XPRTNovice Posted February 5, 2012 Share Posted February 5, 2012 Hey all, I'm very timid about doing this remixing thing, and I just need some validation. Am I on the right track here? http://soundcloud.com/xprtnovice/city-of-ancients-city-of-funk I don't even know what to ask for feedback. This is really just a small sample of an idea that hasn't really come to fruition yet. My equipment consists of a LittlePhatty synth and Cubase SX, but aside from that I'm pretty clueless. XPRT Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Calum Posted February 5, 2012 Share Posted February 5, 2012 Hey all,I'm very timid about doing this remixing thing, and I just need some validation. Am I on the right track here? http://soundcloud.com/xprtnovice/city-of-ancients-city-of-funk I don't even know what to ask for feedback. This is really just a small sample of an idea that hasn't really come to fruition yet. My equipment consists of a LittlePhatty synth and Cubase SX, but aside from that I'm pretty clueless. XPRT This is a pretty cool idea - putting city of ancients in 4/4 and then chocobo theme in minor key. Interesting use of the sources! The drums sound pretty good - perhaps they are loops though? The sax sounds pretty good - is it live? It sounds live... You use the two sources pretty well. I'm feeling the potential for a dub/half-time section with this sound and all the reverb! It's all pretty playful with the vinyl-rip! Doesn't sound like you're all that timid! I like the playfulness. There are some distortion issues - stick a limiter on the master to avoid this. And also the bass/melody's quantisation and note length sound a little clunky. It's clear that the bass is looping at a particular point. Needs more groove, more humanisation in those parts. This is a good start! Stick in a half time section and see what you can do with the rest of the chocobo melody and other parts of the city of the ancients. Lots of potential here. I'd suggest trying to work with making your own drum parts (assuming i'm right in thinking that they are loops). The loops sound good here but the more comfortable you are with making your own and making them sound good the more options you'll have available to yourself with a very important instrument! Looking forward to hearing more from this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Monobrow Posted February 6, 2012 Share Posted February 6, 2012 Haha... The concept. So anyway, I like the idea. The beat is pretty phresh. My problem is that it's way too loud compared to everything else. Turn it down a little bit, let your leads/backgrounds in to the forefront. Overall, it's a bit cluttered. I think I hear you yelling the notes? SO yeah, not much else to say because it's so short, but get a handle on that instrument balance, widen the sound, turn down the drums a bit, and p.s. I want some organ breakdowns Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XPRTNovice Posted February 6, 2012 Author Share Posted February 6, 2012 Thanks guys. That's great feedback and encouragement. Oh - organ breaks are coming. The balance is an issue, but an organ break is imminent. The beat is a sample from a random website that I looped. I'm not even really sure how to begin forming my own beats. Yes, I'm that new. Most of the tracks are live, via either my synth or MIDI. The drums are the only thing sampled. The sax - my first love - is live. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Calum Posted February 6, 2012 Share Posted February 6, 2012 Thanks guys. That's great feedback and encouragement. Oh - organ breaks are coming. The balance is an issue, but an organ break is imminent. The beat is a sample from a random website that I looped. I'm not even really sure how to begin forming my own beats. Yes, I'm that new. Most of the tracks are live, via either my synth or MIDI. The drums are the only thing sampled. The sax - my first love - is live. Nice sax! Welcome on board! I LOVE SAX, I WANT TO COLLAB... haha, but not right now... too busy, must hold myself back... Anyway, depending on what DAW you're using the drums may be easier or harder to get into but once you do it's nothing but progress from there. My advice would be open up a drum setting and then play in the lowest range on your keyboard - C = kick drum, E = snare, Fsharp = closed hat - start playing around with that and trying to play beats you've heard in other songs. You can either play that in (you'll probably want to quantise it after) or (what i think most people would advise) draw in the notes on whatever piano roll system you have. Drawing in the notes can give you really precise control over what's happening and you can make really complex beats. It's just a case of experimenting and trying to recreate other beats best you can and taking it from there. General rule, kick on beats 1 and 3, snare on beats 2 and 4, hihats on 1 2 3 & 4. This is just a standard rock beat. Anyway it's all good - feel free to use this drum sample here but my advice is to start making your own beats asap not as an ownership thing but because of the freedom you'll have by having control over it. Anyway, there's not much more i can say - just wanna hear more! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XPRTNovice Posted February 6, 2012 Author Share Posted February 6, 2012 Thanks for the drumming tip, but I was talking more about the mechanics of putting a drum patch into Cubase and making it sound real. I know how to construct a beat (I actually can drum a bit myself) but I'm already getting kind of tired of scouring the net for hours on end trying to find patches. And the plugins I'm using are really cumbersome...I have to open a new VST channel every time I want to change an instrument, and all that. I guess it will just take some time to figure out how to do all of this. I'd be happy to roll in with some sax on any track you want, anytime. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XPRTNovice Posted February 19, 2012 Author Share Posted February 19, 2012 Okay, so I've been spending some time trying to expand my knowledge and I'm not sure it's working. I tried to take your advice and start creating my own drum tracks. Right now I've been scouring the internet looking for drum samples. I have Kontakt, but I don't have the cash to be spending on .NKI files that are $100 for good quality samples. I know there have to be free samples out there that aren't crap. I've been browsing the forums, but there are over 35 pages of links and people talking about links...many of them are broken or 3 years old. Here's what I'm gathering - please let me know if I'm stupid. I can use my synth as the "in" MIDI, then force the "out" midi to be something like Kontakt. In the Kontakt, I can then load a .nki file that is mapped to certain samples. But I can also use a lot of other programs, like SFZ, to map to samples as well, right? So, in essence, I can sample my own saxophone by recording a single note, then load it as a sample into SFZ and play my keyboard like a sax. The advantage of the internet, then, is the ability to get samples of instruments I don't own or play. But that's so incredibly time consuming if you don't know where to go. I've been searching for 3 hours now for a drum kit that sounds the same quality as the loop I previously had in this track and I've come up with nothing. So that's where I am now on this project. If anyone has any words of wisdom, that might prevent me from just stopping and going back to playing Chopin. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jaipurna Posted February 20, 2012 Share Posted February 20, 2012 With the exception of the stiff and loud drums, this is a cool beginning. I'd like to hear more. Maybe you can try Monkey Machine : http://rinki.net/pekka/monkey/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XPRTNovice Posted February 21, 2012 Author Share Posted February 21, 2012 Okay, so here's a minor update. I replaced the downloaded drum loop with one I made myself using fruity loops, but I still don't think I'm getting it right. I also added a second section that has potential but right now just sounds like chaos: http://soundcloud.com/xprtnovice/city-of-ancients-city-of Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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