Questionable review - does anyone hear "distortion" in this?

[VanderBoegh]

I got a review back yesterday which really made me wonder... I let it sit for a day before saying anything, thinking that I'd be more objective with a little time, but I just don't get this one. I submitted a children's song for the recent children's listing, and my review said simply, "This is pretty distorted sounding and compressed to my ears." But, the "recording" box wasn't checked as a reason for return, only the box that says "other". Granted, this was a "Yes/No" listing, so there wasn't a complete critique, and maybe the screener was just in a rush to get done and move on to the next song?

Now, I'm not going to discuss the compression issue. Maybe the screener is right on that count. But DISTORTED?!?! Tell me, friends, does anyone hear distortion in this track? I'm trying to keep an open mind here, and maybe I'm listening with my personal blinders on... but this just seems to stink to me.

My song "Tie Your Shoe"
https://soundcloud.com/vanderboegh/tie-your-shoe

There's also a version on my Taxi page. Not sure if SoundCloud compresses things even further when adding them to their site, but you can hear the MP3 that the Taxi screener heard on my Taxi page.

I'd appreciate any feedback you guys can give. Am I way off the mark for bringing this up? Am I blind to my own shortcomings in this song? Or is the screener as off the mark as I think he is? Please be honest... brutally honest if need be!

~~Matt

Here's the listing:
U130306CH: CONTEMPORARY CHILDREN'S SONGS are NEEDED by the Owner of a Film/TV MUSIC PUBLISHING COMPANY. They’re looking for SONGS in the stylistic ballpark of:

“Potty Dance” by Ralph's World http://bit.ly/YEztG8
“We Are The Dinosaurs” by Laurie Berkner http://bit.ly/4P1Nn
“Froggie Went A Courtin’” by Elizabeth Mitchell http://bit.ly/RCeiG7
“Daddy O” by Frances England http://bit.ly/aEHHhp

Educational songs, as well as songs that focus on FAMILY, LOVE, GROWING UP, etc., will all be considered. Your songs should be PLAYFUL and HAPPY, and have TONS of POSITIVE ENERGY! Your MELODIES should be FUN and INTERESTING, and can range anywhere from WHACKY and CRAZY, to SWEET and COMFORTING. Be CREATIVE with your approach, this is a FUN listing! Quoting the company’s owner: "I'm looking for SONGS that are firmly within the genre of CONVENTIONAL, and MODERN, CHILDREN’S MUSIC.” The age range for this pitch is newborn through age 6. Please be sure your lyrics are AGE APPROPRIATE. Also, please make sure your lyrics are CLEVER, yet SIMPLE enough for children to understand. MALE and FEMALE VOCALS are both okay. ALL TEMPOS are WELCOME, bur we are not looking for anything DARK, or MOODY.

[andygabrys]

Hey Matthew,

here's my 2 cents. Y/N recordings really can't be counted on to give any feedback. except for Y/N.

So depending on the screeners point of reference (and experience - if they aren't engineers they might not describe things in the same way as a total-tech head would) - they might say things that send you down another road.

so take the distortion with a grain of salt. and take my words with a grain as well.

I listened to your tune (off the taxi page) and the 4 refs.

I don't hear any distortion. But I do hear a loud, narrow, compressed master. And the voiceover parts are also like commercial VO loud.

Listen to the refs:

only the potty dance is a rocker, and its a wider mix, so there is less in the center trying to punch through. Its got a little more space, even though it averages about the same volume as yours.

the next two, are much quieter and "acoustic" folky sounding. The last one is a totally unmastered home phone recording or something similar.

So while in absolute terms the distortion comment may not make sense - in relative terms compared to the refs as a whole: You mix is pretty loud (and sure, its gotta be compressed to fit that much sound in) and its narrow, and not really natural sounding.

[eeoo]

To my ears there is something about the lead vocal/voiceover that sounds a bit fizzy, i think it might be the auto tune setting. I don't know that I'd describe it as distortion but it's definitely cutting through pretty aggressively.

Hope that helps.

eo

[mikeymike2000]

Hi VB,

I thought this was flippin brilliant! I heard no distortion.

Walk it off man, you are doing just fine. it's just one listing....

[cardell]

Tell me, friends, does anyone hear distortion in this track? I'm trying to keep an open mind here, and maybe I'm listening with my personal blinders on... but this just seems to stink to me.

I just hear a little drive [saturation] of the lead vocal. Something I often do on purpose...'cause it sounds cool! It's especially evident at 1:08 on the track.

Incidentally, I've noticed that Melodyne can inadvertently introduce issues like this if your systems resources are inadequate.

Stuart

[richmstudios]

Yeah, there's something going on here with the vocal. It does seem to be related to whatever processing is being applied. It would appear to be either Melodyne/AutoTune-related or a result of the chorus effect in the double-tracked vocal. However, to me it sounds even more pronounced in your spoken sections which aren't double-tracked or (presumably) being run through an auto-tune effect.

Still a great song and tons of fun dude!!! Sorry about missing out on the forward but I'm sure there's many more to come.

Keep on...

[playagibson]

I hear a saturated type sound with the vocals. It sounds like you ran your vocal through an amp simulator with some gain.
It's a cool sound. Unfortunately the screener felt that it was not appropriate.
My entry was returned do to there being " Too much reverb. I felt the intimacy was lost " so there you go.
I'm currently creating an alternate dry mix.
I would just create an alternate mix and wait for the next opportunity because you wrote a catchy tune and it's
not worth giving up on.

Rich.

[andygabrys]

Incidentally, I've noticed that Melodyne can inadvertently introduce issues like this if your systems resources are inadequate.
...

which is why I never leave a project with a melodyne'd vocal in the plugin and bounce - I always render it to an audio track and inactivate the track with the melodyne plugin on it. why make things more difficult? if you don't have Studio One where its integrated anyways.

actually I have another theory on that one too. If you are using melodyne for tuning - I wonder if selecting all the "blobs" and pulling down the volume in melodyne maybe 0.5 db or something might clean things up. I wonder if the input and output gain in melodyne is 100% at unity?

[VanderBoegh]

Hmmmm, interesting thoughts guys, and I definitely appreciate all of the feedback! As for the vocal, now that I listen to it a little more objectively, I can hear the SFX sound in the lead. In all honesty, I don't know WHAT I did to create that... needless to say, it was accidental and my tired "mixing ears" didn't pick up on it during my marathon session to put this tune together in a very short timespan. Sometimes I actually aim for this type of vocal sound (which could be another reason that it didn't stick out to me), but I was shooting for clean-as-a-whistle here, and I missed the mark.

I did use Melodyne to pitch-correct the vocals, but I always bounce the audio file to a separate track and then de-activate the original track - thus getting rid of the Melodyne/memory issue. However, it could be that I adjusted the vibrato settings too much, which perhaps led to some of the issues?

I'll have to dig back into the track and see exactly what caused this (right now I'm not at my home DAW), but you guys have given me great things to look into. I think I'll clean up the track and then hold on to the song for the right opportunity to come along again. As I've learned from my Taxi experience in all the years I've been a member, just because a song gets rejected for one listing, it doesn't mean it can't find a home somewhere else.

On to the next tune!

~~Matt