Distortion

[J van E]

Turn up the volume, please!

Distortion

[arraknid]

Not one of your best - at least not in that form. I reckon you'd be better changing the arrangement to a style that suits your obvious talent. Hopefully this was just an experiment, to see what RealStrat was capable of. Nice guitar programming, but I had to stop it after a minute. Not what I expected.

What genre of music do you want to be known for? Hopefully not this.

[OldGeezer]

[Sergey_MusicLab]

[arraknid]

Nothing could be further from the truth. I grew up on Led Zep, Maiden and the rest and the last and only time I was in a church was to record a choir.

Anyone that posts their latest creations is surely looking for constructive criticism, not just platitudes which are far from helpful. Hopefully, my comments will be taken as constructive, not just criticism just for the sake of it. If that's the way it comes across, I apologise, but I am entitled to my opinion.

Bottom line, the guy is looking for a recording deal and I for one think it's a travesty that he hasn't been signed. Unfortunately, in this day and age, my experience is that record companies have a misguided need to pigeon-hole their artists, and tie them to specific music genres. Their justification is based purely on economics (surprise, surprise!) targeting their marketing and advertising at specific audiences.

So, like it or not, if the record companies have a problem fitting the artist into that all-restricting mould, they'll just move on. I know of a dozen artists who couldn't or wouldn't 'conform', and they lost their chance. Sad but true. Fair it isn't, real life it certainly is.

If I can offer some more constructive advice to J van E, get some management and if possible, get a competent engineer to remix and master your tracks. And good luck, you deserve it.

Edit after reading Sergey's comment... nothing wrong with experimentation, just don't blur the picture by becoming a jack of all genres.

[Voltago]

I really like the sound and the song, it has a good flow! But you shouldn't distort the vocals, the voice is just to good - keep it clean!
Did you use RealStrat's internal feedback for the end of the solo?

[J van E]

Thanks for listening and criticism, good AND bad! Usually only people who like something post, so... I am happy arraknid posted what he had to say! (BTW I've been away for a few days so I didn't have the time to reply earlier.)

First of all, I can't remember having said I am looking for a record deal.

Secondly, I can understand that for someone who likes LZ and IM, this may not sound that good... You are totally free to stop listening after a minute! I make music just for the fun of it and so I simply do what I like to do at a certain moment. I got the idea for this song and so... I made it! Simple as that.

I don't care for styles or genres or whatever. I certainly do NOT only want to make the music I am good at (and btw I don't really know which style that would be...): that would be far too boring for me...
I like to do different things, not because I think I am good at it, but just because I want to! I want to do something different everytime, or at least I do not like to do the same kind of song after each other. You could call this one an experiment, but to be honest EVERY song I made is an experiment for me.

A record deal would be great and nice and so on, but it's not something I am after: the idea of HAVING to make (certain) music scares me. I want to make music when I want to and if I don't feel like it, I really do not want to do it. Even the idea of having to record my songs again scares me, hahaha!

What I would like though is if someone else would hear my music and record it for real. That would be nice. Well, making my own cd would be great too, but without all the hassle that comes with it.

About my voice being distorted: that was the whole idea of the song. My voice get's more distorted over time (every verse and chorus) which 'fits' the lyrics. It's not done just for fun (although that could be the case)!

And about the guitar sounds: no RS-feedback is used: I simply played various extra notes to make them sound dirty here and there: the opening note of the solo are simply three notes in a row (totally impossible in real life, but it gives the result which IS sort of possible in real life ) and at the end I let all notes ring on and on, and Guitar Rig 3 did the rest. So it's not exactly a realistic solo when you would write down the notes, but the result sound like what I wanted it to sound like.

[Voltago]

Thank you for those interesting insights in your workflow!

[J van E]

Ah, well, I am glad someone took the time to read it all...

[Voltago]