Refs question

[jbucklin]

Trying to find that balance between not getting too far away from the listing/ref or being too close to it. First off I’ve taken a break from this for the past four or so years and I’ve noticed a change in the response from some of the screeners. They seem a lot tougher now and harder to please. I was just told that my latest track sounded to quantized and the only thing that was quantized or the drums, which has tune tracks easy drummer. Other than that, I was playing guitar and bass.

Anyway, my biggest struggle in writing tracks for Taxi is trying to get it to sound close enough to the original, but not too close. I was basically told that my track sounded to “karaoke.” And it was an instrumental with the ref being a vocal tune. Which is another problem I’m constantly trying to work out. Anyway, I just needed to vent a little bit. I really just need to talk to somebody about this stuff.

[AlanHall]

i can't point you exactly to it, but there have been threads here on the forum - and several Taxi TV episodes - where the differences between an instrumental and a song-minus-vocal are discussed. Good hunting!