Cover challenge 19 the letter F

Bezzer

stratman3142 said:

In all seriousness, I think I'll refer to it as Poopot's Cover Challenge from now on.

I think you’re the perfect man to take this over if you are happy too, and I think the rename is a really nice idea.
i was considering offering to run it but I just don’t have the time for the admin and you’d all end up finding where I lived just to through things at me.

long May it continue, shame there will be no more Uncle  

stratman3142

Bezzer said:

stratman3142 said:

In all seriousness, I think I'll refer to it as Poopot's Cover Challenge from now on.

I think you’re the perfect man to take this over if you are happy too, and I think the rename is a really nice idea.
i was considering offering to run it but I just don’t have the time for the admin and you’d all end up finding where I lived just to through things at me.

long May it continue, shame there will be no more Uncle  

Based on further behind the scenes discussions, the latest plan is for @flying_pie to take the lead on this. I'll help out where needed. Whatever happens it will be called Poopot's Cover Challenge.

Sorry for the initial confusion between me and @flying_pie. I guess Stu would have been calling us bellends for the mix up.

munckee

Top idea for ‘Poopots Cover Challenge.’

flying_pie

Here's a history lesson:

4 years ago, in casual conversation, @Bezzer mentioned that he and a bandmate used to challenge each other to cover the same song and see what they came up with. At the time we were also talking about how interest in the challenges was waning and how we could get more people involved.

Through stealing other people's ideas (as a musician should) I proposed that we start a Cover Challenge and that I was happy to run it as @stratman3142 was busy enough running everything else. Thus the cover challenge began.

Poopot got on board from the start as he somehow had special access to the email instead of me, and  his energy and determinationi kept it going, especially when I had to take a break. He became a good friend and has done an amazing job, along with Bezzer, IMC1980, stratman and others in shaping it into what it is today.

It's only right that going forward it's Poopot's Cover Challenge

I often joke about it all being my idea, but in truth it's more important that we continue to have fun and share our ideas. I am happy to oversee the admin (I don't think "happy" is the right word as I'd rather Stu was still running this)  but if anyone else wants to take it on or even to help out then let me know.

Habanero

Thanks @flying_pie for agreeing to take over. I really only got into home recording a couple of years ago after having two health issues, the second of which very nearly killed me. Reading about Poopot yesterday brought some of that back to my mind.

I was very happy to recently stumble upon both the Cover and Composition challenges, and keep planning that one day I'll try the Riff challenge. I tried the Solo one once, but it was really beyond my abilities.

I even sat on a beach last autumn with my iPod thinking ahead to what I might do for future letters, and thus have plans up to 'L'!

Snags

Habanero said:

I even sat on a beach last autumn with my iPod thinking ahead to what I might do for future letters, and thus have plans up to 'L'!

Stu always said he expected to be banned before it got much beyond G or H whenever we discussed future possibilities. Didn't expect it to be quite such a brutal permaban, though

Habanero

Snags said:

Stu always said he expected to be banned before it got much beyond G or H whenever we discussed future possibilities. Didn't expect it to be quite such a brutal permaban, though

I was surprised he wasn't hunted down by a rampaging hoard of 'Floyd fanatics after his 'C' entry.

Hurling_Fruitmig

Habanero said:

Snags said:

Stu always said he expected to be banned before it got much beyond G or H whenever we discussed future possibilities. Didn't expect it to be quite such a brutal permaban, though

I was surprised he wasn't hunted down by a rampaging hoard of 'Floyd fanatics after his 'C' entry.

I'm a Floyd fanatic, and I thought it was a work of genius.

flying_pie

Might as well talk about approaches for my tracks.

1. Is if Jack White had written Fooled Around And Fell In Love instead of Elvin Bishop. Perhaps the only thing of interest is that I changed the III chord from F#m to the relative major A so it had more of a White Stripes vibe while still allowing the original melody (although I probably wandered from it as I much prefer the Winery Dogs take on it)


2. Is my attempt at what For Whom The Bell Tolls would sound like if it was written by Ghost instead of Metallica. Sorry about the long into (or īntrö as it would be on the track listing) but that would be needed for the dramatic staging with dry ice and lighting.

I decided not to go full on Tobias Forge with the vocals although it might have slipped through occasionally. Guitar is my amp preamp recorded through a Boss GT100 via 4 cable method into a cab sim. Its my own impulse response from my Blackstar HT50 power amp and 1x12. I don't know why I didn't do that before as it's finally given me the sound I expect (not sure if that necessarily good or not)  instead of faffing around with loads of other IRs in frustration. It's a really easy process to do and would highly recommend it if anyone else does the same silent amp recording process. Can be done in Reaper with just the Reaverb plugin.

And the bass - both distorted and clean is a pitch shifted Telecaster! It's recorded dry and into bass amp and cab sim for the clean tone and into a Boss GT001 for the distortion. Poopot taught me that "hack" a few years back when I asked him how he got his bass tones for the early Uncle Slippyfist stuff.

fnpt

flying_pie said:

And the bass - both distorted and clean is a pitch shifted Telecaster! It's recorded dry and into bass amp and cab sim for the clean tone and into a Boss GT001 for the distortion. Poopot taught me that "hack" a few years back when I asked him how he got his bass tones for the early Uncle Slippyfist stuff.

Interesting. How do you change the pitch though? Do you do it in the DAW?

flying_pie

fnpt said:

flying_pie said:

And the bass - both distorted and clean is a pitch shifted Telecaster! It's recorded dry and into bass amp and cab sim for the clean tone and into a Boss GT001 for the distortion. Poopot taught me that "hack" a few years back when I asked him how he got his bass tones for the early Uncle Slippyfist stuff.

Interesting. How do you change the pitch though? Do you do it in the DAW?

Yes. 

Signal path is dry guitar into DAW. In this case it was bridge single coil. I use ReaPitch set 1 octave down then into amp and cab sims, EQ etc. Seems to work with none of the latency you get with  pedals or multiFX. Any timing issues are down to poor technique on my part!

I wouldn't use that if I needed to sound like Jaco whatsisname but it does the job for rock/punk/metal and is more fun than midi bass on a keyboard.

Snags

Not sure if anyone will be interested, and there are no particular tricks in it, but to keep the thread rolling and because I can't WhatsApp about it with poopers anywmore ...

My target was to do a Hawkind-esque take on the original, a sort of mish-mash of Calvert, Moorcock, Turner style semi-spoken dystopia with some swirly bits. In case of sonic attack on your district, follow these rules ...

Drums are just MTPowerDrumKit2 with a bit of EQ and reverb.

There are quite a few synth pads, unsurprisingly. Various presets from Surge, all played in via a Nektar LX49+ with some minor adjustments to the midi by hand, to account for the swell hitting the beat better.

Sax parts are two different VSTs, played in from the keyboard with dodgy pitch bends to simulate Nik Turner after too many drugs.

Bass just played in via BD21 DI pedal with the gain up, blended with a clean DI signal.

Guitars are a bit layered. Electrics all done via a Boss GT-1 direct into the DAW, using the much derided COSM stuff. Two electric tracks, one the primary rhythm, and a secondary that just plays the changes with some heavy flanging going on. I think I used the LP, but can't remember now. Acoustic is a Yamaha 12-string, recorded with inappropriate mics (no electrics on it) and then some fairly hefty EQ to just push the top end and cut the bass out. Various panning around the place.

Vocal is just a single track, with some fairly hefty EQ and then run through Izotope Trash to filthy it up.

I actually used surprisingly few tweaks in the DAW this time. Quite a lot of automation for volume/panning, and some EQ tweaks on most but far from all tracks. Reverb added to the drums, and Reverb and Delay to the vocal.

flying_pie

I think it's always interesting to hear about workflows and approaches.

And I think Boss COSM is fine for recording @Snags Have you tried turning off the cab sims by setting the output to combo or stack return and using IRs instead?

Snags

@flying_pie IRs are a rabbit hole I've yet to explore. I'm still getting to grips with the basics of driving the DAW. The GT-1 was purchased as a convenient tool for open mics and jams, but I'm still getting to grips with that too,  so this was a combo exercise

In fact, the whole area of recording is a voyage of incompetence and ignorance!

flying_pie

Everything guitar related has a rabbit hole. It gets even worse if you're daft enough to join a guitar forum...

As always there are multiple ways of getting it done and neither is superior. There's nothing wrong with finding a simple workflow and just sticking to it

Bezzer

@snags and @flying_pie if you think guitar shit is a rabbit hole don’t start looking at modular synths ffs … ha ha

maybe we need a new WhatsApp support group …

IMC1980

Bezzer said:

maybe we need a new WhatsApp support group …

Sounds like a plan

spark240

Excellent idea guys…..

mrkb

I’m interested in doing this. What are the rules on how much of the music you have to have played? What’s the general rule for creating bass, keys and drum tracks? 

Snags

All the rules are in the OP. I think historically it's up to you - in the past some people have ripped the parts they can't produce themselves and just done their bits over the top, sometimes people download a backing track, or the midi, and then add to it/tart it up.

I think as long as you do something original in it somewhere that makes it "yours" it doesn't matter.

I know that on E Stu used the original female vocal from another recording, but put the rest together, and tweaked it up. And I think he separated out the original bass/drums for Falling to Pieces, but did the rest himself.

I've always tried to do something ground-up, but that's more because I want to learn stuff, and it forces me to engage with things I would otherwise ignore. And it gives me more room to play to whatever strengths I have (or minimise the weaknesses ). And obviously I can't drum and I can't play sax, so I use VSTs for that, even if I program/play them.