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[GeekyDad]

Quick question (well...maybe, kinda sorta):

I'm trying to reduce as much line noise as possible during the recording process. I'm going to try shutting lights and unplugging things nearby or sharing the outlet with my digital workstation (DAW), but I've also been using an older laptop (bought it about five years ago), which is parked on the same desk as the DAW. This could be embarrassingly obvious and noobish to ask, but could that be causing additional line noise (it's completely quiet to my naked ear)? I'm recording both my acoustic guitar (plugged directly into the system using a high-quality acoustic pick-up) and voice at the same time, but it's only the acoustic that is really presenting me with noticeably obtrusive line noise.

 

[GeekyDad]

Can anyone tell me what is the actual name of the foam mic cap Michael is using in this video?

 

[GeekyDad]

Not sure if anyone's still watching this thread, but if there is...

To Normalize or not to Normalize?

I've been weary of using it in the past couple of years. It's easy to see how it can fix one of my main mastering issues -- overall output, since I'm recording mostly acoustic music -- but whether they call it normalization or not, is sure seems to act like compression for a mix. And for me, I can't help but feel (hear) that I'm losing a lot of the subtly I work hours to attain.

For acoustic music, do you use it when rendering your finished mixes?

 

[Happosai]

Not sure if anyone's still watching this thread, but if there is...

To Normalize or not to Normalize?

I've been weary of using it in the past couple of years. It's easy to see how it can fix one of my main mastering issues -- overall output, since I'm recording mostly acoustic music -- but whether they call it normalization or not, is sure seems to act like compression for a mix. And for me, I can't help but feel (hear) that I'm losing a lot of the subtly I work hours to attain.

For acoustic music, do you use it when rendering your finished mixes?

Sorry for not responding much in the topic. It's embarrassing as I'm the OP too. Anyway, personally I would not normalize as I usually isolate tracks to be mastered from FLAC to WAV and don't want to have any other audio anomalies in the way. By the way, that which I mentioned is the furthest extent of compression I use. The only reason I convert FLACs to WAV is because I'm an old fart who believes in publishing the music to CD in most cases...and FLAC for a 5 track EP would be like 5 discs...lol.

Normalization isn't quite the same as compression. Before you do anything, why not listen to some examples of standard audio without and some with. I recommend to listen to elaborate pieces of music too that implement overdubs of multiple instruments. This is where I've noticed normalization screws things up. I recently started using Apple Music and I'm listening to some classic tracks I had on CD. There's definitely something missing in the overall mix. Not sure if it's compression or normalization but it doesn't sound great. Some levels do need to have higher gain than other too. With an acoustic guitar alone, you'd want bass strings to have a different mix than the treble strings to get the fullness of the sound. It can't all just be one level or a dreadnought ends up sounding like a ukulele.

 

[Mamofish]

The main thing I use normalization for is when using samples that are recorded really low, most of the the time normalizing a small sample it'll bring it up to snuff without altering the character much.

Here's my contribution! I used to do a lot of DAW stuff but, lately I'm enjoying just playing with synths and drum machines.

 

[Happosai]

The main thing I use normalization for is when using samples that are recorded really low, most of the the time normalizing a small sample it'll bring it up to snuff without altering the character much.

Here's my contribution! I used to do a lot of DAW stuff but, lately I'm enjoying just playing with synths and drum machines.

Sounds awesome. I worked with a few myself and had 3 of the Korg Volcas I used to carry around to toy with portably.

 

[Mamofish]

Thanks! I love the Volcas, I have the Volca drum and it's a great little box! Thinking about the modular one..

 

[Happosai]

Thanks! I love the Volcas, I have the Volca drum and it's a great little box! Thinking about the modular one..

The Volca drum is great but I'd also encourage you to try out the Volca Sampler. Plenty of percussive work to be utilized there. Korg MicroSampler is great for percussion too. I'm a sampler guy all the way back to the Korg DSS-1 (which is a beast).

 

[Mamofish]

I had to look up the DSS-1, the thing is a beast literally and the sounds I heard coming out of it. I do have the Octatrack which is taking care of my sampling for now. I'm an Elektron fan so I have a lot of their gear. Rytm, Heat, Octatrack, Syntakt and Digitone. I've just recently got them all setup on a large pedal board for easy transport (doing open mics). Really enjoying having them all working together and finally putting somewhat of a set together.

 

[Happosai]

I had to look up the DSS-1, the thing is a beast literally and the sounds I heard coming out of it. I do have the Octatrack which is taking care of my sampling for now. I'm an Elektron fan so I have a lot of their gear. Rytm, Heat, Octatrack, Syntakt and Digitone. I've just recently got them all setup on a large pedal board for easy transport (doing open mics). Really enjoying having them all working together and finally putting somewhat of a set together.

Octatrack is pretty cool. Feel free to share some sample tracks here for now. Some incredible gear there and liked seeing Digitone in there particularly.

The Korg DSS-1 that I purchased didn't have a made case, the person I bought it from sold it to me in a wooden coffin-like case. It's main defect was the floppy drive failing. I replaced it twice and tried wiring an SD card input to it which was able to obviously store quite a few more samples.

 

[Mamofish]

Octatrack is pretty cool. Feel free to share some sample tracks here for now. Some incredible gear there and liked seeing Digitone in there particularly.

The Korg DSS-1 that I purchased didn't have a made case, the person I bought it from sold it to me in a wooden coffin-like case. It's main defect was the floppy drive failing. I replaced it twice and tried wiring an SD card input to it which was able to obviously store quite a few more samples.

That's quite an upgrade! Were you able to get it to work? Cool to bring new life to an old synth like that.

I put together a little video playing around tonight, it's a bit overwhelming.. trying to get the hang of so much available. I've been using each device on it's own for awhile, creating some patterns. Now I'm trying to combine them all and use bits and pieces from each one and keep the flow going, the goal is to figure out an hour set and contact some venues in town.

I tried a new method recording with my phone, the video is slightly off audio...

 

[Mamofish]

Just wanted to say that I've been going through the back catalog of this thread and there is so much great music in here! Feel a bit late to the party but, glad there is already plenty to catch up on.

Name a musician who inspired you - that may not be a virtuoso (maybe even far from it); someone who is average but respectfully good at what they write/play.

Mine is Amon Tobin, I remember the first track I ever heard of his was Slowly from a skateboarding video. I was already into electronic music but, after hearing his music it exploded my interest.

In childhood my neighbor friend and I used to have a lot of sleepover LAN parties and we started working on tracks in Fruityloops. Then I found Reason and was really drawn to that because of the "real" gear and I connected more with using the routing behind the machines to come up with interesting effects and using CV between synths. Eventually I started to feel burnt out and it was easy to load up the DAW and feel a bit directionless with all the many options and I decided that I needed a groovebox to simplify and stay focused. This has really worked for me, bringing more fun back into the hobby while also being way more productive than I was before.

There's a whole bunch of youtube videos out there about going DAWless so I know I'm not the only one who's felt this eventual burn out on the computer, I wanted to share my story in case anyone else is feeling similar.. Take the leap!

 

[Happosai]

Just wanted to say that I've been going through the back catalog of this thread and there is so much great music in here! Feel a bit late to the party but, glad there is already plenty to catch up on.



Mine is Amon Tobin, I remember the first track I ever heard of his was Slowly from a skateboarding video. I was already into electronic music but, after hearing his music it exploded my interest.

In childhood my neighbor friend and I used to have a lot of sleepover LAN parties and we started working on tracks in Fruityloops. Then I found Reason and was really drawn to that because of the "real" gear and I connected more with using the routing behind the machines to come up with interesting effects and using CV between synths. Eventually I started to feel burnt out and it was easy to load up the DAW and feel a bit directionless with all the many options and I decided that I needed a groovebox to simplify and stay focused. This has really worked for me, bringing more fun back into the hobby while also being way more productive than I was before.

There's a whole bunch of youtube videos out there about going DAWless so I know I'm not the only one who's felt this eventual burn out on the computer, I wanted to share my story in case anyone else is feeling similar.. Take the leap!

With electronic instruments like drum machines and such. I started with a Boss Dr. Rhythm DR-110 when I was about 11-years old. I couldn't play much guitar back then or anything else. My sister played piano and we'd make up songs. I used the preset percussion loops and the press-and-play percussion triggers. I wish I still had it but I lent to a cousin who sold it in the late-90's. Maybe that wasn't a bad thing. I never left percussion but I wouldn't have started woodwind, strings and piano.

 

[GeekyDad]

With electronic instruments like drum machines and such. I started with a Boss Dr. Rhythm DR-110 when I was about 11-years old. I couldn't play much guitar back then or anything else. My sister played piano and we'd make up songs. I used the preset percussion loops and the press-and-play percussion triggers. I wish I still had it but I lent to a cousin who sold it in the late-90's. Maybe that wasn't a bad thing. I never left percussion but I wouldn't have started woodwind, strings and piano.

Blast from the freakin' past, man! Boss DR-220A here. Forgot all about that thing. Yeesh. I think I was 17. Made some stuff I thought was amazing back then. It hurts to hear now. And not because of the device's quality, just my own lack of ability. Ugh...

 

[Mamofish]

With electronic instruments like drum machines and such. I started with a Boss Dr. Rhythm DR-110 when I was about 11-years old. I couldn't play much guitar back then or anything else. My sister played piano and we'd make up songs. I used the preset percussion loops and the press-and-play percussion triggers. I wish I still had it but I lent to a cousin who sold it in the late-90's. Maybe that wasn't a bad thing. I never left percussion but I wouldn't have started woodwind, strings and piano.

Blast from the freakin' past, man! Boss DR-220A here. Forgot all about that thing. Yeesh. I think I was 17. Made some stuff I thought was amazing back then. It hurts to hear now. And not because of the device's quality, just my own lack of ability. Ugh...

That's awesome! I wish I was exposed to some stuff like that growing up. None of my family were musicians but, my brother's loved collecting CD's when those came out and listened to a lot. I had a boombox radio with 2 cassette players in it, I used to record songs off the radio and put my voice in between like I was running my own radio station.

 

[indigo-cyclops]

So since I'm having a hell of a time trying to book shows, I filmed a performance I did at a friend's studio space in November. If you dig electronic music check it out. It's this Friday on Bandcamp.

It's at an odd time (3PM Eastern) because I am trying to account for UK folk, who make up a chunk of my "listeners".

If money's tight hit me up via DM and I'll email you an invite! Trying to get more than 10 people on board

survey channel's Community

Join survey channel's community to access exclusive messages from the artist and comments from fans. You'll also be the first to know when they release new music and merch.

surveychannel.bandcamp.com

 

[Mamofish]

Just went back and listened to all of Silent Graphs.. amazing tracks! Love the sound and feel. Vitamin Mind and ISO7001 were my personal favs. How did you do the visuals?

I've been toying with using milkdrop on an old pc, you can use the linein:// function in winamp to get it to visualize the input instead. Not sure if that has licensing issues though if it was something official. I've also seen some sets where someone else is livecoding visuals in some language as the set is going, not sure exactly what that is..

 

[GeekyDad]

Ugh...sometimes I spend too much time fiddling. And this is why I make new project saves anytime I do something even remotely significant in terms of mixing. Had to finally take a break and give my ears some rest. Was beginning to lose the separation this whole mix was based on.

 

[GeekyDad]

Anyone have experience using harmonic distortion (I assume it would be positive smoothing?) for mixing/mastering? Looking to smooth out some rough edges of an (mostly) acoustic mix. Was thinking about perhaps trying this approach.

Thanks

 

[Happosai]

Anyone have experience using harmonic distortion (I assume it would be positive smoothing?) for mixing/mastering? Looking to smooth out some rough edges of an (mostly) acoustic mix. Was thinking about perhaps trying this approach.

Thanks

I'd run harmonic distortion with an unpublished piece and go back & try traditional mixing to see which fits best. Maybe not entirely on topic but I went through a time of running stereo mixes on top of everything. I recall once with an acoustic guitar recording and then trying the practical overdubbing of two guitars...and that was it. It didn't work for every instrument but sometimes it was simply just getting behind the mixer to get the smooth edges.

 

[GeekyDad]

I'd run harmonic distortion with an unpublished piece and go back & try traditional mixing to see which fits best. Maybe not entirely on topic but I went through a time of running stereo mixes on top of everything. I recall once with an acoustic guitar recording and then trying the practical overdubbing of two guitars...and that was it. It didn't work for every instrument but sometimes it was simply just getting behind the mixer to get the smooth edges.

Let me ask you this: when you do a mix down to WAV or FLAC (or whatever your preference), if you've ever brought that mix back into your DAW to work with it anew with other instruments, etc., would you say you've noticed any difference in the fidelity? I know they've used the term "lossless" for decades, but my ears are either tricking me, or it's not truly lossless in terms of maintaining its quality.

I'm on an old (!!!) PC, and man, when the mix starts growing, the CPU starts panting, usually causing shutdown of the software. I'm thinking if I'm going to try what you're suggesting, that would probably be the only way to do it. Adding another single plugin, and this thing's gonna go kaput.

 

[Happosai]

Let me ask you this: when you do a mix down to WAV or FLAC (or whatever your preference), if you've ever brought that mix back into your DAW to work with it anew with other instruments, etc., would you say you've noticed any difference in the fidelity? I know they've used the term "lossless" for decades, but my ears are either tricking me, or it's not truly lossless in terms of maintaining its quality.

I'm on an old (!!!) PC, and man, when the mix starts growing, the CPU starts panting, usually causing shutdown of the software. I'm thinking if I'm going to try what you're suggesting, that would probably be the only way to do it. Adding another single plugin, and this thing's gonna go kaput.

Very rarely have I ever brought a mix back to the DAW - so it's tough to get you the answer you're looking for. WAV will not come back the same, although it should. FLAC it could be your ears but the only way to be able to tell if there's a difference it to bring out the grid and do the math. The DAW will have multiple channels for each overdub and you'd have to be able to calculate a closer to master mix to see if the two are the same. Honestly, I've thought the same myself that it always sounds clearer through the DAW. The last bigger recording session I did in 2018, I recorded 6 tracks in studio and they sounded great in the DAW. I took all of the raw files and sent them to an old audio engineer friend of mine. When he sent the FLACs back -- there was a noticeable change. I remember one track where the guitar, bass, drums, and Rhodes were all recorded separately. The mix for the percussion sounded a bit fat and the other instruments sounded like it was recorded all in the same studio room. That's not possible because I played everything.

The only true lossless I'm convinced that existed was when studios were recording on analog or with old hybrid consoles. The only things I get out of a DAW that don't sound compressed are the MIDI instruments. Anything else does seem to have a slight difference. Yeah, I wouldn't add that extra plugin. I can't see your screen but I had a friend who was heavy on overdubs in his studio. This was in the 2000's and working with an iMac and ProLogic. He'd have 16 channels open and hot. Sounded amazing but only took about 2-minutes before everything crashed.

 

[GeekyDad]

Very rarely have I ever brought a mix back to the DAW - so it's tough to get you the answer you're looking for. WAV will not come back the same, although it should. FLAC it could be your ears but the only way to be able to tell if there's a difference it to bring out the grid and do the math. The DAW will have multiple channels for each overdub and you'd have to be able to calculate a closer to master mix to see if the two are the same. Honestly, I've thought the same myself that it always sounds clearer through the DAW. The last bigger recording session I did in 2018, I recorded 6 tracks in studio and they sounded great in the DAW. I took all of the raw files and sent them to an old audio engineer friend of mine. When he sent the FLACs back -- there was a noticeable change. I remember one track where the guitar, bass, drums, and Rhodes were all recorded separately. The mix for the percussion sounded a bit fat and the other instruments sounded like it was recorded all in the same studio room. That's not possible because I played everything.

The only true lossless I'm convinced that existed was when studios were recording on analog or with old hybrid consoles. The only things I get out of a DAW that don't sound compressed are the MIDI instruments. Anything else does seem to have a slight difference. Yeah, I wouldn't add that extra plugin. I can't see your screen but I had a friend who was heavy on overdubs in his studio. This was in the 2000's and working with an iMac and ProLogic. He'd have 16 channels open and hot. Sounded amazing but only took about 2-minutes before everything crashed.

Yeah, the only thing I know about it is WAV is supposed to be uncompressed and truly lossless. But perhaps anytime you convert analog to digital information there's (no matter how inaudible it's claimed to be) some slight shaving of the audio. Right now, my work method is to record all my acoustic tracks on my old (from the 90s) Roland workstation, back-up the data to CD-R, bring that data into Reaver on my PC, render that data in WAV stems, and then work with them in Tracktion Wave form. It still sounds good, but I could swear things just sound more full when I listen back on the Roland.

 

[GeekyDad]

Here's one I recently finished with an old friend.

 

[GeekyDad]

Just finished this one yesterday. It's been a long time coming. I wrote it years and years ago when I was still in college. It's got warts and all, but this song has so much meaning for me. I didn't clean it up in the end because...well, I just couldn't bring myself to.



Was going to try and enlist the guys from the band I was in when I wrote it to work with them remotely, but in the end, considering the context of the song, I opted to just work on this one solo. But two of my kids helped out by contributing their artwork.

 

[Mamofish]

Just finished this one yesterday. It's been a long time coming. I wrote it years and years ago when I was still in college. It's got warts and all, but this song has so much meaning for me. I didn't clean it up in the end because...well, I just couldn't bring myself to.



Was going to try and enlist the guys from the band I was in when I wrote it to work with them remotely, but in the end, considering the context of the song, I opted to just work on this one solo. But two of my kids helped out by contributing their artwork.

Great track! Very peaceful and hypnotic, love the atmosphere. I liked all the creaky noises as a texture, not sure if that was intentional or just part of all the acoustic recording.

 

[GeekyDad]

Great track! Very peaceful and hypnotic, love the atmosphere, not sure if that was intentional or just part of all the acoustic recording.

Unfortunately, that was my acoustic guitar. I never was a "sitter." I always prefer playing standing up, but my old girl (Larrivee OM), she makes noises now from the strap rubbing on the wood. I normally have been trying to be very still when recording, but this particular song was just too important to me to allow myself to get hung up on that, so I just opted to let all the feelings come through, warts and all. And then, I was contemplating cleaning the ending up, but I just couldn't bring myself to do it. I wanted to let every ounce of the sustained moment do its thing.

And thank you so much for the kind reply.

 

[GeekyDad]

Good Lord, I made a farkin' mess in there...

I'm still using a very old PC, and this old girl just can't handle the craziness I'm throwing at her (ridiculous number of aux/return tracks, MIDI clips, etc.). Woke up this morning (last night), and the song wouldn't even play back. I've got a fix, but I'm not sure how it's going to sound afterward.

When creativity (or is it madness) meets practicality and reality. Ugh...

 

[Mamofish]

Always a good time running into limitations, sounds like it's time to bounce some tracks!

I used to have the same issue when I was using Reason, so many machines and fx going on I'd have to start bouncing the tracks to keep the pc capable. Bonus side effect I found is making decisions on which sound is done, once it's bounced I don't touch it anymore.. helps to not getting lost in the forever tweaks.

 

[GeekyDad]

That's typically been my routine now -- render each track as a stem. Not needing the plugins running allows me to get the CPU usage back down to a smooth state. However, this tune...whew, just so much going on -- emotion-wise, technically, and I just couldn't commit to anything yet.

That being said, it all managed to come into focus. I was able to get a mix I was satisfied with (until I listened back a few times the next day, but I'm not gonna touch it anymore), molded a video around it, and have it scheduled to publish later in the week.

Sometimes I listen back and laugh at how the Lord manages to fix my mess the way He does. Takes total madness, and uses me to piece it together into something I can bare. And hey, that's good enough for me. I be thankful! I know I'm just a silly person playing in a sandbox like I used to as a kid.

 

[GeekyDad]

So, coming back to recording in the past year, after almost exactly 20 years away, I've noticed an incredible interest (from the new generation of artists) in noise...plugins that simulate the natural sounds of playing vinyl albums, background line noise, etc. This is shit I've literally spent days in the past, in various recording sessions, trying to mitigate OUT of recordings. I think perhaps the balance of human touch in the art of making music has been creating these desires/needs in musicians/recording artists.

 

[GeekyDad]

Pretty quiet here...

Just curious, what recording software(s) folks are currently using. I ended up settling into Tracktion Waveform. I guess that's mostly due to its more approachable interface. Though it's still full of mysteries I'm figuring out daily, for a non-engineer like myself, it's not too intimidating. I'm supposing just about any decent studio software is gonna take some time to learn the ins and outs of, and though it can be frustrating, I do feel rewarded learning this stuff. I'm sure I've said it before, but my focus has always been on my guitar playing and singing, so my knowledge of even the basics (use of compression, sends/returns, etc.) is quite limited. But with the time on my hands right now, I've been able to navigate a lot of that with Tracktion. It's often a lot of fun -- lots of moments of "enlightenment," so to speak.

How 'bout y'all?

 

[Mamofish]

I've spent a lot of time in Reason in the past, I liked the virtualization of using real hardware and being able to change the cables on the back to come up with some weird sounds using cv between them all. It's a great DAW to do lots of sound design with the combinator machine, I've recorded a little bit into it too so it does some of that as well.

I haven't been using it lately and just sticking to drum machines and synths, I like the ease and immediacy. I do have those "enlightenment" moments using the synths, usually stumbling into a new way to get some sounds I haven't tried before and that really sparks some inspiration to get something going.

Lately it's been using a filter on a sound like a highpass for example, then passing that through a mid band filter and playing with resonance on each one while doing slight filter movement with lfo's. Add some fx and some real cool textures can come out.

 

[GeekyDad]

Hope I didn't already bring this up and forgot, but I don't remember asking...

When I went with my son sometime back to buy his guitar, I tried to negotiate with the salesperson regarding the price. He claimed (which sounded like bullshit to me) that Guitar Center (and others) no longer negotiate pricing. The list price is the final price.

Have things changed that much in the last 10-15 years? It's been probably longer than that since I've bought anything other than strings from a music store. But those prices were f****** ridiculous.

 

[GeekyDad]

Ozone Imager...

 

[RagnarokIV]

Any singers here want to record for a band?

 

[GeekyDad]

Any singers here want to record for a band?

What kind of music are you doing?

 

[RagnarokIV]

What kind of music are you doing?

We’ve been around for a while, we’re rock I guess would describe us

 

[indigo-cyclops]

Can't believe I never shared this. I produced/composed some Silent Hill inspired ambient tunes earlier this year just for fun (and to try and hit the YT algorithm). It became an over-saturated niche as I released the last one, and I realized I struggle with making music as "content" that promotes passive listening.

But I released them on Bandcamp; they're also on streaming.

 

[Cyberpunkd]

Hope I didn't already bring this up and forgot, but I don't remember asking...

When I went with my son sometime back to buy his guitar, I tried to negotiate with the salesperson regarding the price. He claimed (which sounded like bullshit to me) that Guitar Center (and others) no longer negotiate pricing. The list price is the final price.

Have things changed that much in the last 10-15 years? It's been probably longer than that since I've bought anything other than strings from a music store. But those prices were f****** ridiculous.

I hope this is not too much of a Necro thread but - everything is always negotiable. Always. If they say it isn’t - they are lying.

 

[RagnarokIV]

Would anyone want to start a GAF band? We can write songs about games, rather than covering game music.
I'd be happy to do some guitar for it

 

[Mamofish]

indigo-cyclops
Love that ambient track, it's a little calming and unsettling at the same time. You hit the Silent Hill vibe.

RagnarokIV
I put together this track really quick, see if you can jam with it and come up with something? If you need something longer or better structure let me know.
GAF BAND

I just loaded up this track and tapped the tempo in and went from there.

 

[RagnarokIV]

This is the the bullshit my band does