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Before KTVA

ShaneShane Enrolled Posts: 10
Hi everyone,
I'm just using this vocal track as a starting point for me to measure my progress as I work on the KTVA program. Feel free to criticize. It also came out kind of loud so you may want to turn your speakers down.



Thanks,
Shane

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    highmtnhighmtn Administrator, Moderator, Enrolled, Pro, 3.0 Streaming Posts: 15,357

    Hey, Shane!

    Kudos for being brave and putting your voice out there!  Your voice is strong, so thanks for the warning about the volume!

    I'm not familiar with this song, so without music in the background to reference, I don't really know what could be going on with respect to pitch.  Do you have some karaoke tracks that you could sing along to, to put your voice into a perspective pitch-wise?  That would be helpful. 

    If you don't have a sound mixer to blend your voice into a mix with the instruments, you may have to experiment a bit to get it all balanced, by moving the distance of the music source and your own voice until you are able to get a good blend on the recording while at the same time you yourself being able to hear yourself and the music so that everything stays "in key" and on pitch with one another.

    It's important to be able to hear all of this as you are recording or you may think everything is in pitch when it actually may be off a couple of cents. 

    The sound of your voice is good on your demo.  We just need to hear it in a context of some music for reference.

    Thanks.

    Bob 

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    ShaneShane Enrolled Posts: 10
    Awesome, thanks for the response and encouragement Bob. I'll see what I can find in the way of karaoke tracks and then put up another song once I get it recorded. The song in my original post was Life is Beautiful by Sixx AM. I see what your saying about having music in the background so you can identify pitches. I'll try to get a couple contrasting pieces posted.

    Thanks,
    Shane
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    highmtnhighmtn Administrator, Moderator, Enrolled, Pro, 3.0 Streaming Posts: 15,357

    Great, Shane!

    Looking forward to your next demo post, and to your progress...

    Bob

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    ShaneShane Enrolled Posts: 10
    edited September 2012
    I did a couple short demos, here they are:
    - Looks like they took this one down.


    Any advice on where I can post my cover of Simple Man and Sweet Child O' Mine? Soundcloud didn't like them aparently.

    I had to be a little quieter in these ones. I'm looking forward to hearing some constructive criticism.
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    highmtnhighmtn Administrator, Moderator, Enrolled, Pro, 3.0 Streaming Posts: 15,357

    Shane,

    Mad World posted to soundcloud OK, and your original Life is Beautiful was still there.  I'm not sure what's up with the other tunes you tried to post.  You could try dropbox if you're looking for another place to post links...

    Thanks for trying again with some backing tracks. It gives a reference, pitch-wise. 

    In your demo of Mad World, the pitch is drifty at the beginning.  It improves as the song develops, and is pretty close for the last third of the song.  I think you need to listen very carefully to the tracks while you are recording to ensure you are staying with the pitch of the backing tracks.  It could be a matter of you not being able to hear the music tracks, not hear your own voice in relation to the backing tracks, or you just need to learn pitch matching better. 

    Keeping your vocals bright is helpful in being able to hear your own pitch with more accuracy. 

    Good job for an introductory demo.  Keep doing your lessons and record and listen to yourself on playback as much as you can.  Be honest with yourself and zero in on the things you think you need to improve.  Don't beat yourself up for the things that need improvement, just work on them and you will improve.  We're all here trying to do better.  It's great to have you here, Shane, and I'm looking forward to hearing your improvement and helping you to get there!

    Bob

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    ShaneShane Enrolled Posts: 10
    Thanks Bob, I'm really looking forward to seeing how much progress I can make through the KTVA program. I can't wait to see where I'm at 6 months from now.
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    highmtnhighmtn Administrator, Moderator, Enrolled, Pro, 3.0 Streaming Posts: 15,357
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    GuevaraGuevara Enrolled Posts: 140
    Hi Shane,

    I enjoyed listening to your demos. 

    Your tone and accent reminds me slightly of Supertramp (and I mean that as a compliment) and also a little bit of Anthony Kiedis from Red Hot Chilli Peppers, and also Neil Young, especially on "Life Is Beautiful". 

    Personally I like hearing demos without backing tracks, but I understand what Bob means about pitch reference, but either way is good:-)

    Good work, you're gonna do great. 
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    ShaneShane Enrolled Posts: 10
    Thanks Guevara! I really appreciate hearing that.
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