Posted
I've joined the soundcloud tombola, been randomly paired with a guy that does pop music. We decided on something like the prodigy sound so he can play guitars and maybe sing.
I came up with this... it is just an intro, verse and chorus to send him the stems to give him something to bounce off, so its very very raw, no mixing apart from very rough volume settings in synfire, no effects not even any eq, and no modulation of instruments.
Everything comes from synfire, the first pass used the engine but although I could export an aiff file I couldnt capture the individual stems (feature request), so I ended up transferring to ableton live.
However I have a question... the drums are using virtual midi to drive an ableton drum rack (non vst), the rest is vsti's loaded in au drones. Can anyone hear a slight timing difference between the two? I know I can enter a latency in the 'midi' instrument in synfire but whats the simplest way to work out what this should be?
Anyway the track as it stands is at
https://soundcloud.com/blacksun/tombola-2013-wip/s-IZfmT
Ill post a link to the finished track once my musical partner for this experiment has added his magic.
finished track in case you dont want to scroll through
Sun, 2013-05-19 - 23:10 Permalink
IMHO
I hear a couple of places, where the timing get's a bit little jumbled.. I would suggest you make a reference track (doesn't have to be included in final mix - where you have a clean tight bass ) attack. Also put a tight simple click track into SFP.. Most of the sounds you use have a bit of slow attack, so it's hard to determine the fine point. Later in Ableton shut them off.. However the basic rhythm section (bass and drums does really need to spot on.. other instruments can shift the time by a tiny amount to give it 'humaness"...
When you get to ableton, if it has a time slide individual track feature, you should be able to 'fine tune the alignment. Haven't used ableton in a long time, so I forget.. In Logic or Cubase you can blow the waveforms up extremely close, then it's easy to align.. Also remember "simpler is better''. I am forever putting in clever parts with intricate timing syncapation, only to strip it down to simple after listening a few days...
At 31 seconds when the synth line comes in, it sounds 'jiggled'. the problem is you are using a lot of syncapation. Also look at drums in some sound editor, Is it human or quantized. Of course if any of the tracks are human played, you are going to have to go thru it with a fine tooth comb.. True you don't want things exactly quantized to the millesecond, it becomes boring..
If you can, tracks with slow attacks, should be slid forward a bit.. I always do that on string and flute instruments.. Other instruments are on the beat.. Sometimes the snare can be a tiny bit behind the beat.. It becomes a very time consuming job sometimes.. But it can make the difference between a great syncapated piece, and one that's sloppy.
Just for comparison, you might try the SFP part with tighter attack instruments, to see if you hear a difference and if pleases you..
You are off to a good start - best wishes
Mark Styles
Thu, 2013-05-23 - 02:07 Permalink
as always the comments are valued highly.
I actually went through the drums and bounced them to audio in live and they were definately behind. Since then Ive been struggling to get my head around the latency settings in synfire and ableton. I had added a latency value in Synfire which helped, and also a negative 'delay' on the drum track in ableton. This has helped a lot, and at one point had it spot on, but its weird. You increase/decrease the value and at a certain point any more changes makes it worse.
I now have some stems from my partner for the tombola, he's decided not to add vocals so its now an instrumental. Ive stuggled to get the guitars to fit in, especially inthe into. Ive 'processed' them with effects and think they now sit better in the mix. At least to my tinitus, destroyed, ears!
Dont think its far off now... (comments still apprieciated)
Thu, 2013-05-23 - 15:58 Permalink
Yes,,, MUCH better now.. The timing sounds spot on to me now.. Good work.... Love the breaks, the 1st guitar solo is excellent; all the parts are talking to and .. The song is definetly drum driven. A minor point... really rather an issue of one's taste, and a question.
You're right about the time latency thing.. sometimes when I use external hardware instruments with Virtual Instruments, you can hear the latency problem.. In Logic I think I use a -26 count in MIDI clock to keep tightness. Different hardware is going to respond faster or slower than other hardware.. Even virtual instruments could take more or less time to respond to the midi data sent it. Yes, you have to experiment a bit to find just the right latency to use.. You eventually find the magic number, go more or less, and you hear more timing differences. After the track is done you might want to isolate the drums and each part and try sliding the part forward or backwards.. Sometimes adjusting the attack time can make the difference, other times changing attack time, changes the quality too much, strings, horns, reeds, are not going to be as instanous as a guitar, bass or drums.
Regarding the piece again.The 'drummer' is taking the lead here... The guitar solo's keep up with the drums..The bass part might pay more attention to drums,, that is hit some more syncapation points with the drums..
A trick I sometimes use, is either copy the bass part to drums, change note value so the original bass part is playing a kick.. And then thin some of that down or vary it so that it's not hitting every note, but enough to make drums/bass more integrated.. In this case, I might run the drum part thru a audio to midi converter, to get the tight timing of say the kicks, and create some extra bass notes to double the kick strikes.. and vary that a bit, to create a kind of 'sectioning' in the bass. The bass starts like you have it, then in a later section add some bass grace notes doubling the kick, and then again later you add some more bass notes, so the kick and drums go 'head to head'.
After I'm about in the middle of building a piece, I solo each track, and try to create some different sections in terms of 'number of notes' range of notes, and motifs used in each instrument. Agreed this track probably is one of those that the bass plays a consistant part thru out.
See if varying it a bit, will create more interest, cause after a while, the brain tunes it out, because it is so repetitous. All the other parts are throwing surprises at you, so the brain is constantly engaged to 'find the differences'.. Too much variation of parts, (the brain wants to hear a certain amount of consistancy), other wise it's chaos, but if things are too similar all the time, the brain moves on to something else, cause it is not 'challenging' enough to keep it's interest..
Merely an idea, that might be incorporated, or tried in a later piece. Perhaps I'm over analyzing.. This is not exactly my genre of music, so it's really up to you, what's 'right'.. The work you have done since previous version is miles above your first version... very good work..
Thu, 2013-05-23 - 18:00 Permalink
Mark, thank you...our music may be poles apart but amazing the insight you have...really apprieciate the time you taken to listen and comment.
You have also inspired me to take the bass. It's actually quite a complicated pattern, but I came up with the sound I've used early on, it has a long release which tends to blend the notes together....whe I only had a few ideas and a few short parts for the song, I loved the bass, but I've been thinking recently, that bass has to change. I've been putting it off hoping I can get away with it as it is, but every listen, I hear a nagging in my head, change the bass change the bass! You comments have sealed the deal I need to experiment with it.
Interestingly enough, the guitar is quite late in its timing but isn't spot on perfect throughout the recording. Hey real human artists eh, who'd use them. I found if I moved the guitar so it starts in time, the timing mistakes are really noticeable, less so how it's placed at the moment.
Thanks again mark
Fri, 2013-05-24 - 04:19 Permalink
The live guitar player.. ah yes, chop the guitar audio up and slide some notes forward or backwards.. I sometimes use or create a temp percussion part and slide other parts to time up.. It takes a lot of time. But it does pay off..
I have one singer, who is incredibly talented, he never sings the same way twice.. He often mispronounces words, adds or cut's of 's'.. I have him do about 12 takes and then take hours compiling the perfect take.. I sometimes splice have to splice consanents onto words cause, although his voice goes to utterly brilliant places, he lacks the patience and discipling to be a good recording artist.
The timing of guitar seemed fine to me, because it had a real 'human' feel to it blended in well.
Fri, 2013-05-31 - 00:50 Permalink
Well the track is finished. There are a few things I would like to improve but each time i improve one area it affects something else so will stay with this version. Everything in the song was prototyped in Synfire with the exception of the live guitar used in the chorus and intro (although i heavily processed that part in ableton). All instuments are hosted by drones in Ableton except drums which are virtual midi, although some hardware synths are in there. All automation not built into the sound patches is applied through synfire.
(https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/track…)
The soundcloud tombola, throws together artists scattered throughout the world and across genre boundaries. This year the pop style of guitarist, singer, songwriter, "The Fisherman" (soundcloud.com/#the-fisherman ) paired randomly with the heavy bass, synth and dubstep styles of Blacksun ( @blacksun ) were to be pair number 62.
The outcome? A track of driving drums, cutting synths and guitars is the outcome. Random freak of Soundcloud or fate? You decide.
Fri, 2013-05-31 - 02:05 Permalink
Sounds good... Your work paid off... I run into the same situation.. A piece of music is like a house of cards.. If you change one thing, you often have to change other parts to keep the song together..