Another Floyd like piece and its really fun to mix !
It took some time, as I could only work on it an hour or 2 last days.
But this comin back to it and havin the mind workin wit arrange and sound decisions while I did other things were a beautiful and learnin experience.
For some reason I had this idea of copyin Floyds "Money" idea, of havin the band comin really close in one section, by turnin the verbs all down, but I couldnt find a spot where it fitted, so Im afraid you have a pretty wet mix in front of you.
What I did, from what I remember, I didnt take notes ...
Drums first, I really liked the room mics, and had them and the OH do most of the job, eq´d and comp´d a bit and ran it through a fairlught emulation on bus. Also had a parallel 1176 helpin snare and kick.
I made a fake amp bas track with logics amp simulator and played around with phase nudging till I found somthin I liked, then eq´d and had an 1176 actins as bas limiter, followed by another fairlight emulation, takina dB or 2 and addin colour.
All guitars were eq´d a fair bit and locut, had a struggle with the acoustic and the rhythm tremolo electric, the first were just eq and comp´d, latter had the full treatment, eq, comp, doubletrack plugin, addin artificial highs after cuttin a bit o the highs, slap delay and also a phaser plugin.
Pedal steel were made smaller in the stereo and locut and added a fair bit of verb and automated a lot, to make it come in from far away, in my mind a siren sound has a lot o verb
the piano were made smaller stereo picture and eq´d to somthin I think suits the song. It was the only instrument left playin all the time.
The hammond had a lot o beautiful bleed from the solo guitar and were made less bottom heavy to give space for drums and bass.
The synth were eq´d and automated and made a fine padding and extra excitment in the lap steel stop sequences. I think it could have come up a tad, sounded so good ...
Voice were heavily deessed and ran through a subtractin eq, then comp 1176 and eq again, a pultec emulation and my beloved 175 slap echo :-)
The background vocals with words were a bit of a challenge, couldnt really make them fit, till I got the idea of runnin them through an auto wah and dirty them up a bit with little distortion.
The sirens were eq´d, comped and had 3 verb bussses .-)
Verbs were a very short ambience thing, an ir from a dutch churc and a 200 ms predelayed pretty logic silver verb with a room verb. I use that sometimes, read an article about Nik Kershaws first hit where they used such a verb and I had to try that out and have used it when music calls for it since.
Then came the thinnin and arrangin. I were pretty familiar with the tracks now and had the idea of makin interest by makin 2nd verse without drums like the 1st verse, it were too much repetition without changes to keep my attention. So I had to make the drums stop in a not too abrupt way and found a place in the arrangement where they playd a full stop and cymbals ring out, think I took the long basnote from the end of the song, listened entire bastrack through and no short E I think it was, till about the last note. Some guys have all the luck :-)
Vocal edits:
I cut up the background vocals couple o starts end breathings and esses, it felt better and clearer they didnt support the lead vox all the time, especially in start of choruses.
The siren solo I got the idea of movin the 2nd siren half a bar and whau, I liked that. Call response kinda thing.
Sirens were moved to the outro as well and automated to sound faar away, and fitted the guitar noise for a stopper.
After the vocals theres a long sequence before solo where pedal steel gtrs play over the same stop chords. I liked it but it were 2 long before somethin happened so I cut all but one sequence and faster to the solo.
By the way pedal steel has a looong echo too.
So here we are with this mutated siren. I hope you like it.
It took some time, as I could only work on it an hour or 2 last days.
But this comin back to it and havin the mind workin wit arrange and sound decisions while I did other things were a beautiful and learnin experience.
For some reason I had this idea of copyin Floyds "Money" idea, of havin the band comin really close in one section, by turnin the verbs all down, but I couldnt find a spot where it fitted, so Im afraid you have a pretty wet mix in front of you.
What I did, from what I remember, I didnt take notes ...
Drums first, I really liked the room mics, and had them and the OH do most of the job, eq´d and comp´d a bit and ran it through a fairlught emulation on bus. Also had a parallel 1176 helpin snare and kick.
I made a fake amp bas track with logics amp simulator and played around with phase nudging till I found somthin I liked, then eq´d and had an 1176 actins as bas limiter, followed by another fairlight emulation, takina dB or 2 and addin colour.
All guitars were eq´d a fair bit and locut, had a struggle with the acoustic and the rhythm tremolo electric, the first were just eq and comp´d, latter had the full treatment, eq, comp, doubletrack plugin, addin artificial highs after cuttin a bit o the highs, slap delay and also a phaser plugin.
Pedal steel were made smaller in the stereo and locut and added a fair bit of verb and automated a lot, to make it come in from far away, in my mind a siren sound has a lot o verb
the piano were made smaller stereo picture and eq´d to somthin I think suits the song. It was the only instrument left playin all the time.
The hammond had a lot o beautiful bleed from the solo guitar and were made less bottom heavy to give space for drums and bass.
The synth were eq´d and automated and made a fine padding and extra excitment in the lap steel stop sequences. I think it could have come up a tad, sounded so good ...
Voice were heavily deessed and ran through a subtractin eq, then comp 1176 and eq again, a pultec emulation and my beloved 175 slap echo :-)
The background vocals with words were a bit of a challenge, couldnt really make them fit, till I got the idea of runnin them through an auto wah and dirty them up a bit with little distortion.
The sirens were eq´d, comped and had 3 verb bussses .-)
Verbs were a very short ambience thing, an ir from a dutch churc and a 200 ms predelayed pretty logic silver verb with a room verb. I use that sometimes, read an article about Nik Kershaws first hit where they used such a verb and I had to try that out and have used it when music calls for it since.
Then came the thinnin and arrangin. I were pretty familiar with the tracks now and had the idea of makin interest by makin 2nd verse without drums like the 1st verse, it were too much repetition without changes to keep my attention. So I had to make the drums stop in a not too abrupt way and found a place in the arrangement where they playd a full stop and cymbals ring out, think I took the long basnote from the end of the song, listened entire bastrack through and no short E I think it was, till about the last note. Some guys have all the luck :-)
Vocal edits:
I cut up the background vocals couple o starts end breathings and esses, it felt better and clearer they didnt support the lead vox all the time, especially in start of choruses.
The siren solo I got the idea of movin the 2nd siren half a bar and whau, I liked that. Call response kinda thing.
Sirens were moved to the outro as well and automated to sound faar away, and fitted the guitar noise for a stopper.
After the vocals theres a long sequence before solo where pedal steel gtrs play over the same stop chords. I liked it but it were 2 long before somethin happened so I cut all but one sequence and faster to the solo.
By the way pedal steel has a looong echo too.
So here we are with this mutated siren. I hope you like it.
Old ears, old gear, little boy inside love music and sounds and my wife, not necessarily in that order
