Quandary

S

SimonT

Member
Just a little quandary I have for people on here.
I have a keyboard song, and some guitar songs played on an acoustic guitar, recorded on a mini tape recorder (or what some would call a dictaphone). For some reason they sound way better than when I've recorded them on Reason. It's hard to explain why they sound better on the mini tape recorder, think they sound fuller perhaps. The keyboard song was a piano type preset on the musical keyboard, and in Reason, I used a piano (Piano combinator patch). Just wondering if anyone could hazard a guess as to why this may be? On the mini tape recorder, the songs are a little distorted, could it be that the whole, or more of the frequency range is being filled, and so they sound fuller? and in Reason, 'cause I haven't completed them yet, they only have a small portion of the frequency range filled, I.e - the part where the piano sits? on the mini tape recorder by the way, it's just keyboard and vocal, or guitar and vocal, but again, the guitar sounds really nice and full. Was a different acoustic guitar, and in my opinion, a nicer sounding one, but don't think that could have made a dramatic difference.
 
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my first instinct is to suggest that the guitar one sounds better because the performance is better and not heavily quantised by the program or you after recording it. In addition, I would suggest that because it is played on a guitar, it is actually a true guitar recording rather than some keyboard based emualtion that does not use guitar voicings

your piano one is probably a result of the same, better, un-quantised performance, but otherwise no different to what reason can do

in both cases you are also not stuck to a strict clock-like lockstep interpretation of time/rhythm and so both flow more naturally

which version of reason are you using?
 
Reason 6.5. Very good points. It's strange really. Listened to the Reason version of the piano track one again after writing this thread, and it didn't sound as bad as I thought it did but still sounded, sort of better on the tape recorder. Maybe it is the exactness the quantizing may have given it, the rigiidty of it, on Reason. How would I give it a more human feel then slightly? Maybe there was a bit more (unintended) reverb in the keyboard sound on the tape recorded version.
 
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you could use iterative quantise (quantise by a % rather than exact quantise (use the F8 toolbox)) or even use one of the many grooves available in reason
 
Think I've discovered the reason. On the mini tape recorder they're a little distorted, this may be the reason. The distortion (or poor quality recording) is acting as an effect and making the chords sort of blend together and just improving the overall sound really. There's also due to the tape being old, a little underwater type effect happening here and there. They were also recorded whilst busking in a tunnel with a great reverb to it. Gonna try emulating one specific song on the tape recorder to see if I can replicate it using either the Scream 4, Audiomatic and RV7 or RV-7000.
 
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