Entourage Paul Tucci
EntourageForum Replies Created
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Jesse,
Sorry to say that the geese did not survive the AI separation process. The new software is so smart ass now that the error message said something about killing two birds with one keystroke.
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I love the whole process of this piece. A little snow, grab the beater guitar, improvisation in nature, and then bring it back inside and expand upon it. The muse visits you and we get to here it.
You had me when I heard the overhead geese. Twice a year we get a delightful goose parade on their way to or from Montezuma Wildlife refuge. In the springtime they first appear hard panned right and slowly make their way to the left channel. In the late fall the imagery reverses itself.
For the final version of Snowday I’d suggest fading into the intro.
It’s easy to float along with the arrangement you have. Things are soft and pleasant sounding until the only thing that jarred me reared up from the woods. There’s that metallic percussion beast at 2:35 that sticks out. Its level drops later but that early entrance dominates the mood. I wonder if high passing that thing, dropping its level considerably and slopping it up with a long plate verb wouldn’t make it sound like cracking ice on the river.
The last “hah” of your chant at the songs finale is crying out for that same reverb treatment. I just want to end back where I was when I first heard the geese.
You don’t usually hear me talk about reverb like that so you must know I mean it.
🙂 @-PT
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Drew,
I might be the first to say it but I’d bet anyone who reads your question will wonder what “pulling down the vocal in the mix” sounds like. A before and after would help me hear exactly what your symptom is and what problem might be. How might you be using the delay? As a plugin on a channel? How much time are you using? Enough to create a slap back or little enough to create comb filtering which literally could cause level to drop? Mix percentage of the delay if it is on the channell? Equal level (50%) mix of a dry and delayed signal is the perfect recipe for comb filtering.
Gain staging?? Is the output lower with the delay engaged in line but at 0 time. Does the vocal level actually get louder with the delay plug in out?
So many questions….
Is it your terminology accurate? … Are you saying the actual vocal level goes down or might you mean that, with the delay effect, the vocal recedes back into the music. Instead of in-your-face-leading-the-charge vocals, they’ve moved back into the mix?
I ask if it might be heretical to USE an “Elvis” slap back delay sound in your working genres.
As Waylon Jennings once wrote “I don’t think Hank done this a way.”
Excellent subject line by the way. Reminded me of an old entry in my to-do list of rap lyrics.
“You quote Shakespeare, I quote Dylan.
I like Beastie Boys when they’re illin’ “
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Jeremy,
I took the liberty of editing the intro of THIS CLOUD and pretty much accomplished what I was aiming for. The intro is softer and more intriguing to my ear now. Kinda gets to the point more quickly. How’s it hit you?
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Jeremy,
This is good stuff! I’m digging this “crooner-like” vibe on this song. Compared to other offerings you’ve served up that had some good banging, this one has a softer, more reserved milieu. It’s another flavor tasted in your musical world. I like it.
You asked the very question I was thinking after listening the first (of three)time…Does anything take me out of the song? Yes, the intro. The ambients feel a little jagged/crooked/ noisy and distinctly opposed to the soothing nature of the rest of the song. I almost think your vocal could be the first thing heard.
I didn’t analyze the words to see if there’s a purposeful intent on your part that would make me understand it differently. I’m going strictly on feel. Will try an intro edit and see if it works to my ear and share it back here.
C’mon listeners. Hop in with your thoughts.
PT
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Michael,
I think the MP community is largely sleeping on this song. I think it’s a well constructed, intelligent pop song. As the kids say, “Hooky as A to the double F.” Do the kids still talk like that or not? Nonetheless, there’s a lot of good to grab hold of here.
The arrangement grows organically from simple guitar and voice to the full blown angst of the female protagonist. The story unfolds in accessible words and layers of instruments. Gorgeous BGVs in the arrangement, perfectly layered in. So well done. I like the use of stops and starts to build the song to a dramatic peak chorus. The dynamics of the song work well throughout
My mix feedback is the following. I wish you had a real drummer to match the dynamics.. The loop works for fleshing out the song but the aggressiveness that works later seemingly overwhelmed the intro when you went to the half time filtered sounds. The half time feel was the right instinct but the low passed kick / snare was too jarring for my ear. I took an aggressive approach to Ringo- the-drummer’s entrance. (See the attached remix.)
I dropped the bass player during the bridge (1:51) to create a bigger mood swing. (8th notes on the bass is just lazy after grooving hard) The tempo becomes driven by the low frequency syncopated (one, two and three and four) toms. Interesting and more audible. Bass fades back in for the end of the bridge to help build the drama into the big stop at (2:22)
The gems uncovered at (2:25) are my biggest observation. Underneath the bass and guitars was a gigantic hole for the tom fill to drive through, clearing the musical muck away for the vocal to be intelligible, then the bass to drop HARD on the 1 leading into the re-entrance of the guitar and out we go. That’s how I heard it.
YMMV depending on your vehicle. Mine has two bumper stickers, one says ” Less is more and more is better.” The other one says “The aliens are here to help.” That’s how the adults talk.
PT
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Jesse,
Good ear! That little rhythmic hiccup at 2:11 appears to be friction between the bass guitar and the marching snare drum playing parts that compete with each other.
Too many peeps vying to fill that little space??
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JLew,
For the visual learners, this may help to understand the process.
The white and green tracks in the session are my live 2 track mix off the console and the guitar stem separation created in RipX. I then duplicated the green guitar separation in my DAW and changed its color to red. Despite all the verbiage, I’m only working on 3 stereo tracks here
The next image is of the EQ applied to the green track, the separated out guitar. This the channel I high passed and added 20 ish mSec to and created a cheapo widener.
The next image is of the EQ applied to the red track, a duplicate of the green separated guitar that I changed the color to red. Just like the roses she’s singin’ about. You can see the low pass filter on the graph disallowing mid and high freqs. The inserted pitch shifter (-1 octave) created the musically related deep bass that warmed up the guitar’s tonality.
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Jesse,
This timely guitar article showed up in my mail today. Passing it on to you.
izotope.com
8 tips for using reverbs and delays on guitars
Learn how to use reverb and delay to enhance your guitar tracks in mixing. Discover tips and techniques to create depth, texture, and space.
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Jesse,
Usually I’m good with words, apparently that explanation was not my usual.
Allow me to go about it differently so that the math does its mathing more clearly.
I only used four channels on my console for the live performance. One vocal mic, one DI for her acoustic guitar, and two channels for the stereo vocal reverb return. Vocal and guitar DI panned center, the reverb returns panned hard left or right. There’s my stereo image feeding the speakers AND the onboard USB recorder simultaneously. Whatever relative tones and levels I send to the house speaker system also goes to the USB recorder That’s my live 2 track.
Post processing starts by importing that 48K/24 into my DAW.
The stem separation process starts when I take a copy of that file and import it to my stem separation software. That’s where the AI voodoo happens. You prompt the software to extract only the acoustic guitar from the live 2 track. The software spits out a stereo file with only the acoustic guitar to the best of its ability. The acoustic guitar went into the software in dual channel mono and will exit the same way. Dual channel mono, equal level to the left and right of a stereo channel.
Now the math starts….
I import this stereo file into my DAW and label it guitar stem 1.
I duplicate that channel in my DAW and label it guitar stem 2.
I now have a total of three stereo channels to work with.
Channel 1 is my live 2 track off the console
Channel 2 is my guitar stem separation that will then be high passed and delayed differently on each side of this stereo channel to create a sense of air and width to my originally mono guitar. Mix enough level into master buss to just widen the sound of the guitar.
Channel 3 is my stereo guitar separation that will then be low passed to 160 ish Hz so as to feed the pitch shifter plug-in only signal that creates deep bass. I’m trying to create bass frequencies that the guitar itself was not producing. Mix enough level of these faux freqs to create the illusion of resonating wood warmth.
Better?
That’s a great idea to add pictures of the DAW session and audio files.
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Jeremy,
Of course I had to try the shorter intro …. I have free time at this point in life to pursue more interests so you benefit. If I could just hybridize my curioslty about recording and the aliens 👽… we could make some damn history around here.
You’re not the only one apparently being unable to playback some of the posted music in the Spotlight forum. @dana video replays playback fine on MP, some of the older Spotlight member mp3s play just fine but many don’t. Even logging on has been a little whack lately.
I’m wondering if others are also experiencing similar issues.PT
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🤠 The girl can definitely sang.
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Me too.!Not that kind
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Michael,
The more I listen the more I love this pop gem. It led me to this even newer interpretation.
The BGV and Ooh loh ohs were so stereo in the vocal stem separation I derived that I could separate the middle from the sides and grab a hold of them and make ’em a little louder where I thought they could shine. Mid side processing with a +4 dB shelf on the sides only and the Oh oh ohs were easy to extract and be made louder. I would love your or anybody’s thoughts on the arrangement/mix that differs from your offering. That return from the breakdown at 2:22 is just so much cleaner, accessible, and powerful to my ear. Can you dig it?
PT
Obviously, I have a bunch of free time.
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Michael,
My handiwork is just above Blisters to MP.
Stem separations into all vocals, all bass guit, all drums/perc and all others instruments lumped together.That gives me some degree of flexibility to rethink arrangements.
PT
