Upper Hand - Judders

[Judders]

Hey Judders, that's different!
I'm not at all convinced by the switch to the Roots SDX though. I have it and I chose not to use it because it was not adapted to what I had in mind for this tune, which is actually more pop than jazz if you think about it.
You also used a lot of the room mics from it, which means that they lack a lot of punch, and are mostly MIA apart from the cymbals...
The mix of the piano+rhodes is also not convincing to me. You can barely hear the wurly (I think it doesn't have enough sustain anyway, and is playing on too high a register), and the piano is also playing high and is a too loud. It's a rather uninteresting part, and in my mix I chose to use only the attack of it and blend it with the rhodes that gives the sustain needed (think of it as a pad more than anything).
So I'm afraid that the chosen tones here are not the best, and not a good substitute for the original tracks. My opinion only of course and you should feel free to disagree entirely!

Ha! No, I don't disagree entirely at all, and thanks for taking the time to comment

I never expected it to be a favourite, as I changed the feel quite a bit. I was just experimenting, trying to get it to sound more jazzy and realistic. The drums are distant so that the bass drum merely accentuates the beat, and the snare accentuates the backbeat, as I felt it was the bass which actually had the meaningful rhythmic information. If you listen to the drums isolated, they are kinda hard to groove to, kinda spiky and jarring in places, but they make more sense once the bass is added, because the bass is driving the rhythm.

It all started when I first opened the project (before I'd read your song FAQ), I found myself a bit distracted because I knew it was Trillian (though that upright sounds fine) and NI Session Horns (the unison bends in particular make them sound very "midi"). The Rhodes sound was not very convincing, and weirdly I had no idea it was SD custom & Vintage, even though I've used that a lot (sounds like you maybe had limited layers and scant, if any, bleed?). The velocity programming of the drums sounded very "midi" too - especially the hard cymbal crashes sound really out of place to my ears.

So then I thought it would be fun to play around with the instruments, seeing as you were kind enough to include the midi. That's when I saw that the programmed parts would need a lot of work. The keyboard parts were all blocks-on-grid single velocity jobs, and I didn't check the chords for playability (I'm not a pianist), but they looked... odd.

I knew I couldn't get a better upright sound (I don't have a bass VI), so that stayed in. The horns stayed because I don't have a decent trombone instrument and separating the parts would have taken longer than I was willing to spend on this, also they sound okay if pushed back. I decided to change the piano part to how one would be played - with the sustain pedal rather than perfectly held keys without any gap between chords, also adding velocity programming so that it became more strident and bright as the song went on.

But, in the end, you are completely right: the keyboard parts are not written in a realistic manner, so they do not support the kind of tinkering I was putting them through. If my experiment were to work, I would need to rewrite both piano and Rhodes/Wurli so that they actually resemble what a keys player would do.

I realise this may come across as a bit passive-aggressive, but that's not my intention. I'm not trying to defend my mix, as there's definitely a lot to criticise about it. I'm just being honest about why and how I ended up where I did with it.

I was halfway through learning the bass part to Reason to Leave, but I think I'll concentrate on playing my own music instead! :p

PS. Roots SDX can be better for poppy sounds than Custom & Vintage! You just have to select the right kit pieces and mic's, and keep the velocity high