subsekt

After a long long break, where I just had no motivation to make music at all... I came up with this.

Firstly, it's not balls out industrial techno, nor is it experimental or innovative I suppose.

Secondly it's an attempt at house.

Thirdly it has two sections of vocals in. The reason being is that I want to inject some message into my music. It's probably terrible, and no-one will listen anyway, but it's a path I try and take now and again. Whether it works or not is a different matter. If they suck, you can let me know.

So you cunts.

All thoughts welcome.

Cool chilled out track, well mixed too, everything sounds clear to me.
Vocals are mixed well, and fit the rest of the track.

Though if you want people to listen to the message, the speech bit might be a bit long to hold the attention. But it's not terrible at all imo.

Just listened to it a little louder, and maybe the bass is eating the kick a little. But that's really the only suggestion I can think of, this thing is smooth AF... And the speech in the breakdown is probably a little more to the point, the message is a bit more obvious which helps keep the attention compared to the intro.

Thanks for the help, and that you listened twice!

I turned down the bass a touch as you suggested.

There aren't too many elements, so a chimp could do the mix and eq and end up with something listenable.

Sounds nice! Bass could probably be a touch quieter, I think it's fine if it overpowers the kick in this kind of track though. The drums could probably use a bit more meat in the mids and lows and maybe a touch of high end rolloff, they are quite brittle, which makes for an awkward contrast with the meaty bass and the warm pads and strings. So I'd ease up the HPFs on the drums, add a touch of saturation to thicken themup and then roll of the highs a bit with some analog modelled crap.

Thanks dubdub, you have really fucking good ears. I listened to what you said, and are 100% right about the hats/claps.

I'll change the track in the header.

Thanks again

Good stuff. Lovely groove. Not a huge fan of where it goes in the second half of the track with the pads n stuff (just personal taste), but still overall a really solid piece of work.

I've been struggling for motivation lately too. Gone back to listening to some of my back catalogue of albums (non-techno or dance, mostly heavy) from when I was a moody teenager to try to get back to something that inspires me again.

I've also been thinking that I need some vocals of some sort but not sure what or how to do it without sounding cheesy or old (not saying that yours do).

I like this track, I think the fact you have so few elements- you need to tease them in, rather than start with so mary from the off, the vocal loop is nice but gets a touch too repetitive for me. The clap/ snare thing sounds thin and could do with layering up or gettgin a thicker one to start with. The freq modded hats move nicely, and the reverse hat 2.35 works well you could let ths ring off far longer tho. The slinky bassline walks well with the kick, though I want it to modulate a little more/ show some colour- maybe a small mid layer of the bassline that appears in a section or two would be nice. I want more to happen after mid way, your elements are spent by then, even a reforming/ variation of the themes/elements that have come before would work. Or some Porc or 1 new musical layer/ idea. It feels like the arrangement came together quite qucikly.

There is emotion in this thats for sure, ive been finding music challenging recently. I pulled away from the technical side a bit to allow the musical side take over and ensure I have enough strong elemtns to eek out 4 minutes, which isnt easy. As always your mixes sound good and are far from ametuer I think if we keep with it it will all come together quite soon.

Nice one for posting...

definitely a nice smooth track! id put a bit less vocal in it in generall, but thats personal taste.
mix sounds good to me

Lovely bit of (techy) house, hints of Terry Lee Brown Jnr (who makes lovely music). Technical aspects aside this is wonderful.

Ok, downloaded, ran it through the gear.

First thing that grabbed me when everything kicks in.
Low end.
It`s weighty, but cramped and therefore lacking detail/clarity.
So the root of the sub part of the kick is at 50hz, and then everything rolls off steep from here.
Then the punch of the kick sits at 77hz, right around the lowest fundamental of the bass.
This makes the low end really dense when it could open up more.
I would maybe move the kick a little lower, sidechain the bass a little harder or EQ it out of the way of the kick, and maybe enhance the kick, or add another layer, somewhere in the mids to give it more punch in the mix.

150 - 400 is a little cramped, make some more room here and the bass will feel deeper, I pulled back in this region by a half to a 3/4 db and the low end cleaned up and felt lower and deeper. This says to me that the higher regions of the bass can also be pulled back in this area, it gives the keys more room to breathe.

I also boosted everything from 550 to 5k by a quarter db, this just re-addressed the overall mix balance and gave more emphasis to the keys and pads. Everything rolls off from 7k a little too much, so to put some air back in to the mix I pushed up this region a little, so that there was a gentler slope from 7-12k.

I`ve included a little clip with EQ adjustments that readdress the balance to give you an idea of the above.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/s984g9783czo5 ... q.mp3?dl=0
Main issue is the clarity of the kick getting through the mix, if it weren`t for that this would be a mastering ready tune.

And once again, great music mate.

Will Frances wrote:I like this track, I think the fact you have so few elements- you need to tease them in, rather than start with so mary from the off, the vocal loop is nice but gets a touch too repetitive for me. The clap/ snare thing sounds thin and could do with layering up or gettgin a thicker one to start with. The freq modded hats move nicely, and the reverse hat 2.35 works well you could let ths ring off far longer tho. The slinky bassline walks well with the kick, though I want it to modulate a little more/ show some colour- maybe a small mid layer of the bassline that appears in a section or two would be nice. I want more to happen after mid way, your elements are spent by then, even a reforming/ variation of the themes/elements that have come before would work. Or some Porc or 1 new musical layer/ idea. It feels like the arrangement came together quite qucikly.

There is emotion in this thats for sure, ive been finding music challenging recently. I pulled away from the technical side a bit to allow the musical side take over and ensure I have enough strong elemtns to eek out 4 minutes, which isnt easy. As always your mixes sound good and are far from ametuer I think if we keep with it it will all come together quite soon.

Nice one for posting...

Thanks for listening. I can't ever add elements to a track once I've got the general idea. I find if I do that, then the track doesn't sound authentic anymore, and the extra elements stand out like a sore thumb.

The reverse hat is just an automation of the send reverb on the hats to give that effect.

One of the things I've really decided recently is just to make music for myself. After a few ep's, I simply can't be bothered to shop my stuff around anymore looking for releases. It's just not worth it. I feel that some of my tunes may be of release standard, but fuck it. I'm just a dude who sits in his living room and puts on the headphones when the kids have gone to bed. If people here like the odd track of mine, then that's fine with me.

over9000 wrote:definitely a nice smooth track! id put a bit less vocal in it in generall, but thats personal taste.
mix sounds good to me

Thanks man!

Lost to the Void wrote:Lovely bit of (techy) house, hints of Terry Lee Brown Jnr (who makes lovely music). Technical aspects aside this is wonderful.

Ok, downloaded, ran it through the gear.

First thing that grabbed me when everything kicks in.
Low end.
It`s weighty, but cramped and therefore lacking detail/clarity.
So the root of the sub part of the kick is at 50hz, and then everything rolls off steep from here.
Then the punch of the kick sits at 77hz, right around the lowest fundamental of the bass.
This makes the low end really dense when it could open up more.
I would maybe move the kick a little lower, sidechain the bass a little harder or EQ it out of the way of the kick, and maybe enhance the kick, or add another layer, somewhere in the mids to give it more punch in the mix.

150 - 400 is a little cramped, make some more room here and the bass will feel deeper, I pulled back in this region by a half to a 3/4 db and the low end cleaned up and felt lower and deeper. This says to me that the higher regions of the bass can also be pulled back in this area, it gives the keys more room to breathe.

I also boosted everything from 550 to 5k by a quarter db, this just re-addressed the overall mix balance and gave more emphasis to the keys and pads. Everything rolls off from 7k a little too much, so to put some air back in to the mix I pushed up this region a little, so that there was a gentler slope from 7-12k.

I`ve included a little clip with EQ adjustments that readdress the balance to give you an idea of the above.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/s984g9783czo5 ... q.mp3?dl=0
Main issue is the clarity of the kick getting through the mix, if it weren`t for that this would be a mastering ready tune.

And once again, great music mate.

That's some golden advice right there. Thanks. Invaluable.

With the bass and the kick, I used crossover vst to split the bass into 2 bands, 85hz and below, which I sidechained to the kick. The higher band, I equed the higher ranges of the bass as you suggested. It sounds way clearer now.

With the point about adding more air to the mix, I'll have to leave that as I don't want to be adding anything to the master, and if I start dicking around with the individual tracks it will end up with me tweaking without knowing really what i'm listening for or doing.

And thanks for the compliment, considering it's almost the polar opposite of your stuff.

Again, thanks for essentially giving us all advice that you normally make people pay for.

This track is nice man, nice smooth grooves. Don't put yourself down like this. Mind if I ask what the source of the bass was (synth,vst)?

jordanneke wrote:
And thanks for the compliment, considering it's almost the polar opposite of your stuff.

.

Oh I make all sorts of music. I used to regularly play a proper house music live PA, and I`ve been releasing house under another name for years.
Heavy metal, house, techno, industrial, dubstep. I do all sorts of shit, I just love music.

Love it man. Really smooth and clean. My one suggestion would be to turn the tempo down slightly, which would accentuate the Terry Lee Brown Jr vibe mentioned.

Kromasome wrote:
I've also been thinking that I need some vocals of some sort but not sure what or how to do it without sounding cheesy or old (not saying that yours do).

Thanks for listening.

About vocals, I really find that they are very tricky. I can't ever manage to get a random dance vocal to fit without it sounding ultra tacky. I decided to try and inject some sort of political message into my music, and kind of have an idea what I'd like to say before I begin. I then spend a while trawling through Youtube, avoiding the obvious Martin Luther King and such, but the hardest thing is finding someone with a voice and cadence that fits to the music, without much manipulation. That's really difficult.

I have an interview with Theo Parrish that I'm trying to use, but with interviews the 'feeling' in the voice just isn't there. With speeches, the passion in the voice is really present. I also check live recordings of reggae concerts too, as the more political ones will often have them addressing the crowds about important things.

Or you can record your own voice and say what you really want to say.

That thought had occurred, but I actually don't like the sound of my recorded voice.

I'll probably should do it though.

ps - If anyone wants to hear the version with the improvements that Steve suggested, here it is