Hello - New to the Forum.

[cho_drummer]

Hi there,

I'm new here. I heard about this place from the cakewalk forums.
I would say I'm pretty new to song writing and my style is pretty much diatonic pop/rock.
Basically simple stuff that people tend to enjoy listening to...at least that's the aim.

I have a little facebook page with some songs i've done on there.
I hope i'm in the right place for posting this.

I demo everything in my bedroom and I'd like to put two songs to you for a listen if you're up for it.

Firstly is the first song on my facebook page called 'Sun Beams and Broken Dreams'. The second is called 'Forever and a Day', which is the next song in the player. (if you're unfarmiliar with the player, its on the left hand side, but you might need to scroll down.

The only other thing to point out is, I'm a drummer first and foremost. I studied popular music and recording up to degree level. However my majors were performance (drums) and recording. So please forgive my guitar playing and vocal performance, I'm not the best by a long way. Hopefully you'll enjoy the tracks though.

Here is the link: www.facebook.com/chrisgallimoremusic

Thanks a lot.

Chris.

[whipsnchains]

Yo Chris, I dig the songs man. Nice recordings. Very well put together. I would say you definitely have some good things to look forward to in the music business! Keep up the good work.

[ottlukk]

Chris:
Welcome1
Ott

[glender]

The 1st one sounded pretty good, it has all the elements of a decent pop rock song. You might want to post the lyrics.

[jlizerbram]

Hey Chris,

You'll dig this forum...so much help here. I frequent the Cakewalk forums as well, CJay (you've probably seen him - on EVERY post) sometimes drives me crazy!

Jeff

[bwd]

Hi Chris, Welcome. "Sun Beams and Broken Dreams" is cool. You're getting a nice warm sound and the guitars are great. I might suggest a breakdown somewhere in the middle. "Forever and a Day" has a great intro. It really drives along. If that's you playing drums as well - well done! "Secret Place" also has a cool moody intro. I took a listen to Milo Cho as well. That's an interesting combination. Modern rock and opera! Ok - so it was you playing the drums! Cheers, Doug

[cho_drummer]

Wow, cheers for the welcome guys

Much appreciated.

In reply to bwd, I don't actually play on my demos, since i'm in my bedroom and the sound for tracking live drums is less than adequate, however I program the midi parts in my style and I would sit down and play those parts if i could get a nicer sound in here I don't think there'd be a difference in accuracy or in the actual parts. (If you want to see me playing, check out www.youtube.com/drumming12345 theres some really old stuff on there but also a couple of more recent gigs with milo cho), I do play live drums for milo cho and my other band Raising Angels (search raising angels on youtube for a couple of Dream Theater covers and one Prog/Rock/Metal tune of our own.

Incidentally (sorry for the long post) my song 'secret place' has just been recorded for my church's new album and it sounds really awesome, a few little changes made by the producer and different people's take on each part has really taken it somewhere a bit more fresh and it sounds great, once the album is mastered and released i'll be sure to let you know.

Again cheers for all the comments, I'm aiming to demo a song a week at the moment but i've just ordered a new Preamp so i might hold off until it arrives.

Cheers,
Chris.

[rnrmachine]

Hi Chris,

Welcome to the forum!!

I gave some of your music a listen and you definitely have talent. I liked the vibe, the arrangement, the style, the musicianship etc... my only gripe would be the mixes seemed a bit mushy at times. Like you need to study the equalizing in a mix a bit more. "Sun Beams and Broken Dreams" & "Forever and a Day" both sounded very professional except for the mixes were a bit mushy. Too blended, especially for this style. Secret Place didn't seem as bad, but I think that is because it was slower, not that you did anything different really.

Please take that ONE thing I said about your music as constructive criticism. And a concern to help another person grow beyond themselves... at least it really has nothing to do with your talent as a musician and producer... just engineering skills which can be learned.

Good Luck in all you do!!

Rob

PS: I JUST read your reply... Good to hear about "Secret Place"... good luck with that!!

[bwd]

Hi Chris. Just checked out your Youtube videos. The drumming on the "Weckl" video is really good. I like the mask vibe with "Milo Cho". Does that make it easier when you have to put in a dep? Seriously, I'd love to know what drum loops/samples you used in your home tracks. I'm still shopping around for some new drum sounds. What pre-amp did your order? There's a recent thread in the technology section in the forum all about that stuff. Cheers, Doug

[cho_drummer]

@ rnrmachine.

Cheers for the reply. I must say I'm a little perplexed at the 'mushy mix'. However my listening environment is far from perfect, however, you're 'too blended' remark made more sense to me. There are a number of things i do when mixing my personal stuff and I think part of what your hearing relates to my dislike of both my own voice and my inability as a guitarist. This tends to make me fill the mix with a lot of other elements to try to detract from some obvious playing issues i have and i have to say, i've only ever treated my demos as such. Bedroom demos. I use a GT-10 for the guitar sounds and everything else is programmed with midi and sounds are created in reason. So, the only time i pick up a microphone is for the vocals. Next little confession is this...Forever and a Day's vocal was recorded on an SM57. I had nothing else available at the time and i'd been mixing on my in ear monitors, which i can only assume attributes to the problems you're hearing. That being said, i can't hear exactly what you're hearing, i think my next investment will be acoustic treatment. I'm happy to take on the critisism though, what sorts of frequencies seemed to be the problem or is it the wall of sound i've gone for that is the issue? I think the asthetic i'm going for is a heavier rock thing but my songs are more pop so that could be the issue, any further thoughts you have would be much appreciated.

@bwd
Cheers for getting back to me and watching my vids The thing with milo cho is we like to put on a show, we've started using projector screens and making videos to songs and interspersing those with live camera feeds too, which is a pain to set up but looks amazing and really adds something to our set, we're currently working on a 45 min non stop rock opera piece with dancers and possibly actors too
With regards to the drum sounds. I use Sonar 7 Producer Edition as my DAW. In that programme you get a VST called Session Drummer 2. Its similar to BFD or EZ Drummer but with fewer features and no room mic sounds etc, so i have to be a little more creative with reverbs, i tend to stick a nice convolution reverb on the drum mix which tends to do a nice job.
I don't use drum loops. I create all my parts by programming the midi information in sonar. Then i send each drum to a seperate channel and stick the cymbals on a stereo channel, then i add EQ and compression and reverb or whatever else i usually would and treat it like a real drum kit, the results are semi-realistic but rather processed sounding, but it tends to work for this style of music.

The milo cho stuff was recorded when i was back at uni, in the propper studios there.

Cheers,
Chris