The Bitter End - A New Original - FolkRock Americana

[lcjones]

Hey folks,

Thought I'd throw this new tune up. Written last week, recorded today. Featuring Roxy, the wonderfully rich 330! Lovin it! Your thoughts are greatly appreciated.

Chap

http://www.chapmanjones.com/moonbow/The_Bitter_End.mp3

The Bitter End - Chapman Jones 10-30-2011
*****************************************************

I left you a note written by my tears
Dripping on the paper in between the beers
I told you how I loved you, how you broke my heart
How you put me on a ghost ship adrift in the dark (Cape Fear)
Don't look for me to swim to your shores again
If you can't tell girl, this is the end

This is the end, the end
We'll never be in love again
This is the end, the end
It's the bitter end

You left me a treasure chest of nightmare dreams
Covered in the blood of a love that screams
In the green murky depths off the coast of Cape Fear
I'm sinking like a stone thrown over the pier
Don't look for me to swim to your shores again
If you can't tell girl, this is the end

This is the end, the end
We'll never be in love again
This is the end, the end
It's the bitter end

And if you ever thought I'd reclaim your heart
I'd sail the seven seas like a psycho shark
Until I make my way to the edge of the world
Where I'd fall over to be free of you girl

Well, I sunk every thing I had in you babe
All you ever did was steal my heart and trade
It in for another lover's hand to hold
Well, let me tell you sweetheat, it's getting old
Don't look for me to swim to your shores again
If you can't tell girl, this is the end

This is the end, the end
We'll never be in love again
This is the end, the end
It's the bitter end

This is the end, the end
We'll never be here again
This is the end, the end
It's the bitter end

[Folkie]

Once again, nice work, Chapman!

[DoubleThink]

Nice tone. How did you record your acoustic (i.e., mic, mixer, amp, etc.)? I have never managed a decent acoustic tone, IMHO.

[lcjones]

Hey thanks a ton Folkie Appreciate it!

And thanks Stefan ....

Hey Stefan, I know how frustrating it is to get acoustic tones to play nice. I have asked that same question all over the place and never really got a satisfactory answer. I hope this helps in getting the tone you want out of your acoustic. As is always the case, your mileage may vary.

I hope I don't sound too weird here. But over the years I have been chided, put down, called names, told to read a book, told to go a recording school, laughed at and generally mocked for asking such questions. The so called recording pro's who frequent "home recording" forums were not overly enthusiastic about "giving away" studio secrets. Maybe I didn't ask the right questions. I don't know. So I've tried to figure it out on my own, piecing together tidbits of info gleaned by lurking on the forums.

I'm off my soap box now and I'm about to get wordy! My way is not the only way and it's probably more than you even want to know! LOL There's a picture of my gear along with my Ric sisters below.

Here's my rig set up for the acoustic. First and foremost, my main acoustic is a 74 Guild D25 with fresh Martin ECM 13's. I bought it new in '74. So I'm very intimate with it's tones. It's a great sounding guitar on it's own but it's very, very resonant in the lower freq's because it has an arched back with no back bracing. Like a violin. It gives a beautiful au 'naturale tone but it's a booger to mic up without a bucket load of EQ to bring the mids and highs out.

In order to bring out the goodness, I run L.R. Baggs M1 pickup's on my Guilds. It's gives one of the truest acoustic sounds I have found. I plug the Guild directly into a Jangle Box (V1), then into a DanEcho pedal, into an MAudio Buddy preamp. The preamp is then plugged into a stereo channel on a Behringer 1222FX mixer. All the sound is handled by an MAudio Delta 2496 sound card.

JB Setup:
Switch to Bright
Gain: @ 12 o'clock
Attack: @ 9 o'clock

DanEcho Setup
Switch to HI
Mix @ 7 o'clock
Speed @ 10 o'clock
Repeat @ 10 o'clock
Hi Cut @ 2 o'clock

MAudio Preamp:
GAIN: @ 8 o'clock ( just enough to get a signal to the mixer channel ... then I use the mixer gain (trim) to override the MAudio setting)

Behringer 1222FX Mixer:
Things to note.... I have a Behringer V-Verb Rev 2496 rack mount unit side-chained into the mixer, along with a rack mount Behringer Ultraflex Pro Sound Enhancer, a rack mount Behringer MDX 1600 Compressor and an old rack mount Ross dual port 15 Channel EQ. All this is routed through RCA cables into an MAudio Delta 2496 PCI sound card in a Windows XP-Pro DAW. The Delta sound card *does not* use the native Windows sound drivers. It has it's own drivers and is superb for a home studio. The rack mount gear is chained and plugged into "insert" ports using TRS cables to the mixer. Each stereo channel has an insert port. It also has a global insert port for all channels to which the Reverb unit is plugged into. On this recording I used the native mixing board EQ and not the rack mount EQ.

Mixer Channel:
Trim (gain): @ 12 o'clock ( don't want to over-drive the gain)

These are the best EQ settings I've found to accommodate the Guild <<<-- For My Ears!
Hi EQ: @ 5 o'clock
Mid EQ: @ 2 o'clock
Lo EQ: @ 5 o'clock

Aux: OFF
FX: @ 2 o'clock ( this is where the rack reverb comes in to play - very adjustable - suit to taste)
Pan: @ 12 o'clock or "center"
Vol: @ 0 db or lower depended on how much volume I want into a mix.

To record and edit tracks I use MixCraft (V5) software. It's great. It's cheap. It does everything I need without spending three years on a learning curve. But even after all the "hardware" I'll make subtle adjustments to a track using the editor. Such as increasing volume or adding a VST effect to a track. On this recording of the acoustic though, I only adjusted the volume a bit. No effects. Pretty much a live recorded track with no treatment. The vol adjustment was in coordination with the vocals and other tracks. The mixing of tracks to get just the right amount of tone on each track is the hardest thing for me. And it's worse when you're doing it yourself. Ear fatigue gets in the way constantly. I don't use monitors, I use Audio Technica ATH M40s cans. Not the best way to get a full and even mix. But it's the way I do it.

I did not use any mic's on the acoustic guitar. On this recording I used an MXL 990 condenser mic on vocals only. Condensers are the only way to go.

Anyway, I've rambled on .... hope this has given you some ideas and certainly hope it helps out in your quest.

Chap

[teb]

I like that! My only gripe is that I'm not sure whether there actually is a bass track or whether those bass runs are being played on a guitar. If there is a bass track, it needs to come up in the mix. If not, it would anchor the bottom nicely to have one, and there are some places in there that are prime for something in the lower registers to fill the sound out. I also wouldn't mind something crisp in terms of percussion on the downbeats, maybe even something as simple as a wood block. There is a lot of strumming and picking going on and it might help focus the overall effect a bit. Nice tune though and some tasty guitar bits!

[lcjones]

Hey Todd,

You are on the money. It's lacking a bit of lower end punch, so to speak. Sounds good in the cans but elsewhere, the bottom drops out. I've been hacking out a cleaner bass line too. It is indeed muddying up the mix. As for percussion.... ahhh ... my achilles heel. I hate working with loops and samples. In this I'm using nothing more than a snare and brushes. I could bring them up a bit in the mix but I think they'd still be muted. I'm going to the shop tomorrow to grab a pair of those sticks that have a number of smaller sticks wrapped together ...kinda like a wooden brush ... I don't know what they are called. I'd really like to get one of those Steve Ferrone beats going. I though about putting a tambourine on the snare too.... Haven't gotten there yet .

Thanks!

Chap

[lcjones]

Hey Todd...

If you have the time and inclination, I sure wouldn't mind one bit for you to have a listen to this mix.... punched up percussion with multi-sticks, re-tracked bass line.

http://www.chapmanjones.com/moonbow/The ... _B_MIX.mp3

Appreciate it ...

Chap

[Folkie]

Chapman,

This new version sounds even better than the original. Once again, I'm struck by your formidable songwriting, not to mention your recording expertise. You have a knack for wedding great lyrics to catchy melodies. Keep posting songs and pretty soon you'll have a CD!

Robert

[jimk]

This evening is the first chance I've had to listen to your song, Chap. I love it. In fact I was sitting here singing the third part to the choruses.
JimK

[teb]

The drum level sounds better. In my opinion (and remember, it's just one person's opinion) the bass is still pretty weak. I want to know without even having to think about it that there is a bass in there. If I'm not sure, then it's probably contributing more mud than it is helping the tune. You have a nice, sort of Pure Prairie League sound going on, but if that's the desired direction, then it needs to swing a little more. One way to do this on country tunes is to keep your bass part really simple with a lot of short, thumpy notes. The best way to play them is by damping them off with your left hand, limiting the sustain. You simply let it ring until you want to stop it and then ease the pressure on your fretting hand. On a tune with this sort of tempo, you want the crowd rocking back and forth with the beat and I think the bass would have a lot to do with it. If I had my druthers, it would sound more like this sample chunk:

http://webpages.charter.net/tbradshaw/M ... sample.mp3

If I can record a bass line right over the top of your bass line and get away with it, it's a pretty good indication that yours was pretty far down in the mix. It's also tough when you're recording all the parts yourself to make sure that you're not playing the same parts, just on different instruments. I don't do it much on twelve-string and bass because they styles are so different, but I really have to watch it when playing six string and bass parts on the same tune.

Pure Prairie League
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_u8WVGY ... re=related

[lcjones]

Todd,

Thank you very much for taking all that time to show me (all of us) a fundamental task in home recording. Getting that solid bass line. Man, that's golden information!

Again, and I don't mean to monopolize your time, but I certainly appreciate it! And if you're interested, here's the C cut. I have no idea how this sounds in monitors or speakers. I hope it the bass is more defined and letting other things breath better.

http://www.chapmanjones.com/moonbow/The ... _C_MIX.mp3

Chap

[teb]

I can now hear a bass line, though it could still come up a fair bit on my monitors and in my headphones, which seem to be fairly accurate. Mixing is always tricky without a dedicated room that's been carefully set up for it, as it's hard to tell where "normal" is for the various levels and tone. One thing that I'll sometimes do is to A-B my mix and its fidelity against something that I know is a really clean and full recording. Then it's a matter of "Well, if his bass lines (or other parts) sound deep and clear at this volume and through these monitors, what's wrong with mine?" This is one of my favorite recordings to use for comparison. There is a full spectrum of sounds going on and it's very clean and transparent. I noticed that they now have a short commercial stuck before the video, but it's worth waiting for.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5Pit2WJ6dI

[beatbyrd]

I can now hear a bass line, though it could still come up a fair bit on my monitors and in my headphones, which seem to be fairly accurate. Mixing is always tricky without a dedicated room that's been carefully set up for it, as it's hard to tell where "normal" is for the various levels and tone. One thing that I'll sometimes do is to A-B my mix and its fidelity against something that I know is a really clean and full recording. Then it's a matter of "Well, if his bass lines (or other parts) sound deep and clear at this volume and through these monitors, what's wrong with mine?" This is one of my favorite recordings to use for comparison. There is a full spectrum of sounds going on and it's very clean and transparent. I noticed that they now have a short commercial stuck before the video, but it's worth waiting for.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5Pit2WJ6dI

Hi Chap, I have been 'watching' this song evolve and it keeps getting better and better. I have learned a lot from following this thread and will experiment more with mixes. I have been bringing the same 3 or 4 CDs to stereo/music stores for years in order to judge speakers before I bought them. I did that when I auditioned/bought my mix monitors. But..... they are dedicated speakers that connect to my hard disk recorder. They are only used for playback of stuff I record. I never thought of playing the same test CDs through the setup AT HOME, in order to gauge the effects of the room, equipment, EQ, levels, etc... I'm glad that Todd mentioned the Fogelberg clip. It's a great recording and 'tests' nearly everything. Here's a song I've always used to test speakers in the stores. The recording on the CD is pristine; the YT video, not so much (but enough to get the idea).

http://youtu.be/pF2ev59KC4I

It's another great song, Chap. Tom

[lcjones]

Hey Tom ... hey guys....

I want to thank everyone for their suggestions, thoughts and compliments. Thank you! Robert, thank you man.

I've spent the week working out the mix on this tune. I've done a very slight re-write. The big things ...... Re-recorded vocals and double track them. Punched the percussion more. Tweeked the bass line. I always have a problem with the lower registers. I don't have a kick drum so the bass line really needs to be cleanly separated in the mix.

So here's the latest mix as of tonight .... you all will have to be the judge if I pulled this out or not.

The Bitter End - @320kb @7.6mb @3:16
http://www.chapmanjones.com/mixed/be-10 ... 1-x320.mp3

Again, I really appreciate you all helping me and others make better mixes.

**
Chap

[teb]

That's too much voice-mult for my taste. At a certain point, you start to lose the human element - that there is actually a person singing the song. I think the mult is fine on the choruses and bridge (though I'd also mult the harmony and I'd love to hear a high harmony added on the chorus reply lines) but it tends to overpower the verses and sound mechanical when it runs all the way through the tune. Let it come down a bit dynamically if needed on the verses. It's supposed to be one guy with one voice telling his story, not a whole group of guys (unless she happened to be a real floozie)

I'd still like to hear a lot more low end on the bass. It's cranked up to the point where I'm hearing crunch on what I can pick out (which is pretty strange on a folk-rock-country tune) but the bulk of the song still seems to be all midrange. Part of that is the bass tone and part of it is that the bass is mostly playing the same runs and parts that the guitars are playing. If you have no bass drum, then that thump, thump, thump on a country song needs to be covered by the bass.

Can you see why the guys I record with often wish that I'd just shut up and go away?