The RPM Challenge

Guilty

Thursday, 13 March 2008

Okay I admit it. I can't listen to my own 08 disk without listening Gaia twice in a row .... every time.

Comments (9)

1 Written by Aged Machine, on 03-13-2008 14:24
That's a killer track, I think I'll do the same each time I listen to it...

2 Written by Sister Savage, on 03-13-2008 14:40
Agreed.

3 i am going to listen right now
Written by Night Driving, on 03-14-2008 10:35
cause im not a jerk. and im risking wearing headphones at work. oh yes.

4 man
Written by Night Driving, on 03-14-2008 10:42
brother, this is really good. very, very good. i think you very much have to worry about what to do if your music gets used commercially.

the vocals sound fantastic...haunting and uplifting at the same time. how old kelsey?

also, i LOVE the turn around of the beat at about 1:40 where the snare comes in. it bumps the track up a notch, and is both tasteful and subtly powerful.

5 i can't type
Written by Night Driving, on 03-14-2008 10:43
how old IS kelsey?

and also, the recording quality of this stuff is fantastic. what programs do you use? what kind of mics?

6 The Run Down
Written by Michelangelo, on 03-14-2008 11:54
How old is Kelsey?
14 - She did two parts. Once as the "little girl" and one in her lower range (she's soprano -- had her sing mezzo-soprano for it -- it's got a long delay reverb on it to make it wispy and airy for the "older girl"). I used an EQ to pull the lows out of her voice to give it an even more "young" sound for the "little girl". What was key (and her idea) as the "little girl" she sang the "Wahkeen" short and as the "older girl" held the long "E" on the "Wahkeen" so you get this incredible natural cross fade. She's very talented but has no confidence in herself. I'm hoping this will help her with that. I set up the gear, sound levels, etc. and then after a 10-minute lesson she ran the DAW and everything all but herself. Amazing.

What Equipment?
Shure KSM109 for Kelsey's and my vocals, flute, and "high" drums like the snare, cymbal, and shaker
Shure KSM109 and Crown PZM30D for didj and the"medium" drums like the djembe and ashiko.
Shure KSM109 and SM57 for the low drums like the buffalo and kodo. SM57 placed about 25 feet away down my hallway for a natural delay. Those big drums rattle the house and the hallway funnels straight down to the mic. Nice effect. KSM fairly close.

Seven other RPMers recorded the "Heya Hada" chants and I'm not sure what mics they used. Some were high quality some not, but the mix of them was exactly right and I am very thankful for their efforts. The song wouldn't be the same without them.

What programs?
Ardour - DAW
LADSPA - plugins
Jamin -Mastering
gAlan - Modular synth (if you can think of it you can build it)
ZynAddSubFx - software synth
Korg DS-8, Yamaha FB-01, Kawai K1r - hardware synths -- old but good - might actually buy something new if I can scrape up the money but I know these old beasts bit by bit so well that I usually convince them to do what I want one way or another

But the quality is very dependent on the hardware and it's RME HDSP audio hardware. It is a little more expensive but there is no comparison.

7 im such a n00b!
Written by Night Driving, on 03-14-2008 12:08
g'damn i have no idea what most of that is.

8 Heyyahada
Written by Gary Fox, on 03-18-2008 23:02
uh-huh-good. The tastiest work here. Love it Mick.

By the way, I used a KSM-27 for a mike.

Cheers,

Gary

9 Written by Beckwith, on 03-26-2008 10:08
Hey Mick - are you like a professional recording engineer or something? Your stuff is really studio quality and your program choices definitely indicate lots of knowledge about this stuff. Here I was thinking that Linux didn't have a whole lot for free audio tools, and I forgot all about GPL! Ha! Sounds like it works a bit better than Audacity (just a bit :) )

What's the best general resource for "the audio recording and producing process?" (aside from going to school for it, I already spent enough money on my EE degree!)

Top notch!