Voting for Composition Challenge 21

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  • spark240spark240 Frets: 2073
    5 Points - Spark420  - i picked up my guitar and played along
      3 points - FNPT        - sounds great and lovely ooohs
      1 point - Stratman     - production arrangement playing

    I enjoyed them all.
    Roll on the next challenge



    Thats very inspiring, Im glad you enjoyed it !..

    I shall be listening to all the others fully  very soon .


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  • fnptfnpt Frets: 735
    edited March 2018
    Great entries everyone.

    My choices:

    @flying_pie

    @bezzer

    @stratman3142
    ____
    "You don't know what you've got till the whole thing's gone. The days are dark and the road is long."
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  • flying_pieflying_pie Frets: 1806
    Thanks @stratman3142 that was very educational. Especially the colour coded regions in Reaper. I could see that being really useful.

    I didn't mention the recording side of things so I shall. My set up is very basic. I used a Boss GT 100 as an audio interface into Reaper with free vst plugins. 

    Drums (MT Power drum kit 2), bass (4 front bass and Ignite bass amp) and layered synths (Dexed and EVM) were all hand programmed in the midi grid. I double tracked the bass to mix cleaner and heavier amp settings. I considered borrowing a real bass to record it properly but thought the synthetic sound suited the mix.

    Guitar was a Michael Kelly 1955 Tele with an Iron Gear Rolling Mill overwound bridge pickup into a Blackstar HT 50 preamp into GT 100 with power tube/cab IRs in Reaper. Guitars were mulitracked with a higher gain American sound on one side and a lower gain Marshall sound on the other. There was a digital clean boost before the amp. "Standard metal EQ" was used to remove annoying frequencies and tighten. I then boosted the higher mids then TDR Nova dynamic EQ to reduce muddiness in the lower mids and tighten the boosted high mids. Since submitting this I've found better amp settings and cab IR to give the sound I was really after but this was in the right ball park. 

    Vocals were done with a SM58 into the GT100 on a clean amp patch! I de-essed them manually while addressing differing volumes in the vocals. I multitracked the intro 1-2-3-Ja!.  I tried that with verse and chorus but it was much trickier to match up the harsh vowel sounds so I just duplicated a track and moved the second track a fraction then used multiple fractional pitch shifts instead.

    There was a tiny bit of reverb on vocs, bass and drums but not guitar. And I used the free W1 master limiter vst which is by all accounts identical to Waves.


    Be really useful to hear how others approached, recorded and mixed their choons.
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  • stratman3142stratman3142 Frets: 2177
    edited March 2018
    Thanks @stratman3142 that was very educational. Especially the colour coded regions in Reaper. I could see that being really useful.


    Regions are really useful. You can Click-Drag on the region bar and move things around. Also, if you Ctrl-Click-Drag, you can create a copy which you can move around. It makes it really quick to throw together basic arrangements and experiment with different options.

    Although I've got loads of paid for drum VSTi's, I've also got MT Power Drum kit 2 and for 'that specific sound' it stands up against the expensive options.

    It's not a competition.
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  • flying_pieflying_pie Frets: 1806

    Regions are really useful. You can Click-Drag on the region bar and move things around. Also, if you Ctrl-Click-Drag, you can it create a copy which you can move around. It makes it really quick to throw together basic arrangements and experiment with different options.

    Although I've got loads of paid for drum VSTi's, I've also got MT Power Drum kit 2 and for 'that specific sound' it stands up against the expensive options.

     I watched Kenny G's video tutorial on regions last night. Wish I'd known about them, especially Ctrl-Click-Drag feature, a long time ago. That's so useful for arranging. Thanks for bringing it to our attention. 
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  • BezzerBezzer Frets: 581
    OK, I'll join in with a "how and why" post ... partly because this was such a speed record it may interest some.

    I really wanted to get something in for this challenge ... I want to start submitting for all of them as the Collective as was used to be a great motivator ... but I knew I had one afternoon or it was never going to happen.

    Picking the song was the first part.  Writing something original was never going to happen in the time, but equally I felt it gave chance for the concept to breathe.  Something simple but recognisable ... so Le Freak, obviously.

    Most of what I did will probably not be of much interest, I mean recording one chord in a semi funky metal rhythm for 5 minutes isn't exactly rocket science :)  It was just run through PODFarm2 (hadn't bought Helix Native then), Marhsall-eqsue setting EQ'd "out of the way".

    The bassline was basically the original just played a lot lower ... a LOT lower.

    The longest parts where the drums and the choir.  For the drums, I spent a long time trying to get these as close to the original as possible.  I wanted to retain the feel but it had to be hammered out and played with a lot more force.  I simplified parts but tried to keep the gist.  The samples were from the utter fantastic Metal Foundry in Superior 2.  Just a pure from the box mix, nothing clever.  Straight ahead power.  Ran through a group and simply added some EQ, compression and a TINY splash of reverb.

    The choir was fun.  I've just signed up with EastWest and was looking for a project to use Hollywood Choir on.  They have this feature called WordBuilder where, using their Votox phonetic alphabet you can get the choir to sing anything.  Programmed in 4 different parts, 2 male and 2 female, and then bust out the keyboard.  I cheated on these and used an EZMix preset for choirs.  Gave the right amount of air and weight to it for me and saved me a lot of time.

    For the outro, was simply the break in the original extended, piled on way more strings (again courtesy of EastWest) and broke out the strat for the solo.  Was aiming to make it more Floyd then metal, keep something melodic.  I mean obviously I failed massively ha ha ... I tried.

    Vocals were direct into the Focusrite from my AKG C1000S (an absolute bargain of a small condensor mic). No pop shield, and kind of rammed halfway down my throat :)

    Overall mix was my usual practice.  Drums balanced to just below 0db on the master, then bring in bass down the centre aiming for the same volume as the kick (although this bass was so low it became almost sub so is still a bit tricky to hear), then guitars panned out, three in this case, left and right doubled and one in the middle quiet.  Then vocals and extras.  Run the whole lot through a compressor and a limiter and apply some EQ to the whole mix.

    I think it could be mixed a lot better ... but it is what it is in the time.  It inspired me to try something else later though, did a Timberlake song and I think the outcome was a bit rounder.

    Not sure it that's interesting or not ... it's certainly long :)

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  • steamabacussteamabacus Frets: 1258
    Finally got a chance to listen. Ten very good entries this time - they all have something interesting but there can be only three ....

    (based on gut response)

    5 points @flying_pie ; Ein Schöner Morgen  Anyone singing in German does it for me. God's Own Language to a Zappa fan. :)

    3 points @frank1985 Nice build up of tension and some tasty guitar playing.

    1 point @Fretwired ; Storm99  So chilled and then .... that dubby riff!

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  • flying_pieflying_pie Frets: 1806
    Bezzer said:
    Not sure it that's interesting or not ... it's certainly long :)

    Said the actress to the vicar...


    As someone new to recording and writing I personally find that sort of information to be useful. That's also very impressive for an afternoon's work. When you originally posted about having a free afternoon I was expecting an acoustic cover, not a full band with choir. 
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  • frank1985frank1985 Frets: 523
    edited March 2018
    @DeeplyDazzled This is a great opener...I’ve never heard an ebow on an acoustic, sounds sweet. Is that natural room reverb, an fx pedal, or both? 
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  • The EBow/acoustic guitar sound was recorded through a condenser mic (Art M2) then into a Lexicon MPX550 chorus/reveb patch.
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  • frank1985frank1985 Frets: 523
    edited March 2018
    The EBow/acoustic guitar sound was recorded through a condenser mic (Art M2) then into a Lexicon MPX550 chorus/reveb patch.
    Nice, I had a feeling it may have been a lexicon, it has 'that' sound. i have a pcm90 myself but i haven't got round to using it properly yet. 
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  • stratman3142stratman3142 Frets: 2177
    Just a reminder that voting ends 11.30pm 14th March 2018, and the top three will be announced shortly after.

    I need to get my finger out and vote as well.

    It's not a competition.
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  • DulcetJonesDulcetJones Frets: 515
    Even though I didn't get a chance to put an entry together for this one I had some time today to listen and vote, some really nice ideas and new people here.

    5 Points -    @Fretwired

      3 Points -    
    @frank1985  

      1 Point  -    
    @stratman3142  

    “Theory is something that is written down after the music has been made so we can explain it to others”– Levi Clay


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  • stratman3142stratman3142 Frets: 2177
    edited March 2018
    Loads of great entries and talent. Very difficult to choose as usual. Do I go for the tunes I like the most, or those that seem to address the theme the best - or a mixture of the two?

    I decided to go with those that seemed to address the theme the best, even though they might not be the type of music that's normally to my taste.
     
    5 points : @flying_pie : There's an inventive madness to this one. Highly creative application of a heavy style.
    3 points : @Bezzer : So different to the original that is qualifies as original work. Definitely a new style for an old song.
    1 point : @Fretwired : Interesting sounds and textures.

    Thanks again to all that took part. Something to learn from all of them. Sometimes I learn the most from those that I don't end up selecting in my top three.


    It's not a competition.
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  • stratman3142stratman3142 Frets: 2177
    A reminder that voting ends tonight at 11.30.

    It's not a competition.
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  • spark240spark240 Frets: 2073
    Ok so real tricky...

    Im going with

    5 points @stratman3142 ;

    3 Points @steamabacus ( would have been 5 but that buzzing got on my nerves all the way through ! )

    1 point @fnpt ;


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  • stratman3142stratman3142 Frets: 2177
    Just a few hours until the voting ends.
    It's not a competition.
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  • TTonyTTony Frets: 27344
    Am I "allowed" to vote, not being an entrant?
    Having trouble posting images here?  This might help.
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  • stratman3142stratman3142 Frets: 2177
    TTony said:
    Am I "allowed" to vote, not being an entrant?
    Everyone is allowed to vote.
    It's not a competition.
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  • stratman3142stratman3142 Frets: 2177
    Voting closed.
    It's not a competition.
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