Epignosis Debut Album Available

Well indeed, composition is always the first and foremost.
If it ain't good music of course people wont listen and I'm no exception.
But there is a difference to me at least, between a production with grit that can add feeling to the overall thing(as a fan of stoner/sludge metal, believe me I like some grit in my sound if the genre calls for it) and a production that leaves the impression of an amateurish production which you don't want to do.
As much as I hate to say it, you're album falls into the latter category.
If I were to review your album, the production job itself would be enough for me to rate it a star lower than it otherwise could have been if the production were tighter.
Some of the levels in the mix made me cringe at times.
Sure, lead guitar parts can be boosted a bit in the mix, but some of the lead stuff was just overwhelming the rest of the tracks in the mix.
And given this album isn't meant to be a guitar solo orientated thing, I'm sure that's not what you would be aiming for.

Do you do much EQ-ing on the guitar tracks after you record them? Post EQ is important, but with Line 6 PODs, post EQ is absolutely necessary. The high end isn't too fizzy as I can hear (high end fizz is a common problem in PODs), so I imagine you did some post EQ-ing.
Backing off the mids in Post-EQ may have helped the lead guitars to sit in the mix better.
You may be happy with the tone though, so at least, back off the volume on the lead guitar track a tadto help them sit a bit tighter in the mix

I think had you spent 2-4 weeks on internet forums, posting clips and asking for opinions, it would have made a drastic difference. Still not professional (I mean, hey, I'm so sound engineer either and couldn't afford to pay one) but it would have sounded that bit closer to a good production.
Parts that seem they should be more subtle having too much power and parts that are meant to be more powerful come across as weaker, due to the weak mix and mastering job.
When a production has the ability to add power or subtlety to something and isn't done correctly, it really robs the music of some dynamics.
And this is where people are wrong when they say that production can't affect how good the music is.
That really is just plain wrong.
Think about it folks.........dynamics is one of the fundamental elements of music.
I, and so many other musicians (and I'd imagine sound engineers) dimiss anyone that tells me that the production can't affect the end result, but it does.
Show people 2 differnet mixes/mastering jobs, of the same song.
Show them the first one, which is poorly done and overblows subtle bits out of proportion and makes the powerful bits underwhelming. Add to this, the mix of tracks is bad, so instruments are not fitting into the mix well and things sound pretty washed out.
They'll like it if the compositions are good, sure.
Then show them a mix that allows the music to come to life with better dynamics and none of that washed out sound.
Instantly, they will start having more positive reactions to the music, not purely because of the mixing/mastering, but because now the music has become more powerful and forceful with the added dynamics, which is an element of music. People are hearing the music and not the production per se, but as a direct and indirect result of better production, the music itself sounds better. Sorry if that didn't come across as totally clear (my lack of English skills coming into play......don't be hard on me forumites, I dropped out of high school, haha), but you get what I mean now?

As for grit, I think that certain styles of music need gritty production.
I'm talking about sludge metal, stoner metal and stuff like that, reallly 'dirty and down' kinda music.
Your music doesn't strike me as music that benefits from grit, it's very 'clean' music and an appropriate production would be well suited to that I think.

I will put this serious suggestion forward:
Give yourself a month, post up clips on various sites, even just the PA Musicians Exchange section if the idea of signing up to other sites ain't your thing (but ideally you want to be going to sites with forum boards dedicated to musicians, as I do regularly) , of clips of your stuff and ask how it can be improved production wise.
After that month, offer people a remixed and remastered versions of the album that has resulted from the opinions of the brains of knowledgeable forum board members .
You'll be surprised beyond what you can imagine how much positive reaction you get.
People are gonna start commenting on how now it breathes better and it's more alive.
And even if they don't understand the process behind mixing and mastering, that wont matter, because the music will improve overall because I feel it will put the dynamics back in the mix that your current production job is robbing.
Listen to those old production jobs versus the newer ones and it will blow your mind, not just everyone else's.

Despite it not being the kind of music I'm into these days, your album has a lot of potential.
You're a good song writer, a great guitarist who really knows how to play and your compositions are very nice and fairly detailed.
The production robs of it more potential than you realize.




Edited by Petrovsk Mizinski - April 02 2009 at 11:17

Sure man, no problems.
BTW, what brand of studio monitors were you using out of interest?

Epignosis wrote: Petrovsk Mizinski wrote: Sure man, no problems. BTW, what brand of studio monitors were you using out of interest? Cheap.  Got em at Wal-Mart I think. By the way, I listened to my music again today in the car, and honestly, I like how it sounds.  I really do.

Epignosis wrote: Petrovsk Mizinski wrote: Sure man, no problems. BTW, what brand of studio monitors were you using out of interest? By the way, I listened to my music again today in the car, and honestly, I like how it sounds.  I really do.

p0mt3 wrote: Epignosis wrote: Petrovsk Mizinski wrote: Sure man, no problems. BTW, what brand of studio monitors were you using out of interest? By the way, I listened to my music again today in the car, and honestly, I like how it sounds.  I really do.    Good! I'm not the only one who listens to his own music! I thought I was super vain, or something,

Of course you only do it to so you can notice all the things you could improve on  ( http://www.last.fm/user/darqdean/charts ) 

p0mt3 wrote: It's worse for me, man. Trust me. I only have one full song recorded at this point, and after listening to it multiple times trying to hear anomylies and/or mistakes, I am about to go insane. If I hear that crappy, squeely guitar solo again . . . !

See, that's what I was talking about in an earlier post.  Sometimes those "anomalies" are treasures, and those "mistakes" are right as rain.

Most of my favorite bits of my work happened quite by accident, and I believe over-analyzing everything would ruin any hope of my music having a more "organic" sound.

Epignosis wrote: Dean wrote: p0mt3 wrote: Epignosis wrote: Petrovsk Mizinski wrote: Sure man, no problems. BTW, what brand of studio monitors were you using out of interest? By the way, I listened to my music again today in the car, and honestly, I like how it sounds.  I really do.    Good! I'm not the only one who listens to his own music! I thought I was super vain, or something, Of course you only do it to so you can notice all the things you could improve on  ( http://www.last.fm/user/darqdean/charts )  #5, huh?  Somebody's a fanboy!

Almost - I've recorded over 250 tracks - so even I can't listen to half my stuff

Yay- I'm in the celebrated halls of my beloved favorite website. 

I just wanted to point out that there's a free streaming mp3 here available for anyone to listen to it ("No Shadow of Turning," the longest song on the album), so if you haven't heard me and you are curious, please, go and hear:

http://www.progarchives.com/artist.asp?id=4642

Again, here is the link to purchase and download the album:

http://www.mymusicsite.com/MediaDetails/AlbumMediaList.aspx?albumid=2926

Thank you everyone for your support. 

Alright Robert- I loved the samples. I'm going to download the album soon.

btw, I see you now have an artist page on PA. Once I download it I'll write a review (you should write one too).

Robert,

I got your album last night, and WOW! I am blown away!

I listened to it twice last night, and twice this morning.

My favorite song is probably An Everlasting Kingdom or No Shadow Turning, but the whole album is really good! It's definitely getting a 4 or 5 star review from me. Great job!

-Jeff