HankTheSpankTankJankerson

Good news everyone! Our new studio is almost complete, so we are almost ready to sound check and then record Willful Lion in full. Easy. Peace. - Spank Tank -

+1 for voiceover.

AARGH SORRY! Gonna claim Meteo if that is okay...?

Well, buddy thank you so much! I need to make the sheet music for your files you sent me the other week now that I am in a place to do it, but just know you are on my mind. Seriously, though, if anyone needs anything, I would be glad to make the sheet music of your tracks and record whatever instruments you want. I can even send you the sheets music! Jorrito and Chernabogue needed brass, so I did just that. Just ask them if you need a reference.

Please put me on as a performer for any track. If you want to hear me demonstrate, listen at the minute mark in this link. I own and perform all Saxophones, Flute, Clarinet, and Bass Guitar

I am much more free now that my busy season is over.

I just gave Jorito my final horn tracks - please blame any and all lag on me. This month has been nuts.

If there is room, lemme know what I can do.

I like that you tried to Blues this up, but the midi drums really kill it for me. You provided rock patterns where blues was needed. The guitar stylings also killed it for me. Rock guitar is busy, where blues guitar is vocal and longer-paced.

AT FIRST LISTEN ON BAD SPEAKERS: The drums are too far forward in the mix, most of the time. They should provide more punch. I LOVE THIS ARRANGEMENT, though. This sort of doubletime bit has a lot of substance. I am not a fan of the pacing of the piano part, but it can do more than block chords every change in harmony - also, I think it is mixed a scoche too loud until 3:07. Dude, good job with this. The harmonies in the solo sections move things forward and make me want to listen more. They ENGAGE. Good job. 10/10 preem. Would listen again, - Hank "The Spank Tank" Jankerson -

And this is always where my crippling self doubt comes into play right? hahaha If I was the one mixing, it would never get done. Thanks for the compliments, @Gario. Always means a lot!

First off, thanks for the criticism, @Bowlerhat, I agree with some of the things you said! And you are a musician too, I know this is coming from a good place. On to discussions: Upon listening to it with this in mind, the big big jump I hear is the one going into 2:40ish, but looking at the score, it modulates to the subdominant, which might be what you are hearing (?), and texture-wise, its still pretty busy. Shaker + set, saxes take a back seat, the orchestration is similar to all that came before. HOWEVER, the textures are sparse during the solos to give them lots of room. When the guitar takes over melody at 2:40ish, the orchestration gets thicker again. That may be contributing to jumpiness / medleyness. And yeah, technically it is a medley, too. Really its 4 songs in 1, but Bonetrousle is dominant with the other 3 in the middle only once through or something. NOW, I CAN TOTALLY see some lack of cohesion where you are talking about that piano gliss going into the more latin section. That totally the arranger's fault (me). I think the next sections make up for that some. How so? The majority of that line is parallel thirds, I believe, maybe I rushed when I was playing tenor It's foreshadowing melody over A section material. I would totally write something like that again, I thought it was cool. @Mannywing gave me a pat on the back for that one, especially it finishes out in the second half of the true A section melody. We thought it welded those themes together without intruding. I feel you dude, but I wanted FULL instrumentation there to prepare for the final cadence before those 4 bars of drums. Thaaank you so much - I was really proud of that one. I had to spend time crafting it, tinkering. @Mannywing would know better than I, but I hadn't thought about that. Great suggestion. In closing, I am aware that there are a lot moving parts in this machine, but it achieved the level of complexity I wanted. I believe in finding more things to latch onto as you listen through than once. I DO BELIEVE it would have benefited from being recorded live with all the musicians in the room, but unfortunately, that requires a lot of players, a lot of gear, and a lot of time. We did this with 5 people, some mics, and a couple of preamps, and its a sure thing that mixing that many different tracks is tricky-dicky. Keeping all your words in mind going forward, I am so glad you listened to it. Currently, I am writing stuff with thinner orchestration, which might help with what you thought was distracting. But, yeah man, I am glad I read your post! Let me know what you think of my responses. Peace, - Hank "The Spank Tank" Jankerson -

Don't speak for the Pretz Dont ask leading questions like your "suplus" question when we all know the money will be reinvested back in the OCR community. "Worst case scenario" questions are counterproductive How dare you. DjPretzel will live forever. As a musician, I can say that this would noooot be enough, but if it was from Patreon *in addition* to gigs paying the bills, then yeah. And, I mean, ANY amount of money from Patreon is nice, it just can't be counted on to pay the bills. Also, Patreon exists for products, but a gigging, working musician is considered a member of the service industry, which pays more. MY FIGURING HERE is that the service industry (and i mean skilled work - not minimum wage) is about $1.25/minute, where on Patreon, tracks might be 99c a piece or something. I got sidetracked there, sorry. All that being stated, I am going to go become a monthly patron of OCR now because I just realized I haven't been doing my part.

For those of you wanting/needing a woodwind player or a bass guitarist, I really want to play for you. If you have a vision of the end product, I can help get you there. I have been playing for 15 years, and I love helping people in this community out. For reference, here is me playing saxophone and bass on an album my band recently released on Overclocked Records Here is another on the same album - much more work done here. I am flexible, and would love to talk to you about your musical needs! Let me know if I can do anything for you. - Aaron Schmitt -

Its a cover alright!

BRO! I will start by saying that I love this interpretation. Good job. I don't think the source material is anything I would have ever touched, but you have changed my mind. And now the criticism: I think the drums are mixed too far forward. I cant't understand anything going on the guitar at climactic moments until it is the feature later in the arrangement. Let the voices all have an equal say throughout the tune! Your slapping technique is vastly different from mine and I would love to talk with you about how you do it - its super defined and I want to hear your wisdom in that regard. - Aaron -

Hey, Nathan, thanks for the love! ^OH BELIEVE ME. I was playing loud, but there are more moving parts in this than a BMW door handle. The saxes don't have much melodic importance until the halftime drop. We mixed them back some to get some "proper" balance of melody vs accompaniment vs rhythm. ^I wanted it to sound MEAN, and to me, Phat Verb isn't the way to get mean. It'll lend some perceived volume, for sure, but I thought it needed teeth. I hope some of that made sense.

Then it should be in 12/8 CLEARLY

Stay SAXY WHAT IS THIS

Very conservative, yes. Same key and everything, I think, without having listened to the original in a long time. Why do you think this lends itself to an orchestral arrangement? (This is pure curiosity)

Hello there, After dealing with this track for a while now, I think I know it intimately, and I think it has a lot of wiggle room with interpretation. That being said, I wouldn't call your remix an "arrangement," but I think "cover" could describe how you treated it - no change in harmony or melody, but you did change the backing rhythm. Things that bug me and how to fix them: the pizzicato strings have a delay on them which makes the midi sound..... inaccurate.....? [0:38] The scratches in the guitar should be stronger on the upstroke. Another way to phrase it would be the syncopated offbeats. The kick is on 1 & 3, which is "correct" but the scratch mutes in the guitar are not giving you the snare-y sound you want. I only caught that in the second listen-through. I originally thought you weren't even going for a 2 & 4 high tone. Make the offbeats in the guitar more accented by powering up the treble some, and make the velocity higher. Things I like: The accordion sound, the artwork, how long you make me wait for the full drop [1:10] - thats real nice. I also think that trill in the strings is cool as the full ensemble powers up to go into the A section again. Thank you for the post - I had fun digging into your cover of this tune.

Awesome groove, dude. I would have used a different synth for the melody. You have established that gritty wave as the accompaniment from the beginning, so.... I don't know. Maybe a super saw?

Hhhhhhokay, this needs real saxes. Haha

Did you use a midi file to do this? Or did you arrange it yourself?