slackoverflow
Member
New House track, this is probably the closest I've got to a proper banger and I've tried to focus on drum programming, a good mix and a massive drop. Interested to hear what you all think!
Amber Lightning - House Track
- Thread starter slackoverflow
- Start date
Hey man,
love the sound design over here, those stabs and the way they evolve are real nice!
That being said, I think the track needs some attention on a couple of things, (i) the definition of the low end, the kick especially, which was sometimes a bit hard to hear, (ii) I think you need a bit more structure in the track, and (iii) I really think with these wonderful sounds you have the drop can be way bigger. Create a pause in the track, build some tension and then let it all come back in!
Keep on going!
love the sound design over here, those stabs and the way they evolve are real nice!
That being said, I think the track needs some attention on a couple of things, (i) the definition of the low end, the kick especially, which was sometimes a bit hard to hear, (ii) I think you need a bit more structure in the track, and (iii) I really think with these wonderful sounds you have the drop can be way bigger. Create a pause in the track, build some tension and then let it all come back in!
Keep on going!
E1GHTH PLACE
New member
Hey @stylist, could you offer better feedback than say "it is a little bit boring"? Perhaps tell the poster why it's boring and what sort of critique could you give to help he/she out? We all gotta start somewhere and just remember that you also started with nothing, so giving any advice/feedback based on your experience to help out another musician would be helpful. Just my two cents.
Anyway!
Ok, so I really like the sound production you've used for this track, really nice effect variations as well but now it's a matter of structuring everything together to sound more cohesive and coherent. As DZM mentioned already, quite a bit of your lower end information is being drowned out in the mix and it's a matter of properly EQing your kick drum so your bass frequencies can fit in nicely with the production. You're slowly getting there but I think at this point you should keep on smashing out more music until you feel more comfortable with your writing and production. By all means though, please do send more new music on here since I'd like to see your progression!
Have fun and thanks for sharing!
Anyway!
Ok, so I really like the sound production you've used for this track, really nice effect variations as well but now it's a matter of structuring everything together to sound more cohesive and coherent. As DZM mentioned already, quite a bit of your lower end information is being drowned out in the mix and it's a matter of properly EQing your kick drum so your bass frequencies can fit in nicely with the production. You're slowly getting there but I think at this point you should keep on smashing out more music until you feel more comfortable with your writing and production. By all means though, please do send more new music on here since I'd like to see your progression!
Have fun and thanks for sharing!
beyond_horizont
New member
I like the synth sound a lot! It has this cool 80s vibe that gives me a nice retro feeing
I agree with DZM and E1GHTH PLACE (not only in this case, the two always give high quality feedback ) You have a solid and creatively good foundation already, with a bit more mixing practice you can get a lot out of this. Maybe use a bit side-chaining to make room for the kick, put some of the sounds in their own space with e. g. some delays and reverbs and try to find a few "knobs" which you can automate along the arragement (be it within the synths or for example some effects on them). I could also imagine that this particular track would work nicely with a higher amount of bpm (but that's also a matter of taste). Keep it up, I'm curious to hear more!
I agree with DZM and E1GHTH PLACE (not only in this case, the two always give high quality feedback
) You have a solid and creatively good foundation already, with a bit more mixing practice you can get a lot out of this. Maybe use a bit side-chaining to make room for the kick, put some of the sounds in their own space with e. g. some delays and reverbs and try to find a few "knobs" which you can automate along the arragement (be it within the synths or for example some effects on them). I could also imagine that this particular track would work nicely with a higher amount of bpm (but that's also a matter of taste). Keep it up, I'm curious to hear more!
slackoverflow
Member
Hi all, thanks all for listening and giving some feedback.
DZM: Appreciate the kind words, not sure the preset + FX I used amounted to sound design but I'll take it. Now as for the issues yes I could hear something wasn't right with the kick but I'm still mastering how to fix that sort of stuff, will have to go back to the drawing board. It was probably the first time I've layered the drums so much and it looks like I'll need to study up a bit as well. As for structure, do you mean the flow of the track or the mix? I deliberately kept a simple flow to this one and honestly I'm probably happy with it other than the way the stabs were introduced, I didn't really have a better idea for how to drop them in. Finally, I struggle with "the drop" as a lot of them are very clichéd, so I decided to keep it simple and focus on the intensity of the music when it comes in. I might experiment with your idea of adding some silence though, that can be very effective.
stylist: thanks for listening, I think?
E1ghth Place: much appreciate the detailed feedback and encouragement, makes me want to hit up Ableton immediately! I had experimented with EQ on the kick but it never really resolved itself and eventually I gave up.
Edit: beyond horizon - missed your post as I was drafting this one, thanks for the kind words as well! I had looked at side-chaining but literally learnt how that worked a few days ago, and I must admit shied away from trying it out. I think the problem was that snare but I probably needed to duplicate the instrument in order to side-chain as they were in the same channel. I thought that about the bpm as well, but it sounded awful when bumped to 140 and would probably have needed some musical surgery to make the stabs etc. work!
DZM: Appreciate the kind words, not sure the preset + FX I used amounted to sound design but I'll take it. Now as for the issues yes I could hear something wasn't right with the kick but I'm still mastering how to fix that sort of stuff, will have to go back to the drawing board. It was probably the first time I've layered the drums so much and it looks like I'll need to study up a bit as well. As for structure, do you mean the flow of the track or the mix? I deliberately kept a simple flow to this one and honestly I'm probably happy with it other than the way the stabs were introduced, I didn't really have a better idea for how to drop them in. Finally, I struggle with "the drop" as a lot of them are very clichéd, so I decided to keep it simple and focus on the intensity of the music when it comes in. I might experiment with your idea of adding some silence though, that can be very effective.
stylist: thanks for listening, I think?
E1ghth Place: much appreciate the detailed feedback and encouragement, makes me want to hit up Ableton immediately! I had experimented with EQ on the kick but it never really resolved itself and eventually I gave up.
Edit: beyond horizon - missed your post as I was drafting this one, thanks for the kind words as well! I had looked at side-chaining but literally learnt how that worked a few days ago, and I must admit shied away from trying it out. I think the problem was that snare but I probably needed to duplicate the instrument in order to side-chain as they were in the same channel. I thought that about the bpm as well, but it sounded awful when bumped to 140 and would probably have needed some musical surgery to make the stabs etc. work!
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slackoverflow
Member
Actually, scratch what I said earlier about the snare it's clearly the bass and I've started fixing it, did my first sidechain . Will post a fixed version tomorrow as my first attempt has kind of wiped out the bass completely and some balance is required. Thanks all for your support and taking the time to help me move forwards!
. Will post a fixed version tomorrow as my first attempt has kind of wiped out the bass completely and some balance is required. Thanks all for your support and taking the time to help me move forwards!
slackoverflow
Member
Ok, well it's done, or at least as done as I can make it. In addition to fixing the bass issue, I cleared away some hi-hat clutter, emphasised some claps and tweaked the drop, which I am in two minds about but I believe it still works well. At this rate I might start to enjoy mixing rather than it feeling like four-dimensional accountancy 
!
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