My First Complete Song - Doug McAuliffe

Hi Doug.

I had a listen and would agree with the first comment about the intro and the guitar.  Some very nice ideas in there though and it's definitely got some potential.  The hammond organ sound is lovely although the other synths sound a bit aggressive and toppy to my ears.   Can I ask a few questions..?

How are you recording it..?  Via analog machines or on a digital platform..?

Are the drums live or virtual..?  They sound live but the problems with getting a good live drum sound are myriad as you need so many mics - including some more specialised ones - and also need to take into account mic placement, each individual drums resonance as well as factors like atmospheric temperature, pressure and humidity as they all affect how drums will sound at a given moment. It's why I always stick to virtual drums in my own recordings, as well as space limitations in my recording room of course.

The guitars sound very scratchy too - how are you amping them..? and what mic(s) are you using..?  or are they D.I.d..?

What are you using for monitoring..?   To get a decent sound you should have the best monitors your budget will allow.  These are the studio headphones I use and I can recommend them as they provide a completely flat frequency response and wont colour your sound in any way..

https://eu.audio-technica.com/ATH-M70x

Re the actual song structure : If it was me I'd bring the drums in a bit earlier - maybe when the acoustic guitar starts strumming..?  Some vocals would help everything along too and would make that long intro a bit more palatable.

You need to get to grips with how to apply eq and compression.  A good place to start is to roll off all frequencies below 50Hz for every instrument as you can't hear sounds at those frequencies anyway but they are still there interfering with your finished sound and messing it up.  Like this :

The small curve in light blue at the left side shows the sub 50Hz frequencies rolled off with all other frequencies on a flat response setting.

Anyway, sorry to yak on.  There's loads to learn in the recording world but it's a fantastic journey if you decide to get serious about it.

Hello and thank you for the feedback! My recording equipment is very ghetto, drums are acoustic recorded with a single mica and my guitar amp doesn't have output so its the same mic positioned in front of it. Keys are recorded through the interface though. Also use Audio Technica ATH-M50X. I'm currently rerecording as we speak and cutting stuff out and going for a better sound overall.

For guitar I've been recording directly from my Boss GT-8 with its amp simulation. It certainly helps getting a less amateur sound if you're still learning about recording and mixing (and in my case I don't have a nice amp ).