PUNK a la '76

[Farmerbrown2200]

it's an old sound by now, but still classic. Tried my best with this one recorded live in a small room with the bare minimum (octro pre and ada8000 to Cubase). Voice is live in the same room and I think could be much better if re recorded (over dubbed) on same bed tracks. As is, the voice really sucks (technically) but at the same time I kinda like the vibe...what to do?

Feedback would be more than appreciated. How close or far is this to say Zero Boys or bands of that ilk? How do you like my driving?? This is the first punk type thing I have recorded in MANY years (20+).


FB

[Farmerbrown2200]

Pogo yeah!

[Farmerbrown2200]

no opinions at all!? say it sucks or something... i can take it really.

[Shaft]

What a piss! I dig the vibe. Way cool

But I like DIY punk sensibilities with clearer and uncolored sound ala Steve Albini. Y'know, Breeders POD, Pixies Surfer Rosa and Nirvana's In Utero.

Cool tune.

[Farmerbrown2200]

Uh thanks... I think, but is it still "DIY" if you have Steve Albini on your team? Surely he is a hired gun, thus movingn a Pixies type of production far beyond "doing it yourself", in which case the term is a sham and the music is then co opted by the system, at which point it becomes part of a marketing scheme that says "it's only DIY if it sounds like this!" Just a thought... thanks for the reply.

FB

[Power Supply]

Pretty cool. A little woofy in the low end but well done.

[Farmerbrown2200]

Thanks power supply! Yeah, was thinking about turning down the bass guitar and adding more snap to the kick drum, but then I listened to some old punk (Zero Boys, saints) and compared the bass level, it was so close I kept it as is. It's just a demo, but the vibe that gets me every time ... the wreckless abandon that peaks about 3/4 through the song... the boys nailed it in the peformance. Hoping to work with them again.

Thanks for the feedback.

[knekor]

Couldn't the vocals come up a bit? I'm having a real hard hearing anything else than the distortion.

[Farmerbrown2200]

knekor,
The vocals can't c ome up as this was just a kind of guide track, a mic in the same room as the instruments with too much bleed. We always intended to over-dub new voices but never got around to it, so it was left as is. In the end we kind of like the ambiguity of the voice. It adds to the Punk vibe, no?

FB

[mr jkn]

I think this rocks!

[Farmerbrown2200]

Thanks mr jkn! Sweden Rocks! (two comments for Sweden) I'll post more as things progress.

FB

[eyesore]

I downloaded the song twice to make sure the file wasn't somehow corrupted during download. The whole thing sounds like it was put through a distortion pedal or something along those lines. I listened to another song on here a while back that was done by lucey that had that sound and I hope it's not a new trend. If that's the sort of sound you were going for then you nailed it, but I don't like it. I am not familiar with the bands you mentioned however.

I experimented with using the distortion function in my audio app on some mixes of mine and it did seem to yield similar results. It seems an easy way to really mess with the dynamics of a song as my distortion function is based on remapping the original volume level to a new level, but at the expense of adding some white noise sound to it.

I would like to hear the song before it was distorted as it seems it might have sounded decent. Or was the distortion introduced at the tracking stage and can't be removed? I don't think you gave enough info about how you recorded this to tell. All I picked up was that you must have had a voal mic in addition to others. I would appreciate some information on what you miced and where the distortion was introduced.

The bass guitar sounds pretty cool but I agree that it is pretty much dominating the song. I agree with your initial thought that the attack of the kick needs brought out as it almost appears like there isn't a kick a lot of the time.

Originally Posted by Farmerbrown2200

In the end we kind of like the ambiguity of the voice. It adds to the Punk vibe, no?

No... ...imho. Rather, in addition to the overall distortion, it makes the mix appear rather unprofessional, 'demo' or not. I can't make out anything it is saying except 'get around'. Therefore, I can't even tell if I like the song or not. It appears as though the vocal was put through some distortion of its own prior to the distortion that the whole mix got? Overdoing this could be part of the problem in addition to the levels/bleed issues that you mentioned. Again I'd like to know how exactly you tracked the vocal and the rest of the song to better understand what is going on.

Thanks.

[Farmerbrown2200]

Eyesore,

This song was recorded live into Cubase SX using four different pres: two VC1s (one for voice one for snare), a focusrite octopre (guitars and bass) and behringer ada8000 (for the drums). guitar mics were 57s and the bass was akg-c3000 all close miced, no direct boxes. Drum mics include audix d1 on snare, mxl2000 and speaker mic on kick with rode NT5 stereo overheads.

The distorted voice is a sennheiser dynamic mic driven hard through a Joe meek VC1 with the compression cranked and then put through Cubase tube distortion effect (so yes, you're right). there is so much bleed that if you turn it up too loud the whole song sounds like it is being put through a guitar pedal. This was never intended for use in the final mix, but the band liked it so much...

Both guitar amps are custom tube jobs (el34s in both amps) the bass amp is solid state Hartke 2000.

The mix was done in Cubase with 4 sub mixes/group outs going into a Pulsar Scope system for compression(vinco), some EQ (psyq) , and finally smashed through the dreaded L3 adding 2 db of gain.

Who is lucey?


Unprofessional! I suppose so, even though I do find myself getting paid often enough... i was not very rigorus about mixing this stuff as it was really a rehearsal tape/test setup for the real thing which is still to come. Funny thing is, it got such a good reaction I thought I would post it here and see what folks thought.

To be more specific about the punk vibe thing, these guys are very into Johnny Thunders, NY Dolls, early Iggy and the stooges, The Saints and the like. All very lofi with a kind of drunken/druggie vibe to it (I remained sober however ). They want that reflected in the final projcet ANy suggestions toward that end are more than welcome.

Thanks for your reply.

FB

[eyesore]

Originally Posted by Farmerbrown2200

Eyesore,

This song was recorded live into Cubase SX using four different pres: two VC1s (one for voice one for snare), a focusrite octopre (guitars and bass) and behringer ada8000 (for the drums). guitar mics were 57s and the bass was akg-c3000 all close miced, no direct boxes. Drum mics include audix d1 on snare, mxl2000 and speaker mic on kick with rode NT5 stereo overheads.

The distorted voice is a sennheiser dynamic mic driven hard through a Joe meek VC1 with the compression cranked and then put through Cubase tube distortion effect (so yes, you're right). there is so much bleed that if you turn it up too loud the whole song sounds like it is being put through a guitar pedal. This was never intended for use in the final mix, but the band liked it so much...

Both guitar amps are custom tube jobs (el34s in both amps) the bass amp is solid state Hartke 2000.

The mix was done in Cubase with 4 sub mixes/group outs going into a Pulsar Scope system for compression(vinco), some EQ (psyq) , and finally smashed through the dreaded L3 adding 2 db of gain.

Who is lucey?


Unprofessional! I suppose so, even though I do find myself getting paid often enough... i was not very rigorus about mixing this stuff as it was really a rehearsal tape/test setup for the real thing which is still to come. Funny thing is, it got such a good reaction I thought I would post it here and see what folks thought.

To be more specific about the punk vibe thing, these guys are very into Johnny Thunders, NY Dolls, early Iggy and the stooges, The Saints and the like. All very lofi with a kind of drunken/druggie vibe to it (I remained sober however ). They want that reflected in the final projcet ANy suggestions toward that end are more than welcome.

Thanks for your reply.

FB

Interesting that the distorted vocal track is giving that impression to the entire track. I believe I follow you on what is occuring now. So bypassing the cubase distortion clears things up? I guess if you are gonna re-record the song it's not all that important. I am just surprised that the band prefers that effect - distorted vocals are one thing, but when it messes with everything else like that... One can't appreciate that those must be nice amps from what you described. Well enough of my going on about that.

Only 2 Db in the L3?! That thing is quashed more than most songs I have looked at. How is that getting it up to -8rms? The super hot level is part of the reason I figured originally that it might have been something you were doing to the whole mix that was making the distortion or that the individual tracks were possibly too hot. I guess you must have compressed it rather hard with the Pulsar...

Lucey is a mastering engineer who posts on these forums a lot, but a while back he posted some songs that he had tracked because I guess he does that occasionally too. They had a similar quality of the whole mix sounding like it was put through a distortion unit.

As far the 'unprofessional' comment, all I meant was that the vocal track could be bringing down an otherwise professional sounding mix, and it sounds like from what you said that that is probably the case.

I will be interested to hear the 'real' version when you re-record the song.

Thanks.

On a side note, I wonder how many bands that made lo-fi recordings really wanted them to be lo-fi and many times it was just the best they were able to do at the time... Type O Negative's(1 of the few bands I am a bit of a fan of) first album is kinda lo-fi sounding but after that the quality went up. I'm not sure the story there because I believe it was recorded in the same studio by the same engineer as some of their later work. My favorite song of theirs is on that album but I wish they would have recorded it better or would rerecord it even.

[Farmerbrown2200]

So bypassing the cubase distortion clears things up?

That's right, it's just alot less interesting without the effect and without the voice. I could post a no vocals version but it will take a few days.

FB

[hethaerto]

Hi. I like the song, and the mix, mostly.
I hate the vocal sound. Some dude yelling through a megaphone while inside a closet with a small hole punched in the door, with the top-end EQ'd to hell.
How does the vocal sound with no crazy treatments?
You've got some serious noise going on in the left guitar track. It's louder than the music.
Cool song, and I really like the rhythm guitar tone, especially during the refrain. Good shit.

[Farmerbrown2200]

Well it's pretty much unanimous, the voice sucks... but I still say... ah never mind.

thanks for the feedback y'all.

FB

[Farmerbrown2200]

Hey Dim light,

I think we have a communication breakdown at some level! I'm more than grateful for your's and everyone's feedback, I'm elated that you would even take the time to listen! I love GS and would never knowingly insult or slight any of the posters here.

I'm not sure what you understood by my last response but I'll tell you it's nothing mean or disrespectful! Simply put, I didn't know what else to say! One thing is for sure, everybody here has a problem with the voice and will go forward in this project with that and all the other feedback in mind.

and by the elipses (...) I was just trying to not re-state the obvious opinion that I still have that is this:

I think the voice is the real soul of the song (any song) and if you listen to Darby Crash (The Germs) or Flipper or early Black Flag or any number of punk bands, the voice can give the vibe without being intelligable.

That's it that's all!

Sincerely,

Mr. Mudface

[Farmerbrown2200]

I've been f@#$ing punked by a Slut!

I'll never forget or forgive this one!!!

That's MR. Mudface to you from now on, or Captain Death Freckle or some other subserviant monicker...

Intermezzo! How dare you???

[dix0r]

damn! that rocks. reminds me of some old non-album versions of old punk/rock stuff i have, like eddy & the hotrods. except faster.

the vocal/megaphone thing sounds kinda cool too - there's some newbomb turks songs with that bandpassed type sounding vox that i really like - for example, the song defiled. love the wanky pentatonic solo too.

what's the name of that band?

[Farmerbrown2200]

Thanks for the kind comments, I'll pass them along to the guys. This is a local montreal group called The Confusers. I'll be recording them again this week. They had more stuff on myspace, but I didn't record it, and it didn't represent them very well (kinda sounded like Oi music, unfortunately).

Cheers

FB