Entourage Paul Tucci
EntourageForum Replies Created
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Drew,
I’m guessing here that these are all separate tracks that you or the engineer have discrete level control on to send to the reverb. If that’s accurate, see if keeping the bass reverb-free (TM) allows you to sneak the reverb in more gently without it crossing the line into too much. Another approach to try might be high passing the reverb return. Allowing only low-mids (200Hz ish) and above into the soup’s seasoning to give the illusion of a room’s space but avoid the inarticulate mumbling of a sloppy low end.
I’m gonna learn something here also when Dana shares his thoughts.
PT
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Dear J-Bear,
I’m with Charissa on this one. I wanted to relish the vocal presentation so I did this to your sweet song. I even used a new reverb I bought yesterday. It’s another in the iZotope line of AI helper plugins called Aurora. The smarts in it do some kinda magic of suppressing the amount of verb while the dry signal is happening and then allowing the verb to bloom. It definitely makes my disdain for (in the way) reverb less because it allows the good ambience to show up after the fact. (It’s substantially different than pre-delay.) I also let the vocal be the side-chained input to the guitar level control. While the vocal is happening one can suppress the guitar track by a tasty amount of reduction to your taste. It’s frequency dependent also, depending on what’s common to both the guitar and vocal. I thought it helped me clean up the overlap, and not hurt the guitar tone. I’ll trust your guitar-centricity on that observation.
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Jeremy,
“Does the beat slap?” you ask. Yes, it’s a strong syncopated groove, but it’s also relentless and doesn’t hold up to the rest of your great work in the arrangement. The variations I hear are the drop in level in the pre-chorus and the dropout, the complete absence of the beat.
Dropping the beat is always dynamically effective because of the suspension of the groove and then when it returns, bang, we’re back on the dance floor. That’s tasty, but when the level changes during the pre-chorus, I’m feeling like it’s losing power AND the tonality changes. (Thanks Mr. Munson.)
Your backbeat is obviously a canned loop. I wish your “drummer” had a different and more thoughtful approach to the differing verse, pre-chorus, and chorus sections of your dance tune. To my sensibility, that would make a huge change to the good. You feelin’ me?
PT
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Jesse,
Once again, you present us with an aquatic audio treasure without the need to get our feet wet or fly the skull and crossbones of an actual pirate’s life. I almost always enjoy the calm and inviting space you craft for your listeners. You’re kinda like the outdoor Bob Villa.
You’ve taken us into nature, up in the mountains, deep into a cave, and along a surprisingly crunchy path in the fall woods. Each journey is its own unique delight, except for that one entitled “Whistler.” It’s not my general disdain of whistlers as much as the close-up of the frozen snot on your mustache. I have limits ya know, but I do encourage MP readers to have a stroll though your ATTICUS offerings and find their own fave.
The MIDI adventure has such potential! I can’t help but wonder what the rowboat series might sound like with a layer from either the Octopi’s Garden, Bikini Bottom, or anywhere Under the Sea for that matter.
PT
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Joe,
Way to make an entrance!! This piece of music jumps out of the speakers because of its phenomenal playing and great composition that just oozes joy. You nailed the hard part of writing and playing already. The technical stuff MP can help you with. I’m happy to put on my lab coat and dissect it and offer up my observations.
I encourage you to check out Patrick Harber’s stuff in the Member Spotlight. I can smell an infectious, positive collaboration between his piano and your guitar work. Powerful enough to make Benjamin Yahoo self actualize and understand that hurt people hurt people? Most likely not, but there’s plenty of good to be spread before that.
PT
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Patrick,
This is a sweet song, I’m happy to hear that you expanded the arrangement. In fact, I was wanting to hear the “band” more. Your mix leads with the vocal upfront, never allowing the band to be equally important (to my ear) so I did this to your song to give the band’s contribution its due. See if it sounds/feels different in a good way to you.
PT
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Jesse,
Not sure why my bastardized version is not playable now. Maybe Dana thought the hip hop beat I added was inappropriate and wanted to put the kaibosh on it. I dunno. 🤨
I’ll DM PT’s version to you here on MP.
PT
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Jeremy,
I think you got some great advice and executed it beautifully.
This version has all the dynamic movement and textural morphing to keep a listener riveted. I’m saying yes, it’s complete, wholesome, and ready for mastering after you consider its target audience. Your vocal work once again is compelling and perfect as a pop release. If the song gets used in support of a primarily visual presentation, let’s say (and hope) for a movie or a TV spot, the lead vocal might be so compelling as to be distracting. Good problem to have, easy problem to fix.
Bravo!👏
PT
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Joe,
My initial listen was on the laptop speakers, critical listening was on my frequency-response connected headphones where the limited bandwidth and overzealous use of compression becomes audible. Dana nailed it.
To my ear, Patrick has some sort of magic in his choice of music and his playing. Curious if you can see that commonality.
PT
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Nate,
Full disclosure, all of my stories are good, most of them are true.
No need to forgive the delay. I love when the muse hits and I go with it at the expense of for instance, painting the house. Chore-y kinda stuff. I look forward to hearing the final version and going back to the other iterations to hear the growth.
PT
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Bar,
Yes! Walk away, hands in the air. Success. I have no idea what the song is about lyrically but it’s unimportant because the vibe is strong, guitar picking is strong, the arrangement is more clarified, and the vocal delivery is captivating and somewhat mysterious. That might could be your brand.
PT
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No, I did not move any drum hits in time but I did remove the very last side stick/snare to decouple the the soft landing of the last vocal phrases from hard time to suggest a musical retard .
PT
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Patrick,
I’m glad you dug it and were inspired to better your supposed final mix. Careful though, while pursuing perfection one can run the risk of never getting stuff released into the world. As a listener, I’ll take sentiment now versus perfectly-polished someday maybe. Though, as a creator, I’m also guilty as fuck.
So what did I do? … excellent question. I got inspired by the tenderness and the delivery of the song so I started asking myself what have I got to work with here? It’s a prayer, and your first intended listener may think it’s all cringe for a generation or so until he or she understands. So, let’s make this thing as beautiful as it can be. With the vocal out front that far it felt like a lecture rather than encouragement. With the supporting instruments back that far in the mix, the kid would metaphorically miss out on the wisdom of the village. I’m guessing you chose the kick drum to represent a heartbeat in the instrumental opening. I chose to bump it up a smidge to let the listener get it in the first couple measures. I chose to taper the bass guitar’s sustain to allow the cymbal swell and the tom fills to be uncovered, and be briefly featured going into the chorus. I tried to give the bass line a little lope rather than the repeating whole notes. Subtle stuff but it helps the song breathe dynamically. I chose gentle intensity over bombast. My intent was the polar opposite of that Alice Cooper song, Dead Babies. What a knucklehead!
To Dana’s question … Yes, both separation software to create stems and mastering on the 2 buss.
Patrick, I did run your mixed song through some AI separation software to extract the drums, bass guitar, vocal, and the AC Gt/strings/KBs into 4 stereo stems. That allowed me finer control of the mix. Neve console strip emulation and judicious use of tube saturation and EQ on all input channels to help them sound natural and intimate. Your vocal had all the closeness and breathy quality to be intimate but the “band” needed to match that level of goodness. All according to my ears of course. (We should have a Mix Protege specific acronym to say that shortcut style.)
My ST buss output channels had yet another Neve output channel emulation with a tube saturator and tape deck emulation native to my Cakewalk software and then a mastering chain inserted. I used a mid-side compressor to give the middle a 90Hz shelf, just a couple two tree dBs to add some weight to the drums and bass that lived in the middle and then cleared out just a bit of sonic space for the vocal to occupy with a little cut at 400-600 Hz. I painstakingly clip gained your vocal line by line to have it sit closer to the band’s dynamic. That was work.
A little 4:1 compression to bind mix together, a limiter to say “That’s all folks!” and the tiniest bit of parallel process digital clipping to add realism.
It’s not the specifics mentioned here that are important, it’s the reasoning behind the moves. Let that be the takeaway.
PT
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Bar,
Much as I do enjoy writing long winded comments, this time I will limit myself to three sentences. Upon further listening, I zeroed in on the density of the vocal that caught my attention in an ever so slightly jarring way. It’s the constant double tracking of the lead vocal that takes up more of the acoustic space than is warranted in this delicate (to my ear) piece.
PT
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Bar,
Those subtle changes you made make your song better, more interesting, prettier, and perhaps, take a step towards sophisticated. Those were good suggestions. I would like to offer up one also.
What if you took the thought of growing the instrumental arrangement as the song progresses as you just did, and apply it to the vocal side of the presentation also? ie. the first verse has the same vocal arrangement construct as the last verse. I think you’re missing the opportunity to use the vocal arrangement to further the story.
What if that first verse was as gentle as your intro guitars? One voice starts the song, no harmonies needed because with gentleness and sparseness first, you allow the next verse to “grow.” Set up the listeners to go “Oh, Pretty!” when the second verse kicks in with a single harmony. Perhaps rinse and repeat to make the third verse get more complex if it fits the story you’re trying to tell.
In my brain, I heard every first word of a verse naked, out there on its own. When a supporting harmony came in it meant something and carried weight, even if this bucket of a song is filled with feathers. It’s the difference that matters and will command the listeners’ ears.
To paraphrase Miles Davis…It’s not the lines you sing that matter most, it’s the lines you don’t sing that can also convey intent.
To quote Mickey Hart ” All we need is the weight of a feather to tip the balance in the favor of love.”
PT