Dave returns !!!!
Discussion of plugins and tools:
Songs from
* The Actor - Les Cotton and Pete Rand Music
* Won't Ever Run - David Cooper Music
* Home - Dave Criddle Music
* Home - Grandma Melonhead Music
* I Got the Sun Shining Down on Me - Dave King Music
Some Links
* Home Recording Weekly
* Sampletron - Mellotron Sampler
* Elektrostuio Free Arp Synth
* Free Arppe2600va Arp Synth
* Seymour Duncan Phat Cat replacement Pickup
* Rondo Isis Guitar
Please note that all the songs played so far were sent prior to the recent request. If you've sent something in then please be patient.
Click on the title above to play the show, right click to download.
We're back. Tony was bullied into it by Zoetrope. Dave will return next week.
Lots of chit/chat,, feel free to FF, and some great home recorded songs.
The forum to discuss the show can be found here Home Made Hit Show Forumemail your songs to homemadehitshow@gmail.com
I'm all alone this week so it's time for an old-school songwriting and home recording show.
There is a very little discussion this week, just music
* You Are - David Cooper (and Ralph)
* Samba - Stranger Than Fiction- Randall Hill and Lee Faith
* Axis of Awesome - Four Chords
* Without You - Daren Sirbough
* Wait - James McDaniel - Extrapedestrian
You can download the Extrapedestrian album here http://www.archive.org/details/Extrapedestrian-ExitStageWestThe Axis of Awesome video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lw3eYsnl31c
Balance the budget by listening to this excellent songwriting and home recording podcast with your power broking hosts Tony Butterworth and Dave Criddle.
This weeks discussions and "stuff"
* Making home music videos
* We need inspiration
* Getting the Pro Sound
* Tape Saturation
* Does listening to commercial songs help or hinder ?
Songs:* Andrew Spicer - Artificial Love * Grandma Melonhead - Maisy * Steven "Kern" Ramsdell - Kicking It Forever http://www.homerecordingweekly.blogspot.com/
Visit www.humblefly.net for a copy of Andrew's album. and here's the video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-o2j5bHWZ4&feature=player_embedded
This week Tony Butterworth and Dave Criddle narcissistically play their own songs. 7 tunes out of last months 20 created for the RPM Challenge www.rpmchallenge.com. Even more confusingly this is one without them being in the same "studio" since they can no longer bare to be in each others presence. Give it a list and you'll understand.
To find more.
http://thetones.bandcamp.com/album/the-loneliness-of-the-long-distance-strummer
http://www.soundclick.com/bands/default.cfm?bandID=723841&content=music
The songs:
Dave & Tony return to discuss many interesting home songwriting and recording subjects.
This weeks topics include
This weeks songs* Ian Holtaway - Colour White
* Mike Anderson - I'm Still Taller Than You
* Rychie Floyd - Everybody Wants To Drink Your Water
* Andrew Richardson - Mary Cries (words by Alan Gentle)
* Edward Wainwright - If You Don't Want Me
There are a bunch of videos below related to the show this weekWalk The Moon
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eW7f54tVRmQ
Ron Sexsmith - See It To Believe Ithttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFww3fLhjl8
Justin Currie - No So Sentimental Now
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDEYxkaTZo0
Justin Currie - I Guess I Didn't Love You makes Chris Difford from Squeeze Cry
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9xS1WkJdKk&feature=related
A search for the BBC Songwriters Circle stuff on youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Songwriter+Circle+BBC&aq=fFran Healy Buttercups (not Daffodils as I said on the show)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSRpATc0lz0
More mysterious and deep discussion of songwriting and home recording from your master - Dave Criddle - and slave - Tony Butterworth.
This weeks discussions
This weeks tunes.* Back To The Beginning - Ronnie Marler * Peoria - Frank Canonica * Windwalkers - Richie Floyd * Wave - The Experiments
Back for more home made songwriting and recording goodness it's your fantastic hosts Tony Butterworth and Dave Criddle.
This week we discuss
* Pro Sounding Home Recordings
* Our RPM Challenge Experiences
* Dave stole my song :)
* Dave at Church
* Dave Murdered His Amp
* Simplifying Your Equipment
* Why no Pop Songs in home recording
* Mario's Site at http://lets-go-digital.blogspot.com/
Visit Zoetrope's new Backstage area of the forums for songs in progress, ideas, lyrics and anything else that's musical but not a full song http://zoomforum.us/viewforum.php?f=40The video for Bruno Mars doing a Nirvana/Michael Jackson mashup is at the end.Songs this week* Make Me Crawl - Mario Gozum aka Pill * The New Risk of the Foot Soldier - The Lions * Relative - Yesterday's Addiction
Relatives song info is here:Lyrically, the song is about love- well, more to the point, breaking up. A relationship has to be collaboration between two willing people, and some women don’t seem to be capable of seeing how good they really have it- “you find sorrow in your treasure”. But, in the end you realize that you are better off moving on- “In the dark, I find the sun”. It was inspired by a close friend of mine who was going through a divorce, in spite of the fact that he completely built his whole life around his wife. So, the song was built around those ideas, and written on an acoustic guitar. After the rough song was “sketched out”, Mike Mitchell, our lead guitarist, recorded some rough guitar takes which were uploaded to the “SendSpace” file sharing site. Jim Tamburini (his real name, by the way) downloaded the .wav files and imported them into his DAW, and put together the drum tracks. He sent back separate .wav files of the kick, snare/hi-hat, toms, and cymbals, which Mike and I re-imported, and then set about the task of recording all of the finished guitar and vocal tracks.Bruno Mars
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zvYxZAwc1F8&feature=player_embedded
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vSNSg2ogpx0&feature=player_embedded
We're back for more of those hi quality distant vocal recordings from Tony Butterworth and Dave Criddle, your self appointed ringmasters of the home songwriting circus.
This week discussions include:
This weeks, all important, songs* Randall Hill - In Between * Sugarspin (Jim Daly & KV( - There For You * Exactly What You Need - Hobey Kuhn
Yes we're back. Tony Butterworth and Dave Criddle here to spin your tunes and harm your ears. Apologies for my sound quality as I have forgotten how to use my PS-04.
This weeks discussions
* Plans for the show
* What we've been doing
* Stuff we've "aquired"
* RPM Challenge - SIGN UP NOW AT http://rpmchallenge.com/
* Writing Music First
This weeks songs
Brother Luke - Everything To Me
Spots - Tegen De Wind (recorded by Jerome Fygee)
David Cooper - Sweet Lady Luna
There will be an RPM Challenge thread at www.homemadehitshow.com/forum for you to post and listen to stuff.
Teenage Fanclub - ShadowsDevo - Something For EverybodyArcade Fire - The SuburbsLCD Soundsystem - This Is HappeningCee Lo Green - The Lady Killer Broken Bells - Broken BellsDeerhunter - Halcyon Digest
Here's a list of my top 10 albums released in 2010 (in the US).
I get so frustrated by so many people claiming there is no good music these days. Truth is the system has become fractured and it's much more difficult to find music you might like, but please rest assured, it's definitely out there.
Arcade Fire - The Suburbs
The National - High Violet
Mumford and Sons - Sigh No More (2010 release in US)
Manic Street Preachers - Postcards From a Young Man
Gaslight Anthem - American Slang
Biffy Clyro - Only Revolutions (2010 release in US)
Sunshine Underground - Nobody's Coming to Save You
Jonsi - Go
Marina and the Diamonds - The Family Jewels
Lightspeed Champion - Life is Sweet Nice To Meet You
A slightly different show here. This is a conversational and music show featuring Les Cotton, Ralph Tonge, Pete Rand and David Claridge. They discuss writing and recording music.
The songs and links are
Les Cotton - Photograph
http://soundclick.com/share.cfm?id=8406215
Ralph Tonge - Give Your All This Xmas
http://soundclick.com/share.cfm?id=8407022
Pete Rand with David Claridge - So Long Ago
http://soundclick.com/share.cfm?id=7454106
David Claridge - The Garden
http://www.myspace.com/davidclaridge
all recorded last December, with some bottles of wine and Skype ;)
A spur of the moment one man home songwriting and recording podcast from your host Captain Tony Butterworth.
This week I briefly touch on
* Why there has been no shows and what the future holds
* Why I'm not doing much recording
* More instruments makes us sound amateurish
* Crap singers using their voices = Mark Knopfler
* Jack White says we need deadlines & limitations to be creative
* Memorable lyrics
* Writing songs with a casio/yamaha keyboard
Remember to post your memorable lyrics at www.homemadehitshow.com/forum
This weeks tunes
Welcome to one last summer show for David Criddle and Tony Butterworth your fraudulent home songwriting guru's.
This weeks discussions include
* Giving away your best ideas
* U2's songwriting approach
* Doctor Horrible and Buffy Musical Episodes
* Breaking a slump (write an easy, silly song)
Tony has been listening to: The Whigs, Drive By Truckers, Edward Sharpe and The Magnetic Zero's, The Submarines and Green Day.
Dave has been listening to U2
This weeks songs
* Sahara - Lochinvar (www.lochinvar.net)
* I've Given Up - Dave Chick
* My Addiction - Marvin Kanarek
* Which - The Rotary Dial
Marvin's video.
Welcome to your source of home recording and songwriting entertainment. Host by the songwriting fraud's Tony Butterworth and Dave Criddle.
This weeks discussions include
Tony has been listening to Lissie, Scissor Sisters, Roots and Wolf Parade.
Dave has been watching Phoenix live on MTV.
http://seanfellowes.com for Sean's downloadable CD
10 Hallmarks of Amateur Recordings
http://www.hometracked.com/2006/12/22/10-hallmarks-of-amateur-recordings
This weeks tunes
* Frank Canonica - Water For Tears
* The Continentals - Working Man's Blues
* Laurier Tiernan - Ransacked
* Sean Fellowes - World Peace
Tony Butterworth and Dave "Jazzmaster" Criddle return for more home songwriting and recording goodness. We need your songs so get them sent in to homemadehitshow@gmail.com.
This weeks topics include
* Using strings in home recordings
* Repeating verses
* Using harmonies that are lower
* Justin Currie reverses cliche's
* The Knack on Rock And Roll Geek Show and Netflix http://www.americanheartbreak.com/rnrgeekwp/2010/05/09/classic-albums-revisited-get-the-knack-with-berton-averre/
* Tony has been listening to Gaslight Anthem, Hanson, Codeine Velvet Club
* Dave has been listening to Punch Brothers, Nada Surf and Teenage Fan Club
Songs
* Losers Street - The Legendary Ten Seconds
* Make a Birthday Wish - Those Dreaded Gnats
* I'm Still Taller Than You - Mike Anderson
* Dan Brown in Town - The Pocket Gods
Back again after my intensive training for the World Cup.
This week we discuss:
* Rock Band: Green Day
* Rock Band 3
* Jack White's songwriting tip
* Lack of motivation
* Inspiration and obscure lyrics
* Dave has been listening to Nada Surf, Hot Hot Heat, LCD Soundsystem
* Tony has been listening to Hot Chip, Green Day and Teenage Fanclub
Some great tunes for you:
* Barricades Rise - Gave Up The World
* Here Today – The Cracks (with Steve Nylander)
* Frank Canonica – I’m Not Myself with intro
* Mat Wilson (Widerenie) - Debtors are Us
Home songwriting and recording talking heads Dave Criddle and Tony Butterworth return for more waffle.
This weeks topics include
* Filling the gaps in your head
* The contest winner (you have to listen to know if you won)
* The demise of LaLa (I hate Apple)
* Dave's Buzzcocks tune
* Tony remixes John Poulton's Gravity
* Keith calls in
* Tony has not been listening to much (thanks Apple) but was underwhelmed by Band of Horses)
* Dave has been listening to New Pornographers and Kraftwerk
This weeks song:
* The Splinters - The Game Of Lying
* Lucas - Hanging At The Forum
* The Pocket Gods - Come On England
* Jay Regain - Motherearth
Band Of Horses
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGmoOSyFe8I
New Pornographers
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxMCaU83QKs
Back for more heavy breathing and incessant home recording and songwriting babbling, it's Tony "Vader" Butterworth and Dave "Skywalker" Criddle.
Remember to send an email to homemadehitshow@gmail.com with Contest in the subject if you want to win a Korg Nanopad (winners announced next time).
This weeks subject matter include
* Check the mastering thread on the forums
* No show next week
* www.homerecordingweekly.blogspot.com, make sure and visit to enter the songwriting contest
* Dave's a street performer
* Dave's bands plays Baby Doll
* Polly on speed
* Tony has been listening to The National
* Dave has been listening to Super Furry Animals
This weeks songs
* Randall Hill - More Than Friends
* John Poulton - Gravity
* Leisure - Baby Doll
* James Bryson and Steve Nylander - The One Who Owns My Heart
The National
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IprgVNlFIqM
Super Furry Animals
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BANdftxuqlM
Yes you can win a Korg Nano Pad simply by sending an email to homemadehitshow@gmail.com. with CONTEST in the title line. If you're in the US shipping will be covered, outside of the US we will review once I know the cost. Read about the Nanopad here watch the video below.
This week Dave Criddle and Tony Butterworth discuss
* Tony's inactivity
* Being in a band is not always that great
* Balanced Cables
* Toneport presets
* Tony's EZMix review
* Read Kevin Selby's R16 site here
* Tony has been listening to - Marina and the Diamonds, Genesis, Kate Nash
* Dave has been listening to - Quasi
Songs:
* Joe Holtaway - We Go Sailing
* Kevin Selby - Wonderin' (R16 Demo Project) -
* Leigh Wright - For An Hour or Two
* David Partrick - (I Unfriended You on) Facebook
Sonic State Nanopad Review
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ktCKcPWwHPw
Marina and the Diamonds
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_oMD6-6q5Y
Genesis - Dancing with the Moonlight Knight
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKIkzGGAG9s
Quasi - Peace and Love
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2dj_Nao5LuA
The week got away from us this week so there is no normal show. Instead how about a show of videos I've been sent.
Also make sure and take a look at my review of the new Toontrack EZMix product
http://show.homemadehitshow.com/2010/04/toontracks-ezmix-review.html
James Donn - All I Ever Got
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwQodVc1JW0&feature=email
Michael Lyzenga - Coal River Blues
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9II-EoUdxZg
Bryan Eddy - You Won't See Me Cry
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bov7JxIr2bI
EZMix Review What follows is a text based review of the new EZMix product released by Toontrack. I would like to thank them for them sending me a copy for review.
EZMix is a liberating and at the same time frustrating product. It's a product that will be perfect for some and will drive others crazy with it's limitations.
First I need to set the stage by describing my own personal background and use case. I am a home hobby musician, who records music purely for the fun of it. My operating mode is to find something that works (a sound, a product, FX Chain or technique) and stick with it, I really don't like to tinker that much so in principle EZMix should be perfect for me. I do use Line6 products for modeling and hence a number of my tracks, most commonly guitar, are recorded with effects already applied. I usually record bass, vocals and keyboards relatively clean. I use mostly clean drum loops or VSTs for drums.
So this is where the first issue arises. I think the product name and the marketing are a little misleading. Even though I now realize it was impossible, I imagined this as some kind of product that I could apply to my project and it would give me a great mix. A magical mastering tool. In reality it really isn't a mastering tool at all, though there are a few presets and it could be used that way. Most of the time the intention is to apply the effects to clean, or in the case of guitars, post amp tracks and to control them by applying EQ, Compression and other relatively simple effects. The result is that in a project like mine, with 40 different tracks I have to apply EZMix separately to every track and choose how to process it.
Lets take a step back to summarize the product. You can find lots of details at the Toontrack site. http://www.toontrack.com/products.asp?item=69 including the video shown below. It costs $69 and is purchased via a download. You buy the product, then download it and activate it on first use. You can have it active on two computers at any time, and you can add and remove computers from your account up to five times. The product installs easily and automatically is added to the folders necessary to make it work on your PC (providing you haven't gone all non standard on your VST folders). I use Reaper and it showed up first time with no issues.
EZMix uses sixteen different effect types (listed towards the end of this article) that are combined in various combinations to create the presets provided by the product. These effects are not really modeling based, there are no guitar amps etc, but are more post processing based. Your ability to customize these presets is very limited. There are three controls two of which behave differently depending on the preset you are working with, the third one sets the volume level. The UI is presented very nicely and is easy to understand and follow, once you have selected a preset a window shows you what is included and what the control sliders are set to. You can modify the sliders to get a sound you like then save the preset with your own name. You can also click any preset and flag it as a favorite for easy access.
EZMix seems very low CPU intensive. I ran a project where it was running around fifteen times on different tracks, including two copies on a single track and Reaper reported minimal increases in CPU usage on those tracks.
I have not counted them but EZMix comes with a lot of presets, probably a couple of hundred. This is both a bonus and a disadvantage. To truly be EZ that's too many, you still have to search through and many of them are meaningless without some knowledge (for example "LPF 12dc OCT" really can't qualify as EZ). In addition many of them are useless in a popular music based production, such as all the bit crushing related presets. Presets are categorized into sections such as "vocal", "Bass" etc and are easily searchable but so many of them fall into the category of "All" that it's a little confusing. I think this would best be dealt with by the user spending some time to work through them for each instrument and favoriting the one's they like, allowing for a bit more EZ access.
So how do they sound ? Well I hope to have an audio review soon for you to hear for yourself but I'll try to cover it hear. Again my disclaimer, I really am no sound expert. I can make these tools work but at the heart of it I really don't have a great understanding of how everything works. I tried the effects on various instruments. I will provide a summary for each one and talk about how it sounds against my normal approach. In all cases I took the presets and used the sliders to modify to taste.
Bass has always been a problem area for me. I have a cheapo bass, can barely play it and I don't believe that Line6 provides a great bass setup from it's standard offerings (not including the bass pack). I tend to record my bass relatively clean then add a little EQ and compression in Reaper. The bass presets in EZMix made a great improvement. I forget now exactly which one it was but I felt I found the perfect bass sound for a recent song by using it, there is plenty of variety of choices also.
Electric Guitar usually I record electric guitar with extensive effects already applied and rarely do much in the mix beyond cutting low frequencies. To that end I didn't find much to use in the EZMix setup that helped the guitar too much other than the limiting and EQ based sets.
Acoustic Guitar usually recorded pretty clean and some reverb, EQ and compression added. I found the EZMix Acoustic presets to do a good job and I would definitely use them again.
Drums Most often I use audio loops with minimal effects. I then add some reverb, EQ and a I use the Camel Crusher plugin to, cleanly, beef it up. I didn't really feel like I found an EZMix plugin that really helped too much with the drums. I suspect I need to spend more time in this area. It was the first section I tried and I really didn't try that hard.
Keyboard (Piano) Usually recorded from a Yamaha home keyboard through the Toneport with some reverb and compression. I did not find the EZMix presets to have a significant impact on these tracks.Vocals This was the real winner. I used to double track all my vocals to thicken them up but about a year ago I switched to using a delay to do that tasks. My vocals are always recorded clean then I use EQ, Compression, a stereo delay and sometimes reverb to beef them up. I applied one of the delay based vocal presets from EZMix and thought I had matched the sound well. However listening to my original mixed tracks back to back with the EZMix version I found the EZmix version significantly better and once the full mix was played back the vocals sounded great.Mastering Starting out I misunderstood EZMix as a mastering tool, in truth it really is not but it does provide four mastering presets. Usually I master using PSP Vintage Warmer. I am not really knowledgeable of how it works and just use a preset to limit and "warm" (whatever that means). I found the EZMix mastering presets (at least one of them) to do a great job of achieving the same thing (for much less cost).
An area of weakness for me, mostly based on my mixing habits, is that I like to clean a mix near then end by cutting frequenicies on tracks to allow them to sit together. For example I tend to cut everything less than 200hz on everything but drums and bass and I cut most tracks except vocals around 2khz. I found using EZMix difficult for this since I didn't really know what all the presets were doing.So should YOU buy this product. It's $69 in the US, around 45 Euro's. It's definitely a question for you to answer for yourself as it is definitely not the answer for everyone. People consider this good value, and it is when compared to the Waves bundle or PSP Warmer, but less so when you consider you can purchase Reaper or Mixcraft for less and these products come with many many effects and more. If you believe it's the answer to all your problems you might be disappointed, if you believe you can use it with no knowledge of mixing or no work you'll be disappointed. But if you believe it will solve some problems in specific cases then it could be perfect for you as another weapon in your arsenal. For me it's improvements in bass and vocal processing were outstanding, it's mastering an added bonus. Others may find other parts of it very useful. If you like to spend money to improve your sound then this is good value and will help you. If you're a cheapskate then I don't believe you will feel you got your value from this product.One final note. While I understand the reasoning it is a shame that Toontrack has decided not to provide a limited demo of this product.You can find this and more like it on the home page for our weekly home recording and songwriting podcast at www.homemadehitshow.com
EZmix includes the following effects type:Overloud: A tone enhancer processor which adds warmth and vibrance to the tone by
a combination of compression, EQing and harmonic generation.
Parametric EQ: 5-band parametric equalizer for tone shaping of the signal.
LPF (Low pass flter): A low pass flter passes (allows through) low frequencies whil
attenuating high frequencies.
HPF (High pass flter): A high pass flter passes (allows through) high frequencies
while attenuating low frequencies.
Compressor: A compressor is used to reduce the dynamic range of the audio signal,
typically with a ratio of 2:1 to 9:1. A compressor ratio of 9:1 means 9dB goes into the
compressor and results in 1dB out.
Limiter: Similar to a compressor but with a ratio of 10:1 or higher.
Bit Crusher: Reduces the bit resolution (ex. 16-bit to 8-bit) and simulates a lower
sampling rate resulting in a distorted type sound.
Transient: Shapes the signal by exaggerating or attenuating the transient (attack) and
the tail (sustain) of the signal.
Frequency Gate: Used to control the level of the audio by only passing signal above
the threshold. It is also affected by a HPF or LPF.
Tape Simulator: Simulates the effects of a tape recorder including bias, tape speed,
and wow and futter.
Chorus: Simulates the effect of multiple identical instruments playing the same part
(for example, 3 violins playing in unison). It results in a shimmering and thickening
effect to the sounds.
Inverse Reverb: Produces a reverb sound that fades into the original sound as
opposed to a traditional reverb that fades out.
Hall Reverb: Provides the sound of a ‘Hall’ type acoustical space.
Tape Delay: Produces an echo type effect. Typically a tape delay results in echoes that
get increasingly more distorted with each echo.
Filter Delay: Produces an echo effect where the frequency of the echoes can be adjusted.
This allows the echoes to react to different frequencies from the original signal.
Distortion: Produces the sound of the input of the audio being clipped which adds an
‘overdrive’ sound. This can add richness or fullness to the sound. In extreme settings
distortion can sound ‘thin’ or ‘buzzy’.
Welcome to more babbling discussion of our great home songwriting and recording subject from your hosts Tony Butterworth and Dave Criddle.
This weeks discussions include
* Working with a lyricist
* Tony the rhymemaster
* A Nanopad was donated to Tony
* Tools for helping (free/easy/webased) screen catchers
+ www.screentoaster.com
+ www.showmewhatswrong.com
This weeks music
* Scott Walker - First Night
* The Morrisons - John Ray
* Basczax - Sexy Robot
My short NanoPad Video
Videos from the what I've been listening to. Please make sure and check them out. Featuring. Kate Nash, Avett Bros, Nickel Creek, Trampled By Turtles, The Hollaways, Burning Hotels and Aqualung
EZMix Video
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