It has been a long long time since I last posted, sorry!
Ok, so I have been using some new equipment and looking at new equipment I have bought myself a new guitar, and I am now looking at something called the Avid Eleven Rack. Possibly one of the best rack equipment available! Very well priced at only $899 USD.
Once I get the Avid Eleven Rack, expect a few more videos ;)
Until then.
Stay tuned! :)
Showing posts with label band. Show all posts
Showing posts with label band. Show all posts
Thursday, June 2, 2011
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Getting Into A Band
I have played in a few bands.... I have only been in one that has really meant the world to me. Four Minute Affair (The name of my band). And we have had a little bit of YouTube success which has helped build us a fanbase over in Australia.
So, when you first decide to get into a band, what sort of band do you want to be? Do you want to be a covers band? or an original band?
My advice for either band type, is start with an easy cover, my bands first two songs were Holiday - GreenDay and Dammit - Blink 182, these songs are basic songs, easy on all instruments (Dammit is just exceptionally fast for the drummer) but they are songs that people know as well, so you are instantly "building a fan base" even if that does start with your fans being your mum, and some friends (they still count)
So, to find band members.... This is the hard part, to start with, make sure you know what direction you want to go in, a covers band will be easier for amateur musicians, and originals band is for more accomplished musicians as you need some experience and creativity.
I know that in New Zealand we have a website called the RockShop. They have a classifieds page in which you can find band members! I highly recommend starting with basic covers (Greenday is always good for rock bands) and then deciding on what it is you want to do!
So, when you first decide to get into a band, what sort of band do you want to be? Do you want to be a covers band? or an original band?
My advice for either band type, is start with an easy cover, my bands first two songs were Holiday - GreenDay and Dammit - Blink 182, these songs are basic songs, easy on all instruments (Dammit is just exceptionally fast for the drummer) but they are songs that people know as well, so you are instantly "building a fan base" even if that does start with your fans being your mum, and some friends (they still count)
So, to find band members.... This is the hard part, to start with, make sure you know what direction you want to go in, a covers band will be easier for amateur musicians, and originals band is for more accomplished musicians as you need some experience and creativity.
I know that in New Zealand we have a website called the RockShop. They have a classifieds page in which you can find band members! I highly recommend starting with basic covers (Greenday is always good for rock bands) and then deciding on what it is you want to do!
Saturday, January 29, 2011
Song Writing
Hmmm so I want post about song writing, but its an extremely hard topic to talk about and explain, every songwriter and every song is written differently, some write lyrics first, some write the physical music first.
I will explain the way that I write, and believe me, in no way am I saying that "this is the way to do it, if you don't do it like this you are doing it wrong" there are so many ways to write songs, and each song writer will have their own way of writing. Back on track, my way of writing songs, has worked out reasonably well for me, I believe it is more of a "pop" sort of method, because instead of writing, exactly how you feel, you are more.. writing along what sounds good, you are still writing how you feel, but it is more about how it sounds with this method.
So, I'll walk you through my songwriting method, to start with, I like to start with little motifs (riffs) or just a hook, that will keep people listening, songs like Dammit - Blink 182, it has that intro guitar riff that is repeated throughout the song. So I find a nice sounding motif (riff) and then, get that sounding reasonably nice, then I will find a chord progression that goes well with the riff, and being into pop punk these chord progressions are generally easy to find, sometimes they are as simple as C,G,A,F and because I am writing a song that can have such a basic chord progression, I will let it have a basic chord progression, it has worked in the past, just about every Greenday song is a basic progression so why do I need to change it?
So, find a motif, or riff, and find chords. Record it! If you have your phone record it on that! but record it on something you can play back to yourself so that you can listen to it, then write lyrics! it helps so so much!!
:)
I will explain the way that I write, and believe me, in no way am I saying that "this is the way to do it, if you don't do it like this you are doing it wrong" there are so many ways to write songs, and each song writer will have their own way of writing. Back on track, my way of writing songs, has worked out reasonably well for me, I believe it is more of a "pop" sort of method, because instead of writing, exactly how you feel, you are more.. writing along what sounds good, you are still writing how you feel, but it is more about how it sounds with this method.
So, I'll walk you through my songwriting method, to start with, I like to start with little motifs (riffs) or just a hook, that will keep people listening, songs like Dammit - Blink 182, it has that intro guitar riff that is repeated throughout the song. So I find a nice sounding motif (riff) and then, get that sounding reasonably nice, then I will find a chord progression that goes well with the riff, and being into pop punk these chord progressions are generally easy to find, sometimes they are as simple as C,G,A,F and because I am writing a song that can have such a basic chord progression, I will let it have a basic chord progression, it has worked in the past, just about every Greenday song is a basic progression so why do I need to change it?
So, find a motif, or riff, and find chords. Record it! If you have your phone record it on that! but record it on something you can play back to yourself so that you can listen to it, then write lyrics! it helps so so much!!
:)
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Gear List (Everything Except Drums)
So, you have all seen my drums, and how they are all pieced together and miked up for recording! I do hope that helped some of you reading this! Now I am going to go into more detail on other parts of the recording process that I do from home...
To start with, after I have got my basic drums recorded, I move onto recording a very basic single guitar track. In one of my earlier posts I described the guitar gear that I use in a lot of our recordings, for those of you that didn't read it I use a Marshall MG HD100FX head and cabinet, I have used this combination in all of my recordings as you can hear in this song here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsyjKoXSVd4 Please excuse the vocals in this recording, they are very very average! But listen to the guitar quality then compare my recording to the original recording here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wtZWfGH7Tv4 There are some parts in my recording that have been missed out (most parts missed out were involving the synth) but the two recordings sound extremely similar in my mind, I should have done more mixing on the guitar, but overall, I got an extremely good sound out of a solid state amp. Below this is a picture of my amp and guitar that I used for the recording.
That is the amp that I have used in my bands recording of "Sweet December" considering at the time I only had one microphone the recording turned out pretty good in my opinion.
Since "Sweet December" I have invested some higher budget recording gear, namely, my M-Audio Fast Track Ultra USB Interface, I havent had it for a very long time unfortunately, although it sure has been used a lot! At the moment I am editing my bands most recent cover called "Counting The Stars"if I had done this using Logic, the song would probably be on YouTube by now, however I am using ProTools to mix and master it (By no means am I saying ProTools is harder!! I have just worked with Logic a lot in the past and know a lot of the ins and outs of Logic I am stil very new to ProTools) For me, using ProTools to mix and master this song, has been a big learning experience, to start with ProTools is a lot different to Logic even from the basic user interface, wait until you get into the EQ's. But any way, here is a picture of my M-Audio Fast Track Ultra USB Interface that I have been using. I highly recommend this product by the way, it is so easy to hook up and use, plus it is so portable.
So, thats a picture of my USB interface that I will recommend to just about anybody starting a home studio!
Next, I have my bass gear, this is fun to use, under this paragraph I will upload a photo of my bass, as well as my head and cabinet (Not that I use my cabinet for recording). In recordings with bass, there are two things that I like to do.. The first thing, is that I like to take a direct out, out of the back of my amp head into ProTools so I get the sound of the bass that I am hearing through the cabinet, coming out directly into the computer. My second way that I like to record bass is by simply a D.I. (Direct in) this means that basically I just take the lead from my bass, plug it into a track in my audio interface and in ProTools or Logic, I am getting the raw sound of the bass guitar I am using, this makes it more fun to mix as you have total control over the sound, and in ProTools, whats really cool is being able to add a guitar amp plug in over a bass guitar track, it can give you a very very unique sounding bass. In the picture below you can see both my bass (Squire Mike Dirnt Signiture Bass) as well as my bass amp and head (Rockit).
Thank you all for reading, I hope that was help for you all and if not leave your questions or comments in the section below!
:)
That is the amp that I have used in my bands recording of "Sweet December" considering at the time I only had one microphone the recording turned out pretty good in my opinion.
Since "Sweet December" I have invested some higher budget recording gear, namely, my M-Audio Fast Track Ultra USB Interface, I havent had it for a very long time unfortunately, although it sure has been used a lot! At the moment I am editing my bands most recent cover called "Counting The Stars"if I had done this using Logic, the song would probably be on YouTube by now, however I am using ProTools to mix and master it (By no means am I saying ProTools is harder!! I have just worked with Logic a lot in the past and know a lot of the ins and outs of Logic I am stil very new to ProTools) For me, using ProTools to mix and master this song, has been a big learning experience, to start with ProTools is a lot different to Logic even from the basic user interface, wait until you get into the EQ's. But any way, here is a picture of my M-Audio Fast Track Ultra USB Interface that I have been using. I highly recommend this product by the way, it is so easy to hook up and use, plus it is so portable.
So, thats a picture of my USB interface that I will recommend to just about anybody starting a home studio!
Next, I have my bass gear, this is fun to use, under this paragraph I will upload a photo of my bass, as well as my head and cabinet (Not that I use my cabinet for recording). In recordings with bass, there are two things that I like to do.. The first thing, is that I like to take a direct out, out of the back of my amp head into ProTools so I get the sound of the bass that I am hearing through the cabinet, coming out directly into the computer. My second way that I like to record bass is by simply a D.I. (Direct in) this means that basically I just take the lead from my bass, plug it into a track in my audio interface and in ProTools or Logic, I am getting the raw sound of the bass guitar I am using, this makes it more fun to mix as you have total control over the sound, and in ProTools, whats really cool is being able to add a guitar amp plug in over a bass guitar track, it can give you a very very unique sounding bass. In the picture below you can see both my bass (Squire Mike Dirnt Signiture Bass) as well as my bass amp and head (Rockit).
Thank you all for reading, I hope that was help for you all and if not leave your questions or comments in the section below!
:)
Monday, January 24, 2011
Mixing: Before and After
At the moment... I only have a before sound demo and a before screen shot. This is using ProTools HD 9 which I am very new to.
In this sound clip it is totally unmixed drums and you can hear quite a lot of bleeding into other mikes as well as feedback from one of my Tom Toms.
Please excuse the drumming!
As you can see from the above two screen shots, there are no plug ins at all involved in this snippet. If you listen throughout the whole thing there is also a clav on the snare.
Unfortunately, the sound file is located on the video which is just a video of a screenshot to show 0 Plugins.
Tonight I will take a picture of the drums, and how they are all miked up!
:)
In this sound clip it is totally unmixed drums and you can hear quite a lot of bleeding into other mikes as well as feedback from one of my Tom Toms.
As you can see from the above two screen shots, there are no plug ins at all involved in this snippet. If you listen throughout the whole thing there is also a clav on the snare.
Unfortunately, the sound file is located on the video which is just a video of a screenshot to show 0 Plugins.
Tonight I will take a picture of the drums, and how they are all miked up!
:)
Saturday, January 22, 2011
Dan Sweeto.
So he hasn't commented on my blog. he is a big star in Australia, he has earned his fame through covers of bands like Short Stack. He has one of the best voices I have ever heard. Although. What is letting him down, is his recordings.. dont get me wrong, I dont want to sound like a judgmental c#$* but if he spent another hour or two on mixing, and EQing the guitar a tiny tiny bit more, you would hear so much more of an improvement in his recordings, dont get me wrong, they already sound fantastic, but honestly, if he spent another hour or so on the EQ on some of his covers, there would be such a great change in the sound, it would be insane!
Who is he? Dan Sweeto is an Australian Singer, he was born on the 13th of August 1992 (almost 19) and he has dreams of opening for Short Stack. I believe he can do it as well as all of his thousands of teenybopper fans, and when I say thousands I do mean thousands, he has over three thousand friends on his personal Facebook page, he has over two thousand views on his Short Stack cover "Werewolves" and believe me, getting one thousand views on Youtube is hard enough!
Dan Sweeto is going to get far, he has done an amazing job with just about all of his covers, he has original songs and everything! I am waiting for a recording company to snatch him up!!
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/DanSweeto
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001019520555
Who is he? Dan Sweeto is an Australian Singer, he was born on the 13th of August 1992 (almost 19) and he has dreams of opening for Short Stack. I believe he can do it as well as all of his thousands of teenybopper fans, and when I say thousands I do mean thousands, he has over three thousand friends on his personal Facebook page, he has over two thousand views on his Short Stack cover "Werewolves" and believe me, getting one thousand views on Youtube is hard enough!
Dan Sweeto is going to get far, he has done an amazing job with just about all of his covers, he has original songs and everything! I am waiting for a recording company to snatch him up!!
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/DanSweeto
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001019520555
All The Small Things.
So, when you listen to your favourite band/artist what do you hear? I know before I started to get involved with the recording and production of music, all I heard was my favourite band playing a cool song. Now I understand all of the parts that go into it to make the song sound radio worthy.
After learning a bit more about music production and recording processes, and recording companies, you learn that there are so many more people involved in the production of a song than you really realize.
And for me, I still dream of being someones favourite band that they listen to, but realistically only a handful of people really can get that far, and for me, I still want to be a part of the music industry, weather that means that I am a record company executive, a producer or my personal dream, the band, or artist you physically listen to.
:)
After learning a bit more about music production and recording processes, and recording companies, you learn that there are so many more people involved in the production of a song than you really realize.
And for me, I still dream of being someones favourite band that they listen to, but realistically only a handful of people really can get that far, and for me, I still want to be a part of the music industry, weather that means that I am a record company executive, a producer or my personal dream, the band, or artist you physically listen to.
:)
Late Night Thoughts
so, do you ever sit at home, late at night listening to some bands, and thinking "I really really wish I had that life"?
I know I do, and I know a lot of other people do too, and believe me, you can get there, maybe not with as much fame, but definately with the same perks!
Since I am still attending high school, I have another few years until I really need to worry about getting a real career and until then, I am going to be working on music production and writing and recording my own stuff.
Anyway, back on topic. If you are reading this, you obviously like your music, correct? So why not, get in a band with a few mates, get a video camera, and upload it to YouTube, covers or originals. Do that, then post your video up here and I will comment it, review it and give you some help as well as give you advice on instrumentation (which instruments you have) and also new gear to invest in.
:)
I know I do, and I know a lot of other people do too, and believe me, you can get there, maybe not with as much fame, but definately with the same perks!
Since I am still attending high school, I have another few years until I really need to worry about getting a real career and until then, I am going to be working on music production and writing and recording my own stuff.
Anyway, back on topic. If you are reading this, you obviously like your music, correct? So why not, get in a band with a few mates, get a video camera, and upload it to YouTube, covers or originals. Do that, then post your video up here and I will comment it, review it and give you some help as well as give you advice on instrumentation (which instruments you have) and also new gear to invest in.
:)
Friday, January 21, 2011
New Gear
Although I just posted saying this site is for new bands and etc, I am also going to talk about some good recording techniques, recording programs and recording gear. I will let you in on some of my bands own demo recordings, none of the mastered songs that you hear on YouTube.
So to start with, I recently got myself a copy of ProTools HD 9, I am still only learning all of the ins and outs of it, as I have been using Logic a lot. But over the next few weeks, I will spend a lot of time in the studio, just making little drum tracks that I can then mix, and create "DIY" videos to help teach you about some of ProTools features.
At the moment, I am actually working on a cover of Short Stacks song, called "Counting The Stars" I will post a link up here as soon as the song is on YouTube.
If anyone reading this has a band that they would like to be commented on, reviewed, get more hits on YouTube or ANYTHING! just add a comment to this page, and I will definately do my best to help you !
So to start with, I recently got myself a copy of ProTools HD 9, I am still only learning all of the ins and outs of it, as I have been using Logic a lot. But over the next few weeks, I will spend a lot of time in the studio, just making little drum tracks that I can then mix, and create "DIY" videos to help teach you about some of ProTools features.
At the moment, I am actually working on a cover of Short Stacks song, called "Counting The Stars" I will post a link up here as soon as the song is on YouTube.
If anyone reading this has a band that they would like to be commented on, reviewed, get more hits on YouTube or ANYTHING! just add a comment to this page, and I will definately do my best to help you !
Welcome :D
Hello to anyone, and anyone who actually reads this, everyday I am going to post some new news on some of my favourite bands, some unknown bands as well as local bands! make sure you keep reading, feel free to post links to your own band and Ill be sure to check some of them out!
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