Mix Challenge

JeroenZuiderwijk wrote: ↑

Mon Mar 20, 2023 14:42 CET

OrpheusXL wrote: ↑

Mon Mar 20, 2023 14:03 CET

I've checked the soundcloud link and really could not find the file.
But it's there.

So I used the "copy link" function. Please try again:

https://soundcloud.com/orpheusxl/the-da ... al_sharing

If this works, I'll change the link also in my initial post (if I can edit it).

Thanks!

This one works! Thank you for sharing. I hear a lot of different influences in your music. I like the idea. When I listen to your song I imagine how this would sound with a live band and a little bit more uptempo. Could even be ska i think. Well done!

Thanks!

I'll try to change the tempo, at least a ittle bit and if I like it, I'll re-upload at soundcloud. And post here of course.


Edit:
I decided to leave the tempo as it is.
As long as it's just instrumental it would work fine with higher tempo,
but in the moment the lyrics come in, it will be too fast.

Imagine to sing: "This was the day when my heart broke" with 120 or more bps!

I hope, the loudness is correct this time.

Mellow Browne wrote: ↑

Sun Mar 19, 2023 22:40 CET

Hello,

Here is my submission for this month.

Cool song. Nice sonic soundlandscape. This is realy back to the '80 s. All sounds fit together nicely. just for inspiration; I'm only missing that one element (theme / hook) that stands out, that gives the song its own personallity. Could be a weird fx, a melody, a catchy variation....to name something.

@JeroenZuiderwijk thanks for the feefback.
I‘ve actually written some vocals for this but I didn’t feel very comfortable while recording. And I also have some problems with my mic. I really need to buy a new one, but this is not going to be cheap

But because you asked for more personality I’m still going to record the vocals and we will see how my singing turns out. A lot of flex pitch work ahead, that’s for sure.

Hi all,

I had a lot of fun using RipChord. I downloaded some presets and used the 'one note' function that generates preprogrammed chords with an electric piano-ish sound. I arranged them in an order that sounded more or less musical to me. Some chords are extremely dissonant. But I didn't want to change that. It felt like part of the challenge. I did added some extra chords to make it more usable. Then I started experimenting with some drums.I wanted a rock / dance vibe combination. I often use Renoise for the beatmaking. It is easy and intuitive. Also if i don't like the sound
I can change it with one click. The first version was realy boring. Than I remembered a trick that I sometimes use to make a beat more interesting. The kick / snare and first hihat are in 4/4 the second hihat is in 3/4. That makes a lot of difference.

With the beat it still felt realy weird and chaotic. It needed some structure that the listener could hang on to other than a steady beat. So I decided to play some guitar chords over the keyboard part. This immediately made it sound more like a song. I played just a couple of different chords over the weird piano progression.The bassguitar part is a guitar with basssimulator effect. Although very dissonant when isolated, in the track the layers seem to work together (you need to listen carefully to hear the keyboard part beneath the layers of guitar). and it evolved more and more into a rock song. So I was like...why not...lets give it a guitarsolo at the end. And so I did :-)

Again it was a challenge to finish something on time. Partly because I have not much time to make music (but I do spent every free second of the day making music ;-) ) and also because everytime I listen to the song I get a new idea and I want to change the song....so if it wasn't for the deadline I would never finish this song. I don't think it feels like a finished product btw. I think I would need so much more time for that, it is mostly just a jam. But that is fine, I did create something that made me happy producing it.
So let me give you some insight in the chord structure etc.

Piano:
couplet
Em - F- Asus2 - Am13/C - D add(2)
G6/D - Bm7 - B aug - Bm
Break
C9/A# - Am7/G - Bm
Bridge
C - G - F - Am - Am - Em - E5 - A5 - C6

Guitar:
Intro:
C#6b5 - C#dim7
Couplet:
A11sus4 - A - A6

Here is the "final" result:

https://1drv.ms/u/s!Ahp8xH6KRIfbgTmPKXV ... 0?e=FktBR0

JeroenZuiderwijk wrote: ↑

Tue Mar 21, 2023 01:27 CET

Hi all,

I had a lot of fun using RipChord. I downloaded some presets and used the 'one note' function that generates preprogrammed chords with an electric piano-ish sound. I arranged them in an order that sounded more or less musical to me. Some chords are extremely dissonant. But I didn't want to change that. It felt like part of the challenge. I did added some extra chords to make it more usable. Then I started experimenting with some drums.I wanted a rock / dance vibe combination. I often use Renoise for the beatmaking. It is easy and intuitive. Also if i don't like the sound
I can change it with one click. The first version was realy boring. Than I remembered a trick that I sometimes use to make a beat more interesting. The kick / snare and first hihat are in 4/4 the second hihat is in 3/4. That makes a lot of difference.

With the beat it still felt realy weird and chaotic. It needed some structure that the listener could hang on to other than a steady beat. So I decided to play some guitar chords over the keyboard part. This immediately made it sound more like a song. I played just a couple of different chords over the weird piano progression.The bassguitar part is a guitar with basssimulator effect. Although very dissonant when isolated, in the track the layers seem to work together (you need to listen carefully to hear the keyboard part beneath the layers of guitar). and it evolved more and more into a rock song. So I was like...why not...lets give it a guitarsolo at the end. And so I did :-)

Again it was a challenge to finish something on time. Partly because I have not much time to make music (but I do spent every free second of the day making music ;-) ) and also because everytime I listen to the song I get a new idea and I want to change the song....so if it wasn't for the deadline I would never finish this song. I don't think it feels like a finished product btw. I think I would need so much more time for that, it is mostly just a jam. But that is fine, I did create something that made me happy producing it.
So let me give you some insight in the chord structure etc.

Piano:
couplet
Em - F- Asus2 - Am13/C - D add(2)
G6/D - Bm7 - B aug - Bm
Break
C9/A# - Am7/G - Bm
Bridge
C - G - F - Am - Am - Em - E5 - A5 - C6

Guitar:
Intro:
C#6b5 - C#dim7
Couplet:
A11sus4 - A - A6

Here is the "final" result:

https://1drv.ms/u/s!Ahp8xH6KRIfbgTmPKXV ... 0?e=FktBR0

Well, I can hear what fun you had with this!
Love it.

@JeroenZuiderwijk
Cool little funny jam you produced and your entry sounds pretty much finished to my ears, I don't know what you were hearing. I would recommend you to spend just a few minutes more and try to compress the kick a little bit so that it sits more efficient in the mix, it feels so loose compared to the other instruments, I'm missing the definition and contour of it. Other than that your mix is pretty balanced.

@OrpheusXL
This is some lofi stuff here at a higher pace. Overall I find your entry balanced I just have the impression that is a bit squashed, I don't know if it is the drum bus or the stereo bus. I would definitely look into this and make it less aggressive.

Arelem wrote: ↑

Sun Mar 12, 2023 21:15 CET

Hello All,

I used chorz to 'generate' some chords for me. The main progression is being strummed out in the guitar parts. I also have a synth playing the chords with some inversions and added 5th or 7th notes. The progression I ended up with is F#min i VII i v III VII i v.
The track is lofi-esque but isn't strictly following the standards for the genre.



Drive link for download:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/ ... sp=sharing


[/spoil]

Polished and relaxing ;-) this sounds very professional. The strumming guitar sounds smooth! With some vocals this could be a hit.

Mellow Browne wrote: ↑

Tue Mar 21, 2023 08:38 CET

@JeroenZuiderwijk
Cool little funny jam you produced and your entry sounds pretty much finished to my ears, I don't know what you were hearing. I would recommend you to spend just a few minutes more and try to compress the kick a little bit so that it sits more efficient in the mix, it feels so loose compared to the other instruments, I'm missing the definition and contour of it. Other than that your mix is pretty balanced.

Hi Mellow Browne, Thank you for the feedback. What I'm hearing when I listen to it is all the rough edges that i actualy wanted to smooth out. I hear mixing issues, the extra effects I actualy wanted to apply etc. But I also realise that to other peoples ears the rough edges are just part of the track and can also add something to the character of the song. About the kick, I agree. I'll see if I can make it sit more in te mix.
Cheers!

Hello everybody,

this is my (final) entry for this month:



WAV-Version:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1B3ko3e ... share_link

First, let me apologize for my singing. My intonation and my timing are all over the place, and software can only correct so much. It is only a mockup to give you a rough idea of how the melody would sound like with the lyrics.

As chord progression tool, I used WAProduction's Instachord 2, preset "RF 32 Arp Amadd9 - AMaj9Sus4 - FMaj7b5 - E - Dm - FMaj7 - G#Tritone - E (harmonic min)"

There are two EMaj chords in the sequence, so I looked up inside Instachord 2 what other chords were suggested and replaced the first EMaj with E7Sus4.

For those who are not familiar with WAProduction's Instachord 2:
Instachord 2 splits the keyboard in different parts by octaves. One octave on the keyboard will trigger the chords of the progression (e. g. C1 = AMinAdd9, D1 = AMaj9Sus4, E1 = FMaj7b5 etc.) and the keys of another octave will trigger strum patterns, rhythm patterns or arpeggios (e. g. C3 = strum pattern 1, D3 = strum pattern 2).

The Instachord 2 preset came with different Arpeggios. I chose Arpeggio 016b, because it would play all notes of the chords and not just the first 5 notes.
Then I "wrote" some Midi, containing only two notes, that would trigger this Arp with the different chords.

I routed the Midi from Instachord 2 to my goto instument AAS Lounge Lizard EP-4, this time preset "13 Model V", and recorded the actual midi notes coming out of Instachord 2.

I split the progression into two 8 bar parts,
the "Verse"-Part
AMinAdd9 x 2 - AMaj9Sus4 x 2 - FMaj7b5 x 2 - E7Sus4 - EMaj
and the "Chorus"-Part
DMin x 2 - FMaj7 x 2 - G#Tritone x 2 - EMaj x2

and structured the song
Intro 4 x AMinAdd9
Verse x 2
Chorus
Verse
Chorus x 2
Outro 4 x AMinAdd9

I copied the whole chord progression and song structure and routed it into Soniccouture's Music Boxes (Instrument for NI Kontakt). I panned the E-Piano a little to the left and the Music Box a little to the right and added the Ableton Live "Velocity" MIDI tool to the E-Piano to introduce some randomness to the velocity of the notes.

The drums are IK Multimedia's ModoDrum, "Black Oyster"-preset. For the rhythms, I used Midi loops from the YurtRock "Clyde Stublefield"-pack, which I edited to work with the ModoDrum mapping. I added the Ableton Live "Velocity" Midi tool here as well to randomize the velocity of the hits a little. The drum bus is compressed with HoRNet Plugins MultiCompPlus MK2, "OPTO" compressor type.

After that, I recorded some guitar melodies but ended up deleting them again.

Then I recorded my Ibanez Soundgear 505 through my Zoom H4n Pro recorder, comped some of the takes together and added a low pass filter, the brainworx Ampeg B15N for flavour and the Ableton Live compressor.

I added some Native Instruments "Session Strings Pro 2" Celli, starting in the first chorus, playing the lowest two notes of every chord, adding additional layers in verse 3, and going back to the two lowest notes in chorus 2 and 3.

As I had only written one verse, I decided to write an instrumental part for the two other verse parts in the song. I experimented with different instruments for a solo and chose AudioThing's "Pong Glockenspiel" (Instrument for NI Kontakt) for its crispy attack.

The chorus is repeated 3 times with a little variation at the end of the second chorus.

The vocals werer recorded through the microphones of my Zoom H4n Pro, run through Audified ToneSpot Voice Express, "Pop Modern Dry"-preset, Brainworx bx_crispytuner for intonation correction and Ableton Live's Utility for gain correction. For the chorus, I copied the vocals on two additional lanes, panned hard right and left, and run them through bx_crispytuner and Applied Audio Systems' ObjeqDelay, "Moon Echo Chorus"-preset, 100 % wet, very short delay time (around 5 ms, a little differently timed between left and right).

My master chanel setup
Hornet ThirtyOne MK2 EQ
TBProAudio ISOL8 to check for problems after the equalisation
Brainworx bx_masterdeck True Peak to make bass <121 Hz mono, to adjust the loudness and to enhance the stereo and glue compress everything.
LUveler to set the target levels
SPL Hawk Eye to check for problems after the mastering plugin
YouLean Loudnes Meter 2 to check for loudness problems


Lyrics:

KukoBass wrote: ↑

Tue Mar 21, 2023 17:02 CET

Hello everybody,

this is my entry for this month:

WAV-Version:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1B3ko3e ... share_link

First, let me apologize for my singing. My intonation and my timing are all over the place, and software can only correct so much. It is only a mockup to give you a rough idea of how the melody would sound like with the lyrics.

I don't think your vocal is that bad. It actually suits the song in a way. The dark voice reminds me of Nick Cave. You could also just be bold and put it more upfront but still let it sit in the mix....that way it doesn't sound as if you are hiding the vocal.
The song is good it is a very cool arrangement.