One Player Game: Walking in the Dark

opg

It's a nice tune in progress. Let me know if it sounds good on your speakers.

www.oneplayergame.com/walkinginthedark.mp3

mosc · Posted: Thu Apr 15, 2004 12:39 pm Post subject:

Sounds very good on my speakers. Really nice sounds. There could be more bass though, IMHO.

opg · Posted: Thu Apr 15, 2004 12:51 pm Post subject:

yeah...I only used some analog toms in there. Do you mean it may sound better with a deep kick drum or an actual bassline? I've never been too good with basslines; they usually screw up the rhythm and make the song sound slower. And just putting in short notes underneath the blips is almost useless as I could just throw a sine tracker plug-in on the intsrument(s).

mosc · Posted: Thu Apr 15, 2004 6:59 pm Post subject:

Good point, the bass is by definition slow. Low frequencies take a long time to speak. Maybe a low tom or bass drum type of sound, or even some sort of sound effect once in a while. Just a suggestion. You are much more of a judge on this than I. It's just that you said something like "how does it sound on your speakers." I have 12" woofers and they hardly moved. Wink

opg · Posted: Fri Apr 16, 2004 3:05 pm Post subject:

That's okay. I try to design my songs for small speakers. I checked it out in the car, on a portable stereo, and in headphones (sorry, not in a box with a fox). They all sound great. I always get confused about mastering at this point. I always assumed I would pay a pro (new ears) to master it. I just never know if what I give the mastering technician is good enough to work with (or what I should/shouldn't do to the tracks before I give it to them- i.e. mastering, rolloff bass at 20Hz, etc.). Any insight?

Mohoyoho · Posted: Fri Apr 16, 2004 6:15 pm Post subject:

I like the pads. It sounds good on my small speakers.

opg · Posted: Fri Apr 16, 2004 6:20 pm Post subject:

Thanks

Hmm....I just uploaded the full song this evening. Did you get to listen to that?

mosc · Posted: Sat Apr 17, 2004 6:51 am Post subject:

mosc · Posted: Sat Apr 17, 2004 6:57 am Post subject:

I just listened again to your track again. It sounds very good.

paul e. · Posted: Sat Apr 17, 2004 1:56 pm Post subject:

opg · Posted: Mon Apr 19, 2004 10:24 am Post subject:

Don't labels normally pay for the mastering if they think it's needed?

Anyway, I was more concerned with getting a pro to listen to the songs mainly as another set of ears. Of course, I wouldn't pay $500 for another set of ears (unless I lost my own in a tragic incident at an ACDC concert.....)

At this point I am constantly trying out my songs on lots of different speakers and trying to get others to listen to them.

Thanks

paul e. · Posted: Mon Apr 19, 2004 10:45 am Post subject:

elektro80 · Posted: Mon Apr 19, 2004 1:09 pm Post subject:

When it comes to music like this, mastering in the sense of "getting that contemporary radio singel sound" is not valid at all. You can probably manage all this yourself.. but you are left with the main problem.. which is adjusting individual track levels so the tracks match each other. This is in fact pretty hard to do well, but you can probably manage this too.

When it comes to bass, the most common problem is having way too much bass.

opg · Posted: Mon Apr 19, 2004 4:48 pm Post subject:

I'll usually roll-off the bass below 20 or 30 Hz. I'll watch the 85, 65, and 150 to see if I'll need to do any compressing. I try not to compress anything. I have T-Racks, which I occasionally tinker with. Question: Should I ONLY wait to roll-off the bottom until I import the file in T-Racks, or can I do it in Fruity Loops (and again in T-Racks, just to be safe)?

I've found that the "TV Broadcast" preset works well in T-Racks, after some tweaking. I takes care of the bass, but I have to watch the highs.