instrumentation (maybe backing vocals, sound effects/ear candy, or spicy background parts), you can often get a little more aggressive—here I often push the filter up until it’s changing the character of the sound to a point where it’s just starting to sound unnatural. this is usually quite a bit farther up than using the first method. that’s when I stop and back it down just a little. I do this in soloed mode as well, but since you’re actively sculpting the sound, you can also do it while listening to the whole mix.
- I almost always choose one instrument that I DON’T put a high pass on, and it’s usually either the kick drum or the bass. it varies by song, but the basic gist is, figure out which of the instruments you want to be responsible for the very lowest frequencies, and let it have that job. if the kick is there mainly for a little thump and a lot of click, and the bass is really low, you might leave a high pass off of the bass, and put one on the kick (using the first technique above). if the kick is holding down that low end and the bass is maybe a bit more midrange-y, then leave the kick alone and high pass the bass.
hope that helps, and good luck!
fwiw, here are some tips that might help...
for me, I’ve found the most important EQ range to be aware of for ensuring there’s clarity (avoiding that muffled sound) is actually going on in the low-mids, from around 200-500 hz or so. that’s always been super tricky for me. I can often get away with carving out a few db (2-6) from several instruments in that range, in busy sections of a song, which usually helps clear things up. as with any corrective EQ, it’s a good idea to start with a fairly tight Q, and sweep through the frequency range with a substantial boost until you find the frequencies that make it sound the most wrong/muffled, then pull those down a couple of db—you may have to adjust your Q at this point.
high passing is a very good idea, but as with anything in mixing, a little goes a long way. here are my rules of thumb for high passing:
- for the most crucial parts of the song (vocals and any primary instruments like drums, bass and guitar), set the high pass all the way down and pull it up while listening to it soloed (this goes against what most people say about EQing, but I’ll explain why in a second). as soon as you hear an audible difference in the sound, stop. move the filter back down to a little bit before that. the reason I do this while soloed is, in this case you’re not trying to change the sound of the instrument at all. you’re just trying to remove unneeded information at the very bottom. if you’re doing that while listening to it in context with the whole mix, odds are you won’t hear the sound change until you’ve got the filter set much higher than if you were listening in solo. that’s because all of the other instruments will be confusing your ability to hear what’s going on with just that instrument.
- for secondary instrumentation (maybe backing vocals, sound effects/ear candy, or spicy background parts), you can often get a little more aggressive—here I often push the filter up until it’s changing the character of the sound to a point where it’s just starting to sound unnatural. this is usually quite a bit farther up than using the first method. that’s when I stop and back it down just a little. I do this in soloed mode as well, but since you’re actively sculpting the sound, you can also do it while listening to the whole mix.
- I almost always choose one instrument that I DON’T put a high pass on, and it’s usually either the kick drum or the bass. it varies by song, but the basic gist is, figure out which of the instruments you want to be responsible for the very lowest frequencies, and let it have that job. if the kick is there mainly for a little thump and a lot of click, and the bass is really low, you might leave a high pass off of the bass, and put one on the kick (using the first technique above). if the kick is holding down that low end and the bass is maybe a bit more midrange-y, then leave the kick alone and high pass the bass.
hope that helps, and good luck!
It is a catchy, humble little pop-song. Sounds a bit 80's flavored. The acoustic guitars work well too. The singing is a bit off here n there but still worked well for me. Not bad at all!
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