New Songs on The Branches MySpace!

[B2D]

Kind of a repeat thread from the OT room but long story short: Virtual Kevorkian's been helping my alt-rock band, The Branches, record their demo for the past 2 months. The end result's pretty good!

The link to the band's MS page is in my sig, so click on it, listen to the songs, and feel free to discuss any gear/recording questions about the songs here. Lets have some fun with it... haha.

I'm sure Jeff can answer any questions that I can't, haha. Later guys.

 

[doveman]

Re: New Songs on The Branches MySpace!

Songs sound pretty good to me. Like the girl singer's voice.

 

[daemon barbeque]

Re: New Songs on The Branches MySpace!

Nice tunes bro!.I liked the tones ,and the voice alot!

 

[larry_emder]

Re: New Songs on The Branches MySpace!

Wasnt a huge fan of the tunes, but the production/mix was very good. nice work

Alright jeff, can you tell us what gear you used??? And what did you record with

 

[B2D]

Re: New Songs on The Branches MySpace!

Songs sound pretty good to me. Like the girl singer's voice.

Thanks! Liana will appreciate the compliment.

Nice tunes bro!.I liked the tones ,and the voice alot!

Thanks! Jeff did a great job capturing it all on tape, too.

Wasnt a huge fan of the tunes, but the production/mix was very good. nice work

Alright jeff, can you tell us what gear you used??? And what did you record with

thanks for listening.

Until Jeff comes in, I can say this:

My guitars were tracked using either Jeff's ESP EC1000, or my Music Man Silhouette Special with an SSS configuration. The amps used were a Peavey 5150 and a Carvin Legacy. I switched it up depending on the songs... I can tell you what was using what if you wanna know.

I was using D'addario 10's on the Music Man and there's a Duncan 5/2 for Stratocaster bridge pickup in it. The ESP had D'addario 12's and was running EMGs.

I used either a Fulltone OCD or a Maxon OD808 for a lead/gain boost or to get a more saturated tone. The wah pedal in I've Had Enough is a Crybaby 535Q with a Fasel inductor. Any other effects (flange, delay, etc) are plug-ins.

Liana used her custom Fender/Warmoth Telecaster with Fender SCN pickups with a Fulltone OCD into a Vox AC30 Custom Classic head.

Both guitars went through a Carvin Legacy 4x12 Cab. The solos to Red Hot Summer and Autumn Constance (not up yet) were done through a Riviera 4x12. The cabs were miced with an SM57, I think.

The drums are DW/Zildjian and were miced with a mix of Shure and Audix Fusion mics and RODE overheads... a fair amount of replacement was done on the kick and snare. The Bass was a stock Fender Jazz that used to belong to JMoose, running direct using an Ampeg B2R as a preamp.

The vocals were done with either a RODE NT1 or NT1A reissue.

The recording rig involved a Presonus Firepod, a Mac Powerbook with Logic, and a buncha other stuff that Jeff will remember better than I will. :laugh2:

 

[Virtual Kevorkian]

Re: New Songs on The Branches MySpace!

Close, Brenno - but I'll elaborate a bit from memory...

Starting with drums:

Kick - replaced 100%, blend of 3 samples (one from actual kit, a bit of a 24" DW for the bulk of the low end, and a 22" Sonor for the click)
Snare - 57, blended 50% with a Noble & Cooley snare (made from compressed Zildjians or something insane like that). I sampled the kit and actually used the original signal to trigger those samples, just for consistency in dynamics.
Toms - 58's w/out grill.
Hat/Ride - Fusion F15 Pencil C's, under the ride bell, and pointing at the bell of the hat.
OH's - RØDE NT-1 and NT-1A, pretty standard A/B pair.

Bass - We originally took two DI tracks - one from my Littlelabs Redeye (straight DI), and one from the bass head, a B2R. The B2R signal actually ended up not being used - I just used Logic Pro's Bass Amp plugin on the DI track for a bit of grit, and EQ'd to taste.

Electric guitars - 4 tracks through most everything, exception being the verses and melody parts of Red Hot Summer. We ALWAYS had 2 tracks of a Warmoth Tele through an OCD and AC30 head, run into a Legacy cab. Those tracks were mic'd with a 57 on-axis and one of the NT-1's back about 3 feet, with the RØDE sitting about 5-6db lower than the 57.

The dirty guitars were pretty much the Legacy through the Legacy cab, single 57 slightly off-axis. We used the 5150 through the same cab/mic for a wah solo or two, and for all the heavy guitars on I've Had Enough. As mentioned, two of the leads were through my Rivera cabinet, same mic/position.

Clean guitars were the Legacy/Legacy setup, with an NT-1 positioned about 4 feet back for some body.

Acoustic guitars - Ended up being either a single NT-1 positioned infront of the soundhole and aimed at the 12th fret, or that setup with the other NT-1 over the players right shoulder, mixed in for a bit of top end sparkle/presence.

Vocals - NT-1 into a Studio Projects VTB-1 pre.


All mics went, aside from for vocals, directly into the Firepod (stock pre's + untreated rooms slightly blurs the high end), and into Logic Pro. Plugins by Sonalksis, Apulsoft, WaveArts, and iZotope (Ozone 3 for mastering).

PS: I LOATHE MySpace compression.

 

[CGord]

Re: New Songs on The Branches MySpace!

PS: I LOATHE MySpace compression.

LOL, who doesn't? :chairfall

 

[larry_emder]

Re: New Songs on The Branches MySpace!

Why did you replace the kick and snare with samples?

 

[Virtual Kevorkian]

Re: New Songs on The Branches MySpace!

Why did you replace the kick and snare with samples?

Consistency (Troy was a good player, just didn't hit as consistently as I would've liked), actual tone of it. The pre's I'm running, unfortunately, aren't the best, and the mic we were using for the kick (Audix Fusion D6 copy) wasn't that great sounding. The snare needed a bit more presence in the top and a bit more of a crack to it, and the kick needed to not sound like socking a pillow.

 

[larry_emder]

Re: New Songs on The Branches MySpace!

Understood, it IS a good snare sound.

So you dont think that it took away any of the 'feel' of the track? Sometimes the repetitiveness of a sampled snare gives me the poops.

Hard for me to judge though with that myspace quality ......and one man's 'repetitiveness' is another man's 'consistency'.

 

[Virtual Kevorkian]

Re: New Songs on The Branches MySpace!

With the replacing program I use (aptrigga), I set it to randomly trigger one of 9 samples I took - I always have multiple hits to choose from, and that reeeeally helps.

The only song I'd say is really lacking "feel" when it comes to snare is Red Hot Summer, as we had problems with the snare channel on the snake. I ended up having to gate the original signal around the spike from the snare, trigger the first sample 100% (no blend from original, where most of the dynamics are), and then blend with the other sample afterwards.


I know what you mean about over-consistency, though. I'm used to working in a metal context, so I referenced a lot of softer material to make sure things weren't sounding too mechanical.

 

[B2D]

Re: New Songs on The Branches MySpace!

You guys were recording? Now I feel bad for playing video games and storming around the house like I own the place. Oh wait, that wasn't me, that was the other roommate. My bad.

*gigglesnort*

 

[SOLO GUITAR STEWIE]

Re: New Songs on The Branches MySpace!

nice work guys, great vocals and I love that legacy of yours B2D
great now I have worse GAS than ever before (thanks brendan!!)

chris