In the following interview at about 3:38, MJR states that to warm up before shows, he has mixes of Symphony X songs that have no guitar (for use as backing tracks). I know this is unlikely, but is there any way he would release some of these for the fans? I think it would be really cool to hear what kind of stuff is buried in there that the guitar overpowers (keyboard on PL, I'm looking at you). Also, it would be nice to have to just jam over with guitar.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHgg3Eq63JA&feature=related
Facts are I am a sweet dude and I spent all last two weeks on this very topic of symphony x backing tracks. So I figured I could register and share with you guys some info on this topic.
First you need to buy the paradise lost 5.1 special edition.
What for ? 5.1 mixes have 5 channels which is far more than 2 thus increasing the chance to have separate instruments.
Second , you need to extract the 5.1 channels of your DVD disc to mutichannels WAV files. There are numerous free tools to do that on the Web(search for DVD audio extractors).
At his point , you have your multichannels WAV files on your drive , open them with Audacity a free multichannels audio edition tool.
You will now notice that each track is mixed as :
Channel 1 : Drums 1 + Guitar 1
Channel 2 : Drums 2 + Guitar 2
Channel 3 : Bass + Vocals (and sometimes guitar solos)
Channel 4 : Synth/Piano and additional vocals (sometimes guitar solos)
Channel 5 : Synth/Piano and additional vocals
Then now the tricky part is to remove the guitar from the drums on channel 1 and 2 , and cut them from the channel 3 or 4 for the solos (and replace them with the backing guitar).
Use Noise Reduction / Manual and automatic gapping functions in audacity for that as well as some clever EQ tweaking. You might also use the vocal remover plugin to get a drumsless track that you can inject as noise profile for the noise reduction plugin.
And you should come with some quite clean backing track without the lead guitar (but with all the other instruments of course).
I have tested and it should be possible to get bassless , drumless , synth less and vocaless tracks as basically you need to remove just one instrument from the mix and you do not have more than two instruments mixed on the same channel. True multi track is hard to achieve as the track mixed with the instrument that you remove will suffer from the process (and therefore will not be truly usable for a true multitrack).
But to make your own backing track , It works damn well, I have tested this with Oculus Ex Inferni and The Serpent Kiss and I now have some niiiice guitar backing track from my 5.1 DVD with no/almost no guitar bleed and even backing guitar for the solos. The drawback is that I spent the whole week tweaking things on and on to get a good result.
Good luck , and rockkk on !
And buy this 5.1 mix , it sounds damn good and provide far more dynamics than the CD mix!
