Opeth cover take a listen plz

[Masticore]

Please, tell me what you think. need criticism and thoughts to try and improve. Guitars done with 456, bass through ampeg, drums are SSD slates hybrid. Working on recording vox atm. Theres an overdub that wasnt taken out at the end.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3825188/Deliverance.mp3

 

[Masticore]

Anyone? :****(

 

[amitzwar]

dude its just insane !
great playing and mixing , i realy love the guitars !
about the drums - oh are awesome , the snare is good but need more punch imo , same in kick

overall great cover man

 

[jagarock]

listened to it yesterday, and again now. its great! sounds like a timeconsuming project!

 

[Masticore]

Thanks guys! Its been an on and off project for 3 or so months now. I tried limiting the snare some on that recording. Im going to try to sidechain the snare, hopefully squeeze out a little more snap and bring it up in the mix.
Any eq issues you guys can hear? How about spatial separation? Usually thats something I have problems with as in the past things kinda dont melt well into each other and sound like garbage.

As far as tracking, drum mapping, and recording that all was very easy and quick. Ive spent the last while trying different mixes, and I think it is helping me to improve. Im gonna post another smaller clip soon to show rework on the snare.

 

[Humidfume]

Hey man nice job, only 2 things I could think of is the snare is too loud in the mix, I think that is what's making everything sound so far apart for me and a lack of bass guitar (it could be a touch louder in my cans), but it's a really good job.

Well done man

 

[CannibalBarnes]

Good work man!!

 

[lolzgreg]

It's a bit fast and the snare is a bit loud, otherwise awesome.

You gotta try to program Martin's fills a bit better on this. I know they're not easy at all, but you missed a lot of ghost notes on the snare.

Kudos for trying this.

 

[Harry Hughes]

I thought this was just gonna be a short, small portion of an Opeth song.
The fact you covered one of their much longer songs is just fucking epic man
Don't see why you speeded up the tempo for some points, the original tempo of the song is fine.
One thing that also really sticks out in the solo that starts at 8:15 (but in your cover it starts at 8:04m which is due to the speeding up of some parts).
The first bend is too slow, and almost makes me cringe.
There seems to be almost no vibrato and your phrasing is pretty bad.
No offense, but you made the solo sound like it was done by one of those bedroom shredders. It has almost no feeling in it, just sounds like a terrible hack job of a solo. Same as the first solo too.
You seriously need to work on your phrasing and vibrato so your solos don't sound like they have been played by a robot.
Your rhythm playing is however, generally pretty good

The general mix has this "closed in" feel to it. Feels constricted.
Guitar tone needs work so that it sounds more open and lively.
Automation is needed at various points throughout the song to keep things under control.

 

[HandsOfDespair]

The hihat sounds really robotic, and like someone else said the snare dont really fit, too muffled and fat. I'm pretty much sure the guitars would sound a lot better with a real amp.

Otherwise the mix sounds nice, the worse thing IMO is the robotic hihat.

 

[kaamosprod]

I've listened it and i really like the brightness of your mix... we can hear all the instrument perfectly, so very good job.

Harry Hugues is always very hard on his point of view about mixes and way of playing... but i have to agree that he is fucking always right... lol

i agree with him on the fact that the rythms are well played, but the solos are very feelingless... no vibrato, no slide, no "warm", it is too robotic.

The solos are my only critic because for me, all the rest is perfect.

 

[Morgan C]

Not much to add, but watch your snare velocities. You seem to hover around 100 velocity on the main snare hits, which causes some hits to be 'hard' and some 'crack'/rimshots, which are very different. Boost to like 115 velocity on the hard hits so that they are consistent.

 

[Masticore]

Ok thanks all for the constructive criticism!

Drums- I mapped them out using ezd originally and the ghost rolls got lost in translation. Ive tried to fix them, but I'll need to rework them completely over the slow parts. Snare I dont know, I am mixing over a sony stereo system ( I know its ghetto, its all I have) Hi hats got lost in translation to SSD also.

Solos- I think its better than http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/1663306/Thingo1.1.mp3 that harry posted not to long ago.

For the guitars, I dont know what to do to open them up. When I apply some EQ in the higher ranges it make the amp sims sound very harsh. A friend here is reamping them for a final version. I basically put a HP/LPF. Any Suggestions?

Bass- It had to many spots where the velocities were inconsistent so I compressed it. Maybe a little to much I dont know. Ive only started recently playing bass so my intonation isnt that good on it yet. When that is better perhaps the bass will be more prevelant? Any tips for quick remedies?

As far as automation, what parts are you reffering to? Ive done basic automation to change volume env during the quiet and loud parts.

Thanks all again for the great responses, I started to give up hope

edit: after checkng out harry's posts around the forums, Ive decided to disregard anything he has to say.

 

[mrbean667]

Holy crap, that is one of the best covers I have ever heard.

 

[kaamosprod]

e

edit: after checkng out harry's posts around the forums, Ive decided to disregard anything he has to say.

Why ? i think he gave you an advice... : that the solos aren't enough expressive.

Even if a man is not able to play it better than you, he have ears and can see what is good or what is not. i'm a shit playing drum but i can tell if a drummer is good or not.

For my point of view, i already told you, it's one the best cover i've seen here... but i'm very frustrated for the solos... i think you should record one more time with more feeling.

 

[Masticore]

No im not dissing anyone, I was being an asshat. To bad there arent letters that indicate sarcasm. Really, I appreciate everything and anything people have to say here. I have improved dramatically sinced Ive starting reading threads here some time ago.

I have alot of MT typing to do, so I will get some new wavs going as soon as I can.

I also have a Bleak cover going, as well as some Vinnie Moore stuff brewing, perhaps a Frank Gambale cover when my chops are in better condition, then I have alot of drum maps to work on for our originals.

 

[XnaySaturo]

Fuck man, that's so close to the real thing. Awesome job. I tried Bleak once, and it was just too much work.