konalavadome

Planetarians - two songs or one?

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Jenna

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« on: November 25, 2018, 04:41:16 AM »
Hey folks. New track in progress. I'm not sure whether to split it into two songs or keep it as one. It sort of takes a right turn in the middle with the second half being almost completely different than the first. Then again, I'm thinking of keeping it the same and reusing a lot of the elements here and there while continuing to build on it, sort of like a Pink Floyd album. I'd like to know what other listeners might feel is the right direction for it.

Planetarians

The sound isn't anything like what it sounds like in my DAW. On SoundCloud it's weak and unbalanced. How can I improve this when uploading? It did give me the message that there was some clipping on upload. Does it chop off the top of the sound with limiters or something? I've noticed others songs are much louder than mine, though.
« Last Edit: November 25, 2018, 04:43:47 AM by Jenna »

RealKevM

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« Reply #1 on: November 28, 2018, 10:21:28 AM »
Hi Jenna, good vibes. I like how what you are doing is very different from others here. It's a genre of music I don't usually listen to but i'm glad I did. I think it works well as one song but I see what you mean. The thunder break to divide the parts works brilliantly.

Jenna

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« Reply #2 on: November 29, 2018, 11:08:31 PM »
Thanks again, Kev. I came to love chillout when a long-time friend introduced me with a compilation album called The Buddha Lounge. I lot of people love it for background music while working on tasks, so appeals to the young and old alike. Anything that can musically cross a generational boundary is unique, as most are geared toward one segment of the population it seems.

Cawproductions

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« Reply #3 on: December 02, 2018, 02:14:13 PM »
Hi Jenna.

Was just cruising the forum and come across your post,

The first section of the track was punching my speaker cones, Lots of attack and loud.
Second section of the track was a lot lower in Volume and perceived loudness.

If I am telling you to suck eggs here, then please tell me to do one.

Before you start, Make sure your tracks are balanced in volume and loudness. but mix out to about -6db on your output meter.

Then to finish add to the master bus. A compressor, with just a little ratio. 1:5 Long attack time and a quick release. (Hope that makes sense)
adjust the threshold until you get just about 1-2 db of gain reduction.

Then add a limiter to bring up your final volume to around -1db.

This should level out your track a little,

Soundcloud only plays back a 128k MP3, so its not great.

Hope this helps
Prob a million ways to do the same but it seems to work here ok.. good luck.

Jenna

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« Reply #4 on: December 03, 2018, 01:54:06 AM »
Hi Jenna.

Was just cruising the forum and come across your post,

The first section of the track was punching my speaker cones, Lots of attack and loud.
Second section of the track was a lot lower in Volume and perceived loudness.

If I am telling you to suck eggs here, then please tell me to do one.

Before you start, Make sure your tracks are balanced in volume and loudness. but mix out to about -6db on your output meter.

Then to finish add to the master bus. A compressor, with just a little ratio. 1:5 Long attack time and a quick release. (Hope that makes sense)
adjust the threshold until you get just about 1-2 db of gain reduction.

Then add a limiter to bring up your final volume to around -1db.

This should level out your track a little,

Soundcloud only plays back a 128k MP3, so its not great.

Hope this helps
Prob a million ways to do the same but it seems to work here ok.. good luck.

Thank you for the listen and detailed advice. Truth is I've not yet mixed the second half, only the first. I've been waiting for it to come back from a mix evaluation before moving onto the second. I've been mixing to -12 db with the faders at unity, but the additive effect in the main output still clips for me. I'll try your fixes when I get back to finishing up this project. Appreciate it.

jman1283

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« Reply #5 on: December 04, 2018, 01:00:53 AM »
Hi Jenna. I just joined the forum this week so am very happy to meet other creative types. I enjoyed your track! Were the vocal sounds all samples as well? I totally could see/hear this as a soundtrack to a film.
Jason R. Ferguson
jman8964@gmail.com

Jenna

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« Reply #6 on: December 04, 2018, 07:35:48 AM »
Hi Jman and welcome. I'm happy to hear you enjoyed the track. Yes, the vocals were samples. I hadn't thought of this as a film soundtrack. Maybe I should expand my view of it's potential. Thank you for taking the time to listen and comment.

Solaris.Musac

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« Reply #7 on: December 04, 2018, 07:40:40 PM »
Great track, i like it! Definitely never heard anything like this before. Have you considered adding vocal parts to the first section 0:00 -> 1:52? Also in that part might i suggest pulling back the kick drum back? Also how do you develop your drums?, are those samples?

Jenna

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« Reply #8 on: December 11, 2018, 07:57:05 AM »
Great track, i like it! Definitely never heard anything like this before. Have you considered adding vocal parts to the first section 0:00 -> 1:52? Also in that part might i suggest pulling back the kick drum back? Also how do you develop your drums?, are those samples?

I haven't considered adding the vocals to the first part. Thanks for the suggestions. I've got the final version up in the feedback on finished songs forum. The drums are all sample loops. I just auditioned them and collected a bunch that I liked in the moment when first building the song. These are all stock loops packaged with the Studio One DAW.

hardtwistmusic

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« Reply #9 on: December 11, 2018, 09:18:42 PM »
Couldn't play it.  It said the track "might have been removed." 

Without hearing it. . . the best advice I can offer is:   "Leave it one song as long as you can."  It's easier to develop that way.  THEN, if/when you have to begin editting it down, just don't discard any of the lines you pull out.  It can become two songs any time in the process.  But it's unlikely that you will re-combine the parts if you separate it now. 

What that means, is that you leave yourself more flexibility by leaving it one song for now.  As I said, you can always split it in half. 
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Verlon Gates  -  60 plus years old.

Jenna

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« Reply #10 on: December 15, 2018, 01:45:41 AM »
Verlon! There you are. I've been wondering where you've been. Thanks for trying to listen? I'm not sure what's going on with the link because it's working for me. This is strange.

Jenna

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« Reply #11 on: December 15, 2018, 01:47:16 AM »
I'll recopy it here. I keep forgetting that I updated this.


hardtwistmusic

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« Reply #12 on: January 06, 2019, 02:34:23 AM »
Okay, I got to listen to it.  Loved the sweet, pretty vibe to the first part.  Nice contrast with the kettle drums (or whatever they were,) but felt that the rhapsodic change should have come sooner.  Loved the additional change in the chant/vocal. 

I think it's just one song, but I don't think it's best served by being a four minute song.  My opinion, and recommendation would be 2 minutes and 50 seconds tops. 

Listeners tend to have short attention spans for pieces that are "instrumental heavy." 
www.reverbnation.com/hardtwistmusicsongwriter

Verlon Gates  -  60 plus years old.