what is going on in your musical life

Though I guess the other way to be democratic is to divide up responsibilities, in which case you need to position yourself as the one who's in charge of final mixes.

OR you all need to agree on an outside mixer/producer.

yeah we're using the computer - i'm the only one with the program that'll make it work. we've been very democratic so far and managed to avoid pitfalls. i think my main issue is our drummer has it in his head that kick drums need to be really smackingly loud in the mix for a track to work and no amount of reasoning and playing him example songs (songs he LIKES) will convince him of that. he's a real 'if there's an effect available i have to use it' kind of person but his confidence in mixing and producing outweighs his actual knowledge. he's a young dude with a bucaneering spirit and won't be told or listen to things like 'if a sound's too quiet, turn the other sounds down' etc. i don't claim to be an expert by any means - in fact i'm a total amateur/novice - but i've been doing things for a bit longer and watching him work just seems like he's randomly turning gate and compressor setting up and down, washing things in distortion and echo and many of his mixes sound really over-the-top. it worries me when he says he can't hear the kick drum (it's there! you can hear it!) or that the track doesn't make him want to dance (it's not a dance track!). I wanna get him involved but last time i did he ended up undoing nights of careful tweaking.

he sounds like a dickcheese

can someone tell me what "cake format" is, because it sounds delicious

btw I was sort of half-listening to "Long Division" until the outro, which is fantastic all the way around

Paul, that stuff sounds good!

dog latin - he ended up undoing nights of careful tweaking - can you not make a duplicate track for him to dick around with? That way you won't lose anything when he messes it up. But also, BEWARE. Being in a band that has taken 5 years and then 8 (maybe 9, it's not out yet) years to release their albums, I am very well aware that you can fall into a massive hole of mixing. Things don't need to be perfect. New band has just released a four-track demo tape into the world, it's super lo-fi and messy, and honestly I'm pretty happy with just having it out there, we can work on perfect mixing later.

yeah it's really good advice emil.y. i'm a big believer in letting songs speak for themselves and that's why i'm keen to concentrate on, not so much "mixing", as getting the structures and performances right. I kind of don't care whether the kick drum's loud enough or not, but being told that such-and-such an instrument's too thin or a drum's too quiet isn't helpful at this stage - all that can be changed. i guess this is a symptom of showing people a work in progress. if you paint a wall you can take all day on it, make sure you get the underlay right, do three coats, get it looking really nice, but you shouldn't complain if the first thing people do when they see it is point out the few inches you missed in the lower left corner.
lo-fi is a cool aesthetic and i'm down with it. not sure it's quite the aesthetic we're after, but the other extreme is super-clean, super-flat, super bland mixing which is what we got when we recorded our first couple of songs at a local studio. none of us were that happy - the character didn't show through and since then we've decided to go the hard way and try and teach ourselves. part of this is a challenge to our selves and it gives us creative flexibility. again, i'm not an expert but i'm taking a lot of time to watch youtube videos, ask for advice where i can get it etc.

i am way behind on this thread but i just wanted to say i actual loled @ "someone in our spiritual ensemble stole my wife's pitch pipe"

You know what sucks is writing a song you can't sing. I've never had much vocal range but since I stopped playing shows I've lost some of that little range I had. I wrote a nice little song with a real melody but it sounds dumb when I try and record it because it starts out very low (I used a capo to bring it up into the bottom of my range) but then in the chorus does these little jumps into falsetto that I can't really pull off.

Also I recorded it as a straightforward guitar and vocals song and it's SO HARD for me to avoid the temptation to add a bunch of other stuff. I have no problem listening to other people's minimal arrangements but I can't listen to my own. Even on this one I doubled the guitar (subtly) and parts of the vocals. Some of it is I can hear every little mistake I make and adding more stuff helps smooth the mistakes over. But I need to make myself work harder to actually get a good performance instead of getting a passable one and then trying to make it sound good by adding a ton of shit.

^ this is the worst

big news, found out my rehearsal space appeared on the showtime drama brotherhood back in 2006

http://scontent-b-dfw.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/1488119_10152229285903268_2027922070_n.jpg

writing a song you can't sing

SO HARD for me to avoid the temptation to add a bunch of other stuff

I think these two go hand in hand and also are most of my songs.

Some guy put me on a "Worst Music of 2013" list which only had 2 entries:

https://twitter.com/ResistorSings/status/413396850138292224

Congratulations.

that's dope, especially since demdike stare is awesome.

2013 has given us some fantastic music – Arctic Monkeys, Arcade Fire, Nine Inch Nails, and Lorde, to name a few

HAHAHAHAHAHA

which ilxor runs that blog

wait, is that really demdike stare? it sounds like millie and andrea and the picture there would say so too.

congrats steve! i really liked that song.

oh it is demdike. weird, quite different for them.

Congratulations Steve!

Haha thanks dudes I guess I'll keep on living after all

Just finished subbing for a caroling gig, which may lead to other pickup gigs in the future. YAY NETOWRKING

i made a couple recordings of versions of holiday songs for my mom. maybe ill make a christmas album next year?

you should put pics of yr non-plussed pets in santa hats on the cover

"non plussed" is being v generous imo lol

there are certainly plenty pics to choose from. my pets have more santa hats than dan perry does

Juat signed up to Weeklybeats. Imagine I'll last about 1-2 months before I run out of steam, but hey.

The barbershop quartet I impulsively agreed to sing with is meeting on Wednesday. Here's hoping I still have low notes!

an insight into what super cool dudes are doing with themselves at 4:30am

http://oi41.tinypic.com/qo8sgz.jpg

looks like fun!

great delay pedal there.

That's a Behringer IINM? Don't knock it, I have one of those. Although it does tend to overload and go wrong a lot.

"it does tend to overload and go wrong a lot"

^^^ possible new Behringer company slogan there

My band is playing it's first gig in Knoxville on Saturday.

You guys, barbershop is massively fun

I'd love to get involved with barbershop.

We're playing our first out-of-our-immediate-area show in a couple of days - gonna tear St Albans a new one.

It was just great singing for-real bass in an all-male quartet again; haven't done that in YEARS

also lol the bass part is usually the easiest one to read in barbershop, aside from the melody

wasn't knocking it, have one myself coupled with a Behringer C-C300 Space chorus.

Analogue delay and chorus for £50 in total.

Oh god. Band hasn't practised properly in over a month, just agreed to a last-minute gig tomorrow in front of a potentially large (for us) audience. Scared!

i reckon you'll be fine, e. nothing like a good break and the fear of god to help you along the way.

that said the last couple of practices we've had haven't felt very satisfying. i hate practice rooms and having a time limit. we used to have our own garage we could jam in all day and all night, take frequent leisurely breaks etc, but now everyone's gotta turn up and start playing and we're conscious of how long we have and the money we're spending. invariably someone's not on form or the drumkit's not set up properly and the whole thing feels like a frustration and not conducive to creativity.

I don't know, though, having a never-ending jam session seems like a bit of a nightmare to me - is there actually the impetus to finish & polish when you can just meander for a day? (I'm sure there probably is, it just wouldn't necessarily suit my temperament.) My favourite rehearsal length was always the four-hour slot, where we invariably took an hour break somewhere in the middle to just sit down and talk about band stuff. Three hours is enough to make sure you can play your old songs and work on some new stuff.

yeah i guess it depends on temperament. no two bands are the same. my bandmates are notorious ditherers, easily distracted and hard to keep on point. if there's a reason to wander off-course it will happen, the phrase 'herding cats' springs to mind. i'm sure if i was working with people who were more focused then the 'get in there and practice' method would work better but it doesn't seem to suit us.. I think having the chance to break for an hour is really good if you can get it. all creative activities need reflection time.

i went through a similar transition recently (went from jamming in our drummers' loft to a shared space) and i actually prefer the more economical jams, after having adjusted to not taking a break to watch seinfeld or cook curry every hour. sounds like you're on top of your shit, just whip those slackers into shape

i'm playing drums live for the first time tomorrow night, very pumped. did you know that drumsticks are called baguettes in french? "baguettes de drum" thats what it says hahaha

hah, i'm half french and i didn't know that

earlnash - are you in white gold??

Went to McCabe's and Norm's today to enjoy a rare day off - played approximately $60k in acoustic guitars between the two places.

Collings D3 and D2H
Collings f-style Mandolin
Collings orchestra model
Martin D-28s from 53,55,57, 63 and 67

TONE!

started jams yesterday for new electro funk duo

awesome im totally jealous

I'm singing in a concert with my church choir Sunday; I have a prominent solo in a King's Singers arrangement of a random folk song. We're also doing stuff by Daniel Pinkham, Phillip Glass, Samuel Barber, Randall Thompson and more. The theme is "Americana", starting with traditional folks songs, going up through the romantic and minimal periods, and including some stopovers with modern arrangements of a spiritual or two. It's gonna fucking rule.

That sounds awesome! Will there be a recording up anywhere?