"unfamiliar enemy" by AYAN

[Ferryman_1957]

Excellent rocker Ayan, this sounds very powerful and really drives along. You've recorded it well, it's got a very powerful sound. My only advice would be to open up the rhythm guitar a bit in the mix by doubling them up and spreading them left and right. Everything is pretty central in the mix but actually it doesn't make it sound cluttered. It does sound quite "live".

Very nice guitar work and guitar sounds, looking forward to more in a similar vein. Although the ending was a bit sudden.....!

Cheers,

Nigel

[AndyR]

Yep, definitely get them vocals up a bit louder next time - you've got a great voice hiding in there , and a good feel for melody and harmony.

The track itself, even with the vocals where they are, just rocks like it ought to for me.

And like others have said - I love how you managed to combine "pop" melody with aggressive riffing. With your voice on top of it, I think you might even have something commercial going here (Do bear in mind I'm well out of touch with what commercial might actually be now-a-days )

I'm really looking forward to hearing more from you as you figure out more of what you can do with the MBR.

EDIT: Was making a cup of tea for my missus, and I realised I wanted to come back and ask a question...

Ferryman: "My only advice would be to open up the rhythm guitar a bit in the mix by doubling them up and spreading them left and right."

Do you mean record the part twice? Is that how it's done?

I personally struggle with this myself - it's one of the reasons my stuff is always so "orchestrated". I get a good rhythm guitar part but I've got trouble with the mix not being "stereo" enough... so I record some other parts - you can always come up with more

But then, you lose the "focussed" rocking of the original part... I'm keen on doing something that keeps this focus. So I've been wondering "two guitar bands" (like Judas Priest or whatever...), but it still won't have what I'm after, and what I think AYAN's got here at the moment - an excellent rocking guitar part that doesn't really need any more.

So, is the technique to record the guitar part twice, as close as possible, then pan hard left and right? ... In the past, I've copied tracks and delayed one slightly, but that makes things too "thick and smooth" sometimes... it's never crossed my mind that the "one rocking guitar" sound might be two takes of the same thing... I'll experiment...


Oh, there is one thing I can pass on AYAN, once you start adding more guitars this'll really show up - an electric guitar has loads of bottom-end that you can't actually hear, but it muddies up a mix... it gets in the way of the bass part and the bass drum... You can't figure out why you can't get the mix sounding like a rock band until someone points out what all producers/etc have been doing since time began... The solution is: you can take lots of bottom off the guitar tracks without changing/hurting their sound in the mix, and the overall recording seems to rock a lot more

[Bluesberry]

Great hard rocking song.  I agree with the vocals being excellent and not quite present enough.

[ayan0815]

thanks for all the great response for this song. i will definitely use everyone's advice in recording my next song(april 25?). im a big fan of KISS. not the band.  but short for K.eep I.t S.imple S.tupid. Although, the next song would be quiet different. I love to expirement.

[Saijinn Maas]

I like this a lot! Good riff, good changes, just a solid solid song!

One trick that I use regularly is instead of just double tracking, which I usually hate to do, I'll track the main rhythm and pan it left, then I'll track a second rhythm using chords that compliment the original chord line in some way. Might be harmonies, or could be a counter point type thing. Give it an interesting sound while still making it sound more full. Just an idea... 

Good luck! Can't wait to hear the next one! 

[Greeny]

I agree with the panning tips. It'll transform the soundscape if you do. This is a tuneful and hard rocker though. I love the big main riff... kind of 'Enter Sandman' territory. It's a great piece of work. I also would like to hear some harmonies on the chorus.

[AndyR]

One trick that I use regularly is instead of just double tracking, which I usually hate to do, I'll track the main rhythm and pan it left, then I'll track a second rhythm using chords that compliment the original chord line in some way. Might be harmonies, or could be a counter point type thing. Give it an interesting sound while still making it sound more full. Just an idea... 

Yep, that's what I usually do myself. But I've noticed that for what you gain, you also sometimes lose the original beauty/power of the simple single guitar riff that you had in the first place... and I'm wondering does anyone have a trick to preserve this?

What made me think of it was AYAN's riffing on this one - superb

(Although, on a later listen, I actually wondered whether I could hear more than one guitar anyway . I don't think there is, but if there is AYAN, pan them, and you'll find something amazing happens - not always good mind, but it's usually pretty impressive in headphones when you do it! )