Oct 21 2008
Hey all! It’s been a while (and a hell of a day job ride lol) since I last blogged about anything useful to the home recorders out there, so while I’m awaiting feedback on a mix ‘n master job I’m doing (some rockin’ stuff by the way!), I thought I’d talk about MP3 quality. And point 1 is…MP3 QUALITY SUCKS!!!!
Sep 26 2008
After 17 years and some-odd months, my career at Nortel is over. Okay, it was probably over several years ago but I kept trying to find that “spot” where I fit and could make a difference and get rewarded for it. It hasn’t been the place to have that happen for me, too many criteria I don’t fit in and the place has been going downhill for a long long time.
Sep 03 2008
I joined Taxi in early January 2008. I was pretty sure I wasn’t ready, but at some point you have to go with what you have and get to the show! There’s a lot of piece parts that go into all this, from production to songwriting to the various performances, to matching the song to the listing. Everything has to be just right. I started out by trying some of the songs that already existed, basically to see where I was at and how far I had to go. The critiques came back (along with the songs!) and showed I had a lot of work to do…but also seemed to indicate I could get there. They gave me things to target, and though a bit cryptic at first (just like the listings) I learned to dissect and read them and get some pretty good insight on what to work on. And oddly they seemed to think my vocals and musicianship were good.
Aug 30 2008
We’ve been doing Backing Tracks for about a year now, and it’s been a great experience in understanding exactly what is going on in today’s hits. It’s also allowed us to meet a lot of new people around the globe and be a part of their talent shows, club shows, personal recordings, and fun times with their friends.
Our catalog is not large, but continues to grow. Rather than turn into just another “karaoke factory” on the internet, we decided to focus on putting together the best quality tracks you can find. When you use our Backing Tracks, you sound like you are ”in the band” instead of singing or playing over it.
There’s 2 things we do to separate from the crowd. First, we build each track from the ground up right here at Gator-Studios.com. Second, we don’t hide behind our website, we use it to reach out!
Aug 24 2008
It’s Sunday night in Gatorland, and I’m in the studio working on some old songs. My wife asked me yesterday why I keep rehashing old ones instead of doing new ones…I guess perception is the reality! Personally I’d much rather be writing and recording some new tunes (okay, I snuck in a new acoustic instrumental to get a fix).
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Here’s the scoop. There’s a lot of new songs still in my head, and a fair number that have been born into the world in some form. I’m working on my songwriting using Taxi as my main guide right now, and as the listings and critiques go, so goes me! Taxi is certainly not the only way to get your tunes into the marketplace, but Taxi has more opportunities for me than I can handle at this time. Every 2 weeks I pour through the listings, categorize the listings I’d like to go after, and prioritize them. Most of them never get a submission, due to time contstraints of the ol’ day job and the ol’ night/weekend job here at Gator-Studios.com. As time goes on, hopefully my catalog of songs will get bigger and I’ll be able to submit and write more.
Aug 09 2008
I think back to when I started in this room 3 years ago and the slap echo (when you clap) was unbelievable. And yet I went ahead believing since I was recording direct through a PODxt at the time acoustics didn’t matter.
If you can’t truly hear what a GuitarPort patch sounds like, well, then it does matter. It matters when you choose your tone, it matters when you add other tones, it matters when you add bass, vocals, etc. If you can’t hear what it is really going in, by the time you get to the mix you’re already in a bit of trouble. If you mix in the same environment, it will add up even more. You will make bigger wrong decisions because you have more bad information. And if you try and master it too…
Aug 09 2008
Part 5 is where we’re at. If you want to skip the first 4 parts that’s great, so long as you take what I have to say right now as gospel.
“I WISH I WISH I WISH SOMEBODY WOULD HAVE INSISTED TO ME THAT I START WITH MONITORS AND PROPER ACOUSTIC TREATMENT ON DAY 1.”
Seriously. For something like time that I thought was “free” I wasted a ton of it. Avoiding what I should have started with in the first place.
Aug 08 2008
In part 3 I was using sound reducing ceiling tiles to great effect. I got very busy with projects and they generally did well by me. I went along happily this way for about a year, but found myself getting tired of all these big tiles laying all over the place. I’d put them away when I’d get done with a project but it seemed like they were out almost all year!
I talked to somebody I know in a similar situation one day, and he told me he had just moved to Auralex acoustical tiles. Also he had switched his room around so he was facing the rising ceiling from his mix position. He didn’t give me much detail other than to say the change was amazing. At the time I was planning to join Taxi and start down my songwriting road, which compelled me to look at doing this. So I bought a kit that was way too small to completely do my room right, but enough to get started and see if it made any difference over the other achievements. First I switched the room around to see what impact that had…not too much though it did appear better. Then I went to work on the Auralex tile.
Aug 08 2008
How long can this go on? Hey, this is 3 years of hard-fought history condensed into a few blogs…relax!
In part 2 I had finally come to grips with acoustic treatment. I was addicted to the improvement quest now that I was into “business” and wanted to both get better and reduce the time I was taking. When you’re getting paid a flat fee (as I do), running around to cars, other computers, stereos etc. a bunch of times adds tons of hours…big time.
Again I looked around for ideas on the cheap. I came across one that seemed to make some sense, acoustic ceiling tile. At Lowes I found 10 - 2′x4′ sheets of sound reducing ceiling tile could be had for $35, and a big roll of duct tape for about $4. Including tax I escaped for under $40!
Aug 08 2008
Part of engineering music requires understanding some level of what is happening with sound. Sound waves, sound fields, sound spectrums all play into a successful end result. I have some background in this kind of stuff so it makes sense to me what is happening technically. All the more reason I was pissed that I was turning out crap. So I turned back to my old friend the internet to do some research on where I was going wrong.
I read a lot about properly treating rooms, flat monitors, standing waves, etc. I read up on how commercial studios are constructed. Man there’s a lot of detail people go into! It’s hard to separate the wheat from the chaff sometimes, but reference monitors seemed to be a good place to start. I hunted around the web and found some good consensus on KRK RP5’s as a good “rock” monitor. So I bought a pair. And was unimpressed. These things didn’t make my songs sound amazing, they made them sound like crap! Dull, lifeless, uninspiring. I was disappointed that I shelled out $300 for much ado about nothing.
As it turns out, that was more like what it really sounded like. As I worked on my next song, I had to work much harder to get it to sound good. But when I went ’round the circle of devices (2 cars, theater stereo, “Hello Kitty” boombox, shoqbox, TV, a couple pair of headphones, etc.) things were off, but not nearly as bad. I still had to go around the circle a few times but I ended up with a better result in a bit less time.
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