Monthly Archives: November 2017

Bass Editing

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Now that i’ve recorded all of the bass parts, I wanted to make sure that they were edited and comped before moving onto the guitar tracking process. I’m also doing this to maintain an effective workflow and to save a lot of effort when it comes to the mix stage.

I began by sorting through all of the takes we had recorded and then cross fading them into one another to avoid any unnecessary pops. I then removed all of the unwanted parts (parts where dave wasn’t playing and you could just hear the hum of the amp etc) and consolidated them all into one piece of audio per track. I then went through all of the bass tracks and altered the phase alignment as I was noticing a bit of cancelation with the bass amp track compared to the DI track. Once I had done this, by removing all of the cancelation it meant that I could clearly hear the sound of each track more accurately. These are similar steps that Chris Lord-Alge recommends on his latest Waves webinar.

With the bass edited, comped, consolidated and phase aligned, it now means that we are ready to begin the first session of guitar tracking.

Screen Shot 2017-11-08 at 14.03.54

 

Mixing Masterclass With Chris Lord-Alge https://www.waves.com/mixing-masterclass-chris-lord-alge

Week 7 Lol Hammond

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This week’s guest lecture was given by Lol Hammond who is a music supervisor for Vertigo Films, a music composer and occasionally works as a free-lance music supervisor.

I found this lecture very informative as I’d briefly heard of the music supervisor role, but never really understood the full extent of it. Lol went on to explain that the main premise of his job required him to source different pieces of music that were needed to be featured in films and TV shows. He needs to contact the record label, publisher and sometimes the artist to then work out a deal with them for their music to be licensed. The majority of the time Lol mentioned that getting the music required is usually successful however sometimes there are a few artists who demand too much money or refuse to have their music broadcast on films and TV.

Sometimes parts of the job can be more creative than others. There are times where the music supervisor can even work with the editor and be heavily involved in the creative process of choosing the music. However, there are other times where the music supervisor has no creative input and is only there to liaise with the label, publisher and artist.

When giving some tips on how to become a music supervisor, Lol said that it’s always good to have a wide knowledge of music and to immerse yourself in as much music as possible to avoid boxing yourself in. Another way to get into the industry is to cut your teeth working with independent companies on short films as they are an important part of the industry and are a good way of building up your contacts. This has never been easier due to the influx of social media and film makers being able to showcase their work to a massive internet platform. He also suggested that it’s always good to know a bit of video editing so you can show directors/producers/companies your choice of music for their project.

Bass tracking

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Today I worked with Dave on tracking all of the bass parts for this project.

Prior to this session I conducted some research on different bass production techniques used by various producers and if there were any specific types of equipment or hardware that were popular for this. Although I found a vast array of different techniques, I found that a lot of producers favoured the use of the DBX 160 compressor for bass to help reduce its dynamic range including Jacquire King, Joe Chiccarelli and even Mark Ronson who uses the Waves plugin equivalent. I also used a technique applied by Warren Huart where he adjusts the attack of the compressor to print a bass track into Pro Tools which stops the bass from ‘fish tailing’.

When applying these techniques into my own session, I used the pair of Sony SRP-L210’s to compress the bass amp and the bass amp DI. A quick point here is that I decided to leave the bass guitar DI channel raw and uncompressed so that I could use it as a backup if I needed it further along down the line. I adjusted my gain structure to the appropriate level and then began setting the threshold on the compressors to achieve around 3-5 dbs worth of compression. I did actually have an EBS bass compressor pedal on me for the session however using the hardware in the studio gave more flexibility when it came to adjusting the ratio and the attack.

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Applying the necessary amount of compression to these two channels really helped warm up the overall sound of the bass as well as control the dynamic range. The main reason I wanted to reduce the dynamic range like this is because when Dave was recording his bass takes, there was a significant dip in volume when he played the higher strings which prevented us from getting a stable level for the control room mix. Once I was happy with the compressed bass tone, I noticed that the signal was still ‘fish tailing’. To prevent this I increased the attack time on both of the Sony compressors which didn’t eliminate these sharp transients completely but it definitely helped reduce them. The pictures below show the ‘before’ and ‘after’ of the adjusted attack time of the compressors.

Before: Screen Shot 2017-11-13 at 17.46.44

After:

Screen Shot 2017-11-13 at 17.46.26

 

 

Jacquire’s Shoot Out: Vintage Hardware vs. Apollo & Unison / UAD Plug-Ins https://youtu.be/D0TrTPAXM1I

In the Studio with Mark Ronson https://www.waves.com/in-the-studio-mark-ronson?utm_source=wnletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=studio-mark-watch-now&utm_campaign=weekend-newsletter-oct-13-2017-ronson-mR

Recording a Band with Joe Chiccarelli https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rjFPQFjIEdo

How to Record Bass – Warren Huart: Produce Like A Pro https://youtu.be/9F5XgkvGuSE

Tutorial – Week 6

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This week me and Ben looked more in depth at my production plan and how to focus on certain types of research before my recording sessions. This way I can go into my recording sessions with a clearer idea of how to hit my learning outcomes. For example, because I had my bass recording session the next day, that night I looked at how different producers apply different techniques to improve the sound of their bass production. Doing this advanced research will also help me when recording guitars, vocals, mixing and mastering.

I also showed Ben the track I worked on with Dave back in May and the drum takes I’d captured during my recording session a few days earlier. This was a good way for Ben to get an idea of how the project was sounding and to give some advice on how to improve the sound of what I’d captured so far. One thing he suggested was that it might useful to use some samples over the snare to help thicken it up and to help it sit in the mix.