Lesson 90, A little vamp incorporating part of lesson 90 Options

[AK Rich]

Hey Todd !

I recently got Reaper and Addictive drums and was experimenting with it yesturday and decided to make a little vamp incorporating part of the lesson 90 warmup. I wanted to give you an idea of what I was hearing when trying to harmonize with you in the video chat lesson. Check it out

[attachment=25758:lesson90warmup3.mp3]

Peace! Rich...

[Todd Simpson]

I'm diggin it! Works pretty well as an almost Djentish lead part eh? Addictive drums are killer. I noticed that the bass drum sounds like it was mixed on near field monitors maybe 5 inch woofer? Just at a guess. On a full range rig with a sub, the bass frequencies were moving my desk around. I've run in to the same issue as I use KRK6 Rockits and often by the time drums sound good on them, and I turn on the sub, it sounds like a missile test. I know you didn't plan on a mix critique, but just thought I'd toss that out there as it's bitten me too

Hey Todd !

I recently got Reaper and Addictive drums and was experimenting with it yesturday and decided to make a little vamp incorporating part of the lesson 90 warmup. I wanted to give you an idea of what I was hearing when trying to harmonize with you in the video chat lesson. Check it out

[attachment=25758:lesson90warmup3.mp3]

Peace! Rich...

[AK Rich]

Hey Todd Man!
Glad ya dug it and thanks alot for the mix critique, I pretty much just got this software so this was an experiment. And I appreciate the feedback for sure,I think I was just using my headphones when I was setting levels and effects but it may have been my logitech speakers with a little sub, yeah maybe 5 inch, if anything its smaller. I tried some of the effects in reaper such as the ReaXcomp, ReaVerb, And the ReaEQ where I boosted the lows a bit much maybe eh? They are at about +2.5db at 50hz I guess and the slope continues to rise to the lower freq range probably +3 db at 20hz.
The drum track itself was just a preset loop in Addictive Drums (Hard Rock Bundle).
Also I think I made the whole mix a little too hot,it sounds a little overdriven to me maybe, what do you think?
The other thing was after I render the mix it doesnt seem to sound as good as it does in reaper,Like its decreased in quality somehow.

Thanks Todd! Rich...

[Todd Simpson]

Hey Todd Man!
Glad ya dug it and thanks alot for the mix critique, I pretty much just got this software so this was an experiment. And I appreciate the feedback for sure,I think I was just using my headphones when I was setting levels and effects but it may have been my logitech speakers with a little sub, yeah maybe 5 inch, if anything its smaller. I tried some of the effects in reaper such as the ReaXcomp, ReaVerb, And the ReaEQ where I boosted the lows a bit much maybe eh? They are at about +2.5db at 50hz I guess and the slope continues to rise to the lower freq range probably +3 db at 20hz.
The drum track itself was just a preset loop in Addictive Drums (Hard Rock Bundle).
Also I think I made the whole mix a little too hot,it sounds a little overdriven to me maybe, what do you think?
The other thing was after I render the mix it doesnt seem to sound as good as it does in reaper,Like its decreased in quality somehow.

Thanks Todd! Rich...

It's often tough to mix at home. I"d say if possible, splurge for a pair of nice head phones like the AKG MK II 240 (about $125) which are great studio quality phones. Most engineers will of course flip out at the idea of mixing on headphones, but for home studio work, where budget is a factor, something like this works well. They have good bass and treble and will give you a better idea of what's happening in a given mix.

When you export, if you use a "lossy" format, like MP3, then you will notice it's not as spiff sounding as the original. Just part of getting the file size that small. You lose some bits.

For a quick and dirty thing it's more than fine. Just offering some suggestions to try as you keep working on mixes