My last music blog

For a while at least. GOTCHA. 
 
Anyway, what with the advent of university WoW, Starcraft 2, and rejoining myself to the rest of humanity, I doubt I'll have an awful lot of time to make music. 
Who am I kidding? I'll find time. Whether it be by not attending lectures, or not attending tutorials, or not playing... no, lets not get ahead of ourselves here. 
 
So this here critter is a definite WiP (Work in Progress - for those folks out there with abbreviphobia) so right off the bat, here are the things that I'm not happy with (and obviously as an impartial listener, you should totally gloss over these issues, and only focus on the good parts - that's how Metallica gets away with it!!!): 
   

1. The Mix: Things get real... crunchy in the last, oh lets say 20% of the song. In layman's terms (because I know of no other) there are too many sounds playing at once, and it distorts like a mofo. The instruments themselves are about as balanced as they're going to get, but the overall volume of the track becomes - at a few points - too loud. The only solutions are to remix the entire thing (which isn't hugely time-consuming, but I'd rather not), re-render it at a lower volume (so that you - the listener - have to turn your volume up more, which isn't exactly ideal for you), or meet the distortion half-way with a limiter, which increases the volume of the track, while sacrificing it's dynamic range. I freakin' love dynamic range. Also I don't know how to use a limiter properly, and I ruin more than I fix 99% of the time.
2. Length: Fact, it used to be about a minute shorter, and in my opinion it was uncomfortably short. So I added an extra couple of bars. Now I think it's too long. That synth solo near the end is basically what filled that gap, but I don't know if it was worth it.

For a while at least. GOTCHA. 
 
Anyway, what with the advent of university WoW, Starcraft 2, and rejoining myself to the rest of humanity, I doubt I'll have an awful lot of time to make music. 
Who am I kidding? I'll find time. Whether it be by not attending lectures, or not attending tutorials, or not playing... no, lets not get ahead of ourselves here. 
 
So this here critter is a definite WiP (Work in Progress - for those folks out there with abbreviphobia) so right off the bat, here are the things that I'm not happy with (and obviously as an impartial listener, you should totally gloss over these issues, and only focus on the good parts - that's how Metallica gets away with it!!!): 
   

1. The Mix: Things get real... crunchy in the last, oh lets say 20% of the song. In layman's terms (because I know of no other) there are too many sounds playing at once, and it distorts like a mofo. The instruments themselves are about as balanced as they're going to get, but the overall volume of the track becomes - at a few points - too loud. The only solutions are to remix the entire thing (which isn't hugely time-consuming, but I'd rather not), re-render it at a lower volume (so that you - the listener - have to turn your volume up more, which isn't exactly ideal for you), or meet the distortion half-way with a limiter, which increases the volume of the track, while sacrificing it's dynamic range. I freakin' love dynamic range. Also I don't know how to use a limiter properly, and I ruin more than I fix 99% of the time.
2. Length: Fact, it used to be about a minute shorter, and in my opinion it was uncomfortably short. So I added an extra couple of bars. Now I think it's too long. That synth solo near the end is basically what filled that gap, but I don't know if it was worth it.

I ah ....er.... dont kinda of lik.... I mean er..r.... -_-??? That last min is ok .... I guess , the rest I.... nope ,  no sorry :( I guess this one would be your ugly child , no one likes but you

Now this is something I can listen to whilst playing Alpha Protocol.

I think it's quite good! I got a Mission Impossible or James Bond vibe from it. I could do without the synth solo at the end, but I'm not a fan of high-pitched tones in general. Nothing murders a good guitar riff more than taking it to a high pitch.

" Now this is something I can listen to whilst playing Alpha Protocol. "

" I think it's quite good! I got a Mission Impossible or James Bond vibe from it. I could do without the synth solo at the end, but I'm not a fan of high-pitched tones in general. Nothing murders a good guitar riff more than taking it to a high pitch. "

@Axxol said:

" Now this is something I can listen to whilst playing Alpha Protocol. "

I'm gonna assume that's a good thing :P 
 

I've been listening to an album called XTRMNTR by Primal Scream recently, and I'm kinda seeing similarities between that and this song you've thrown up, which is a very good thing. Starts to sound like something from Super Meat Boy at about the 3 minute mark, and I'm not sure about the last 40 seconds, but I did enjoy it.

Its actually pretty good,better then most of the amateur stuff i hear.

This is the first I have heard from you, so I have nothing to compare it with, but I really dig this song. How long was the first version that you thought was too short? If anything it might be a little too long, but overall good stuff. Better than everything I can come up with. What do you use to record? (I am sure you answered this before)

Feels like it should be Crash Bandicoot menu music.

I really like the beginning James Bond-ish bit, and also enjoyed the Super Meat Boy-sounding stuff in the middle, but I have to agree with everyone else, the ending is kinda fucked.

• Panning background and supporting instrument layers (like pads) about 15 or so degrees will take a considerable load off your mix without sounding awkwardly far left or far right.  Don't know if you were already doing this, couldn't really tell. 
• If you groups tracks, try cutting around 1.5dB at 100 and 200 Hz on your instrument bus.  This will not only make your kick and snare stand out more in the mix, but it'll lessen the chance of clipping at that freq. range, and make mixing your bass and drums into your main mix much easier.
• As far as volume goes, don't be afraid to just turn shit down, especially background stuff that's not absolutely integral to that section of the song.  You can always accentuate that freq. range more in the mastering process.  Also, be wary of using too many instruments in the same octave (and thus frequency) range at the same time.  That not only can cause overloading at those frequencies, but it can bring mild to moderate phasing into play.  I would say don't put any kind of limiter, compressor, maximizer, etc. on your master out at all in your arranging/mixing session.  Just push it up to a good level with the master fader.  This will retain that dynamic range you rightfully love so much. 
• Bounce your project at a high sample rate and bit depth (48kHz/24 bit is good) WAV or AIFF, then load that file into a new session.  Now to do some real, critical EQing.  Use a frequency analyzer and boost low or important (genre defining) areas you thing should be louder and maybe cut some of the troublesome areas and the super low end and high end that nobody can hear.  Light compression and limiting will make your tune louder without sacrificing too much dynamic range.  Make sure your plugin chain is right, though.  Usually EQ first, then compression, and limiter always dead last.  Mastering is an art and takes a lot of time and practice to get good at.  There's a reason there are people that have made entire careers out of just being mastering engineers. 

I really enjoyed it, but I am easy to please with instrumental-only music. I like the build up to the end.