It's Christmas!

One of the hardest things about recording under not-so-ideal conditions and with not-so-ideal gear is coming up with a mixdown of the song which sounds satisfactory.That's the trouble I'm having once again. I usually end up making several mixdowns because after mastering each one they usually all end up sounding bad on one playback source or another.

I've already made a couple of mixes/masters of my new holiday song, "It's Christmas," and have not been pleased. I will try once again tonight. Have I mentioned how difficult it is to get a good recorded drum sound? Of course I have. But it's also pretty hard getting a solid recording of an upright bass. On a whim I decided to play my upright for this song to give it a little more of an acoustic sound and feel--a kind of 60's folk/jazz vibe if you will. I'm more of an electric bass player so playing this huge acoustic bass is completely different and physically demanding. This is the first song with vocals that I played upright bass on.

The bass track came out sounding pretty nice but quite weak on some notes. Even going back to some 60's tunes such as Roger Miller's "King of the Road" and Ian & Sylvia's "Rocks & Gravel" which both begin with upright bass intros and continue throughout, I don't hear any weak notes but rather solid consistency throughout. On the other hand, I did listen to "Stay" by Astrud Gilberto which also features upright bass and noticed some less audible bass notes being played. And when I say less audible what I mean is that there are certain notes that don't have that deep, booming quality. And the bass playing on "Stay" is a lot busier than on "King of the Road" and "Rocks & Gravel," so perhaps there are a lot more weaker bass notes being played. I just don't know what it is. I'm going to try working on tweaking that track a little more and see what I come up with. Not only for that reason but also because the bass overall is a bit too booming compared to those older recordings.

There are a few more things I'm going to play around with the attempt to come up with a final version that is most sonically pleasing to my musical ear. That will be later on tonight. For the time being, I have uploaded the 2nd version to Soundcloud and YouTube and it happens to be the version that will be featured on the "Justin Sane Show Christmas Special" tonight at 7pm CT on CNEU Radio; Christmas Eve on Insane Realm Radio at 5pm CT; day after Christmas at 10am CT on Digital Mayhem Radio; Friday at 3pm CT on Digital Revolution Radio; and a few other places after that.

Here it is on Soundcloud:



And here it is on YouTube:



Hoping I will have the final, best-sounding version ready tonight.

Now Until Then

I have an upright string bass (or double bass) that I don't use much in my recordings because I haven't gotten down how to play without frets yet. It is my own fault because I rarely practice playing it. But occasionally I do use it and there are at least 2 recordings of mine that feature it. It is also a very hard instrument to record well. I hear these modern jazz recordings and the double bass just sounds so rich and deep. Of course, it could have something to do with the fact that mine is an $800 Chinese made instrument, while theirs are most likely vintage and cost thousands of dollars.

Here is a song titled, "Now Until Then," which I made in 2011. I was just fingerpicking away at my nylon string classical guitar and I came up with something I thought interesting so I recorded it and used it as the basis for this song. It features 2 classical guitar parts, a drum track and a double bass track. (I don't like referring to it as 'double bass' because drummers also have something they call a 'double bass.' So in order to avoid any confusion from here on out I will refer to the 4 string acoustic double bass as upright acoustic bass or just upright bass.)

This song has elements of jazz, folk and even classical. I wouldn't know how to categorize it. Actually most of my music is very hard to categorize. This one is no exception. Listen to it and decide for yourself:




I am leaning towards more instrumental music not only because it is more universal but also because it is very difficult for me to sing and whenever I do vocal tracks I end up doing so many takes and edits. It requires the most amount of time compared to any other instrument I record.

Well, here is another similar type recording. This one was made several years ago and pretty much fits the same arrangement as "Now Until Then." The exception being that steel string acoustic guitar tracks replace the nylon string guitar ones. Drums and upright bass are both here as well. This recording was really just an improvisation. I did not set out to make an actual song. I was just laying down some ideas, especially concerning the rhythm acoustic guitar. So the songs starts off well but really breaks down about midway through or later. I don't even really have an official title for it. But I will record an official version of it at some point.

This is one of those recordings that would not normally see the light of day, but I include it here because it has some interesting elements:




I am interested in acoustic music and would like to record a whole album just of acoustic string instruments. Would be nice to have a resonator guitar and also a banjo. But I'll make do with what I have for now.